Comment on seminary training

I received this comment and thought it would be best to devote some attention to it. 

Others will know much more than I about the system of educating NAPARC pastors, but what I have seen is not very impressive. I know of a man who had no education beyond high school, who got an Associate degree in business from an online place that no longer exists, and somehow was accepted by a respected reformed seminary. He now has an MDiv, and gets to "pastor" a church. He, like many others, seems to believe that his sole purpose in life is to be studying. Then he "serves" his congregation by "preaching and teaching." This entitles him to a salary and to be the head of the "session," which makes all of the decisions for said tiny church, with no accountability to the members, although they give lip-service to the idea of accountability. The church has no outreach into the community, but is quite a comfortable little enclave for those who think that the church is a little mini-seminary/book club where the only hope for people is held tightly, inerrantly, and rather exclusively. Sermons frequently mention what the Catholics/Lutherans/Baptists/ people who don't study their Bibles like he does are getting wrong. I could say much more about how the church has accepted the idol of perceived scholarship in the place of elders as described in Scripture. But my original point is that these men are perceived as "educated", but truth is, many of them are seemingly not acquainted with the realities encountered by people who must hold to knowledge/skill sets in order to produce something of tangible value in the world to provide for their families and support the church. This ignorance would be fine if it were accompanied by a humility and kindness, but the church seems to love to put people who lack those qualities in leadership positions.

All of this affirms the scriptural assertion that "knowledge puffs up". I think stamping achievement onto men simply because they succeed at reading and regurgitating and communing with others that do the same is part of the problem.

I think there is a flawed system in place here. I've had many debates on this subject and am more convinced that this is a core problem in the church today. The Apostles were trained in a mentorship/apprenticeship model by Jesus. There is good evidence that the next generation of pastors were trained in the same sort of model - walking alongside the Apostles. At some point, however, the church "discovered" that the apprenticeship model wasn't working(!!) Pastors were not being properly trained in basic Christian truths, and thus an educational model was necessary. This led to the seminary model where pastors were given a base level of knowledge necessary to pastor a church. Our church history has been filled with examples of trying to find that right balance between the book smarts and apprenticeship model.

To add some insight into this, there is a book by Peter Colin Campbell, called The Theory of the Ruling Elder, or the Position of the Lay Eldership in the Reformed Churches. This book is public domain and available online. This book completely floored me. Campbell had access to the minutes of the Westminster Assembly. This is his understanding of what happened in the Westminster Assembly:

While the Grand Committee declare unanimously in favour of the institution of lay rulers in the Church, they carefully exclude from their conclusion not merely the term presbyter, in reference to lay rulers, but even that of elder, as liable to be confounded with "presbyter," and refuse to quote I Tim. v. 17, in regard to the office. The conclusions of the Committee are recorded thus by Gillespie and Lightfoot: — 

1. That Christ hath instituted a government and governors ecclesiastical in the Church. 

2. That Christ hath furnished some in His Church with gifts for government, and with commission to execute the same when called thereunto. 

3. That it is agreeable to and warranted by the Word of God that some others besides the ministers of the word be church governors, to join with the ministers in the government of the Church. Rom. xii. 7, 8 ; i Cor. xii. 28.

Some members had expressed a wish to rest the institution simply "on a prudential ground" — that is, on expediency — and some were opposed to the citation even of the two above-mentioned texts, although none except Dr Temple and Lightfoot voted for their being omitted. But the attempt of Whittaker and Gillespie, renewed the following day, to procure the citation of i Tim. v. 17 as applicable to the office of lay ruler, met with no success; and the conclusions of the Committee were sent in to the Assembly in the form in which we have given them above, with the following addition : "That in the Church of the Jews there were elders of the people joined to the priests and Levites in the government of the Church." 

The conclusions, or, as they were styled, "votes," of the Committee were brought up for the consideration and approval of the Assembly on the 14th November 1644, preparatory to their being transmitted to the Houses of Parliament; when, as Lightfoot tells us, "there fell a debate about naming church governors, whether to call them 'ruling elders' or no; which held a very sad and long discussion: at last it was determined by vote thus, — such as in the Reformed Churches are commonly called 'elders.'" Gillespie made a last attempt to obtain the recognition of the theory, and, with obvious purpose, moved that the Assembly itself should call them "ruling elders;" " but this," Lightfoot tells us, "prevailed not."* The battle of the presbyter theory had been fought and lost. 

* It would have been well had the caution happily exercised by the Westminster Divines in the citation of Scripture in reference to church government been shown on other occasions. The craving for express Scripture warrant, in matters where common sense is a sufficient guide, was natural in the position of the Reformed Churches, but it led sometimes to an unjustifiable and even ludicrous straining of the Word of God. 

* There is a blank in Gillespie's Notes, extending from the 25th October to the 15th November 1644. 

The following is the chapter on the subject in the 'Form of Church Government ' as finally authorised by the Assembly: — "Other Church Governors. — As there were in the Jewish Church elders of the people joined with the priests and Levites in the government of the Church, so Christ, who hath instituted government and governors ecclesiastical in the Church, hath furnished some in His Church, besides the ministers of the word, with gifts for government, and with commission to execute the same when called thereunto, who are to join with the ministers in the government of the Church, which officers Reformed Churches commonly call 'elders'. 

