Monthly Archives: April 2018

3 Fruits of a Gospel Centered Church

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Article by Adriel Sanchez, pastor of North Park Presbyterian Church, a congregation in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). In addition to his pastoral responsibilities, he also serves the broader church as a contributor on the White Horse Inn radio program. He and his wife Ysabel live in San Diego with their three children.(original source here)

It has been in vogue for the past few years to talk about “gospel-centrality.” I don’t know about you, but I appreciate the language. Having experienced churches that had a very truncated view of the gospel (i.e., the gospel is something that only relates to your conversion, but not to the rest of your Christian life), I’m refreshed by the fact that churches have been emphasizing the sanctifying power of the work of Jesus.

A gospel-centered church is a church which focuses primarily on Christ’s work. It recognizes that Jesus’ priestly ministry doesn’t just relate to our justification (the act of our being made right in God’s sight), but to every aspect of our salvation. In gospel-centered churches, we’re continually reminded of God’s initiative and action toward us, what some theologians have called, “redemption accomplished.” It’s this good news that creates and sustains the church.

Here are three fruits of a gospel-centered community:

1. Gospel-Centered churches produce humility.
Throughout the Bible, God condemns pride. The arrogant person makes himself God’s enemy (Js. 4:6). Sadly, pride is a weed that can grow in our own hearts if we aren’t careful to cut it down. Moralistic churches often water our pride because they focus on human achievement. When we think we’re living up to God’s standards, we start looking down on others whom we deem less obedient than ourselves (Lk. 18:11). Ironically, we can even grow arrogant in our theological learning (1 Cor. 8:1). The gospel is like God’s heavenly weed whacker, shredding our pride to pieces as it reveals to us how desperately we fall short of God’s standard. We need more than just a little bit of assistance here and there; we need God to come to earth and fix the job we have botched.

Gospel-centered churches ought to produce radically humble disciples because the focus is always on our need and God’s great grace. Since the solution lies outside of us, we have no reason to be proud in ourselves. This is precisely what Paul was getting at when, after discussing God’s free justification of sinners, he wrote, “Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith” (Rom 3:27).

2. Gospel-Centered churches produce diversity.
Sadly, this fruit of the gospel is much rarer than it should be in our churches. Oftentimes today we walk into a church and find an affinity group rather than a gospel-built community. Here’s what I mean: in many of our churches, what brings us together isn’t primarily Jesus and his gospel, but shared interests. This is what Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop call “gospel-plus community” in their helpful book The Compelling Community. We’re here because of Jesus—plus the fact that we’re all white-collar professionals, or lower-income Hispanics, or millennials who listen to Head and the Heart. We have to understand that our churches will always become affinity groups by default unless we talk about the implications of the gospel for forming diverse communities. The gospel doesn’t speak to one demographic; it speaks to sinners. Sin doesn’t discriminate and neither does Jesus.

When the gospel is central to the life of the church, it should attract people from all walks of life and all cultural backgrounds. This is a fruit we should strive to see in our local churches because it’s such a powerful depiction of what the good news of Jesus is capable of. No one is surprised when a bunch of friends sit down for a meal; everyone is surprised when two people with nothing in common—indeed, people who had even harbored hostility toward each other—sit down to break bread. Among Jesus’ first disciples you had one guy who wanted to terrorize the government (Simon the Zealot) along with a corrupt official who had been colluding with the government (Levi the tax collector). Mortal enemies by the world’s standards, they were brought into Jesus’ church to serve side-by-side. When the world tastes this sweet fruit of the gospel, they’ll have a hard time denying its power.

3. Gospel-Centered churches are welcoming toward sinners.
Gospel-less churches don’t know what to do with sinners. So many of us have experienced this type of church that we’re curious about whether it’s safe to be ourselves around other Christians.

A pastor in Germany named Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everybody must conceal his sin from himself and from the fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy” (Life Together, p. 110).

We live in a merit-based world where people can’t be honest about their failures. This culture sometimes seeps into the church, and we can have a “pious” fellowship that’s ultimately built on pretending. The gospel breaks through this fake piety and allows us to be honest with each other about our failures. It allows us to bring our sins into the light because Christ’s blood can cleanse us and remove our shame. When we stop pretending we’re perfect, we become a people who welcomes sinners instead of looking on them with an “us vs. them” mentality. We are them, who have been mercifully washed by Jesus. Building a culture of transparency and dependence on the gospel helps other sinners see that there’s a God who isn’t afraid of them.

