David Nakhla 0:00

This is David Knockler with the OPC Committee on Diacal Ministries. We're bringing this to you as part of a series of special episodes of the Reformed Deacon. These episodes consist of the audio of the many plenaries and workshops presented at the fourth OPC National Diaconal Summit held in Wheaton, Illinois in June 2022. It's our desire that deacons who were not able to attend the summit or those who simply missed one of the many wonderful workshops offered will benefit from this practical content. If you find this episode especially invigorating, please consider sharing it with your fellow deacons. If it's an episode that's particularly suited to the work of your diaconate, consider watching the video version of this presentation together with your fellow deacons and discussing it. The videos can be found on opccdm.org. And now I hope you enjoy this episode.

SPEAKER_11 0:59

Welcome to uh Emergment, Ministry, and Social Justice World. Uh prefer to have Eric Watkin speak on this topic. Um very relevant topic in the world, so uh very important to be here at that purpose. And we are the left post a lot, uh it's perfect and all the both. I heard the path temperature port, on the subject uh each posted, it's posted and complicated on the subject, and published another word part of the block. Uh we also don't need to empty that port on anyone, and we have the part between the part between God's part to the lot in here. So please help me follow up with the Reverend Dr.

SPEAKER_04 2:23

Let's begin with a word of prayer. God in heaven, we thank you for who you are and all the things that you have done for us in the Son of your love. It is a remarkable thing, O Lord, to think about all that Christ has done for us, all that He is doing in us, and all the things that He is going to do, even as a result of the time that we're spending together. Your word reminds us that in a multitude of words, sin is not lacking. And as one who often speaks, O Lord, we are mindful of these things. We pray that you'd restrain us from evil, not only thoughts, but also words and deeds. We pray, Lord, for the well-being of your church. I pray, Lord, that in some small way this time together might be an encouragement to my brothers, the deacons, and that together we might seek your face, the good of your people, and the glory of King Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen. All right. So I was told I could take the majority of the time that we have now leading right up to supper. And uh when you're when you're assigned the afternoon slot, you can take that one of two ways. Uh you can take that as a form of punishment, uh, as the one who has to try to carry your attention not only after lunch, but after a plenary session, and be the one right before dinner. So it could be uh a form of punishment. It could also be a possible compliment that maybe they think you're the one that can keep people awake in the late afternoon right before dinner as well. Uh there will likely be a little bit of time for questions and answers at the end, and uh hopefully we'll be edified in our time together. Uh so let me uh let me jump right into it. I've tried to provide slides, I can send these slides to you, although they're in keynote, which is sometimes hard for people to open up, uh, but not everyone. Um I'm almost far-sighted enough to see the back there, so see how this works. Alright, so this is my family. I have four kids. Uh my wife Heather is holding my youngest Liara, uh, my youngest son Liam standing in front of my oldest Kira, who is 15, and then the gigantic monster over beside my wife is my 14-year-old son Carl, who is 6'3. And uh really just by God's grace, beautiful family. That's our dog shadow. Um, some some things that may be helpful to know in the context of discussing the subject. This diffuses people to know a little bit. I'll share a little more about my backstory, family-wise, but at least right here. Uh, all of our children are adopted. Two, as you can see, are black. Uh, two of them are white. My two white children were born heroin-dependent. And uh, my oldest son, Carl, is a fetal alcohol kid now with autism uh-like effect. Uh, Cura is perfect in every way. And uh that's the Watkins tribe. Alright, um, so it might also be helpful to give a little orientation to why do I speak on this subject because it's not one that really comes with great reward. Uh, I showed you a picture of my current family, growing up wise. I grew up outside the church. My dad was an atheist military family. Uh we didn't go uh to the body of Christ when I was a kid. My dad is black, my mom is white. I was born in St. Louis in 1972 while my dad was recruiting uh in East St. Louis in the projects. We moved down to Florida, excuse me, North Carolina, where I spent most of my years. My dad abandoned our family when I was 12, which left my brother and myself as sort of latchkey kids. So we really grew up on the street doing drugs beginning at age 12, all the other stupid stuff that comes along with it. By the time I graduated high school, I had been shot at twice. It's not hyperbole. Uh, I'd been in jail, arrested, done and sold drugs for quite a number of years. Failed my senior year of high school and had to repeat