“Free at Last…Now What?”
Exodus 15:19-24; 20:1-3

A sermon for the closing worship service of
The Covenant Network Conference, November 3-5, 2011

Mary Lynn Tobin, pastor Davis (CA) Community Presbyterian Church
and Co-Moderator, Covenant Network Board of Directors

How do you like that song we just sang -  Canticle of the Free?
All of that singing – full of triumph:

O Pharaoh, your army, they sink like a stone.
To God be praise and glory!
My God, he plunged them in the Red Sea all alone.
To God be praise and glory![i]

Me? I love the tune and it’s got a good beat. But I have had a love/hate relationship with the lyrics ever since we started singing it at our Easter Vigil service. And it’s not because of the gender-exclusive language for God that is simply impossible to modify.

I will sing to the Lord, triumphant is he: the horse and chariot he cast into the sea!

Glee – at people dying? Seems akin to the crowds chanting “USA, USA” when Osama bin Laden was finally killed by US troops. A reaction which I understand, but which also, frankly, made me nauseous.

On the other hand, “I will sing to the Lord, triumphant is he: the horse and chariot he cast into the sea!” was exactly the song phrase that came to me when Amendment 10-A passed, as we finally witnessed language in the Book of Order that had oppressed and enslaved us for years being cast into the sea.

I wonder – as I attempt wrestle with the text “charitably,” as Frances Taylor Gench taught us yesterday – does God want songs like that from us?

I remember a conversation with Del, an evangelical Presbyterian who has become a good friend, not in spite of, but because of our disagreements over ordination. He even attended the last two Covenant Network conferences and relished the theological and biblical meat that is offered here. When I asked if he would be coming to this year’s conference he responded, “If I come, they’re not going to rub in in my face in it, are they?”

If we’re honest, that’s exactly what we want to do. You won’t find anyone admitting it publicly, but c’mon, there is a part of most of us who long to shout “Neener neener neener!!” and imagine God tossing our opponents into the sea. Right? Or is that just me?

We have been liberated. Freed from oppression! Freed to be the people God created us to be! Freed to fully answer God’s call! And so we dance and sing and shake our booties the way only Presbyterians can:

A bit awkwardly.
A tad seriously.
A bit “white guys can’t dance.”

Liberation is FANTASTIC!

So the Hebrews thought. For about 10 minutes.

Until they discovered what they had been liberated to:  a harsh wilderness where food and water was scarce, where without the Egyptians breathing down their necks, they weren’t sure what to do with themselves.  There were enemies to fight.  They were stuck with a leader who seemed unsure as to what to do and who disappeared for long periods of time to “talk with God.” And that “promised land” of milk and honey? It was nowhere in sight. They were not happy campers.

And what about us? Now, after 15 years of labor to achieve freedom; now, standing on the other side of the Red Sea, we have a few minutes to breathe. And we stick our heads up, look around, and discover that while we have been working so diligently, so faithfully, so hard to win this freedom, we have been “liberated” from things we didn’t necessarily want to be liberated from.

You see, we are in our own wilderness.

Cindy Bolbach and Gradye Parsons described it yesterday: we are living in one of the most contentious periods in mainline Christianity in the United States in most of our lifetimes. We may have thought that with the deletion of the oppressive language in the Book of Order, we were finally getting our church back. But do we want it? Do we want what some are calling the “deathly ill” Presbyterian church?

We may have read about how the church is changing, but many of our congregations are only beginning to experience the American tsunami of apathy and hostility toward religion in general and Christianity in particular. We on the west coast are especially blessed, I suppose, because we are getting drenched first.

Like the Hebrews longing for Egypt, we long for the way things used to be, when churches stood at the center of communities’ lives; when the voices of Presbyterians were taken seriously in Washington, D.C.; when our Sunday schools were bursting at the seams with baby boomers and we had more money than we knew what to do with, and our leadership had a road map for exactly what to do each step of the way.

It’s hard not to yearn for that fabulous food in Egypt.

Like the Hebrews looking back with rose-colored glasses, we forget about the other side of life in Egypt. We may not have even noticed it because it was in the air we breathed – but there was a downside:  the gods of status and power and wealth crept stealthily into our decision-making; success was too often valued over faithfulness; numbers were too easily valued over transformation of lives; and contentment with people “just like us” was valued over the challenge Scott Anderson offered Thursday night – to not just tolerate but to seek out and empathize with those who are different than we are, embracing our differences.  In those days, we didn’t have to leave the safety and security of our church buildings.

Heck, we kind of liked that time. We may not want to go back to slavery, but the barbecue was pretty good.

So we have been liberated from things we’re not so sure were all that bad; liberated from the church many of us grew up in and knew and loved every bit as much as Cindy Bolbach knows and loves FOG, and now, none of us are quite sure what to do with ourselves.

Like the Hebrews, we have been thrust, somewhat impoverished and stripped of authority, into a wilderness that is unfamiliar and terrifying. The Hebrews, confused by the place they found themselves, expressed their fear by turning on Moses and turning on each other.

I wonder how we’ll behave?

