Category Archives: Theology and Philosophy

Hearts and minds on fire

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by Jeff Gissing | @jeffgissing

Lauren Winner is interviewed at Comment, a journal of Cardus (a think tank dedicated to the renewal of North American social architecture). It’s an interview that’s worth reading. I’ll pull out some highlights below. Thanks to Andy Byers (@Byers_Andy) for the link.

Two Qualities of a minister…

 I teach future pastors at a divinity school because I believe that thinking well matters—I want my students’ future congregations to be guided by pastors who know how to think clearly, think well about (among other things) theology, politics, and history.

-Lauren F. Winner

Two qualities ought to be present and mutually-reinforcing in a minister: vital piety and a well-formed mind.

Parts of the church have elevated piety and made it to stand alone. A heart of fire is enough for these people, and they do not trust the mind. Others have emphasized the life of the mind and have come to distrust the heart.

In reality the two must go together–a heart burning with love to God and others as well as a keen mind with which one worships God and seeks to know God through His self-disclosure in Scripture. 

Five books you should read…

Reading is indispensable for those in leadership, especially for those whose leadership is in the church. Guiding a community of people is a complicated task at the best of times, especially when that group of people are “strangers and aliens” in the midst of a culture that no longer (if it ever really did) understands its story in the story of God.

The minister has an essential task of being rooted in the redemptive history of God and, at the same time, interpret and apply that story to a people who are also located in the world (which has a competing story). It’s impossible to do either of these things without reading. The Biblical world requires both knowledge and understanding. The contemporary world also requires hermeneutical skill and tools. The minister is, as John Stott’s book puts it, between two worlds.

In what ways do you think it important for ministers to be trained?

When calendars collide

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by Jeff Gissing | @jeffgissing

When secular and ecclesiastical calendars collide, the secular calendar always wins. At least, it seems that way to me. Christmas on a Sunday? Let’s cancel church–Christmas is a time for family, right? Pentecost on Memorial Day weekend? Time to head to the beach. Observing this little fact over the years suggests that culture is more deeply shaping many American Christians than the story of the Church.

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Pentecost celebrates the church’s coming into being as recounted in Acts 2. The giving of the Holy Spirit is no small part of the story of the Church and it’s no small part of the story of individual Christians. That we are so immune or ignorant of the Spirit’s work in our own lives is, again, testimony to the ill health of the Christian community.

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Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with secular holidays such as Memorial Day. As a Reformed Christians I have no problem observing the sacrifice of members of the Armed Forces who have given their lives in the defense of the nation. The military is an extension of the civil authority and therefore is to be respected.

Further, I don’t have a great deal of problem with a sense of allegiance to or respect for one’s nation. After all, we’re all born somewhere and as part of some people. It seems to me that love of neighbor begins with love of one’s fellow countrymen. It should be remembered, of course, that love of country and allegiance to the flag (or the crown) has its limits.

There is a prior or more ultimate allegiance for the Christian–Christ himself and His bride, the church. We shouldn’t forget how radical a statement that can be. After all, imagine such words coming from the mouth of a Muslim. Some of us might feel somewhat different in that instance.

What I long for is a day when the evangelical church is marked by a growing sense of its on-going participation in the story of Christ as marked by the church calendar. What I hope for is the sense that above and before all other commitments is a commitment to a local group of believers who live in intentional accord with the testimony in the book of Acts (2.42):

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

I get excited envisioning a day in which when two calendars collide, the church calendar wins.

Don Quixote de la Vanderbilt

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by Jeff Gissing | @jeffgissing

They’re tilting at windmills again! Thirteen campus ministries are continuing their attempt to get Vanderbilt to reverse its decision to implement an all-comers policy for determining qualification to lead a student organization. As I understand it, the policy prohibits religious groups from using religious criteria to select their leaders. It has effectively revoked university recognition for more than ten student groups.

The saga continued this week with the publication of an Open Letter to the university. Personally, I have never seen the point of Open Letters (but that’s just me). Here it is:

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It is challenging to believe that university will reverse itself based on this letter. Parents, alumni, and donors of the university have expressed concern over the policy–to now avail. The Tennessee legislature passed a bill threatening state funding to the university. They had their bluff called by the university aided by the Governor who (not unreasonably) vetoed the bill.

