Calvin on sheep and goats

John Calvin in his commentary on the parable of the judgement of the sheep and the goats writes this:

"As a shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats. When our Lord says that the separation of the sheep from the goats is delayed till that day, he means that the wicked are now mixed with the good and holy, so that they live together in the same flock of God. The comparison appears to be borrowed from Ezekiel 34:18, where the Lord complains of the fierceness of the goats, which attack with their horns the poor sheep, and destroy the pastures, and pollute the water; and where the Lord expressly declares that he will take vengeance. And therefore Christ’s discourse amounts to this, that believers ought not to think their condition too hard, if they are now compelled to live with the goats, and even to sustain many serious attacks and annoyances from them; secondly, that they ought to beware of being themselves infected by the contagion of their vices; and, thirdly, to inform them that in a holy and innocent life their labor is not thrown away, for the difference will one day appear."

A Dis-heartening Action involving the Synod of the Pacific

On May 6th, at the Sacramento Presbytery meeting in Weed, the Presbytery voted not to appeal the court's ruling that First Presbyterian Church of Roseville California owned their property.

Now an e-mail has come from the Presbytery staff that, once again, David Thompson, Garry Cox and Timothy Little, Pastors at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Sacramento, filed a complaint against the Presbytery. The notification goes on to state:

"On May 13, 2008, the Stated Clerk of the Synod, Joey Mills notified the Temporary Stated Clerk of the Sacramento Presbytery that a stay of enforcement on the motion was granted signed by Melvin Kachigian, SusanBarnes and Linda Lee.

The stay orders that the corporate officers of Sacramento Presbytery,Barbara Farley (Moderator of Council), Marie Segur (Treasurer), and Claire Pisor (Temporary Stated Clerk), be directed to authorize the presbytery's attorney to file a timely notice of appeal of the judgment. Accordingly,the officers have complied with the order of the Synod Permanent Judicial Commission."

This order to file a notice of appeal is all very dis-heartening and one of the reasons so many churches are asking to be dismissed from the Sacramento Presbytery.

The California Supreme Court and the biblical Church: A difference of opinion ?

In my early years of college I was required to pick a class from a rather strange listing of classes. I picked an encounter class led by an interesting psychology professor named Famous. Famous, whose background had at one time included the desire to be a bishop in the Methodist Church, lived a postmodern lifestyle to say the least.

We had some rather interesting and provocative discussions about Christianity including the meaning of marriage. I remember stating at the time that I believed that in our Western mindset there would come a time when marriage would only have any true purpose or meaning for Christians. While everyone else in the class was upset by that statement, Famous agreed with me. I think both his Christian background and his lifestyle helped him to see that when people simply live with their partner or when marriage can be seen as meaning any kind of arrangement, including same sex marriage, the biblical understanding of marriage dies.

Except in that place where the true body of Christ gathers to hear the word.

Jesus, when answering a question about marriage and divorce, stated what was once obvious:

“Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let no man separate.”(Matthew 19:4-6)

And my argument that day, in class, was, Christ and his love for the Church sets the standard for marriage, gives the Church a picture of marriage. Paul, writing to husbands and wives states:

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.” (Ephesians 5: 25-27)

Today the Supreme Court of California ruled that banning same sex marriage was unconstitutional. As a secular body they went the direction of our broken western culture, which truly does not understand the basic foundation of marriage. How could they understand when they do not acknowledge the biblical Lord?

Marriage, as it copies Christ’s great love for the Church, and his desire to present his bride to himself with out any blemish, negates any kind of marriage that encourages un-holiness. Whatever the state does, whatever it blesses, whatever its words, the Church, biblically, may not, must not, call same sex partnerships and rites, marriage. They must not, alongside the state, acknowledge any arrangement called gay marriage.

A call for prayer from friends afar

This is an e-mail that arrived from our missionary friends just a day ago. Remember that for safety's sake I have left their name out of the e-mail.

"My husband has just returned from a four week ministry trip to Bangladesh and India. One of the team members on that trip was a Pastor who oversees seven churches and four Bible schools in his home country of Myanmar/Burma.