Well, I have one observation: the first day of this conference, in fact during our very first gathering of this motley crew of people who have worked long and hard to be freed from G-6.0106b, we noted voices of anger and frustration among us:

“Why aren’t we celebrating?”
“Why are we pandering to these people who have treated us so poorly, who are now trying to take off with our congregations and our property?”
“What about the others who are missing?”
“I’m not ready to talk about reconciliation!”
“What about marriage?”

“Where is our water?”
“Where is our food?”
“Where is our promised land????”

Now hear me out. I am NOT saying that any of those questions are inappropriate. I’m not critiquing the content. I’m sensing that – as Linda Lader said in the plenary this morning  – “the issue isn’t the issue,” you know what I mean?

Here’s the issue: We’ve won our freedom and inherited a church that is falling apart at the seams.

Oh joy. Oh bliss. Oh sublime ecstasy.
Do you see? Sometimes liberation sucks.
It’s just not what we thought it would be.

And we take our disappointment out on each other.

We’re not the first to find ourselves in this place. In 1989, Romania’s President Nicolae Ceausescu, was executed. As we’ve seen in more recent developments in other countries, suddenly no one was in charge, and the country was in turmoil. Western reporters found someone to interview who could speak English, and she said, “We have freedom, but we don’t know what to do with it.”[ii]

It was to people like us, like the Romanians: the Hebrews – newly liberated, perhaps even begrudgingly liberated – that God gave a gift.  Do you remember what it was? Hint – it was given to the people through Moses – on Mt. Sinai – on tablets of stone?

Yes – God gave them the gift, the gift, mind you, of the law.   Didn’t think I was going there, did you?

Perry Yoder, a Mennonite and Old Testament scholar, writes that the gift of the “… law is necessary for liberation, because it is law that allows the liberated to become liberating. …In response to liberation, the law sketches out the way by which God’s people live liberation.”[iii]

Poet and author Wendell Berry adds that the 10 commandments tell us “what to do with our freedom”… They spell out “the responsibilities without which no one can be legitimately free, or free for very long.”[iv]  They are a gift. A gift of grace.

In her sermon last night, Mary McClintock-Fulkerson reminded us that Jesus summed up the commandments with two rules: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind,” and “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Well, I don’t mean to one-up Mary OR Jesus, but I think I can name that tune in just one commandment: “You shall have no other gods before me.”

We can’t move from being a liberated people to a liberating people if we are following other gods.

And we are all following other gods. We just are. We humans do that.

This commandment reminds us that only God can and should take all our best energies; God should be, as Tillich would say, our “ultimate concern.” …because the truth is that only God frees us and sustains us in that freedom. Only God does that. No other gods live up to that.

Yoder claims that the first commandment is “number one” because if we are able to avoid the temptation of all the other gods clamoring for our attention, it actually becomes easier to keep the other commandments. For example:

• “It is good for my neighbor for me not to make money or power my god;  it is good for my neighbor for me to make the gracious, forgiving God of liberation my God;”[v]
• If I honor no other gods, I have no reason to steal or lie or covet or commit adultery.
• I will not kill my neighbor, not just because my neighbor wouldn’t like it, but because God is the giver of my neighbor’s life.” And I wouldn’t think of destroying God’s creation – either human beings or the environment.

So who is our god at this time?

In this wilderness time – and if we stay true to our history, we are in the wilderness for much longer than we expect – much longer than we’d like; in this wilderness time when tensions are high and freedom is very new; in this wilderness time when it takes incredible commitment and hard work to sustain that freedom for ourselves and for others; perhaps we’d best concentrate on and discipline ourselves to obey the law that was God’s gift to the newly liberated everywhere.

How might we do that? Well, there are many questions we could ask to detect our personal gods, but I’m thinking about “we,” “us.” How might we, in the context of our continuing work as part of the Covenant Network gang, how might we detect the gods that we are in danger of swapping for GOD?

Perhaps we could ask, as we engage in every conversation, in every action, decision, or statement: “Who is my god, who is our god now? In this moment?”

Is our god the church as it once was?
Is our god success? Is it power?
Is my god personal status in this denomination?
Is it winning?
Is it being able to tell my grandchildren that I was actively a part of this generation’s civil rights movement?

If we want to be a community that is not only liberated, but is also a joyful liberating force, we must be brave enough to examine our hearts to discover what and who our actual gods might be.

In addition, by ruthlessly repeating the question, “Who is my god NOW?” we have a better shot at living the four reformed virtues that James Calvin Davis named Thursday afternoon:

• humility (because I will become better at admitting that there is a God – and it’s not me),
• patience (because I will begin to trust that all things are in God’s sovereign care, I will take the time that is necessary to discern God’s plan),
• kinship – (because humanity is created in the image of the God who is my God, I will view and treat even those with whom I deeply disagree as worthy of respect), and
• forbearance – (I will accept that the physical church will always be a weedy garden – but it’s God’s garden, not mine.)

If along the way, we can practice being aware of and honest about who and what our gods are, when we look in the mirror, we will see in our reflection traces of our Egyptian genes.

When we admit the possibility that we are of mixed heritage, that as much as we long to be faithful, we are all too often guilty of aligning ourselves with the armies of this world that cling to power and pleasure and lust and wealth and our ease at the expense of the rest of the world and at the expense of each other, perhaps then we will see how our wheels are becoming mired in the mud of the Red Sea – how our chariots are breaking apart and we are drowning.

