Daily devotions: Blind Leading the Blind - Matthew 15

Matthew 15:14            (Jesus said) “Leave them; they are blind guides. If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”

There’s a true story about John Calvin that many in the Presbyterian Church either don’t know or they have forgotten. When he was a young preacher in Geneva trying to get the Reformation established, he was confronted by a group called the Libertines. They believed in sexual promiscuity and even had a local law that allowed a man to be both married and have one mistress at the same time. They also believed in complete sexual freedom of any sort and that they were allowed to do this because they were Christians under the grace of God.

Calvin opposed them and his life was threatened. The Libertines conspired against him and planned to rush at the Communion table when the Lord’s Supper would be next celebrated. They wanted to be at the front of the congregation and take communion, so that everyone else in the congregation and community could see that God approved of their Libertine lifestyles.

John Calvin was informed that this would take place, so he had a choice. He could allow this to happen and let the Libertines overtake the newly Reformed Church, or he could oppose them and possibly be killed.

When it came to the celebrating of Communion, the Libertines rushed forward to receive the elements first. John Calvin bravely stood between them and the elements of bread and wine. He then Calvin flung his arms around the sacramental vessels as if to protect them from sacrilege, while his voice rang through the building: "These hands you may crush, these arms you may lop off, my life you may take, my blood is yours, you may shed it; but you shall never force me to give holy things to the profaned, and dishonor the table of my God."

John Calvin saved the Reformation in Geneva at that critical moment in time by ‘fencing in’ the Lord’s Table from those who slandered the church, disdained God’s Word, and who were unrepentant of their sexual immorality. Presbyterianism grew out of his uncompromising ministry and his devotion to God’s Word.

Today, the PCUSA has changed its course from Calvin’s Reforms. The Libertines have won the battle and the unrepentant blind are leading the flock astray. The question we all need to ask ourselves today is this: what have we become?

Prayer:                        Lord Jesus, we are blinded by our own sense of cultural morality and therefore we create our own system of modern beliefs. We pick and choose from Scriptures what we want to read and hear, and then discard those things that confront and challenge our worldly ways. We are all sinners, but some of us don’t ever want to repent, so we remain unforgiven. Lord, have mercy on our souls. In Your Holy Name, we pray. Amen.

John Stuart is currently the pastor of Erin Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. If you would like to comment or ask questions of today’s message, please send him an email to pastor@erinpresbyterian.org.

PCUSA Gay Ordination: Transformation, not Reformation

PCUSA Gay ordination: Transformation, not Reformation

The current on-going issue in the PCUSA concerns the biennial problem of ordaining gay people who are in active sexual relationships. As each year passes, the opposition to this is diminishing which denotes a change in culture as opposed to a change in Biblical standards. And this is where I have a problem with the PCUSA church and its Louisville leaders.

They are calling this a re-formation of the church which is false. Reformation is originally a military term that refers to soldiers in the battlefield. The order for reforming is meant to bring the scattered forces together again in the midst of the battle to a basic standard formation in order to consolidate the strength of the troops. When Luther, Calvin & Knox called for the Church to be reformed, they were asking Christians throughout Europe to get back to the basics of New Testament Christianity. They weren’t seeking to change the church; they were looking to have it return to its most basic biblical principles.

Ordaining gay people is not re-formation, it is transformation because the Church is being asked to radically change from its Biblical and New Testament beliefs. Those who call it reformation are wrong, because in order to reform the church would have to get back to its biblical basics.

Homosexuality has never been a practice that was acceptable in the original Christian church, so what we are being asked to do is to radically change who we are and what we believe is right. If we take this path to accept the ordination of practicing homosexuals then we are separating ourselves from the New Testament Church. We will have transformed into something else and into something other than New Testament Christianity. Our Western culture may demand this of our society, but our churches are meant to be separate from our culture in matters of doctrine, Biblical teaching, and Christ given truth.

In essence we have to ask ourselves this important question: are we Christ’s church in the world, or are we the Western World’s Church?