Do InterVarsity, et al, really believe that they can prevail against an institution with the money, influence, and time that Vanderbilt enjoys (the university has the money and influence to outlast a protest movement)?

I haven’t the faintest idea. However, I do know a couple of things.

  • First, it is never wrong to fight for what is right though it may cost a great deal.
  • Second, truth is stronger that falsehood. Regardless of the outcome truth will, in the end, prevail.
  • Third, the Christian God specializes in using the marginal to overcome the powerful, using folly to outsmart the wise, and using the weak to defat the strong.

I guess that means that, in the end, the Don Quixotes of Vanderbilt have more going for them than one might think.

Embracing our post-Christendom future

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by Jeff Gissing | @jeffgissing

We are living in a post-Christendom era–a time in which the influence of the Christian church has become significantly diminished. Post-Christendom is not post-Christian. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is as powerful as it ever was, but it’s transformative work will take place despite resistance rather than with the support of society.

Opinions differ on where we are in the process of decline, but most agree that the age of a “Christian America” has come and gone. To the extent that America is Christian that Christian faith is increasingly more akin to moral therapeutic deism described by sociologist Christian Smith.

I recently read two articles that are worthy of your time:

  • On The Telegraph blog Tim Stanley argues: “…It’s perfectly possible to be a Christian within a society that regulates or proscribes religious practices. The Christians in classical Rome or the Catholics in communist Poland proved that.” However, removing the influence of Christianity from a culture creates an undesirable alternative: “A society that has no moral point of reference beyond the reason of the individual (and who, in their right mind, would trust that?), or the ever shifting law of the land, is bound towards selfishness and tyranny.”
  • Timothy Tennent of Asbury Theological Seminary notes that we have a huge opportunity afforded by this post-Christendom period. That is the chance to recover a robust Christianity “finally set free from the domesticating influence of Christendom.” We’re not there yet. Tennent describes our depressing current reality: “We have retreated so far from biblical Christianity you can almost hear the Christian oxygen being sucked out of the culture at every turn.  The church has become one of the most vacuous spaces of all.”

It’s an exciting and alarming time to be a Christian, especially a Christian in ministry leadership. While I do not know what the future holds, I know the God who holds the future.

Gay marriage and a crisis of authority

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By Jeff Gissing / @jeffgissing

There seems to be something of an authority crisis today. Let me explain. It seems increasingly difficult for contemporary Americans, even American Christians, to recognize any authority outside of themselves. The self is conceived of as the ultimate frame of reference and what appears to be deference to rightly constituted authority is often simply an internal calculus of cost verses benefit. Where there is little to no cost to defiance the chances increase that we will follow our own decisions regardless of the authority that tells us otherwise. I’m not able to trace the history of the rise of the self as a sort of unimpeachable moral authority, but I’m sure that consumerism has cemented a  previously developed understanding that places the “I” as the ultimate moral agent and authority.

An interesting example comes in the form of a sort of Constitutional crisis in the Presbyterian Church USA (via: Mary Naegli). You can read news coverage here.

The Presbytery of Redwoods (PCUSA) has refused to carry out a lawful order by a higher court, the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission. This is the church equivalent of a trial court judge deciding that a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States is “wrong” and s/he therefore will not act on it.

Incidentally this actions falls into the category of “schism” so eagerly used when churches wish to leave the denomination, but not when governing bodies refuse to abide by the decisions of higher church courts.

Here’s what happened (in brief). From June to November 2008 the State of California recognized same sex marriages. During that period of time Jane Spahr (a Presbyterian minister) conducted sixteen (16) same sex marriages despite the fact that the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (USA) defines Christian marriage as between a man and a woman exclusively. The narrative of facts from the decision is copied below.

Spahr was brought on charges before the Presbytery of Redwoods for violating her ordination vows by representing as Christian marriages unions that were not. That conviction was subsequently upheld on two appeals (to the Synod and General Assembly). According to the highest court of our church the presbytery did not err in convicting Spahr nor in rebuking and enjoining her from doing same sex marriages.