And with that honest look at ourselves, perhaps we can try singing that song again.

Check out the last verse:

In saving waters we sink like a stone, To God be praise and glory!
From death into living we each must go alone, To God be praise and glory.
But stand in the light of this great family, To God be praise and glory.
God’s love will unite us and make us all free. To God be praise and glory. I am free!

Perhaps the refrain of that song should be sung in this way: “I will sing to the Lord, triumphant  is he: my horse and chariot he cast into the sea!”

If we can be courageous enough to observe the ways we rush into the waters of the Red Sea on our Egyptian horses and in our Egyptian chariots, we will find ourselves rescued from the chaos of what really are baptismal waters. When we realize that, we will be able to step up on to dry land as liberated, yet drenched Hebrews in bright white robes.

God will save us from ourselves. And then we will have something to cheer about!

At the beginning of the new year, General Assembly Moderator Cindy Bolbach and Vice-Moderator Landon Whitsitt hosted six other ruling and teaching elders for a conversation about their hopes for the Presbyterian Church (USA).

Please find their letter to the church and summary videos and respond to their invitation to add your own voice to the conversation.  According to Vice-Moderator Whitsitt, “We’re most interested in what you have to say…  Tell the church where you see God working.”

Reforming the Ties that Bind:
Theological Virtues for Living Together in Difference

Plenary Address from the 2011 Conference,
Excerpted and Edited,  by James Calvin Davis, Middlebury College

Several years ago in our denomination, a task force was charged with thinking intentionally about our simultaneous responsibilities to the peace, unity, and purity of the church, in the face of intense theological disagreement, most notably over the issue of ordaining gay and lesbian candidates for ordination. This year, with the passage of 10-A, there are many Presbyterians who are again concerned with negotiating the balance of the denomination’s peace and unity with a duty to its purity.

To be sure, emphasizing the purity of the church is a biblical and Reformed priority. Both Scripture and our theological tradition suggest that it is a duty of the church in the world to reflect, to the best of its abilities, right belief and living. The First Letter to the Thessalonians reminds us, “For God did not call us to impurity but in holiness” (4:7). Similarly, Paul urged the Philippians, “Beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (Philippians 4:8).

The priority on purity is a reflection of our Reformed heritage. The Scots Confession, for instance, emphasizes the faithfulness of the Kirk as a prominent theme. It adds discipline to the two marks of the church Calvin himself identified, thereby drawing attention to that consistent theme in the Confession, that purity of doctrine and practice is a duty and trait of the faithful church.

Obviously in this latest round of debates over ordination that resulted in the passage of 10-A, Presbyterians on both sides of the issue claim that they are the defenders of the church’s purity, and that the other side tragically misrepresents the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Both sides of this debate can and have asserted that to stay in fellowship with their opponents puts at risk the integrity of the Gospel for which the PCUSA stands. These days more conservative congregations and clergy lament that they cannot stay in a church in which ordination is so understood and practiced, while some more liberal congregations and clergy may secretly or openly wish them to make good on their threat to leave. Each side argues that they are prosecuting the mandate of the Scots Confession, to repress vice and nourish virtue, by wishing for a fellowship devoid of the opposing view.

Virtues for Living Together

But I want to sketch out a theology, rooted in Reformed sources and principles, for living together with our difference. We cannot pretend that Presbyterians do not remain deeply divided on this and other issues. We cannot simply wish away the strength of genuine Christian conviction on one side or the other. But I want to claim that there is a mandate in our tradition for staying together, even with our difference, and there are theological resources in the Reformed tradition for guiding what living together in difference might look like, that don’t come at the expense of a commitment to pure witness to the Gospel.

Among the Reformed virtues that compel us to stay together in our difference, the chief virtue among them is humility. Humility is a Reformed virtue because it falls out of a Calvinist anthropology, a theological understanding of what it means to be human. What it means to be human is to be created as a masterpiece of God’s wisdom and benevolence, but created nonetheless, with all of the limitations that come from being creatures and not God. What it means to be human is to be created as a reflection of God’s goodness, only to have marred that reflection through pride and disobedience, relegating ourselves to a perpetual condition in which we turn from the good in favor of inordinate self-interest. As Christians, we call that read on the human condition “original sin.”

Sin aggravates the restrictions that naturally come from our finitude and limits the confidence we can have in our knowledge of what is good and right. Even for the Christian who enjoys the advantage of grace and the guidance of Scripture, the effects of sin remain, so that it is easy to overestimate the confidence with which we understand God’s intentions for us and the world.

So a Calvinist anthropology dictates that humility be a part of our character. And a theological commitment to humility requires that we make a habit of regularly admitting the limits to our own understanding. Humility urges each of us to admit that we could be wrong in matters small and significant. You could be wrong, or I could be wrong, but in the meantime we live together and struggle together in our shared commitment to Christ, muddling through our understanding of what that obligates us to be and do in this world.

