Misplaced Ambitions

If Kirk of the Hills is Fort Sumter, then the evangelicals are in just as bad shape as the liberals. The Civil War was about rights--states' rights. One of the comments at the end of Mr Brown's blog entry proposes this being more like the Boston Tea Party, which was about representation (or lack thereof). In other words, both these conflicts were about power and who has it and who doesn't. The evangelicals are upset because they don't have it; that is the bottom line. Much can be pontificated about holiness and Biblicism and whatnot, but as long as the votes were going their way, the conservatives hung around. One vote (out of how many?) doesn't go their way, and all of a sudden, schism is in the air.

There is another dynamic afoot: Pride. Some of the comments (such as the one about mass insurrection and the Boston Tea Party in the linked post above) sound almost gleeful at the prospect of secession. For some, there is a spirit of 'taking it to the enemy' and making them pay for what they have done. In others, there is a sense of arrogance, as though we are the next Luthers and Calvins, standing up for righteousness and taking our place in history. There was an incident a few years ago where some PCUSA ministers tacked some 'theses' onto the door of the headquarters in Louisville. How obnoxious. As though they stood with those great men who risked their lives for reform.

Ah, yes. There's that word again: Reform. Luther and Calvin had to be thrown out. They pushed, not for secession, but for reform. They were called to reform the Roman church and the Roman church threw them out. Would we be Luthers and Calvins? Then we will press for the reform of the PCUSA until the PCUSA throws us out. Anything less is a schism, if not from the PCUSA, then from our Reformed heritage and from the testimony of Scripture.