The Proposed PCA Strategic Plan
If you are a minister or member of the PCA, or a sister NAPRC denomination, you have most likely heard about the proposed strategic plan. The plan was drafted by a members on the Strategic Planning Committee of the PCA, and was presented by Dr. Bryan Chapell. You can watch the the videos of the entire presentation here. Roy Taylor, the stated clerk of the General Assembly of the PCA, presented the plan at this years’ Twin Lakes Fellowship. There seem to be quite a lot of concerns that this plan betrays a wholehearted commitment to the standards of the PCA and the methodology of historically Reformed and Presbyterian churches. You can read some of the more substantive critiques here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. There are others in the denomination commending it as an fitting plan for progress. You can read them here. The future of the PCA hangs in the balance as we decide what are the causes for which we are denominated.
But Nick, what say YOU? 🙂
I am interested, Nick, in your own views. I gather, from the sources you cite, 10 of whom were cautious/displeased with it and the 1 eager respondent, that you are 90% unhappy with it? I found it highly ironic that Green Baggins and Andrew Barnes continuously argued that we don’t need new “safe places” but that we simply ought to be less contentious! T-rav seems to think the PCA isn’t confessional enough, seemingly unaware of the brush with which Chapell just painted him and his ilk.
Someone else is bound to read this, so I better say where I’m coming from. I am a seminary candidate, under care of Presbytery. My pastor is very ‘missional’ but my church has Bible Pres./doctrine-first people too. I was saved into the Assemblies of God (“doctrine doesn’t matter”) and got Reformed into the URC (“doctrine is all that matters”). I am very happy now in the PCA (“doctrine matters”). I thought Dr. Chapell’s diagnosis was spot on, though I did find his prescription challenging. While the blogosphere and even my presbytery are alight with Keller-wannabe’s versus Scott Clark-wannabe’s, real people’s lives are burning down because of secularization and impiety. Their witness to non-Christians is pitiful because of divorce, contentiousness, politicing and Biblical illiteracy.
I can’t say there should be a balance between doctrine and mercy ministry because I think they are both equally ultimate. Most non-elders I meet in the PCA are either Reformed-Baptists-at-heart, or snarky-confessional-aholic-pharisees. NIck, you walk the line so well: what DOES the PCA stand for in your book?
Brothers,
I am committed to the Reformed faith out of belief that it is the most faithful representation of biblical doctrine. I adhere to the Westminster Standards because I believe that they faithfully represent that doctrine in an ecumenical way. I am equally committed to evangelism and missions as a part of ordinary biblical ministry. I spent three summers working at the Boardwalk chapel in Wildwood, NJ and am now a church planter. I want people to know Jesus Christ. I appreciate so much of what my brothers in the Acts 29 movement are doing, but I have willingly and knowingly chosen to plant a church with the PCA. I am concerned that the strategic plan is built on sociological principles rather than on God’s word. I think this is a real danger that might fall under the purview of the apostle Paul’s warning in Colossians 2:8 in some respects. I do not have time to write all my thoughts here but will say that there are many weaknesses with the plan. That being said, I do agree with the men on the Strategic Planning Committee that something needs to be done to encourage a more healthy outreach with regard to the communities in which we live. I am note sure why we need “safe places” when a Presbyterian system should have healthy discussion on the floors of Presbytery and GA. We did away with that possibility years ago, and I fear that many of the progressives in the PCA are now simply dishonest about their thoughts on such things as NPP, FV, and women’s ordination, to name a few. Hope this is straightforward enough for you both. Thanks for your comments.
It is, Nick. Thanks for the answer. I hope you are wrong about TE’s and RE’s being duplicitous about their theological positions, though I fear you may be right. Conversely, however, I would wish all of us who are OPP, not-FV and opposed to women deacons could hold fast to our brothers in the LORD who aren’t so enlightened and not seek for their removal on such non-salvific grounds (Romans 14). Just because some of us suspect they may be sneaking towards Gospel Issues doesn’t mean we can crucify them yet. The Judgment of Charity is all I ask for.
Thank you Nick for your thoughts! Spot on!
But let’s hope both you and I are wrong. Let’s pray that God would bring reformation and revival to the PCA making it both more faithful to and more zealous for the un-compromised Gospel!
Robert Murphy, I find it odd that you would link NPP and FV with non-salvific. Is not the FV and NPP a distortion of the gospel? But such attitudes is what is wrong with the PCA. Furthermore, the issue of women deacons is one of biblical fidelity. A hill, IMO, worthy of dying on.
There are good men (B.B.W.) who have made the Greek-based argument for women deacons. I find them ultimately unpersuasive, but that is a far cry from saying Warfield was Biblically infidelitous.
The NPP’s are wide and various, but those men typically are scholars and answer straight-ahead questions on their theological views (usually damning).
The FV, on the other hand, is a collection of unwise speculators who parade their bar-room debates around as theological insight. The obfuscated, unsophisticated garbage coming from the average FV fanboy leaves him most guilty of 1 Tim 3:2. Now, the pentaverate (Wilson, Leithart, Schlissel, Wilkins and Lusk) have said some boneheaded things, but the movement arose as a laudable corrective to Presbyterians who were really Baptists at heart. The FV as a whole is such confusing mess, that I’m unsure we can saying anything universal. Do we even give non-FV, post-mill, paedocommunionist, covenant successionists a fair shake? No, we do not.
I’m not surprised at all that this is going forward. IMHO the PCA has lacked any central identity since its inception.
@Robert Murphy,
“The obfuscated, unsophisticated garbage coming from the average FV fanboy leaves him most guilty of 1 Tim 3:2.”
Not sure I agree. Even if you don’t want to slap these men with false teaching (which we should), they’ve been unclear about the gospel, and that is a serious enough issue to boot them out.