This acknowledgement of our limitations encourages our second virtue, patience. A Reformed commitment to the virtue of patience is rooted both in our humble admission that our opponent may be more in the right than we are, but also in a Calvinist affirmation of the sovereignty of God. If a Reformed Christian anthropology convinces us that we cannot be overly assured that we understand God’s wishes more properly than someone else, Reformed theology also assures us that God is the final arbiter of truth and that God will make the right and the good known at the end of human history. Until that time, we pursue the truth, but our tradition also commends a certain amount of patience with the slow pace of human understanding, with the mysteries of God, and with the dissenting views of others. “But we appeal to you, brothers and sisters… Be at peace among yourselves. And we urge you, beloved, to admonish the idlers, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak, be patient with all of them” (1 Thessalonians 5:13-14, NSRV).

The exercise of patience toward our fellow Christians as we wallow through our shared finitude and truncated knowledge is itself a reflection of the third virtue essential for living together in disagreement, mutual respect. Respect for other human beings is an important corollary to the doctrines of creation and grace. In the face of extreme differences, in the presence of deep disagreements, we nonetheless show respect for one another out of respect for the imago dei and in imitation of the grace God extends to each of us.

And if God’s creative benevolence and gratuitous grace demand that we respect one another as human beings, how much more should we convey respect, kinship even, for one another within the church? Perhaps that’s the term we should use for this virtue, kinship, for the regard it implies is more than a generic deference. It is an investment in the well being of the other, even the other who stands for substantially the opposite of what you think is right for the church. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12, NSRV). The commandment isn’t to love those members of Christ’s community who substantially agree with you on important issues, with an escape clause for one’s theological opponents. The commandment doesn’t ask us to love those who are most like us, and abandon those who aren’t. We are commanded to love one another, as Christ has loved each one of us. Period. In that love commandment, as much as in the reflection of imago dei, lies the imperative for us to bind ourselves to one another in Christian kinship, even in the face of important disagreements.

Because we find ourselves extending respect to folks with whom we continue to disagree, a fourth virtue important to our living together as a community of faith is Christian forbearance. Forbearance means to delay a negative reaction to another’s action, inaction, or presence, to tolerate or indulge another. In light of what we have said about the claims of Calvinist anthropology, theology, and a doctrine of grace, it seems appropriate that Reformed virtue requires a certain willingness to tolerate those who claim to share our allegiance with Jesus Christ but understand the implications of that allegiance in very different ways.

Christian forbearance acknowledges that in our quest to protect the unity of the church, we may find ourselves sharing fellowship with sisters and brothers whom we believe hold incorrect convictions on important matters of faith and morals. But the discovery of that disagreement should not automatically lead to a break in our fellowship. Instead, there is a place for Christian forbearance, for tolerating the disagreement and what we personally consider error in the church. This commendation of forbearance is not just a reflection of our realistic theological anthropology. It is also a reflection of our ecclesiology, for the Reformed tradition has always acknowledged a distinction between the perfection of the invisible church and the muddiness of the visible. The visible church will always be a mixture of wheat and tares, right thinking and misguided theology, and Jesus specifically commands us not to rip out the weeds (or separate ourselves from them) at risk of endangering the garden itself.

When I’m not talking about civility, I study Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island and America’s first voice for religious freedom. Interestingly, what got Williams booted from Puritan Massachusetts was not primarily his insistence on separation of church and state. It was his ecclesiology. The Puritans had come to the New World to construct a holy society as a beacon of righteousness to the world. But most of them had no intention of renouncing the Church of England. Instead, they meant to reform the church from within. But Williams believed that in order to maintain the purity of the church Puritan congregations had to explicitly denounce the Church of England. For Williams, the Puritans were not real Christians as long as they shared fellowship with the sin-laden Church of England.

John Cotton, a religious leader in Massachusetts, insisted that Williams subscribed to bad ecclesiology. Cotton pointed to Jesus’ parable of the wheat and tares and charged Williams with threatening the unity of God’s church. He wrote to Williams, “the failings of the Churches (if any be found) are not forthwith to be healed by separation. It is not surgery, but butchery, to heal every sore in a member with no other medicine but abscission from the body.”*

Cotton insisted that theologically it was a more faithful balance of concern for purity and concern for unity to work for the reform of the church from within, rather than breaking the church apart. “The way of separation is not a way that God hath prospered,” he wrote. To this thoroughly Reformed Puritan, the visible church was always a weedy garden that needs to be carefully tended, not torn apart.

Life Together in Disagreement

Nothing I’ve said so far requires that we abandon the pursuit of truth in our commitment to live together. Civility requires respectful dialogue, but respectful dialogue can include respectful disagreement. It allows room for us to say to one another, “I think I’m right, and I think you’re wrong,” as long as that sentiment is followed up by another. “I think I’m right and that you’re wrong, but I love you as a Christian sister or brother, and I do not question your place next to mine at the Table of Christ.”

Living together in disagreement does not require us to abandon the pursuit of righteous truth. How can we abandon the pursuit of truth? It is our mission as the Body of Christ in the world! The preservation of the truth is one of the Great Ends of the Church! How can we abandon such an awesome responsibility! We can pursue, defend, and debate truth. We should discuss, study, and pray together. We should challenge one another to defend our convictions in the light of Scripture and the wonderfully complex tradition of Christian witness. We should confront one another when we perceive distance between our convictions and the words and pattern of our Lord Jesus.

