My Little Investigation Into The PCA's RUM

For the past few months, there have been some disgruntled voices concerning the Mississippi Joint Committee on Campus Work (MJCCW). MJCCW is a committee set up by Covenant, Grace, and Mississippi Valley Presbyteries to oversee the RUF works within their bounds. Now, I’m not going to get into the nitty-gritty of what has happened within these presbyteries and concerning MJCCW, but as a member of Mississippi Valley Presbytery (MVP), I am concerned about what is and has gone on in the past months. So, following our February Stated Meeting, I decided to investigate some things (via the RUM offices in Atlanta), and I came to a few conclusions. Please note that these are not necessarily the thoughts or actions of MVP. I am saying these things as an individual.

First, here are some things I found out that I didn’t know before and that you may not have known before:

1. How are RUF ministries started and funded? Your typical RUF is started when a Presbytery decides they want an RUF at a particular college or university. The Presbytery puts funds aside for that ministry to start. Presumably, churches within that Presbytery give as well. After about 40% of the funds are raised, they are ready to hire an RUF minister. After the man is hired, he reaches out to his network (individuals and churches) seeking help financially for his salary and ministry expenses.
2. Does an RUF ministry have to have all the funds determined by a set budget to start? No. It is understandable that in the first year or so it will be more difficult to get off the ground, and the RUM offices in Atlanta help in such cases. However, the need should drop as time goes on and as alumni are able to give. That is another source of raising finances: alumni.
3. If an RUF minister is directly affiliated with RUM in Atlanta and not under the oversight of Presbytery groups like MJCCW, are there administrative costs that he has to pay to RUM Atlanta? Yes. Each RUF minister has to give $800 per month out of their ministry expenses (not salary) to RUM Atlanta. What is the $800/month ($9600/yr) used for? Of the $800, $600 is used for administration costs like audits, keeping books, etc., and the other $200 goes to RUM Atlanta.

I thought this was a steep number for the average RUF ministry, so I asked if men struggle keeping the ministry going financially. Some do, but there are procedures in place to focus more time and effort on fundraising, if there are difficulties. I also asked how many RUF ministries had ceased to exist or closed down due to finances. I was told that four had, though three of those are back up and running again. The other one, Marshall University, is still closed.

Second, I have some questions on the ‘best’ way to do the work of campus ministry (financially and governmentally).

1. Does it make more sense for the Presbytery or General Assembly to be overseeing campus ministries? I guess I should clarify that each RUF minister is still under the oversight of a Presbytery, but I guess this is a question, “Does RUM Atlanta have a hand in everything or anything?” If the Presbytery has oversight, then why do funds go to Atlanta? Why isn’t the Presbytery handling all the administration costs? Isn’t it their ministry, or is it RUM Atlanta’s?
2. What is the best way to fund RUF ministries?  Let’s first ask whether it is more appealing for a potential giver to give to RUM Atlanta, of which their gift goes to some far off college/university on the other side of the nation that they have never been to nor long to go, or for a potential giver to give to a local group (known as the Presbytery) who will give to colleges and universities you are familiar with? I’m from Illinois, so I will use my state as an example. Is it going to be more appealing to me to financially give to help start up an RUF ministry at the University of Illinois or to give to RUM Atlanta where it could go to, say, the University of Arizona? I love my people, don’t I? I love the Fighting Illini. Of course, I want to give locally. Of course, it is going to be easier to raise funds locally then nationally. So, my conclusion is that a Presbytery or Presbyteries joining together should decide how to start and fund RUF ministries within its or their bounds. Of course, in the PCA, most Presbyteries decide to go with RUM Atlanta. Yet, those with Presbyteries leading the way, like MJCCW, are able to start more RUF ministries because more funds are raised, and there are less expenses. Within three presbyteries, there are 13 RUF ministries including small colleges/universities like Delta State University, Rhodes College, Belhaven College, Mississippi College (a Baptist school), the University of Tennessee (Martin), and even community colleges: Holmes Community College and Hinds Community College. Can RUM Atlanta go after the small schools? I guess that is the Presbytery’s decision.

Missouri Presbytery Exonerates TE Jeffrey Meyers - Federal Vision

Here are two links to Wes White's blog where he describes Missouri Presbytery's TE Jeffrey Meyers having been exonerated on charges of holding to false teaching called the Federal Vision.

http://www.weswhite.net/2011/01/mo-presbytery-exonerates-federal-visionist-jeffrey-meyers-of-all-theological-errors/

http://www.weswhite.net/2011/01/mo-presbyterys-specific-exonerations-of-te-meyers/

How to Get Along With "TR's"

Let me say first that I don’t really like the term. The connotations of the term imply someone who doesn’t care about unity and love in the church. It also implies an arrogance that they are the only ones with any truth, and/or that they are the only people who can legitimately claim the term “Reformed” at all. All of those are untrue of confessional Presbyterians I know. I cannot judge whether they are true of me or not, though I can say that I really do not enjoy conflict, contrary to what many people might think.