it. Uh, it's not really a promising uh college application. You guys don't laugh much. You need to you need to laugh when you can because it won't all be funny, and they they don't get much better than that. So help me out a little bit. All right. Uh so my high school class voted me most likely to live in a Volkswagen van forever. And I I actually like that part. Uh so I I came to Christ while following the grateful dead around the country. And if you don't know who that is, you're not missing anything. But by God's grace, that's how I came to Christ. Uh ended up spending 18 years in school for five degrees, and in God's providence, the last one ended up dealing a lot with postmodernism, uh, largely through the perspective of preaching, but I ended up writing on preaching Christ from the Old Testament in a postmodern context. And so postmodernism in some ways is my story, backstory intellectually, and it became an academic interest afterwards. But as the whole social justice thing erupted in the last couple of years, one of the things that has really caught my attention and made me want to speak into it and talk about a little bit, both as a pastor and as a parent, is that at least in my view, when I hear a lot of the rhetoric that I hear and I read a lot of the ideas I'm seeing spouted, uh I'm hearing the echoes of things that I study, like Deruda and Foucault and Charles Taylor and identity theory and things that, at least in my view, are drawing far more from extra-biblical, anti-biblical sources than from the Bible. And why that matters is, as you've already seen, I'm both a dad and a pastor. So to watch the world pour a cup of Kool-Aid and the church drink it so happily, and young people drink it so happily, and you know, the term that has sometimes been used, covenantal drift, the out-migration of young people from the church, uh, particularly in this context of social justice and the ideas swirling around the church, that has gotten my attention. And while I might not like a snake on the playground, it doesn't change the fact that you have to deal with it. So I'm greatly concerned about the estate of things. I'm not sure that everything I have to say will be overly helpful, but ultimately we want to uh strive for what's good for the church. I also have had the privileges David mentioned of planning two churches. The second one in particular, by God's grace, uh, was remarkably, I if I can say it this way, not that I did anything well or right, but by God's grace, became a very multicultural church. And as a uh OPC in the South, and you know, we were in Northeast Florida, and I'll confuse you for a moment, but in Northeast Florida, you go to you go north to get to the south, and you go south to get to the north. If it didn't make sense, about 3 a.m. you'll have this, oh, that's what he meant moment. Um, but that really is the case. And so to have a mixed race church in the south doing a lot of outreach ministry, kind of reaching across economic and ethnic fences, all that before George Floyd was something that the Lord had done. And it just kind of brought together in my mind a zeal for thinking about how the church can um go through this. A few qualifications I want to give as well as we are working our way through this. Nope, that's not, I'll go back. Uh a few qualifications. Uh, I don't feel like I'm an expert on this subject. I am a student of the subject, that's uh quite clearly the case. Uh second, uh, I could probably learn just as much from you as uh you might be able to learn from me. I told a friend here that I feel in many ways at a conference like this, I I feel like, not that feelings matter, where's Bill Shishko? The most touchy-feely guy in the OPC swears he has no feelings. But I feel like a lion in a den full of Daniels being in your midst. Uh frontline, servant-hearted men who are doing a lot of the work of mercy, compassion, uh, justice. Uh so for me to be speaking to you really feels like role reversal. I should I should be listening to you instead. All right. So here's what we're gonna talk about: five things. Biblical text, the OPC report on race relationships, I sent around to all of you. Uh, three books of church order, OPC, PCA, and URCNA, some practical suggestions I will attempt to offer, and then uh a roast. Let's begin with scripture. Psalm 68 uses beautiful language: God shall arise, his enemies shall be scattered, and those who hate him shall flee before him. If smoke is driven away, so you shall drive them away, as wax melts before fire, so the wicked shall perish before God, but the righteous shall be glad. They shall exult before God, they shall be jubilant with joy, sing to God, sing praises to his name, lift up a song to him who rides through the deserts. His name is the Lord, exult before him. Now catch this, this becomes important. Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. I want to both agree and slightly nuance something my brother Bill Shishko said yesterday evening about the origination of the office of deacon. There is a genuine sense in which, in history, redemptive historically speaking, it does originate in Acts 6. But the ministry of mercy and compassion that God has for not only his people, but even those outside the covenant, we'd all agree does not begin in Acts 6. It goes all the way back into the soils of the Old Testament, just like all of our other doctrines do, so also does this one as well. Okay? One other psalm, uh, thinking again of themes of our subject. Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, who made heaven and earth, is he and all that is in them, who keeps faith forever. Now listen, who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry, the Lord sets the prisoners free, the Lord opens the eyes of the blind, the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down, the Lord loves the righteous, the Lord watches over the sojourners, he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin. The Lord will reign forever, your God o Zion to all generations. Praise the Lord. So here's my point. When you think about the question of from where does mercy flow, the answer is the heart of God. Right? Justice, mercy, compassion, all the things that we talk about as deacons, they actually find their point of origin in the heart of God Himself. But what's interesting is you think about mercy ministry and an Old Testament idea, where did it happen? Well, in the Old Testament, if you go back and read in the Pentateuch, and we don't have time to look at everything, but if you go back and read in the Pentateuch, it was actually part of the law that when the tithe was collected, it would be stewarded by whom? The priests. And the priest had a responsibility to care for the orphan, the widow, and the stranger. So, in a sense, it's right to say that the office of deacon initiates in Acts chapter six, but the mercy of ministry in many ways began as a part of old covenant worship. It began as God had a place for his people to come, but he also had a people for his place, right? And the ministry of the temple uh was not simply a ministry of liturgy, it was also a ministry of mercy. And I think we missed that uh in ways that um, you know, it might be helpful to recognize that mercy flowed from the heart of God, mercy flowed from the temple of God. Mercy is a very Old Testament idea. What does God think about injustice when it when it happens? What does God think about justice when it doesn't happen, when it doesn't flow from those He's entrusted it to? I'm not saying this to chide you, I'm setting up for the law gospel uh anticipation. Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression, to turn aside the needy from justice, and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be their spoil. Think Mark 10, and that they may make the fatherless their prey. O house of David, thus says the Lord, execute justice in the mourning, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed, lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn with none to quench it because of your evil deeds. Thus says the Lord. Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed, and do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. And finally, the people of the land have practiced extortion and committed robbery. They have oppressed the poor and needy, and have extorted from the sojourner without justice. Thus says the Lord God, enough. Enough, O princes of Israel, put away violence and oppression and execute justice and righteousness. Cease your evictions of my people, declares the Lord God. To sum it up, justice flows from the heart of God. God established a ministry of mercy in, through, and from his temple. Uh the priests in the Old Testament were the responsible parties to embody the justice of God for the fatherless, the orphan, and the stranger in the midst of Israel, and wondering, if you will, as sojourners, through Israel. So why then in Acts 6 does this happen at verse 7? We've talked about this a lot. I think it's a big deal. It's my attempt to offer you hopeful encouragement. Verse 7. And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem. This is a big deal to me, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith. Why? Because they saw the heart of God in the church. They saw the heart of God that was revealed in the Psalms, that was to have been embodied in the temple, that in so many ways had fallen apart, the wrath of God having come upon Israel, and then the Son of God comes into history to embody the love and compassion, the heart of God incarnate in Jesus Christ. He did what he said and he said what he did. Right? He embodied the heart of God for those who needed the compassion of God. And when they saw it, those who were priests under this old covenant order, they became obedient to the faith in Christ Jesus. It's a beautiful connection that explains not only the origin, in some ways, backstory of the office of deacon, but the evangelistic side of mercy ministry, which in a social justice world, when even the church, people in the church, are now often looking outside the church for different paradigms of compassion, mercy, and justice, this is what I say, brothers, this is a great time to be the church. It's an exciting opportunity to be the church and to think biblically about what it means to be the church and not just defensively about what's wrong with critical race theory and you know BLM and all those things. And I have tremendous criticisms of both, and I've written