But in order to discharge that responsibility without abandoning our obligation to the unity of Christ’s Church, we must find ways to pursue the truth in debate and disagreement that are respectful, patient, humble, and peaceful. We must find ways to live together in disagreement, dogged in our pursuit of what is right while bound together in grace and love.

Now we descendents of Calvin must admit that respectful disagreement is not necessarily what we’re known for. Calvinism doesn’t exactly enjoy a reputation for patience and tolerance in the popular imagination. But we know better, don’t we? We know that ours is a complex and complicated tradition, one in which diversity of theological understanding has been a consistent characteristic. Despite the simplistic depiction of our tradition in American public culture (and in some churches), there is more to Calvinism than witch hangings and five-point litmus tests. The great minds of Reformed Christianity commended humility, patience, respect, and forbearance as theological virtues of deep importance. And when we take those theological values together, they give shape to an imperative for living together in unity and peace, despite and even because of our disagreement. Those who really know this tradition understand that the virtues of civility are as Calvinist as the intolerance for which we are sadly better known.

Because we know this, we are well positioned to own those virtues in our own congregations, and in our denomination, and then to offer them to the world as a gift of grace and a template for living. In other words, if we Presbyterians figure out some way to live virtuously in disagreement among ourselves, perhaps we then can extend that ministry of reconciliation to the world. To do so, I would suggest, is to position ourselves to fulfill one of the other Great Ends of the Church, to exhibit the Kingdom of God.

*The Correspondence of John Cotton (University of North Carolina Press, 2001), 220.

Rev. Scott Anderson preached to a packed sanctuary at the opening worship service of the national Covenant Network conference in Durham.  His message is a gift to the denomination, offering a challenge to all who seek to embody the radical hospitality of Jesus.

As sessions and presbyteries begin to implement the revised Form of Government, including the substitution of G-2.0104b for the obsolete G-6.0106b, the Covenant Network of Presbyterians offers an updated edition of its resource Guidelines for Examination of Church Officers.

From the Introduction:

Examination is a good and faithful practice that contributes to the health and vitality of the church.  It helps to ensure that our officers are well prepared for leadership.  At the same time, it is a wonderful opportunity to affirm the importance of our calling and service; to share the faith and build up the church as we celebrate each other’s journey in it; to acknowledge with gratitude the gifts of those who were elected, and those who are completing periods of service; and to affirm our vital connection as part of the PC(USA).

This paper reviews some of the basic principles that guide our examination of persons who have been elected to office – both when examination is easy and joyful and, on occasion, when it raises more difficult questions that we struggle with in the church.

The pdf file is available here.

The Covenant Network of Presbyterians has had two primary goals since its founding in 1997:  to work for the removal of ordination barriers to the full participation of LGBT Presbyterians, and to support the mission and unity of the denomination.

With the recent passage of Amendment 10-A, now G-2.0104b, our founding mission has been greatly advanced.  How the denomination lives into this new reality now demands a renewed commitment to advocate for those LGBT Presbyterians who seek ordination as ruling and teaching elders and deacons.

Given that there are many in the PC(USA) who are troubled by the change in ordination standards, the Board of Directors lifts up this effort mindful of its commitment to tend to the unity of the denomination.  In that spirit, the Board has decided not to support or encourage overtures to the 2012 General Assembly to change the constitutional language regarding marriage.  The Covenant Network will, however, encourage overtures seeking Authoritative Interpretation to protect pastoral discretion to celebrate same-gender marriages where they are sanctioned by the civil authorities.

In humble service to the One who we believe calls us toward a church as just and generous as God’s grace,

The Covenant Network Board of Directors,

David Van Dyke and Mary Lynn Tobin, Co- Moderators

By the Rev. Nancy Enderle

Much has been said and written about the ordination of Scott Anderson this past weekend at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Madison, Wisconsin.  I’m adding my reflections and observations about the day and the process that led up to it.

I served on the Committee on Preparation for Ministry for John Knox Presbytery, where Scott went through the process of inquiry and candidacy. As Scott worked with the committee it became clear he was an exceptional candidate for ministry.  His manner of life and expression of call was spiritually mature and theologically sound.  He demonstrated a thorough knowledge of Scripture and participated in the preparation for ministry process with an open mind and heart. The final CPM vote to recommend Scott to the Presbytery as ready to receive a call was unanimous.  As the chair of the committee I’m biased, but I think our work was thorough and transparent.  We aimed to be consistent with the process we followed for all the candidates under care, but were mindful of the importance of the need for transparency and communicating our process with the broader Presbytery and the national office.

The ordination service Scott planned was inspirational.  From the gathering music to the closing benediction, the spirit in the sanctuary reflected the joy and blessing felt by the congregation. Dr. Mark Achtemeier delivered a powerful sermon that he has shared on the Covenant Network web site.  He emphasized the power of God’s word that has moved God’s family toward new visions of faithfulness in the past, and continues to lead us today.  Mark also addressed the important message of welcome to GLBT Presbyterians and the general public that Scott’s ordination sends: “I also believe God will use your ministry, Scott, as a life-giving spring of water for sustaining weary exiles who have been alienated from the church of Jesus Christ and are seeking a way back home.”

The moment of the laying on of hands nearly emptied out the sanctuary of its 325 worshipers.  It was a powerful witness of support and connection, which was followed by an extended period of applause and even a few shouts.