While the Pastor was on the trip, his country was hit by a category 3 hurricane that produced tens of thousands, and as is currently being reported, possibly up to 100,000 deaths. It is estimated that 1-1 ½ million people may have lost their homes in the disaster as the hurricane cut a swath through the central part of the country. The military dictatorship there has been slow to respond and reluctant to give visas to aid agency workers who have offered to help.

Please pray for us as my husband will be trying to get a visa to Myanmar this next week. He has been working on relationships in Myanmar for the last 20 years, and is friends with the head of the Baptist Convention with over a million members. He speaks Karen, which is the language of ten percent of the population, and there are Karen people in leadership positions around the country. Many top leaders also have wives who are Karen.

When he was in Shillong, NE India at the All Nations House of Prayer, the quotation from the Book of Esther was shared in the meeting by a YWAM leader that God had been saying we were coming into a season where it would be essential to recognize that God has positioned people “for such a time as this”

Please pray that permissions and the visas will be released so that the churches may be able to minister to their neighbors in need in the speediest and yet precise timing of God.

In Jesus"

Spirit, Holy Gift of the Father

Spirit, Holy gift of the Father,
Gentle witness to Jesus,
Bright burning fire

You lingered affirming the work of redemption,
You descended with gifts for the Lamb’s chosen ones.
Effecting the work of the Son and the Father
Bringing to memory the words of the Son,
Bringing to memory all He has done.

Spirit, Holy Gift of the Father,
Gentle witness to Jesus,
Bright burning flame.

I think I have been a commissioner to presbytery about a year and a half, probably for about nine meetings. I can’t really remember, but the point is we have sung a particular song about five times now. It has a nice melody but the words remind me of Hegel’s idea of the spirit moving and evolving through history helping humanity progress to greater heights and “bold new decisions.” (And, yes, Hegel would have mentioned the cross and the stable.)

The song is politically correct. It’s the women who have visions; it seems the men need to “clear their eyes.” Hegel’s spirit is not really biblical and a lot of false philosophy and theology have been perpetrated on his philosophical foundation. This song has potential; but for what? However, a wonderful thing happened as we sang the song this last time.

Have you ever read a good English novel where as the plot thickens a great storm intercedes tearing everything apart so that the author of the story can put it all back to rights. Or think of C.S. Lewis’s The Hideous Strength where at the end you have ancient Merlin appearing speaking in a strange ancient language and with him a great catastrophe wipes out everyone’s plans. That is every one's plans except for the main character Ransom and all the benevolent Powers of heaven. It’s really a wonderful English tradition.

So, back to the event. Well, I am not actually sure what was wrong but it seemed like the organist wasn't playing the right notes at the right time. Or maybe he was just playing the refrain all the time as we were singing both the refrain and the verses. Most of the words never got sung although we tried to sing the whole song. Anyway it was like a good English novel or mystery, but it caused me to think about the words and how I would like to write a different version. But of course I have no sense of meter or much musical background so I have just began writing a kind of poem song as you can see at the beginning of this post.

It is my attempt to say what I wish the song was really about:

Spirit, Holy gift of the Father
Gentle witness to Jesus
Bright burning flame

I’m still working on it as you can tell.

Prebyteries dancing like puppets

Sometimes reading is hazardous to a sense of reality. Trust can be broken in the midst of a hierarchy of words.

Several Pastors, within and without the PCUSA, recently blogged on the Advisory Committee on the Constitution’s advise on the Presbytery of Charlotte’s questions about the transfer of ministers and Congregations to Transitional Presbyteries.

The two questions were:
Can a presbytery dismiss a congregation to a transitional presbytery in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church?
Can a presbytery dismiss a minister of the Word and Sacrament to a transitional presbytery of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church?

One blogger who is an Evangelical Presbyterian Church Pastor is naturally interested. Pastor David Fischler of the The Reformed Pastor wrote Down the Rabbit Hole. And Presbyterian USA Pastor Toby Brown of Classical Presbyterian wrote, Ex Cathedra: The ACC of the PC(USA) takes aim at dismissals to the EPC . The first blog posting I read about the advisory was after returning home from a Presbytery meeting. It was written by Pastor Bob Davis at Presbyblog. He wrote, May 6, 2008: ACC recommends Authoritative Interpretation regarding transitional presbyteries .

