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Viewpoint
August 8, 2007
Moderator Gray raises a complex biblical and constitutional issue
Does she selectively use the constitution and is her argument faithful to Scripture?
By Winfield Casey Jones
PC(USA) Constitution, Part 1, Book of Confessions (B.C.) 4.086 and 4.087
Heidelberg Catechism Q. 86. Since we are redeemed from our sin and its wretched consequences by grace through Christ without any merit of our own, why must we do good works?
A. Because just as Christ has redeemed us with his blood he also renews us through his Holy Spirit according to his own image, so that with our whole life we may show ourselves grateful to God for his goodness and that he may be glorified through us; and further, so that we ourselves may be assured of our faith by its fruits and by our reverent behavior may win our neighbors to Christ.
Q. 87. Can those who do not turn to God from their ungrateful, impenitent life be saved?
A. Certainly not! Scripture says, "Surely you know that the unjust will never come into possession of the kingdom of God. Make no mistake: no fornicator or idolater, none who are guilty either of adultery or of homosexual perversion, no thieves or grabbers or drunkards or slanderers or swindlers, will possess the kingdom of God."
PC(USA) Constitution, Part 2, Book of Order (B.O.) G-5.0103 Inclusiveness
The congregation shall welcome all persons who respond in trust and obedience to God's grace in Jesus Christ and desire to become part of the membership and ministry of his Church. No persons shall be denied membership because of race, ethnic origin, worldly condition, or any other reason not related to profession of faith. Each member must seek the grace of openness in extending the fellowship of Christ to all persons. (G-9.0104) Failure to do so constitutes a rejection of Christ himself and causes a scandal to the gospel. (underscore added)
I have the greatest respect and gratitude to God for our Moderator Joan Gray. She has truly been a wonderful spiritual leader for us – calling our church to humility and prayer, calling us to be radically dependent on God, and challenging us to return to ancient disciplines like tithing. I am so grateful for her, but now I find myself for the first time disagreeing with her.
She has written an email, which ran on presbyweb.com under the title, "A Deeply Pernicious Heresy." She says she is reacting to statements she has heard in the church which go like these: "Gay and lesbian people are not my brothers and sisters; they can't be Christians," or "Gays and lesbians would not be allowed to join my (Presbyterian) church." She continues, "I am deeply grieved when I hear this opinion, and I believe it is not only wrong but deeply pernicious heresy." Unfortunately Moderator Gray's thoughts skate lightly over some deep issues of interpretation about which good Presbyterian Christians (none of whom may be heretical) might disagree. Among those questions are these: Should any persistent pattern of sin ever be a bar to church membership? If not what would be the effect of receiving a person into membership and then immediately undertaking a disciplinary process against them?
What is the connection (if any) in the Bible, in our Book of Confessions, and in our Form of Government, between faith and obedience? Finally, is homosexual practice sin? I doubt that such deep and complex questions can be dealt with (even by such a gifted person as our moderator) in an essay of less than 540 words, particularly when one is accusing even a small part of the church of heresy!
But before I say any more, let me be clear about one thing: Above all else, every Christian is called to have a deep Christ-like love for all people, including people who are tempted by, or who participate in, homosexual acts. The only appropriate questions are "what shapes does such love take?" and "can words like 'no' or concepts like 'discipline' ever be expressions of this Christ-like love?"
Perhaps the first thing that could be said about Moderator Gray's piece is that she has failed in the quotations to which she says she is reacting to distinguish between a response to people who are subject to homosexual temptation (our culture prefers to call it orientation) and a response to those who regularly engage in homosexual acts. Under even a very conservative reading of scripture, the first group have done nothing wrong, but under a number of readings, the second group are sinning. True, under such readings of scripture, they are joined in sin by those who habitually engage in heterosexual fornication or adultery, lust, greed, gossip, envy, and a host of other sins, but they sin nonetheless. The question then becomes one of what--if any--measure of obedience is required of a Christian. Biblically and confessionally this is not so simple a question as Moderator Gray suggests.