There was a particularly meaningful moment in the service when Scott was presented with his pulpit robe and hood by his long-time friend and former colleague in ministry the Reverend Jim Zazzera from California.  David Lohman, from the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in Minnesota, then returned the stole Scott had given to The Shower of Stoles Project.  According to Mr. Lohman, Scott’s stole was among the first added to the collection which now numbers over 1,000 stoles and other sacred items representing the lives of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people of faith.  Scott’s is the first stole to be returned to someone who had donated it to the project.

It was joyful and poignant to see Scott vested in the robe and stole he wore in his previous call, and to see the five stoles that were displayed on the communion table with the names of the individuals who donated them to the project.  One of the stoles placed directly in front of me had the name of a dear friend who couldn’t attend the service due to a hospitalization.  The stole I was wearing was given to me by the partner of a close friend who died before he could see the day when the PC(USA) ordained an openly partnered gay man.

Both the charge to Scott and the congregation were focused on those things which are present in all ordinations:  an individual and a calling organization.  The charge to Scott was given by me, and focused on the blessings from God that support us in our service to Christ’s church.  Peg Chemberlin, President of the National Council of Churches, gave the charge to the Wisconsin Council of Churches (WCC) where Scott will continue to serve as Executive Director.  The Reverend Chemberlin reminded the WCC to share fully in the work of ecumenism and to keep the blessing of Christian fellowship present in their work.

Scott’s closing remarks focused on his gratitude to everyone who walked along side of him during this long journey, particularly his partner Ian.  It was uplifting to have his benediction rest upon us as we left.  And I, for one, will count this day among the richest in my ministry and life.

Eminent South African Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, has written Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons in support of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s recent change in ordination standards:

23 September 2011

The Rev. Gradye Parsons
Stated Clerk
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
100 Witherspoon Street
Louisville KY 40202-1396

Dear Brother in Christ,

I am writing you with the request that you share these thoughts with my brothers and sisters in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.):

It is incumbent upon all of God’s children to speak out against injustice.  It is sometimes equally important to speak in solidarity when justice has been done.   For that reason I am writing to affirm my belief that in making room in your constitution for gay and lesbian Christians to be ordained as church leaders, you have accomplished an act of justice.

I realize that among your ecumenical partners, some voices are claiming that you have done the wrong thing, and I know that you rightly value your relationship with Christians in other parts of the world.  Sadly, it is not always popular to do justice, but it is always right.  People will say that the ones you are now willing to ordain are sinners.  I have come to believe, through the reality shared with me by my scientist and medical friends, and confirmed to me by many who are gay, that being gay is not a choice.  Like skin color or left-handedness, sexual orientation is just another feature of our diversity as a human family.  How wonderful that God has made us with so much diversity, yet all in God’s image!  Salvation means being called out of our narrow bonds into a broad place of welcome to all.

You are undoubtedly aware that in some countries the church has been complicit in the legal persecution of lesbians and gays.  Individuals are being arrested and jailed simply because they are different in one respect from the majority.  By making it possible for those in same-gender relationships to be ordained as pastors, preachers, elders, and  deacons, you are being a witness to your ecumenical partners that you believe in the wideness of God’s merciful love.

For freedom Christ has set us free.  In Christ we are not bound by old, narrow prejudice, but free to embrace the full humanity of our brothers and sisters in all our glorious differences.  May God bless you as you live into this reality, and may you know that there are many Christians in the world who continue to stand by your side.

God bless you.

Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu (Cape Town, South Africa)

by Dr. Mark Achtemeier

 Isaiah 49:8-13
Hebrews 4:12-13

Covenant Presbyterian Church
Madison, Wisconsin

October 8, 2011

We are gathered here today to ordain a wonderfully gifted Christian man to the ministry of the Word and Sacrament. Scott’s steadfast faith and pastor’s heart and devotion to Christ and the church have been a source of personal inspiration for me and many others. I give thanks to God, Scott, that your gifts will now be fully available to the Presbyterian Church, and to John Knox Presbytery, and to all the individuals whose lives will be touched by your ministry. This is indeed a joyous occasion.

Many of us wondered if this day would ever get here, and what a blessing it is to be witnesses of its coming! Many of you have worked and prayed diligently to make this day a reality. But lest we think this is all about us, I think it important to take a step back and reflect on what God is doing in and through this happy occasion.

Indeed the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.^[1]

From the very beginning of its existence, the church has borne witness to holy occasions when the Word of God blazed to life, judging the thoughts and intentions of many hearts, overturning established assumptions, bringing light and life where formerly only darkness reigned.

In the earliest days of Christianity, the Word and Spirit of God kindled a fire in the hearts of Jesus’ followers about the despised and unclean Gentiles. Standing apart from biblical law and condemned by it, these Gentile outsiders were so unclean that Jesus’ followers wouldn’t even eat with them. But God’s Word and Spirit helped the church see these despised outsiders as beloved children of God. The result was a new reading of Scripture, and the joyous movement of a reviled and ostracized people into the fellowship of Christ’s body the church. The Word of God is powerful!

In the late Middle Ages God’s Word blazed to life in the heart of a troubled monk named Martin Luther. The result was a new reading of Scripture and the release of millions of anguished souls from a thousand-year captivity to guilt and fear and condemnation into the clear light of God’s grace and mercy in Christ. The Word of God is powerful!

