Presbyterian Distinctives (4): The Church and its Structures
- Rev Norman Cameron

INTRO

Over past weeks we have been looking at what makes the Presbyterian church distinctive in its beliefs and practices. Much of what we believe is also believed by the rest of the christian church especially as regards the essentials of the gospel. In many cases when we talk about Presbyterian distinctives we are talking about doctrines that we emphasise; the differences are not so much in kind as of degree and often concern more secondary issues and not the primary doctrines of the nature of God, the Trinity, the virgin birth, the death and resurrection of Jesus and the fact that we are saved by grace through belief in Jesus Christ alone.

In our series we have looked at doctrines that we emphasise more than other denominations such as the sovereignty of God, election and predestination, the idea of covenant which runs like a thread through the scriptures of Old and New Testament. Today we want to look at the Presbyterian view of the church and again there is so much here that we share with other christian denominations although we emphasise certain things as we shall see. But when it comes to our structure and the governing of the church that is more distinctive than other models of church government and here we see major differences with the Anglicans, Baptists and Congregationalists, and most independent and Pentecostal churches.

I want to look at the church then under three headings – the nature of the church; the marks of a true church and Presbyterian ordering or governing of the church.

1. The Nature of the Church

Earlier we recited the Apostles Creed which for hundreds of years has set out basic beliefs about God, Jesus and the church. We share these beliefs with other Christians. As Presbyterians we affirm that we are one branch of the holy, catholic and apostolic church. It is holy in that we are called out of the world to follow God and to live distinctively different lives. It is catholic in the sense of universal, we are a part of the worldwide church from every tongue and nation. There is but one church of Jesus Christ - one church, one faith and one Lord. No one denomination has the monopoly on all the truth about God and Jesus although some denominations seem to act as if they are the only true church.

The Westminster Confession says that outside of the church there is no ordinary possibility of salvation. Two things can be said about this. First note the word ordinary – God normally saves us through the means of the church, through its preaching and through the witness of individual Christians who are part of local churches. God can save outside of the church and there are stories of people of other religions – Muslims, Hindus etc – who have had visions of Jesus and who have come to faith, but these are not the ordinary. God ordinarily chooses to work through his church, so the church is important. The second thing to note is that it does not say there is no ordinary possibility of salvation outside the Presbyterian church, although some again might want it to say that. There are denominations that do say that but we believe that God calls people through the church and that church does not have to be Presbyterian. One practical way of acknowledging this truth is that we recognise baptisms that have been carried out by other churches – Church of Ireland, Baptist, Roman Catholic, Methodist, Pentecostal. If someone has been baptised in another denomination we recognise that – we do not baptise again. So the church is holy and catholic or universal.

It is apostolic. That means that it is founded on the teaching of Jesus and the apostles. It is the historic faith that has been handed down through the generations based on the scriptures. Eph.2:19-20 says that we are “members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Jesus Christ himself as the chief cornerstone.” The roots of our beliefs and practice are derived from scripture and the early church. Like other denominations we note the scriptural descriptions of the church as being like a bride, a body, a building, a household, an army. The church can not only be universal but of course it meets locally and can be a congregation of 20 people to 20,000 people as in some mega churches.

But a distinction that the Westminster Confession and Presbyterians do make much of is the distinction between the visible and the invisible church.

The visible church is the church in the world that we see now made up of professing christians and their children. We have noted before the emphasis upon households in the Bible and household salvation and household baptisms. Thus when we attend a church on a Sunday we see part of the visible church. However the Confession also talks about the invisible church. This is the church that God sees past, present and future. These are believers that we do not see visibly but which God has called to himself through the ages in the past and will call to himself in the future.

The other thing to note is that the invisible church is the true church, it is the church which is truly made up of God’s people, where God knows who are his. The visible church that we see may be made up of professing Christians but not all who profess to be Christians are Christians. Jesus said in Mt.7:21f “Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven but only he who does the will of my Father in heaven. Many will say Lord, Lord did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles and I will tell them plainly I never knew you. Away from me you evildoers.” It is possible to profess Jesus is your Lord and yet not actually be saved. We can be part of the church visible but not be part of the church invisible – those who are truly God’s.

My role is to teach the scriptures and explain the way of salvation as clearly as possible to people. The role of K Session is to oversee and guard the doctrine and make sure that people make credible professions of faith rather than incredible ones, and yet when all is said and done it is the Lord who calls people to himself and it is the Lord who sees those who are truly his.

Now this is important for Presbyterians in how we “do” church. Throughout history there have always been moves to purify the church. Purity can be good, avoiding error is good, encouraging people to examine their hearts before God and walk closely with God is all good, but there is a limit to how pure we can make the church this side of heaven. In our service we read Mt.13 where Jesus tells a parable of wheat being sown in a field but an enemy comes in and sows tares or weeds among the wheat. The enemy is satan. There is always the temptation for us as church leaders to make strenuous efforts to weed out those who we suspect are not true believers. In the parable the servants ask the farmer Do you want us to go and pull up the weeds? The answer is No, because in pulling up the weeds you may root up the wheat with them. Let both grow until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned, then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.

