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The First Presbyterian
The First Presbyterian church newsletter is published semi-monthly with articles written by the pastoral staff and membership, including a section entitled Pastoral Perspective. Listed here is an updated copy of a recent article submitted for this column. For a more printer-friendly version, you can also view the PDF file by clicking here. Pastoral Perspective – On Discerning Our Evangelical Response after General Assembly What can I say to our congregation after this year’s General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA)? This has been the reverberating question on the hearts and minds of many an evangelical PCUSA pastor in the wake of this past month’s GA 2006. As I have read various comments in response to the actions at www.GA2006.com while vacationing with my family on the Jersey shore, I prayed by the beach for God’s leading, guidance and direction. One and a half years into my first call in the ordained Ministry of Word and Sacrament as your senior pastor, and four years after being conferred the Masters in Divinity at Princeton Theological Seminary in NJ, I once again struggled and wrestled in prayer for the strength of conviction to heed the Lord’s calling anew. I sensed I was not alone. In the shifting sands of time, along with other like-minded colleagues in ministry, I yearned and longed for the Holy Spirit’s awakening of God’s people in the PC(USA). Even as God had preserved for Himself a faithful remnant in ancient Israel during their exile in Babylon, I believe the Lord is reshaping His people in the Presbyterian Church and is fashioning a church in jars of clay that is already in the process of being molded by the Potter to emerge as a strong evangelical witness for the new millennium we are now living in and to experience the Gospel vitally engaging our current postmodern post-Christendom culture. I had to hearken back recently to what I had felt inspired to write in my personal information form when I heard the Lord calling me to First Presbyterian Church in New Castle, Indiana.
As postmodern ideologies pervade the media in the new millennium, the key theological issues facing the church and society revolve around the notion of the existence of Truth as absolute. When relative truth and tolerance are deemed as axioms embraced to the extreme, even to the point of absurdity, a truth claim such as this is viewed as undesirably exclusive. Yet, The Truth is, in a sense, radically inclusive. As one song lyric goes, “Truth has a Name: Jesus.” Jesus said, “I AM The Way, The Truth, and The Life; no one comes to [God] the Father except through me.” This exerts a strong proposition that all are invited to consider, confronting any idea raised against the knowledge of God with The Truth that sets us free. Speaking The Truth in Love, we take captive every thought to obey Christ as Christ’s ambassadors entrusted with the ministry of reconciliation. How this ministry is shaped in the 21st century’s missional context is now being discerned in the post-Christendom environs of society as we see God transforming and liberating God’s people from denominationalism’s vestiges to the new wineskins of today’s emergent Church. “See, I AM doing a new thing! Do you not perceive it?” How we participate in what God is doing anew while keeping and obeying the core Truth God has given us in the riches of reformed tradition will be key to our experience of God shaping our ministry in the season of heeding the Lord’s call upon us. In this, we look forward to God’s better future.
“What will we say to our congregations…? …details will differ from place to place but the center must remain the same: not a center devised by calculating political strategists or polity experts but the center who reconciles all things to himself…Jesus Christ. His is the glory, the honor, the power, now and forever. Nothing that happened this week changes that. Thanks be to God.”
We would do well to heed this exhortation. Many at the Assembly felt like its decision on the PUP Report changes everything. And in one sense there’s some truth to this. But in light of God’s enduring faithfulness and the victory promised to us in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, very little has changed at all. We are called to press on, assured of the hope of glory which no Assembly can render a non-essential.
Pressing on with you, I am Pastor Rex
Past Perspectives Watch here for a future listing of past articles of Pastoral Perspective.... For current information on evangelical responses to the recent General Assembly 2006 of the Presbyterian Church (USA) click here. For other articles of interest click here.
Other Pastors' Perspectives | Discussing GA 2006: Pastoral Letters, Your Input Too [From Other Presbyterian Pastors] | | Tuesday, 27 June 2006 | | Many pastors have had to carefully inform their congregations about the 217th General Assembly, writing letters or giving presentations, etc. Below is a [link to a] list of some pastoral responses [PFR] ha[s] received... We hope you find these edifying. | | Read more... | | Wednesday, 20 June 2006 (posted Thursday, 21 June 2006 PeachtreePres.org) | | "The future of the national structure of this denomination is in serious trouble... It is important that we speak clearly, act wisely and lead humbly in these difficult times. [We] and other evangelical congregations plan to remain in the PCUSA, but must now explore our own new ways of being the church. ...[We are] leading in the formation of a new movement, The Presbyterian Global Fellowship. The recent action by the 2006 General Assembly drives a wedge between the PCUSA and Presbyterians in the global contexts of Asia, Africa and South America. We have much to learn from these often heroically faithful churches. Along with the blow to our relationship due to these recent General Assembly actions, the denomination continues to reduce our funding for global partnerships abroad. We want to do all we can to heal this wound by reaching out to our global partners, by learning from them and by strengthening our bonds with them. To that end, Peachtree will host the organizational meeting of the Presbyterian Global Fellowship on August 17-19... For details see presbyterianglobalfellowship.org ...There has never been a more exciting time to be a Christian!" | | Read more... | Vic Pentz, Senior Pastor, Peachtree Presbyterian Church, Atlanta, GA -- "the largest congregation in the PCUSA" | Wednesday, 20 June 2006 | | "Simply stated, it is very easy to get caught up in matters that seem so important, but in the grand scheme of God's plan for the world and our lives aren't really THAT important.... I have attended 36 General Assemblies. I know that what we do here as a church is exceedingly important. But perhaps we need a reminder about what is really important and basic, to what it means to know and love Jesus Christ, and attempt to serve him." | | Read more... | William Ross "Bill" Forbes, Vice President for Church Relations and Corporate Secretary of the Board of Pensions | Free To Be Faithful: Covenant Community After the 217th General Assembly |  |  | | Written by Michael R. Walker (excerpts) | Let me suggest something that may sound a bit dangerous: there is a certain freedom in our present circumstance, a freedom out of which God might end up bringing some good. In some ways the Assembly's decision on ordination finally admits in theory where we have been in practice for quite some time. And staring reality in the face can be a revelatory experience. ...the substance of the Assembly’s action on ordination itself encourages greater local control and admits the weakness of our national identity. Maybe that in itself should diminish the sense of being morally compromised by the Assembly’s decision (a concern of many evangelicals). We can express our identity locally with confidence and integrity and need not feel defined by the unrepresentative actions of the Assembly. [An] important thing to remember about the recent Assembly’s decision on ordination, which granted license to local governing bodies, is that you are not required to use the license they have granted. You are free to be faithful in your congregations and in your presbyteries to uphold the biblical and constitutional standards of the church. ...even if some use their new local license to [defy as] non-essential [constitutional] requirements for ordaining officers, we are free as an evangelical movement to expand into rather than shrink from global [evangelical/missional] Presbyterianism. Read more... http://www.pfrenewal2.org/new/content/view/295/
| Written by PFR Administrator | | Tuesday, 04 July 2006 |  In her first major appearance as Moderator of the 217th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Reverend Joan Gray spoke to about a thousand evangelical Presbyterians at the PFR Christian Life Conference in Montreat, NC on Sunday, July 2, 2006.