In the history of our own nation, the Word of God blazed forth in the hearts of abolitionists and prophets and reformers. The result was a new reading of Scripture and captives emerging from bondage, former slaves set out on the long road toward freedom and dignity and equality. “The Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword!”

Such revolutions are not the product of human devising. At the height of the Reformation a friend of Martin Luther’s found him sitting idly one day over a drink. ‘Dr. Luther,’ said the friend, ‘look at everything that’s happening, look at the crisis that’s upon us. Don’t you think you should be working?’ Luther sat back in his chair, looked at his mug, and said, “Here as I drink my little glass of Wittenberg beer, the Gospel runs its course!”^[2]

The Gospel runs its course. What a remarkable privilege to be living in a time when once again the Word of God has come to life as good news for the broken-hearted! The Holy Spirit is abroad, blowing across the landscape of our established convictions and setting many hearts ablaze.

These changes are supported by the work of many scholars, but their origin is not the scholar’s study. How many of the changes leading to this day have been Damascus road events, holy occasions when ordinary life and ordinary assumptions are caught up short as the Risen Christ begins to speak. .

The Spirit moves and hearts are changed. And when that happens we are able to go back to the Scriptures and see all those things we missed earlier. We employ all the classical guidelines for interpreting Scripture: We read the Bible in its historical context. We interpret Scripture by Scripture. We follow the Rule of Faith and let the fullness of the Gospel illumine individual passages. Following Calvin we interpret biblical Law according to the purposes of the Lawgiver. Joining with the ancient church we read every text in accordance with the Rule of Love.

When read the Bible as our tradition has taught us, we have found God’s Word blazing to life and all these paths converging on the gracious conclusions that bring us here today. Jesus tells us that when we interpret the Bible rightly, we shouldn’t expect to come away bearing only the old understandings: “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”^[3]

This new treasure we have found in the Scripture seems so obvious to many of us, but we have to remember it is not obvious to all. There is nothing unusual about this. Almost always when the living Word has blazed to life there has been conflict and heated opposition. Almost always there have been committed Christians defending the status quo based on long established readings of Scripture. In the wisdom of God, change does not come quickly or unanimously. And so in our own time, Christ grants us an important opportunity to the bear witness to his love which binds us together even in the midst of our disagreements.

For that reason we must all be very patient, and very respectful, and very gentle with our sisters and brothers who take a different view of this day than we do. They, like we, confess the Lordship of Christ. They, like we, fervently desire to follow Jesus in obedience to the Scriptures. For a time, in the mysterious providence of God, we are finding something very different in the Bible from what our neighbors find there. It is a distressing and puzzling situation, but far from unusual. And it gives us opportunity to testify that the faith we hold in common is vibrant enough and faithful enough to sustain our fellowship until that joyful day when all our differences are overcome  in Christ.

Until that day arrives, however, let us be mindful of the particular role that Scott and we have been granted to play in God’s plan. Our passage from Isaiah today describes what happens when the Word of God goes out to do its work. The result is release for the captives, hope for the outcast. Isaiah paints a moving portrait of one such occasion when the Word of God has done its work. He speaks of newly liberated exiles setting out on the long and difficult journey that leads toward home, toward grace, toward blessing. It is a slow and arduous trek across a barren wilderness, but they do not journey alone:

They shall feed along the ways, on all the bare heights shall be their pasture; they shall not hunger or thirst, neither scorching wind nor sun shall strike them down, for he who has pity on them will lead them, and by springs of water will guide them.^[4]

I think this passage provides a fitting picture of the hope and promise contained in this day. I believe God will use the life of John Knox Presbytery as a spring of clear water, a source of renewal and refreshment for a tired and weary Presbyterian denomination that is struggling to find its way through a wilderness of rapid change.

Scott has led the way with this, going out of his way time and again to forge bonds of respect and caring and understanding across the lines of separation and disagreement. Other people have responded in kind, so that with rare exceptions, the life of this presbytery has been marked by kindness, mutual respect and forbearance grounded in the love of Christ. This little group of Jesus’ followers provides compelling testimony to a grace of God that is powerful and life-giving even in the midst of deep disagreement.

I also believe God will use your ministry, Scott, as a life-giving spring of water for sustaining weary exiles who have been alienated from the church of Jesus Christ and are seeking a way back home.

I recently read an essay by a woman named Chely Wright, a Kansas farm girl and a country music singer. She writes about being a gay person growing up in the church, calling to mind third grade kickball games where the kids would pick up sides before playing. Inevitably there would be that one awkward, uncoordinated kid who always got picked last or not at all. “[E]ventually,” she writes, “that kid would stop hoping to be chosen for either team…”

And eventually that kid would probably develop an aversion, perhaps even a life-long, deep loathing for the game of kickball. It’s a protective mechanism that humans employ to preserve the most tender parts of their psyche. That’s what it feels like for an LGBT kid in a place of worship.  That kid is repeatedly given the message that he or she will never, ever fit in and be acceptable to God or to the congregation.^[5]

Chely Wright was pointing a loaded gun into her mouth when God spoke to her over and above what the church was saying. That Word from God touched her heart and started her on a long journey toward wholeness. Today she writes, “It is my deep belief that someday I will meet my maker and I will be asked who I am and what I did for others. Everyday, I am working hard, preparing my answer to be, ‘I am a gay, Christian, farm girl from Kansas who sang Country Music and I did the very best I could do — to know God and to share God.’”^[6]

Scott as we gather here today, you and I both know there are thousands upon thousands of Chely Wrights out there, beloved children of God who have been ostracized and alienated from the faith. They have learned through bitter experience to associate the name of Jesus with hostility and rejection and condemnation.