Nothing can be more significant than this sound and well-guarded language. Equally guarded and significant is that of the Confession of Faith in its allusion to lay rulers. It knows nothing of them as presbyters or elders in the proper sense. 

The conclusion of Campbell's book as that Gillespie et. al. returned to Scotland and misrepresented the position of the Westminster Assembly, thus establishing the Ruling Elder as an ordained office and through it, "Classical Presbyterianism", when Westminster came to the exact opposite conclusion.

There are definite conclusions regarding ruling elders, but consider what the implications are for the Teaching Elder.

1. There is no warrant for "young" teaching elders. The name elder itself suggests age and wisdom, not youth and knowledge.
2. There is an expectation that the church should see the fruit of their parenting, not have pastors with infants.
3. There is an expectation of a life lived within a church and demonstrated faithful witness, not seminary training and a 25yo pastor.
4. The Biblical model has always been people chosen from the congregation by the congregation and not candidates approved by the leadership and forced on congregations.
5. The seminary model and cost/"benefit" of seminary training paid by the church lead to a push to train younger and younger pastors for a lifetime of ministry rather than, let's say, a 50yo man who has had a successful career and raised his children well.
6. The church has fallen into [what the church claims!] is the failed messianic model of education where morality and character can be imputed through book knowledge.
7. What does a 'plurality' of elders [pastors] mean when RP churches are often separated by hundreds of miles from the next-nearest RP church.

There is much more to say about this, but the more you think about the implications of what transpired in the quote, the more staggeringly we've fallen away from even Westminster.

To reference an earlier comment, as much as we may be upset with "Pastor McPedigree" - that model is so much closer to the Biblical model, and, I believe, we see much more faithfulness and pastoral qualities in the 2nd and 3rd-generation pastors who were raised under their father pastors and had essentially an apprenticeship. What we see in the young hotshot pastors is exactly what you've related. They cannot wait to wave over a congregation. They cannot wait for the adoration and obedience they see pastors command, and once they are in that position, the thought of pastoring -shepherding and walking with people - is the furthest from their mind.

The book, The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse also points to wisdom and Spirit-guided life experience as the hallmarks of the office of elder/pastor. These are things that cannot be trained in seminary.

The Reformed church likes to claim that study of the Bible in the original languages of Greek and Hebrew is necessary to be a pastor, but this seems to be mainly an Islamic or even old Catholic claim. The history of the church shows that there was an early effort to translate scriptures into the common languages of the day, and we still see that today. The Holy Spirit works beyond language, and thus claiming that a pastor must know Greek and Hebrew to be effective is more a slap in God's face than anything else.

Recovering from Spiritual Abuse - Part 4: Depression, Reflection, Loneliness

Hi all, welcome back after the Christmas break :) Today's topic is a hard one for sure, and is probably why it was so long in coming. I think it will be hard to separate externally-forced stage 4 grief from internally-forced stage 4 grief, but I will try. I think in handling personal grief, such as the loss of a loved one, there is a sadness once the loss is truly recognized. When leaving an abusive church, I'm sure there is that, too, but also, there is the sense of active abandonment. There is a distance with people like Chris who would not share the same fellowship with me now compared to the past, especially knowing my journey.

So, the external grief is very hard - there are people I saw week after week, invited over for dinner and was invited over regularly. There was a shared sense of purpose, of friendship, and even though we perhaps had similar views of the failings of the church, when I left, there was a rift. When I look back at the fun at conferences and church picnics and all of the fellowship common to RPs, it's hard not to feel left out and abandoned. When I left it was a very clear choice - I could stuff myself into the RP mold for me so that my family and I could have the RP experience, which was mostly good for the others in my family, or I could follow God without compromise and accept the consequences. There have been a lot of consequences - mainly bad from RP-land and mainly good from non-RP-land.

Internally is somewhat different, and I can't really say which stage I'm in - it seems to change from day to day. Much of the depression comes from being between a rock and a hard place with family and church. For both, there was fellowship and fun times and a sense of belonging, but at a cost of knowing and accepting my place. The places where I was supposed to be accepted offered that acceptance at a price too high to pay - shame and silence.

There is also a related self-shame spiral. I was as legalistic and hate-filled as any RP towards those who compromised truth for comfort. I thought of the people who left the church as weak and inferior, because I believed the RP church was the most pure. Even if I could try to right that, what would the response be? How do you apologize for something you never said or did, but felt in your heart? It seems the best I can do is promise to do better with my new-found freedom. But, even with freedom, there is conflict - what if following that freedom puts me in direct opposition to the born-and-raised RP position on exclusive psalmody and a capella singing?

Isolation has become a struggle because I don't feel like I can invite anyone into my processing of grief. On one hand, it would be good to have some help with the load I carry, on the other hand, if I show anyone the load, I doubt they would want to help carry. I think that is why online spiritual abuse groups have become a lifeline for so many, even if they cannot share things in person, they can still hear and commiserate.