This PFR conference came right on the heels of the PC(USA) General Assembly, whose action on ordination standards has caused much soul searching among evangelicals. The question on the minds of many at the conference was, “where do we go from here?” The Moderator spoke candidly, and she pointed the crowd to Jesus and to prayer. “I want to recognize that many of us are hurting, grieving, sometimes even angry at what happened and what has come out of the General Assembly…Where do we go when we are broken?....Where do we go as believers?... There’s only one place to go when we get to places like this, and that’s to our knees.”
Recognizing that for many evangelicals the PC(USA) feels like a desert right now, Gray noted that it is when “we get to the places where there is no water and nothing to eat. Those are the times when God does miracles.”
To listen to Joan Gray’s remarks at the PFR Christian Life Conference (6 minute recording), click the play button below (the arrow). You may also download the MP3 below.
Click here to download the MP3 File | http://www.pfrenewal2.org/new/content/view/294/
 The Company of Pastors' Quote for the Day:
Think of a hospital. The patients are dying like flies. The methods are altered in one way and another. It's no use. What does it come from? It comes from the building, the whole building is full of poison. That the patients are registered as dead, one of this disease, and that one of another, is not true; for they are all dead from the poison that is in the building. So it is in the religious sphere. That the religious situation is lamentable, that religiously men are in a pitiable state, nothing is more certain. So one man thinks it would help if we got a new hymnal, another a new altar-book, another a musical service, etc., etc. In vain - for it all comes from . . . the building — Sren Kierkegaard, What Christ's Judgment Is about Official Christianity http://www.pcusa.org/pastorselders/dailyquote.htm#july15
Links to some recent related articles from Christianity Today magazine online.... Weblog: Equal Opportunity Divestment
Compiled by Rob Moll | posted 06/22/2006 04:30 p.m. 1. Presbyterians un-divesting The Presbyterian Church (USA) has been accused of being anti-Semitic for singling out Israel in statements and positions regarding human rights. But at its national assembly this year, the church decided it would change its policy of divestment from businesses that operate in Israel to one of investing in "peaceful pursuits." The Associated Press reports that Jewish groups are satisfied with the action. David Bernstein of the American Jewish Committee's Washington office, who is observing the assembly, said the new wording "subjects Israel to the same process as every other country in the world. That's what we wanted. Singling out Israel is not the way to approach peace in the Middle East." The resolution also apologized for "the pain that this has caused" among "many members of the Jewish community and within our Presbyterian communion," reports The New York Times. 2. Pro-life Presbyterians? The PCUSA also adopted a resolution that "viable unborn babies—those well-developed enough to survive outside the womb if delivered—ought to be preserved and cared for and not aborted." The AP reports that "an amendment to add 'based on the choice of the mother' was defeated."
Lord, I don't know where all this is going
Or how it all works out
Lead me to peace that is past understanding
A peace beyond all doubt You are the Author of knowledge
You can redeem what's been done
You hold the present and all that's to come
Until Your everlasting kingdom Lord, I don't know where all this is going
Or how it all works out
Lead me to peace that is past understanding
A peace beyond all doubt You are the God of tomorrow
Turning the darkness to dawn
Lifting the hopeless with hope to go on
You are the Rock of all salvation Lord, we don't know where all this is going
Or how it all works out
Lead us to peace that is past understanding
A peace beyond all doubt Oh, Lord, you are the Author
Redeeming what's been done
You hold us in the present
And all that is to come Music by Peter Furler / Lyrics by Steve Taylor and Peter Furler 2002 Dawn Treader/Ariose Music (admin. by EMI Christian Music Publishing) / Soylent Tunes / SESAC Song performance/recording by the Newsboys
A Prayer for Today in the Aftermath of GA2006 O God our Father, in the Sovereign Redeeming Mercy and Grace of Your Son our Lord and Savior, the Author and Perfecter of our faith, and in the power of Your Holy Spirit, may we be found faithful to your present and future call for generations of saints after us. God of the now and the not yet, Lord of and over all, please help us. Amen.
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