I rejoice in the sure hope that your gifts and your ministry will nurture and strengthen many people in the faith. But I am especially hopeful that your ministry will bring healing good news to all the Chely Wrights who have been rejected and alienated from the Christian faith. What we do here today won’t solve the problem. But I pray your ministry may at the very least provide a spring of water in the wilderness for sustaining and refreshing those weary exiles on the long journey back to the God who loves them.

I sometimes wonder if there really is hope for many such journeys to take place. There is a passage in Isaiah just after the one we read today where the exiles are wondering the same thing. “My Lord has forgotten me,” they say.^[7]  Their alienation seems too hopeless, their darkness too deep, for these dreams of restoration to have any meaning for them.

God’s response is powerful. I was with a person the other day who needed to remember a phone number, and while I was searching my pockets for a scrap of paper he simply wrote the number on the palm of his hand. It’s a messy but effective system these hand-note-takers have.

Well God’s response to the exiles who have lost hope is to show them his hands: “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands,”^[8] he says. God has not forgotten these alienated children. There, written on God’s hands are the names of every anguished soul, every broken spirit.

Scott I rejoice that today we ordain you to the ministry of the Word, and I am confident that you will both proclaim and embody the deep love which that Word conveys for all of God’s exiled and brokenhearted children. You will not always see immediate results, but that loving, powerful Word of God will not return empty. It will accomplish the purpose for which God sends it. Good new will come to all the exiled souls.

They shall feed along the ways, on all the bare heights shall be their pasture; they shall not hunger or thirst, neither scorching wind nor sun shall strike them down, for he who has pity will lead them, and by springs of water will guide them.

May God make your ministry a spring of life-giving water, Scott!

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Dr. Mark Achtemeier has served the Presbyterian Church since 1984 as a minister,
author, speaker and theology professor.
He may be contacted at  mark.achtemeier@gmail.com.

The Covenant Network of Presbyterians rejoices in the decision of the Synod of the Pacific Permanent Judicial Commission (SPJC) moving Candidate Lisa Larges one step closer to ordination as a teaching elder.

The SPJC ruled this week that the Presbytery of San Francisco’s approval of Ms. Larges for ordination “is constitutionally valid.”

Ms. Larges’ first trip through Presbyterian judicial process was in the early 1990′s; despite a rebuff based on the old “definitive guidance” (before G-6.0106b), she has remained under care, insisting on calling the PC(USA) to follow its own best principles.

The 2006 General Assembly approved the recommendations of the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity, and Purity of the Church highlighting the ability of a presbytery to approve a candidate for ordination with a departure.  The Presbytery of San Francisco, accepting her Statement of Departure from G-6.0106b, has voted twice to move Ms. Larges toward ordination.  Each time, dissenters have filed remedial cases objecting to the presbytery’s decision.

In in latest case, Parnell et al. v. Presbytery of San Francisco, the Synod of the Pacific PJC had upheld the presbytery’s vote to approve Ms. Larges’ ordination.  The General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission, meeting in late July to consider the appeal of that decision, did not sustain most of the specifications of error (i.e., affirming the SPJC), but remanded the case to the SPJC to rule “on the Appellants’ contention that Scripture and the Confessions prohibit certain sexual behavior.”

Citing the reality that there is wide disagreement about the interpretation of Scripture when it comes to same-sex relationships, the SPJC has now ruled ”that Presbytery’s decision to ordain the candidate was neither doctrinal error nor an abuse of its discretion.”

The GAPJC had suggested that the SPJC might instruct the presbytery to re-examine Ms. Larges under the newly-approved expression of our ordination standard, G-2.0104b, but the SPJC unanimously declined to require that step.

The complainants in Parnell have 45 days to appeal the SPJC decision.

Three dissenters on the SPJC, while acknowledging that testimony demonstrated differing interpretations of Scripture among Presbyterians, nevertheless wanted to choose one interpretation and impose it on the whole church — substituting their judgment for that of the presbytery.  According to their dissent, anyone who does not accept their conclusion that Scripture and the confessions condemn all same-gender practice is incapable of responding in the affirmative to all the ordination promises.  Such a position would disqualify thousands of Presbyterians from serving in ordered ministry.

In addition to our gratitude to Ms. Larges for her faithful persistence and forbearance, we are indebted to the Covenant Network’s recently-retired Executive Director, Pam Byers, who serves on the Committee of Counsel for the Presbytery of San Francisco, and to CovNet Director Doug Nave, who has represented the presbytery pro bono by writing numerous briefs and arguing their case at multiple hearings.

We hope and pray that it won’t be necessary through the church courts — but the Covenant Network will continue to support councils and individuals in the quest to
ordain those whom God is calling to serve.