Earlier this week the Presbytery of Redwoods met and its docket (agenda) included carrying out the lawful order of its own Permanent Judicial Commission to rebuke and enjoin Jane Spahr for and from performing same sex marriages. It refused to do so.

Instead it resolved to “oppose the imposition of the rebuke” as such an imposition is “inconsistent” with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. (read the resolution below). In other words: it refused to carry out a lawful order by a higher court purely and simply because it did not agree with that order.

What is really going on here? This is actually a short-circuiting of due process. A presbytery is claiming that it has no duty to act in accordance with the authorities that it has vowed to respect and obey. The presbytery has said to the church that it will comply with lawful orders only when such orders meet with its approval. The presbytery has said that it is the sole authority and will respect no others in the making of this decision.

Some observations:

  • With this action, the presbytery has shown itself to no longer be meaningfully presbyterian in its polity. Unchecked, each presbytery will become further balkanized a disconnected from the rest of the church.
  • This action mirrors the larger culture where there is an increasing polarization and lack of respect for authority which necessitates greater use of coercive power.
Authority is conceived of as resting on the ability to coerce, but in reality it rests on integrity.  Should this define by a lower court not be checked, then our church’s higher courts will have lost more authority by showing a deficit of integrity in handling this matter.
This is a troubling development for the Presbyterian Church (USA) and occurs in the same week that saw 20% of the churches in the Presbytery of Tropical Florida be released to other denominations (ECO: A Covenant Order of Evangelical Presbyterians and The Evangelical Presbyterian Church).
God help us.

Additional Information

1. Here are the facts a reported in the decision of the General Assembly PJC (Order 220-08):

On April 28, 2008, this Commission issued its Decision and Order in the case of Jane Adams Spahr v. Presbytery of the Redwoods. That decision stated that a same-sex ceremony is not a marriage and that officers of the PC(USA) shall not state, imply, or represent that a same-sex ceremony is a marriage. On May 17, 2008, the Supreme Court of California ruled that same-sex marriages were legal under California law. Same-sex marriages were sanctioned by the State of California from June 20, 2008, through November 4, 2008. During that time period Spahr performed wedding ceremonies for approximately sixteen same-sex couples.

In 2010, a prosecuting committee of the Presbytery brought charges against Spahr for officiating at these ceremonies and a three-day trial was held before the PPJC in August 2010. At the conclusion of the trial the PPJC found her guilty of three of the four charges, issued a Rebuke, and enjoined her “to avoid such offenses in the future.” The PPJC also declared that the “rebuke and injunction shall not be imposed” until any appeals were complete. Spahr appealed to the SPJC, which affirmed the decision of the PPJC on March 25, 2011. That ruling was appealed by Spahr, and on February 20, 2012, the GAPJC sided with the Synod to say that the change in state law had no effect on the church’s definition of marriage that can be authorized by the PC(USA).

2. Here is the language of resolution from the Presbytery of Redwoods:

The Presbytery opposes imposition of the rebuke as set forth in the decision of the Presbytery Permanent Judicial Commission, dated August 27, 2010 (which was stayed by its terms until the present day), by declaring and resolving as follows:

WHEREAS, our primary ordination vow as Ruling and Teaching Elders is to be obedient to Jesus Christ, the Word of God, as the Scriptures bear witness to him, (F-1.02; W-4.4003 (a);

WHEREAS, the love of God in Jesus Christ is for all people, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people;

WHEREAS, the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the constitution require that full inclusion and pastoral care be extended to all members of the church;

WHEREAS,  this Presbytery called the Rev. Dr. Jane Adams Spahr to a ministry in outreach to- and in community among and with – lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people;

WHEREAS, the 38-year ministry of the Rev. Dr. Jane Adams Spahr has been faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and to her calling;

WHEREAS, the decision of the August 27, 2010, by its terms, acknowledges and apologizes (1) that the rules of the church “are against the Gospel,” and (2) that the decision and rebuke continue the grievous harm “that has been, and continues to be, done” by the church to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people “in the name of Jesus Christ”;

Be it RESOLVED that the Presbytery of the Redwoods opposes imposition of the rebuke set forth in the decision dated August 27, 2010, as inconsistent with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the faithful life of ministry lived out in this Presbytery.