and spoken on both of those subjects. But but I want to come just full circle and full stop to say it's a great time to be the church and to be the church biblically for the heart of God. Think about the ministry of Jesus. I'm preaching through the Gospel of Mark right now. I'm in chapter 12. And think about what Jesus does, how often forms of mercy ministry set gospel stages for the Lord to not only speak, but for the Lord to act. Word and deed ministry, as Jesus goes about, what does he do? He doesn't just stand on street corners and preach, he heals. Right? Speaking to embodied people who have been ravaged by sin and its effects. Right? He heals the blind, he heals the lame, he heals the mute. For a moment, you might say he reverses the curse for people who are experiencing the effect of this curse in this present evil age that for a moment they might partake in the blessing and restoration of the age to come. But they're still in this age. And it's not enough. Jesus gives a blind man sight, a mute man voice, and a lame man legs if they still perish in their sins. So what does he teach? The kingdom of God has come. But the kingdom is far more than restoration to the way things were in the Old Testament. It is rather the coming of the blessings of heaven incarnate in the Son. We've heard a little bit about the great commandment, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind, and your neighbor as yourself. But think about not only the question that Jesus poses there, you know, who is the neighbor? It was actually Al Tikerico stole my thunder, but I can't blame him. He did a better job with it than I can. But that question of who is my neighbor, right? That stage in the story there in Luke 10 uh becomes a question that Jesus answers how? Right? With his life. With his life. He doesn't just answer the question verbally, he answers the question with his life. It's not just his example, it's not just his teaching, but it's his life in the cross. And this is a big deal for me. This is what separates us from not only secular paradigms of mercy ministry, but for liberal humanitarianism, it's the cross. Right? Mercy ministry is bearing the cross. Why? How do you know? Because for the Savior, mercy ministry was summarized in the cross. All of his mercy ministry, all the healing, everything that he did was just one breadcrumb closer to where he was going, which is the cross. Mercy ministry is summed up in the cross, and few things are more Christ-like than dying for others to give them life. Right? There's a certain sense in which every diaconal moment, every diaconal opportunity is like a little stage that in its own way becomes a caricature of death and resurrection. Sin has come, and here comes salvation. Right? The wages of sin has come, and here comes hope, restoration, and healing. Right? And this is why I think, and it was uh handled also very well. I'm starting to wonder if every time you have a summit, like the same text become the John 3.16 of the week. But Mark 10, 45, for even the Son of Man came not to be deaconed, as we were properly taught, but to deacon and to give his life as a ransom for many. What a wonderful compliment that the Savior would bind his salvific ministry to the word deacon. Right? As though when you think of the Savior's work, you ought to think about him as the deacon of all deacons. And when you think of the work of deacons, you ought to think of them as little understudies of the great deacon who gave his life a sacrifice for many. What does this mean for us? Well, it means that in Christ, think now of the Old Testament text that we looked at, Psalm 68, Psalm 146, uh other places, strangers are now friends. Right? Objects of oppression are now recipients of justice. The hungry are now satisfied with the bread of life. Aliens are now citizens, prisoners are now set free, widows have become part of the bride of Christ, orphans. Are now adopted into the family of God. Children of wrath are now beloved, children of promise, all and only because of Jesus Christ Himself, the deacon of all deacons, who bore the cross for us as his ministry of mercy and compassion. Okay, so question. Where does God manifest this gospel display? The power of Christ, death and resurrection, the power of the cross. Where does God display these things? Calvin was prone to use the language. Calvin didn't like the theater, like the one you could, you know, kind of go to. He didn't like that theater, but he liked to talk about creation as the theater of God's glory. John Piper even did some writing on this. But there was another theater, often referred to by Calvin, where the glory of God is displayed, the justice of God is displayed, the compassion and the mercy of God are theatrically, dramatically, creatively, yet faithfully, according to Scripture, displayed. And guess where it is? Amen. The church. Now, one of the things I really appreciate about a conference like this is that we're not just talking about in the abstract how to do justice, mercy, walk humbly with our God. We're talking about how the church does justice, mercy, and walks humbly with our God. That's uh Stephen Tracy's church up in Portland.

SPEAKER_12 23:20

Yeah, yes. Next time you just talk bitter up, one night.

