This post, I think, is certainly well-intentioned, especially there at the end. And Mr Sizemore is certainly correct that the PCUSA is not the "Church"--it is quite obviously not the fullness of the Body of Christ. But the PCUSA doesn't have to be the Church Universal in order for leaving it to be the wrong tack to take. Mr Sizemore makes this point himself, although he certainly doesn't mean to. He is referencing a prior article which used the example of Jeremiah in its argument to stay in the PCUSA, and he replies, "While [the] reference to Jeremiah has standing, I would suggest that for this discussion a more modern and relevant example be considered. A better example might be the story of Jesus throwing the moneychangers out of the temple. Wrong and bad things were happening in his Father's house, and Jesus took action! Could the same sort of things be going on now, both by the denomination and its members?"

Now, the first problem is to think that the example of Christ is more relevant than the example of Jeremiah. One of Calvin's significant contributions was to re-elevate the Old Testament to the standing of the New Testament. We do not ascribe to a deuterocanon; Jeremiah is not less relevant than Christ. But the second error is in the use of the story, which is quite telling. Jesus doesn't leave! He runs the other guys out! In fact, Christ is quite persistent in his ministry to the Jews, reaching out to them time and time and time again, even as some of them attack him, even as he challenges some of them, and even as some of them abandon him. IN FACT, Jesus dies for those very same folks, imploring his Father to forgive them their murder. So, if Mr Sizemore feels that this text is the relevant one, we are left with two options: 1) Run them out of our denomination. Take action! Or, 2) keep ministering to them again and again until the point of dying for them.

Yet another issue is the flippant use of the word 'apostate'. Mr Sizemore says we need to be careful calling folks 'schismatics', but he is rather quick to label the PCUSA 'apostate'. I wonder: How would the writer feel about the Corinthian church? Would they be apostate? They certainly believed in boundless love, especially as it concerned guys and their mothers-in-law. Should Paul have washed his hands of them? After all, they were not "the Church"--they were only a part of it. In labeling the denomination apostate and permitted some to leave from it, do we run the risk of, as Augustine put it, separating the wheat from the chaff, when that is rightly Christ's job? (Note that translated Augustine doesn't say we are separated from the Body of Christ, but instead separated from the unity of Christ.)

And that is the fundamental problem with all this talk of leaving: It is so very egocentric. We decide when the denomination has become apostate. We decide who is Christian and who is not. We decide which straw breaks the camel's back. We decide what to do with properties and assets. Perhaps we would be better off laboring and worshipping and loving in precisely the place our Father has put us. Jesus did.