Ms. Gray reminds us that our Constitution (in Part 2) says "No persons shall be denied membership because of race, ethnic origin, worldly condition, or any other reason not related to profession of faith." (G-5.0103). To be fair, three clarifications should have been added to this observation:
1. All of the specific conditions mentioned in G.5.0103-race, ethnic origin, and worldly condition – have to do with conditions beyond a person's control, and – more importantly – conditions which one cannot possibly read scripture as calling sinful. I understand that the argument in American culture and church has to do precisely with whether homosexual practice is a sin like stealing, or a created condition, like race, but it is disingenuous to implicitly choose one side of this argument without being explicit about what one has done.
2. Arguably to persistently engage in practices which the scriptures call sin DOES relate to profession of faith! (Look at the wording of G-5.0103 above again).
3. The sentence which precedes the section in the Form of Government noted by the Moderator clearly links faith and obedience. It says, "The congregation shall welcome all persons who respond in trust and obedience to God's grace in Jesus Christ and desire to become part of the membership and ministry of his Church." (emphasis added) (Look at all the wording of G- 5.0103 above again). It is clear that our Form of Government uses the coordinating conjunction "and" to link two equal responses – trust (a synonym is faith) and obedience.
Another of Moderator Gray's chief arguments is that the positions I cited her as quoting at the beginning of the article represent what she calls the "Jesus and heresy" – the idea that something other than Jesus Christ is necessary for salvation. As she suggests, the letter to the Galatians is clearly written to combat a version of this heresy-the false notion that people are saved by Jesus Christ and circumcision. Proclaiming that salvation requires fulfilling a ritual law (like circumcision) along with faith in Christ is a pernicious error and a heresy. But saying that faith in Christ should entail at least an attempt to fulfill the moral law is quite different. The New Testament never says the first; it often says the second (except, unlike me, it says nothing about merely attempting to obey.) The question about the extent to which fulfillment (or exceeding, see Mathew 5:20!) of the moral law is part and parcel of true faith is raised again and again in scripture
(and in our Book of Confessions and Form of Government), and in ways not altogether congenial to the simple argument made by our Moderator. James says "faith without works is dead." (James 2:26) Jesus himself says "not every one who says to me, 'Lord Lord' shall enter the kingdom, but the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." (Matthew 7:21)
While Jesus is all we need for salvation, scripture is clear that mere intellectual assent to him (gnosis) is NOT enough for salvation. (In fact such Gnosticism itself is clearly a heresy!) As previously mentioned, not only does James say, "faith without works is dead," but Paul begins and ends the letter to the Romans, that great epistle on faith, with the affirmation that true faith entails obedience. Five verses into Romans he writes, "Through him (Christ) and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith." And in the penultimate verse of that same letter Paul finishes up by again linking faith and obedience. He writes that God's truth has been predicted by the prophets and revealed in Christ "so that all nations might believe and obey him."(emphases added.)
If Moderator Gray wishes to make the point that it is hypocritical and pernicious to disallow people who engage in homosexual practice to join a church but to allow fornicators or thieves or the exceedingly greedy, then she is right. I heartily agree! In our own congregation, we would probably let all of the above types join our church, but my problem is that I am not at all sure that we are right! If I Corinthians 6:9 (echoed in the Heidelberg Catechism, see above) categorically states that unless such people repent they will not enter the kingdom of God, are we really doing them a favor by unblinkingly accepting them as members? As I say, I believe our congregation does it. I am just not sure that we are right or that we serve people in this way.
If the problem of Christianity in America is that it is three thousand miles wide and one inch deep, is Ms. Gray's truncated interpretation of G-5.0103 really our answer? If American Christianity is increasingly Gnostic because the lifestyle of American Christians is increasingly indistinguishable from that of non Christians, is her proposal really our answer? If we as Presbyterians, unlike some other denominations, read scripture in such a way as to indicate that simply praying a sinner's prayer and then forgetting about obeying Jesus is inauthentic if not false Christianity, is a minimalist interpretation of our Constitution really what we need? If we understand that the forgotten part of the Great Commission is to "teach them to obey whatsoever I have commanded you," are we really served by an interpretation of G-5.0103 which de-emphasizes its emphasis on obedience and emphasizes only a verbal affirmation of the Lordship of Christ?
Winfield Casey Jones, D.Min, is pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Pearland TX. and can be reached at wrjones2002@yahoo.com.
Note: Viewpoint articles are unsolicited essays that we believe deserve to be highlighted. Viewpoint articles often do not express the opinion of Presbyweb.
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