The Limits of 1 Timothy 2:11-12

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Article by Richard Holdeman – Called to faith in 1987; to marry Amy in 1989; to coach college hockey in 1992; to have daughters in 1996; to teach at I.U. in 1997; to pastor the Bloomington Reformed Presbyterian Church in 2005. (original source here)

Let a woman learn in silence with all submission. And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence. (1 Timothy 2:11-12, NKJ)

Last year at about this time our congregation hosted Rosaria Butterfield to speak to our community about how to love people struggling with their sexual identity in ways that honor the law of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our event was held at a large church in town, and Dr. Butterfield’s talks were well-attended. It was a challenging and edifying couple of days for the evangelical churches in our community. Notably absent from our gatherings were men from some of the more conservative churches in our community. In what I suspect was an effort to honor God’s word through Paul (quoted above), the leaders of these congregations encouraged women to attend but did want their men coming to be taught by a woman.

While I applaud the desire to be biblically faithful, the conclusion that 1 Timothy 2:11-12 teaches that men can never be taught by women is not warranted by this text. Paul’s prohibitions against women teachers have a context. They are not absolute prohibitions. For starters, reading the verses surrounding those quoted above shows us, without question, that the context of the requirement for silence is the church. Paul here is not making any comment about women teaching in schools or universities or in other settings. Paul is also not addressing whether a woman could teach men about the process of childbirth (say, in Lamaze class) or the intricacies of organic chemistry (say, in a graduate chemistry program) or the details of budgeting (say, in a personal finance class).

I have known men, who objected to women teaching adult men in ANY setting, but this is simply not what Paul is talking about. It is a perversion of this text to insist that women are never to teach men.

Ok, back to Dr. Butterfield. She was speaking in a church about spiritual issues. Does that mean her speech is prohibited if men are in the audience? Once again, we must look more closely at the context of 1 Timothy 2:11-12. It is helpful to note that Paul later writes in 1 Timothy: “Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine” (1 Timothy 5:17, NKJ). He describes the office of elder as having a two-fold function. There is a ruling function in which elders act with the judicial and governing authority given to them by Christ as His under-shepherds (1 Peter 5:1-4) and there is an authoritative teaching function, which is especially the work of the teaching elder/pastor (2 Timothy 4:2).

In light of this description of the work of the eldership, it seems that what Paul is doing in 1 Timothy 2:11-12 is excluding women from serving in the office of elder, in which they would need to have judicial authority over men and women. Paul is also excluding women from the authoritative teaching office of the church – the pulpit ministry, which is the responsibility of the eldership (Acts 20:28-31). If we allow Paul to define what he means by teaching and authority within the book of 1 Timothy, we have a clear context in which to evaluate his prohibitions against women teaching or having authority over men. What Paul is actually teaching here is that women may not serve as ruling or teaching elders in the church. What Paul is NOT doing is saying that there is an absolute prohibition against women having any responsibility within the church or being able to do any teaching within the church setting.

What do I mean? It is not a requirement for all Sunday school classes to be taught by elders. Sunday school is not the same as the authoritative teaching ministry of the pulpit. The elders are responsible for everything that is taught publicly in the church but they may delegate some teaching in non-pulpit settings to other qualified individuals in the congregation. In our church we often allow younger men, whom we think have potential to become ruling elders, to get experience teaching a Bible study or Sunday school class. This always happens under the oversight of the elders, who are ultimately responsible. In the same way, there may be circumstances when a woman has a special expertise that would make her the most qualified person to teach a class or Bible study (also under the oversight of the elders). One recent example comes to mind when we had a husband and wife team teach a class on parenting. Perhaps a woman might have expertise in financial planning or stewardship that would make her the best person to teach a class on that subject. I believe she can teach in the church (even classes with men in them) without violating what Paul is forbidding in 1 Timothy.

A number of years ago I preached a sermon series through a book of the Bible, in which I consulted a dozen commentaries. The most helpful commentary was written by a female professor of theology. We are to welcome the truth wherever we find it. I did so, and my congregation benefited from it.

I also think that women can have real responsibility (i.e., authority) in the church that does not violate 1 Timothy 2:11-12. In the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America we affirm that the office of deacon is open to women. In talking about the qualifications for the office of deacon, Paul says in 1 Timothy 3:11, “Likewise, women must be…” (literal translation). Deacons are ordained officers of the church. They serve under the authority of the elders. They have real responsibility that includes benevolence, mercy ministry, budgeting, finance, and facility maintenance (among other things). This is an authority of sorts but it is not the type of judicial/ruling authority that Paul is addressing in 1 Timothy 2:11-12.

Understanding that Paul is addressing particularly the functions of the eldership in 1 Timothy 2:11-12 will help us resist the tendency in conservative, Reformed congregations to go beyond scripture in imposing limitations on the service of women in the church and the culture. We can uphold biblical standards and resist the feminizing forces in our world without reflexively restricting Christian women in the exercise of the myriad gifts they’ve been given by our Lord. The church faces enough challenges without unnecessarily imposing limitations on her members.