SPEAKER_04 23:29

He starts to twitch when he sees pictures of pretty churches without accessibility ramps. Oh, yeah, that's right. We're gonna take up a love offering to improve his lenses. So the local church. These pictures are not intended to be token-esque or braggadocious uh in any way. Uh on the left is my adopted son Carl, and beside him is a semi-adopted uh big brother, DeAndre. Uh he and his older sister, they share the same mom, two different dads. His dad is alive in a drug dealer. His sister's mom died in a drug deal gone wrong. DeAndre largely grew up in our house when we lived in Florida to the point of literally calling me dad and my wife mom. One of the hardest things for us about leaving Florida to go to California was leaving him and his sister. But uh in their own way, they're all dressed up, right? Why? Because they're ushers that day at Covenant uh being taught by the deacons what it means to serve the church, and they loved it. So they were being taught and they were learning to serve, and they loved it. The next picture, this is kind of interesting because the man to my left is DeAndre's grandpa, just a beautiful prince of a man in St. Augustine. In the African-American low-income community, a dad is easier to find than a unicorn. And this guy is a dad to many children without fathers, and just a wonderful, wonderful elder. This family who's joining that day is a family our church cared for diaconally in some pretty significant ways. They lost a child uh a couple years before, and if you look in the eyes of the dad, you can see it. Uh so it's a beautiful portrait, at least to me, of just the local church doing tangible forms of mercy ministry and how beautiful the church is. Why? Because the church should be the safest place in the world. Talk about shelters, right? You know, back in the day before you had hospitals, you know where sick people went? They went to church. Before you had shelters, you know where the abused went? They went to church. If you're hungry, you know where you went? You went to church, right? When the world and the sin and the stuff and the muck and all the effects, right, would manifest themselves. The church was the center, literally, of the city. In my view, I hope yours, the church should be, in a social justice world, the safest place for women, for widows, for the abused, for children, for orphans, for wanderers, for the afflicted, for the needy and the distressed. Uh, this is our game. This is our show. This is our house. Right? All these problems, right? We know what the answers are. What we know the only thing that can truly heal, it's not just handouts, it's the gospel, right? But the church should be uh the safest place in the world. The church is a hospital and it has the best physician. The very best physician. Uh so what Jesus has been to his church, typo, is what the church should be to the world. All right, so we're gonna transition. Uh we're gonna talk a little bit about this report. I'm hoping you've all read it. Uh, it does have some profitable features. This uh study committee originated uh in the early 1970s, around 71, went for several years. Uh it was uh continued, and then finally it was presented. It's not a binding document, okay? It's just a report, but it had some really helpful features that I want to talk a little bit about. When Martin Luther King uh gave his I Have a Dream speech, very famous speech, he began by saying, if you remember the words, we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to was to fall heir. Dot dot dot. We have come today to cash that check. A check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. I want to tease that a little bit and say there's a certain sense in which I, when I read the study committee report on race relationships, I kind of feel like the OPC wrote a check. But I'm not entirely sure how thoroughly it's been cashed. Now, this is not going to turn into OPC bashing. I love the OPC. I've never been happier in the OPC, and I think I know its problems better now than ever. But if you read it and you read some of the recommendations, some of the interaction with the Reformed Evangelical Senate and its recommendations, it it suggested there are some things that we could do, and I'm not sure we've done a lot of the things that were suggested, or maybe another way to say it is we did them for a while, and then we kind of got busy with other things, and those things fell to the background. And now this crazy monster of social justice has reared its head and it's raised the question: where is the church as it relates to race relationships? Where is the church as it relates to the treatment of women? Where is the church as it relates to obvious inequity, injustice, oppression in communities around us, uh, while the church sometimes is perceived as more of a fortress than a haven. So some observations about the report, clearly written in the context of the civil rights movement and what happened with Martin Luther King Jr. And for that we give tremendous commendation that this uh report uh was engaged. It was not just the OPC wrestling through this subject, it was also uh other denominations as well. This is an ecumenical synod uh that also becomes part of an appendix at the bottom. This is also in the context uh when the PCA uh was forming, and there are people who would end up in the PCA. There are functions in the PCA that look a little bit different on this subject uh than in the OPC. But the actions and recommendations of doing things like holding conferences and getting together to talk about the subject and pray about the subject and contemplate things that churches can do, I think in some ways was probably acted upon, and there are men in this room that are older than me and can remember and probably give a little context when I get to the end. Uh, but there are uh there are ways which, at least in talking with some of the men I refer to as fathers in the denomination, that would say, yeah, that was a little bit of a spike, but maybe didn't have the lasting glow that it possibly had, particularly in terms of things that churches could actively do to go out and demonstrate gospel mercy ministry, even in the context of things like church planning, uh, etc. So I feel like for myself, I have really strong appreciation for this report in that it offers a very wonderful biblical analysis of the idea of race, right, which is a sociological construct and not in the Bible. This is everyone should know that by now. There's only one human race, only one race. It's the human race, right? And uh, whatever race is is really just uh ethnicity or tribalism or something along those lines. But there's there's one human race. It also really uh it rebukes. I'm I'm not sure if you're aware of some of the other things that would be written even by ministers and naypark churches at that time, uh, saying that things like interrace marriages were unbiblical. The report flatly rejects that idea as out of hand unbiblically. So you've really got to commend that report for taking a bold stand and pushing back on some things and you know the trajectories of Presbyterians who wrote and published things that said things like black people are subhuman. That's not good. And the report really pushes back on that's kind of a sinful uh treatment of people, uh, any excuse for antebellum slavery, and so there's a lot of things about the report that we could appreciate. Uh there's also some places where we might critique it in the sense that, at least in my view, it offers some good suggestions. Holding conferences and talking about race relationships and mercy ministry, that's good. But you can go to a thousand conferences and do nothing afterwards. And some of you have mastered the art of it, by the way.

