Frustration!

The question about fencing the communion table came up recently and led to a wider discussion about authority and accountability in the church. I'm not a from-the-top-down Presbyterian and prefer to think of the so called courts of the church as wider rather than higher but still worry about democratizing church leadership on the one hand, and a kind of seeker-sensitivity influencing what and how we act, on the other.

For example, what do we expect from those who sojourn with us for a long time without ever formally committing to membership - sort of cohabiting without marriage? And what about the many members and non-members of local churches who go about preaching? Who gave them permission to go and to whom are they accountable? Why worry about training ministers when all sorts of people appoint themselves?

I agree that the church is in such a parlous state that some congregations would have no preacher at all were it not for lay preachers. I also agree that we should be patient and sensitive and give people time to come to terms with the kind of church we happen to be (right or wrong). I just worry that anxiety about what people think tends to stop us being the church we are so that we end up wondering whose tune we are dancing to. Once, when discussing the form and content of some incarnation services a young woman chided us for not including songs that would appeal to outsiders. None of us knew the songs in question, and more to the point, neither would the average outsider, but they would have been more familiar with the traditional ones.anyway and I'm sure the outsiders didn't either but probably knew the traditional ones.

It is general practice to play down the importance of church membership and to allow people to do what the want, provided they think God told them to do it,so is the quest for identity, authority and accountability now redundant? Or can we continue to be what we are or ought to be in order that those who sojourn with us will know whom they are sojourning with? It cannot preclude patience and sensitivity and certainly doesn't argue for pressuring people to join up. Actually it isn't about them but us. I'm just asking whether we can be ourselves so that we may be honest about it and others might know that we are being honest.

I sometimes feel as if these are the concerns of dinosaurs (among whom I have been occasionally numbered) but I don't have the impression that our Lord Jesus Christ was relaxed about authority and accountability and I am certain the apostle Paul wasn't. I know that those not against us are for us and rejoice that the gospel is preached for whatever reason but as churches, doing it honestly and in the right way ought to count for something don't you think?

Final victory

S. Africa 2 - Lions 1! But the Lions were not smashed in scrum and line-out or in the loose or in the backs or anywhere else in this the final rugby test at Ellis Park. One is tempted to think that justice triumphed in the end but of course that is rather silly when set beside the doctrine of Christus Victor and the vindication of the saints. It's good to be on the winning side, especially when immediate results suggest otherwise.

Encouragement & comfort!

It’s more fun to look at things from a distance to see how the Lord is working than to be in the midst of what seem to us to be the tumultuous providences of God! The Lord gives us much of the former to help us w. the latter!

This came from my friend Bill Shishko, pastor of Franklin Square Orthodox Presbyterian Church, New York. I mentioned to him the sudden providence which threatens to remove our youngest son to a pastorate in the U.S.A. We have already lost one son to a church over there, which leaves only our middle son and daughter in law, plus their children to comfort us in our old age.

Calvin on true worship

'I know how difficult it is to persuade the world that God disapproves of all modes of worship not expressly sanctioned by His Word. The very opposite persuasion which cleaves to them, being seated, as it were in their very bones and marrow, is, that whatever they do has in itself a sufficient sanction, provided it exhibits some kind of zeal for the honour of God.' Tracts & Letters, Vol. 1 THE NECESSITY OF REFORMING THE CHURCH, 129.

Substitution

The Lions were smashed in scrum and lineout in the first test at Durban. One small compensation was the difference made to the scrum when Rees and Jones joined Jenkins in the front row. Maybe Powell should have a start in the second test. Substitution - wonderful doctrine!

Heroes - a good read!

	Book Title: Heroes
	Author : Iain H. Murray Banner of Truth
	Price: £ 15.00
	ISBN#: 9781848710245

Worship

'While believers are to worship in secret as individuals and in private as families, they are also to worship as churches in assemblies of public worship, which are not carelessly or willfully to be neglected or forsaken. Public worship occurs when God, by his Word and Spirit, through the lawful government of the church, calls his people to assemble to worship him together ... '

From the proposed Directory for Public Worship of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church