However, what is often shouted at TR’s is that they are unloving, uncaring about church unity, and fanatical about doctrine, and denigrate love. What is rather amazing to me, however, is that many people do not care to find out about what makes a TR click. They do not feel that they need to take any steps to get along with TR’s. If any unity is going to happen, it can only happen if the TR abandons his convictions, they think. But what is really irritating is that the people who are yelling and screaming at the top of their lungs for love and unity aren’t showing very much love and unity in screaming and yelling for love and unity. I’ve lost count of the times this has happened to me. Raise a question of BCO procedure, and get shouted at for being unloving. It gets old. Fast.

What I would like to do is to help people understand what makes a TR click so that people can understand us. In this way, we might be able to get along better, even when we disagree.

Principle 1. Never, ever, ever ask a TR either explicitly or implicitly to abandon his principles. This is probably the single most unloving thing that anyone can do to a TR. The principles he holds are what he believes the Bible to be saying. Furthermore, asking a TR to do that will only make him that much more royally upset. Any attempt to force a TR to abandon his principles will make the TR think that the other person has abandoned truth.

Principle 2. Stop accusing the TR of being unloving. People do not know what is in someone else’s heart. It might be fair to say that a particular action seems unloving to you. That can be debated, certainly. But blanket statements about someone else’s motivations are never very helpful, and they are almost always inaccurate.

Principle 3. Focus attention on the issue when you disagree with a TR. Nothing irritates a TR more than having personalities dragged into it. The TR doesn’t want to dwell on these things. He is thinking about whether something is logical or not, whether something is biblical or not (and this is not to say that non-TR folk are not concerned about this). If I have any more thoughts about this, I’ll add to this and edit it.

PCA Proposed Strategic Plan: Is It Presbyterian?

If you remember, about a month ago I wrote an article for The Aquila Report and asked, "Is the proposed PCA Strategic Plan Biblical?"  William Schweitzer asks today whether it is Presbyterian or not.  Below is the article.  In parenthesis is a number corresponding to the page number of the proposed strategic plan.

Thoughts on The PCA Strategic Plan: Is It Presbyterian?

 

There are some attributes of a thing that can be altered without compromising its basic character. You could remove the stone cladding of Buckingham Palace to reveal the red brick underneath and it would still be Buckingham Palace. Yet if you painted the White House even a pale shade of yellow, you would make it something other than the White House. 

 

Likewise, the Pentecostals can officially place leadership in the hands of people other than ordained elders and they will still be Pentecostals. However, it is doubtful whether you can do that in the Presbyterian Church in America without making it something else. So we ask just this basic question of the PCA Strategic Plan: is it Presbyterian? 

 

The Presbyterian form of church government is very simple. In accordance with Scripture and the Westminster Standards, all leadership at every level is exercised collegially by ordained elders. Nothing more (special officers exercising greater authority than rank and file elders by virtue of some quasi-permanent office) and nothing less (those who are not elders exercising any authority at all beyond that of casting their congregational vote) can truly be called Presbyterian. The Strategic Plan, however, proposes several initiatives that seem to run counter to this beautiful simple, biblical polity. 

 

First, the plan enhances the power of the agency Coordinators and the Cooperative Ministries Committee (CMC). References to the CMC “identifying,” “suggesting,” “picking,” “forwarding,” “approving,” and “reviewing” are littered throughout the document. Clearly, the plan intends for the Coordinators and the CMC to exercise authority in the PCA in ways other than that of ordinary elders acting through the courts of the church. Now there is nothing novel in hierarchical leadership and bureaucratic structures.  However, these things are proper characteristics of Roman Catholicism and Episcopalianism, not Presbyterianism.

 

Secondly, the plan would like us to “establish standards for voluntary certification of men and women for specific non-ordained vocational ministries” in order to “endorse the importance of lay men’s and lay women’s gifts in non-ordained church ministry” and “Gain”/ “Protect” their “insights & contributions” (22). Yet the Bible knows nothing of “voluntary certification” for “non-ordained vocational ministry.” Certified vocational ministry means that one has been called to it by God and set aside to it by the church. If this is the case, then the person must meet the qualifications that are established in the Pastoral Epistles and be ordained. If they do not meet the biblical qualifications, then “voluntary certification” is either meaningless or it creates a parallel track that will subvert the meaning of true ordination.

 

Third, the Strategic Plan wants to create more “seats at the table” for women (17). Indeed, one of our “resources/strengths” is listed as “Theological Respect for PCA in Broader Evangelicalism” with this minor exception: “except for actual position on women…” (16). That negative perception in the eyes of broader (more liberal) evangelicalism would not be a problem, unless one of our stated objectives is to acquire “Significant PCA Representation in Leadership of Major Evangelical Organizations” (16). Of course no one intends to ordain women in order to achieve this. But what does creating “seats at the table” mean? That women can advise elders on an informal basis? They can already do that. Or does it mean some official role in church leadership? That is what ordained elders do, and allowing women to teach or exercise authority over men is precisely what Paul specifically prohibits (1 Tim 2:12). 

 

Giving people a “voice” or a “seat at the table” is fundamentally about power. If it would not make any difference at all to give these non-ordained people voice and seat, why do it? No, of course it will make a difference. Outcomes will be changed. If nothing else, there will be a real shift of authority in the church to those who are not biblically qualified and rightly ordained elders. One must therefore question in what sense the proposed Strategic Plan can be considered Presbyterian, much less a blueprint for a better PCA.

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William M. Schweitzer is a MTW Church Planting Minister in Gateshead, England