unknown 31:53

Right?

SPEAKER_04 31:54

We can get together and talk and pray about what we can do in our community and do nothing in our community. Okay? So, at least for myself, I wish there were even more tangible expressions of how mercy and compassion could be walked across the fence. And this is where I really just want to, so this is my big nudge right here, okay? I wish we'd talk more about how the office of deacon relates to embody mercy ministry in a racially charged context like the early 1970s to set a stage for some of the things that are now before us. Because here's my take. I think our deacons, in some ways, uh, are not the guys that do nothing, uh, they're guys that do a ton. And I want to be really sensitive here to not further burden the conscience of schedules of men who are already heavily burdened. Like I said as a pastor and a friend, I really mean it. And that being said, I feel like our deacons are one of one of our most underused resources in our church as relates to confronting some of the challenges of mercy ministry that the world calls social justice. It's who carried out the heart and compassion of God, not only in the church, but outside the church in the Old Testament. It was to be the priest. How does that ministry translate in the New Testament? It comes to the office of deacon, but it it seems to me that in some ways our deacons have not been strongly challenged or maybe challenged enough, or maybe it's out there and I'm missing it, uh, to be the sort of front line of engaging some of the things that are now popping up in a social justice context, and we've got the best tools and the best resources. So I I want to get the I want to get the race car out of the garage. That's not too forceful a metaphor, and really drive this thing down the street and say, this is what mercy, justice, compassion really looks like. It's gospel-centered, it's church-oriented, it's the hands and feet of Jesus reaching our communities where the pain actually is. So I wish there were more about the work of deacons in that report, which is one of the main reasons why I bring it to you, because I think it's a great report. But what if it had a whole section on how deacons and the office of deacon can not only help do some of this work, but do training in this area. Alright, so now I want to talk about a few books of church order, because I do think they get they get close. By the way, someone like David needs to tell me what time I'm supposed to stop. Yeah, how much? Five o'clock? Okay. I have a very I have a very postmodern relationship with time. What feels like an hour to you may only feel like 15 or 20 minutes to me. Alright, so I'm not going to read the whole thing. You're welcome. Um, but I do want to highlight a few things that are very interesting to me as we look at the OPC, the PCA, and the URC and A church orders on the office of deacon, and let me just put a point on the end of the spear. Here's the question: To what extent does each book envision mercy ministry not being that of simply in-reach, but also outreach to those outside the church? That's where I'm going. That's what I'm asking. Okay? So here, deacons, top, top highlight, deacons are called to show forth the compassion of Christ in a manifold ministry of mercy toward the saints and strangers on behalf of the church. What's my point? The strangers are there. And at least in my knowledge, in this context, strangers would be those outside the covenant. Okay. Secondly, uh, a recognized stewardship and care of the gifts and graces for those in need or distress. Now, again, that could mean only the baptized, or it could mean those in need or distress. How big is the net? Well, I didn't write it, uh, but we can at least wrestle with that category against the backdrop of the word stranger. Very interesting, come a little bit further down, other forms of service may also be committed to the deacons. Now, I in the church I serve, we have four deacons who are machines. I mean, these guys, they just do a ton. They really do a ton of work and have tremendous appreciation for these guys. A lot of forms of service have been committed to them. COVID, glad it came up in the last session, nearly crushed them because all the other stuff going on, along with that, was added to, you know, now we're going to meet outside and set up and break down. And that all by itself just changed the way Sunday was thought about for a year and a half at least, right? But what if the other forms of service included uh things that we might describe as forms of diaconal outreach? And I'm trying to micromanage uh exactly what that would be, just to say in principle, forms of diaconal outreach, and it doesn't even have to be that the deacons do it all, but they cultivate some sort of a leadership catalyst and either set the example or train up and delegate others who may go and do it. We've talked a little bit about the role of women in the church, right? There are a lot of things that I cannot do that I will not do as a pastor, and deacons are not likely going to do, but there could be a place for people in church that are not ordained to do varying forms of outreach that would embody the compassion of Christ well and be included in other forms of service. I'm going to come back to that thought as we look at the PCA. I'm moving quickly because time is not on my side. Alright, so their book is longer. I'm not