Davis points out the advisory's recommendations to Presbyteries. He writes:

"The provisions of G-15.0203 a and b do, however, require that the General Assembly, as the highest governing body of this denomination, advise its presbyteries in this matter. The 218th General Assembly (2008) therefore advises the presbyteries that they must satisfy themselves concerning the conformity with this denomination of a transitional presbytery of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC) in matters of doctrines and order. Presbyteries may facilitate the exploration of conformity by means of an administrative commission, although such commissions may not be empowered to approve the dismissal of the congregation. In exploring this matter, presbyteries should consider such questions as whether the receiving EPC presbytery is

• 
  doctrinally consistent with the essentials of Reformed theology as understood by the presbytery;
• 
  governed by a polity that is consistent in form and structure with that of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A);
• 
  of sufficient permanence to offer reasonable assurance that the congregation is not being dismissed to de facto independence.

Failure on the part of the presbytery thoroughly to explore and adequately to document its satisfaction in these matters may thus violate, however unintentionally, the spirit of the polity of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). "

Davis also wrote, "This is a pure regulatory move. It is not missional in design. It would take away authority from the presbyteries and establish greater authority in the higher "governing" bodies. It would have a chilling effect on congregations trying to discern where God is calling -- heightening the sense of distrust."

I was surprised by Pastor Davis's posting. The reason I was surprised: I thought that the advisory must have been posted for several weeks on PC-BiZ and instead it was only posted on May the 6th the day of our Presbytery meeting.

I had already read the Advisory and saw how it had been used since it was a part of the papers posted on our presbytery's web site a week ago. And it was used in the first report written by a mediating team concerning a church in our presbytery seeking dismissal from the PCUSA. The first two meetings with the teams from both the church and the presbytery were held on April the 9th and 11th. So I have two questions concerning these papers.

1. I wonder how many other mediating teams in other presbyteries are receiving this advice from Louisville or more succinctly the Office of the General Assembly before it is even voted on by General Assembly?
2. I also wonder if other mediating teams are giving out the suggestion this team did in its first report? That is, given the advisory recommendation to the Presbyteries, "We noted that these issues were the subject of a Request for interpretation from the Presbytery of Charlotte that is currently pending before the General Assembly for consideration at the June meeting, and Presbytery [Sacramento] might choose to defer making a determination with respect to those issues until the General Assembly acted on that Request."

In other words, the suggestion was being given that our Presbytery might just want to put this off until after General Assembly. As it happened mediation broke down without this ploy being used. I am not blaming our Presbytery, I am not blaming the mediating team. I am just saying it seems like Presbyteries are becoming puppets on a string being pulled by others in Louisville. That isn't connectionalism, its madness because it will simply further erode any small bit of trust left in the Church.

(It should be noted that this church asked to be dismissed to the EPC not to a transitional presbytery.)

A Hymn for Some Saints in the Church

I have searched for and found a good song to dedicate to a list of fellows who follow Jesus Christ faithfully and and have been maligned because of it:

Rev. Jim Berkley
Rev Jim Yearsley
Rev. L. Rus Howard
Rev. David Perry
Rev. James Coone
Rev. Robert Kopp
Rev. Jim Tilly
Rev. Toby Brown
Rev. Mark Hughey

I will add to this a Church in my Presbytery, Sierra Presbyterian Church, in Nevada City and they will know why.

These words were written by Hen­ry F. Lyte, who seems to have been a prolific writer of verse.
The song is In Vain the Powers of Darkness Try.

In vain the powers of darkness try
To work the Church’s ill,
The Friend of sinners reigns on high,
And checks them at His will.

Though mischief in their hearts may dwell,
And on their tongues deceit,
A word of His their pride can quell,
And all their aims defeat.

My trust is in His grace alone;
His house shall be my home.
How sweet His mercies past to own,
And hope for more to come.