The Confession says “the purest churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and to error.” There are both hypocrites and heretics within our number and at various times all of us are subject to both hypocrisy and heresy and so being mindful of this we need to act graciously with each other and if we are going to err let us err on the side of grace. John Calvin says “in this visible church we have mingled many hypocrites who have nothing of Christ but the name and outward appearance” but he also cautions against a too rigorous attempt to purify the church as the Anabaptists did long ago and sought to ensure that all professing christians were truly regenerate. He said that we should exercise “a certain charitable judgement” toward those in our denomination or outside it “who by confession of faith, by example of life, and by partaking of the sacraments profess the same God and Christ with us.”

Thus the Presbyterian church seeks to be open minded as regards people’s confessions of faith resting in the assurance that God knows those who are truly his and that the visible church does not necessarily represent all the true people of God.

2. The Marks & Membership of the Church

The Reformers emphasised three marks of a true church – eg the Confession says that “particular churches are more or less pure according as the doctrine of the gospel is taught and embraced, ordinances administered, and public worship performed more or less purely in them” (WCF 25:4). There is a strong echo of this in Calvin where he says “Wherever we see the Word of God purely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to Christ’s institution, there is not to be doubted, a church of God exists”.

This definition of the true marks of a church is fairly minimal of course and would not satisfy many today but again we must be careful in our enthusiasm to have a pure church not to go too far in the other direction and impose marks of a church that go beyond what scripture indicates. Mark Driscoll has eight marks of a true local church which I think are quite good and are a fair balance but again we must be careful and gracious in how we work them out in practice –

According to him a true church has a regenerate membership; qualified leadership; gathering for preaching and worship; sacraments rightly administered; unified by the Spirit, disciplined for holiness; obeying the great commandment to love, obey the great commission to evangelise and make disciples. Each of us could probably put together our own pet list of the true marks of a church which might include everything from just singing Psalms to don’t chew gum.

How do we become a member of a Presbyterian church? Well again we make a distinction between two kinds of members – adherent members and full or communicant members. Adherent members are those who say I want High Kirk to be my church and they will attend that church, they will receive FWO envelopes and pay in to the church and will receive visits from elders and minister and are entitled to be married by the minister, visited in hospital and be buried etc. Adherent members may have been baptised as children and thus have entered the visible church are counted as members in that sense.

A communicant, or Full member of the church is someone who has not only been baptised but who has in later years confirmed, if you like, the baptismal vows taken by their parents and who now owns and professes faith in Jesus Christ for themselves. They profess Jesus is Lord before the Kirk Session and the Church and their names are put on the Communion roll. They can take communion and they have a vote in issues such as the call of a minister to the congregation. It is also the policy in High Kirk that only children can be baptised where at least one of the parents is a communicant member. We encourage those who profess salvation and who love the Lord to become full members of the church and this also opens up more opportunities for service in the church for certain positions are only open to communicant members.

3. Finally what of our structure?

Presbyterians are noted for doing all things decently and in order and if you have been to a General Assembly in Belfast you will see that there is a lot of talk about points of order and business being conducted properly. This can be a great strength but it also can be our greatest weakness and can frustrate people greatly. But we are a very democratic church and this can slow everything down so that people have a chance to have their say and to vote. The down side of this is that some argue the church should be more of a theocracy than a democracy and we should entrust more decisions to the leadership trusting that they have sought the Lord on the matter.

Nevertheless we have a strong democratic bent, thus elders who are voted on require two thirds of those voting to be content and a minister being called by a congregation requires two thirds of those voting to be agreed on the call.

Presbyterians have really three levels of court or government. Firstly, at the local level of a church we have the Kirk Session made up of elders. The word elder is a translation of the Greek word Presbyter. Elders or Presbyters play a key role in our church government and have given the name to our denomination – the Presbyterian church.

The elder’s main responsibilities include exercising pastoral oversight of the congregation, which we divide into districts, and we encourage you to be welcoming to your elder who is there on behalf of the church. The elders also oversee all that goes on and exercise discipline over members if needed. As a member of this church you submit to the authority, decisions and discipline of the eldership. We live in days where many resent accountability and discipline but it is part of being a true church and of being a responsible church member.

A minister is an elder on an equal footing with the other elders. The minister is called the teaching elder who is mainly responsible for the preaching of the Word and the administering of the sacraments. In the Presbyterian church only the minister is authorised to chair or moderate Kirk Session and to administer baptism and communion.

The second level of church government is Presbytery. This is a grouping of local Presbyterian churches in an area. We are in the Ballymena Presbytery which consists of 32 congregations. It meets seven times a year and consists of the minister and an elder from each congregation. Elders are ordained by the local Presbytery and so the Kirk Session is answerable and accountable to Presbytery.

The third level is General Assembly which meets once per year in the first week of June and Presbyteries are accountable to the General Assembly. All ministers are members of the General Assembly plus an elder who goes as a representative. There are also Youth reps, and PW reps who attend. Currently there are 381 active ministers who look after 549 congregations throughout Ireland.

This is our church – a very democratic church with a high degree of accountability and if a decision is taken by a court, even the General Assembly, there are procedures where even an individual member of a congregation can appeal that decision.

It is an historic church, we stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us. We have been guided by their wisdom, we thank God for those who have sat in these pews before us and to whom we are bound together in the unity of the Spirit. May we continue to appreciate and love our church with all its strengths and weaknesses – but even more we look forward to that day when we shall see the church as God sees it and join together with our brothers and sisters in Christ and worship and serve the bridegroom of the church, Jesus our Lord, for ever and to Him be the glory.