sure why. Um, but anyway, uh so 9-2, just follow the highlights. It is the duty of deacons to minister to those who are in need, to the sick. Love this phrase. To the friendless. That's a great phrase. I don't envy a lot of things about the PCA, especially currently, no offense to any friends here from that, but I love that phrase. That's a great phrase, right? I was friendless and you befriended me. What a friend we have in deacons. Sometimes you gotta edit as you go. Right, Al? Okay. To the friendless and to any who may be in distress. Now I I find that to be, you know, that's a pretty big net. Right? Clearly, the priority is the household of faith. But there's room to find the friendless and any who may be in distress. Coming back now to our report, the next highlight way down bottom of the page, conferences on subjects uh that seem to have some sort of interest before the church. These can be coordinated by deacons. When was the last time we had a conference coordinated by deacons on something related to mercy ministry, not just this one that you come to, but maybe something uh nudged by a local church itself. We actually did something like that at Covenant a few years ago on building race relationships at our church, and it was something that all of our leadership, including the deacons, got behind. This last one you'll probably find controversial, but it is what it is. Uh, it is often expedient that the session of a church should select and appoint godly men and women of the congregation to assist the deacons. Now, here's what I expect. I expect half of you to be unhappy with that, and I expect the other half of you to give a loud amen. Right. Okay. This is like an OPC altar call. I don't want to see that hymn. Please stay in your seat. There will not be one more round of that hymn. But I I actually appreciate the phrase a lot. We deal with things like domestic abuse. You have to have ladies involved, that's been said, right? Single moms. How do you care for them, come alongside, and minister to their needs? Uh I can't just go to their house and sit down. There's all kinds of things here that we can do together as a church, and I'm not trying to set the bar as low as I can as though to not offend you. I think in general, those are so easy, they should allow us to think creatively about how can, let me say it like this, unordained people in the church assist the office of deacons so that deacons don't die on the track. Often our paradigm, and I think this is slightly systemic in the OPC, is that we have too few people doing too much work until they either collapse or leave. It's true of elders and deacons. They collapse or they leave because it's the only way to get a break, catch their breath, because we don't recruit enough help, we don't provide regular sabbaticals and refreshment, and they just go and go and go until that energy runs out, and then they're done, right? And we probably not even tapped all that they could really be doing, part of which is leaning on uh the congregation. All right. One more. URC. This is a fun one. They have one chapter. The PCA has like 13 paragraphs, the URC has one. Um, but it's interesting here, come down to the middle, needs of those outside the congregation couldn't be clearer. Right? Needs of those outside the congregation, especially of other believers, should also be considered as resources permit. Now, I I love this, and I also have a funny slash frustrating story. I love the fact that they're saying clearly we can help people, uh, not simply other congregations, but people outside even that, as resources permit. All three, let me make a summary comment and tell a story. All three books of church order have some version of a conditional clause that puts a priority on the household of faith, but still reaches across the fence to those outside the congregation as resources permit. I had a student in class once from a large URCNA. We were talking about this very thing, this very uh paragraph in their book of church order, and he told this great story of his church who every year has like over a hundred thousand dollars surplus in its diaconal fund and puts it in its building fund and wonders why it has no ministry to neighborhoods around it. Hold on, I'm gonna start pulling some hair out. We're gonna be here a while. Right? Well, this is I think the resources are there. It's the vision that's lacking. Okay? And I think that's often uh part of our challenge. Uh it's not that the resources are missing, it's the vision that's lacking. Uh money tends to follow vision, and when there's no vision, not only the people perish, uh, the resources are just not there. So just a little bit of interaction with all three. The diakon exists to express the love, compassion, and mercy of God in Christ. You agree with that? Priority is clearly upon the household of faith in reach, but what about the all-important comma after the household of faith as resources permit, to the family of God, but then also to the friendless, to the stranger. My point is, even in our form of government, in our chapter on deacon, uh, there's an underused comma that seems to envision ministry of mercy going well beyond just in-reach ministry of mercy to the local church. And in my view, I'm gonna humbly suggest I think it's an underused comma. Whether or not we have the time is one question, and I grant that's a very important question, but at least