Some of you may not know that Grace Community Church is part of a larger church body or denomination. That church body is called the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). In the PCA, there are three levels (called courts) of oversight and governance. At the local church, there is the Session, which is the group of elders shepherding a particular congregation. The next court is the Presbytery, which includes all the pastors and churches in a particular geographic region. For GCC, we are part of Blue Ridge Presbytery, which includes Charlottesville, Roanoke, Blacksburg, and others. Finally, there is the General Assembly. This is the highest level and all the pastors and churches that are part of the PCA can participate.
Next week, in St. Louis, the General Assembly will meet for its 48th meeting. This is the first Assembly I will miss since I was ordained over 20 years ago. A daughter’s wedding is more important, in my estimation. However, this Assembly has many important issues before it. Matters come to the Assembly in two ways. One is through the committees and agencies of the PCA. For example, a committee was appointed two years ago to study the topic of human sexuality and that report will be presented to this Assembly. The other way a topic can come is through requests (called overtures) from sessions and presbyteries. Because the Assembly was unable to meet in 2020 due to the pandemic, there are 48 overtures the Assembly will be dealing with next week.
These are trying times for the Church, including the PCA. The world in which the church seeks to minister is rapidly changing and often in ways that challenge a Biblical view of the world. The pandemic, along with other cultural issues, has heightened tensions and revealed cracks and faults within relationships, sometimes ending those relationships. And much of that is going on within the church as well, as our differing views threaten the unity that is ours in Christ and should be the dominant note of our life together. Throw in the seemingly endless exposure of abuse within the church and you can feel the weight of trying to be “faithful to the Scriptures, true to the Reformed faith, and obedient to the Great Commission” (motto of the PCA).
The work of our Assembly is always important but perhaps even more so this year, given the issues before the Assembly, the overall state of the Church, and the greater cultural context. So, let me make two requests of you.
First, don’t immediately believe everything you might read on social media. If you follow the happenings of the General Assembly, be careful about assuming that one blogger’s account is “the truth”. It doesn’t mean the person is lying or attempting to deceive. But often what they are giving is their interpretation of what happened, an interpretation that will be colored by their personal understanding and convictions. The Assembly is ordered by certain rules and procedures and often what seems odd to someone has more to do with not understanding how the Assembly operates rather than something nefarious. Also, be wary of any Doomsday predictions for the future of the PCA. If you hear or read something and have questions, please feel free to check in with me and I’ll do my best to answer those.
Second, pray fervently for the work of the Assembly specifically and that of the PCA in general. Pray that God’s Spirit would be at work to bring unity even in the midst of disagreement. That love for God and for each other and for the world would be the atmosphere for our deliberations and decisions. That God would continue to be at work in and through the members of the PCA for the building of the Church and the furthering of Christ’s kingdom. And that we would be faithful to our callings even in the midst of tumultuous times.
The PCA is not perfect (nor is any church or denomination) and it never will be until Christ’s return. Yet, we can be thankful for the blessings the head of the Church, Jesus, has lavished upon us. We can rejoice in the ways He is using the PCA to reach college students through Reformed University Fellowship (RUF), to plant churches through MNA (Mission to North America), and to take the gospel to the ends of the earth through MTW (Mission to the World). We can give thanks for the preparation of college students at Covenant College to enter a variety of vocations with the gospel and a Christian worldview and for the training of future pastors at Covenant Theological Seminary.
At the end of the day, the PCA, like us as individual Christians, does not exist to make much of itself. Instead, we exist, individually and corporately, to make much of Jesus. Would He grant us the grace and strength to do just that!
If you want more information on this year’s Assembly, you can find it at www.pcaga.org .
