The rubric of Overture 23 is a common sense Presbyterian adaptation to our context. It does not promulgate a stricter sexual ethic or a narrower view of sanctification. It specifies qualifications for office exactly where they may well be misunderstood or challenged. Our society has largely and even unconsciously adopted new corrupt assumptions about homosexuality… Aspirants for office who do not share our convictions should have clarity from the start: the PCA is not congenial to what is affirmed in various evangelical connections. This is not shocking news in general, although it may be acutely offensive given the topic specified. Some people hate this more than predestination.

A discussion offered for the deliberation of Eastern Carolina Presbytery
(TE Benjamin T. Inman, Assistant Pastor of Grace Presbyterian Church in Fuquay-Varina)

(I address an argument recently offered for voting down Overtures 23 & 37. While I have not heard it expanded so directly, it has been implied in various discussions. It strikes the target.

“In the past, we have trusted local sessions entirely as to the character of their candidate they are putting forward for licensure and ordination. I don’t want that to become a practice on the floor of Presbytery, where a young man may stand before a room full of men he does not know and don’t know him. The local session is the right place to determine fitness for office with regard to the character requirements set forth in scripture.”

It is heartening to hear reference to the actual point of the amendments. While Overture 23 places specific attention on homosexuality, neither amendment addresses pastoral practice regarding any notorious sin. Rather than the nurture of members or even the discernment for receiving members, both amendments address only the qualifications and examinations for office. Sadly, the quoted argument is at odds with our polity and demonstrates our need for reform–all the more urgent in our corrupt context. The offered amendments for the Book of Church Order (BCO) chapters 16 and 21 stipulate just such reform.

Why These Overtures Matter

23

Overture 23 gives a rubric for homosexuality in assessing officer candidates. It does not address the controversy of Revoice, although it does represent a view in contrast to some points elaborated in those conferences. This rubric would not be cited for the pending SJC case about Memorial PCA’s hosting of the first Revoice conference. Qualification for office is simply not relevant there. Nor does it attempt an after-the-fact reconsideration of the recent SJC decision regarding Missouri Presbytery’s investigation of TE Greg Johnson. One member of that SJC panel has opined from his well informed position that the amendment of overture 23 would not have changed the outcome. Despite the furor, sex and such is not the point of the amendments.

The rubric of Overture 23 is a common sense Presbyterian adaptation to our context. It does not promulgate a stricter sexual ethic or a narrower view of sanctification. It specifies qualifications for office exactly where they may well be misunderstood or challenged. Our society has largely and even unconsciously adopted new corrupt assumptions about homosexuality. Increasingly, evangelical opinion and institutions demonstrate an assimilation to these aberrant views; consequently, there is good reason for the PCA to specify its qualifications for office. Aspirants for office who do not share our convictions should have clarity from the start: the PCA is not congenial to what is affirmed in various evangelical connections. This is not shocking news in general, although it may be acutely offensive given the topic specified. Some people hate this more than predestination.

More happily, the PCA too can repeat the apostle and say of candidates for office, “and such were some of you.” Men for whom homosexuality appears among the “earthly” things which they must put to death (Col 3:5), these men should have clarity as well. They should know: no shame or suspicion will attend being an example to the flock of God’s “perfect patience” to the “foremost” of sinners (1 Tim 1:14), though they replace Paul’s ringing “blasphemer” with a frank “homosexual.” They should be no more embarrassed in disciplining homosexual sin than was Paul in excommunicating men “that they may learn not to blaspheme” (1 Tim 1:20).

37

Overture 37 directs presbyteries for examinations in the ordination of teaching elders. The topic is NOT homosexual Christians in the PCA but PCA officers in a precipitously degenerating society. As the ferment regarding racism, degradation of women and sexual exploitation of the vulnerable pricks our conscience with a longing for past healing and future fidelity, the PCA does well to question the rigor of officer examination. A renewed purpose and more careful process is recommended not only by doubt about the past. It is all the more commonsensical in a society with diminishing moral constraints in general, a society which is arguably most conspicuous in normalizing sexual corruption by simplistic correlation of consent with subjective identification.

The amendment of BCO 21 stipulates careful examination with attention to notorious matters (including but not circumscribed by sins sexual, relational, racial and financial). The specified matters have become observably notorious over the recent many years in the scandalous failures of Evangelical leaders, congregations and institutions. The scandal cannot be blunted: the adjectives evangelical, Spirit-filled — even Biblical — are no longer reassuring public marks of professed identity. Evangelical sins grieve us to remember semper reformanda,– which includes both the mysterious fecundity often called revival or renewal, and the clarifying reassertion of principles and practices regretfully neglected.

Presbyterian polity– practiced by faith, and not by rote— is our denomination’s declared method to deter such shamefulness and harm. We believe that presbyterian governance– which is to say presbyterian ministry and mission– is not necessary for the existence of the church but for the well being of the church (BCO 1.7). If the church did not exist, it could not be so powerfully and publicly shamed; the issue is her well-being, her wholesomeness. Without disdain for the numerical majority of evangelicals who differ on the matter, we rightly and with expectation pray that God will bless their well-being without presbytery. The Presbyterian Church in America, by conviction– as grateful heirs of the church that replaced Bishops with Presbyteries– we claim to stake the matter on the officers serving rightly and faithfully in submissive plurality. For the PCA, the qualifications of officers are a fundamental for fidelity. This is why the amendments of Overtures 23 and 37 matter.

Why These Overtures are Reform

As do many, the argument here under review assumes that the BCO is presently sufficient. Sadly, it actually assumes practice at odds with that very standard. A question put to our presbytery must not be decided by contradiction of our standards– in the guise of wisdom. While I will go on to criticize it, I appreciate the argument’s attention to the actual point of the amendments. In this, it serves deliberation well. For better consideration, I repeat it:

“In the past, we have trusted local sessions entirely as to the character of their candidate they are putting forward for licensure and ordination. I don’t want that to become a practice on the floor of Presbytery, where a young man may stand before a room full of men he does not know and don’t know him. The local session is the right place to determine fitness for office with regard to the character requirements set forth in scripture.”

The argument’s logic is coherent and champions a laudable concern; however, it ignores our polity. Look, there, that’s what a rubber stamp looks like when it has been well used. By arguing earnestly in the opposite direction, it demonstrates our need for reformation of both order and ardor.
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