wrestle with me. Do we agree with this that paradigmatically, even our Book of Church Order, and far more importantly, the Bible, seem to envision uh mercy ministry not simply being in reach but also outreach? That's the question of the hour in a nutshell. The uncashed check. I'm mindful of our limitations, I'm not trying to kill you guys. Okay, but what can deacons do? What can deacons do? Are our deacons one of our best underused outreach tools? Do deacons have to do at all? There are a lot of things that only ordained people should be doing. But how much of what deacons do could be done by the unordained to free up the ordained to do things that only the ordained can do? That's a really important pastoral question to me. Okay? And what about training? I I I think one of the things, I I love the fact that I'm a very ordinary means of grace guy when people in our church talk about like how do we identify? We identify as an ordinary means of grace church, but I do wonder when it comes to discipleship and training, if we're weaker than we're willing to admit. Like I'm willing to admit that you know, ordinary means of grace and GCP do not necessarily check every box as it relates to discipleship. Training. How are we raising up the next generation of deacons, next generation of elders, next generation of pastors? What acts upon them to make them want to do this? Is there an older man training a younger man, an older woman training a younger woman in one fashion or another? And what about partnering with other churches? You're not going to do everything. Your church is not going to start a homeless ministry and a crisis pregnancy ministry and a food pantry and an everything ministry. It might if you've got 500 people. It probably won't. But we can work with other churches. We start with the best ones theologically, and even sometimes work with parachurch ministries that are doing things that we are not yet able to do if we believe those are things that are God honoring and we can get behind. But the point is we can't do everything, but somebody's going to walk through your door and they already have who needs something you can't do, and where are you going to send them? Right? So we're not going to create the wheel, uh, or we're going to look at ones that are already rolling. The cash check. There is a lot of great mercy ministry, outreach included, going on in the OPC, and being here today and yesterday has just furthered my confidence in that. I love the OPC, and I'm grateful for the deacons of the OPC. I think we are doing a lot of great mercy ministry. And again, I don't want to keep stacking straws on the camel's back, but I also think there's a lot of untapped potential in our deacons and in our members, and there is a great moment of opportunity to be the church and do mercy ministry in a social justice world. If the world is looking at the church and asking the question, so how do you do mercy and show compassion to the broken, the bruised, the abused, the marginalized, uh, the economically disenfranchised, what are you doing in your community? That's a fair question, right? Let me make it a little more uncomfortable. Your teenage kid about to go off to college or already in college, who has all kinds of social justice activism outside the classroom and CRT inside the classroom and is pressed by one of her friends. So tell me what your church is doing regarding this stuff. That's the fault line that I think we need to be really concerned about. Uh five years ago, I felt like the question before us was largely how are we gonna reach the unchurch. Now I almost wonder if the question has shifted to how are we gonna keep the church from covenantal drift in a social justice age? I think it's a real question. And the answer, in some ways, is embodied in our conversation. Right? The world can't fix its own problems and it never has. French Revolution, Marxism. The world's never been able to fix its own problems. Uh only the gospel can fix the world's problems. It always has and it always will, and Jesus will always do it through his church. So where do we go from here? Well, one, uh, yes, it would be great to talk about this, and you'll have some great conversations over beer and pizza tonight, later, uh, when you go back home. But let me just encourage you, uh, when I get to talk about critical race theory, and get to the end, and maybe sometimes even before that, one of the things I want to say is there's a real genuine sense in which, in my view, we don't need it. We just don't need it. Because everything that we need to know about what race is, right, uh, what justice is, what mercy is, what compassion is, what equity is, right? Uh, what not uh showing partiality is, all those things are already in the Bible. Uh, what we need to do is get our Bibles out and ask the same questions that people are asking, uh, but give gospel Bible-centered answers. Uh wrestle in prayer together. These are things to pray about. These are hard questions. I don't have all the answers. Sometimes I feel like I'm worthless because I'm much better at coming up with questions than answers. And I often feel that way. But we can wrestle in prayer together. We can discuss it as deacons with our elders. Uh, we can consider having a retreat or a workshop or, yes, a conference on the subject with hopefully some kind of an action plan on the other side. So you don't just say, hey, that was a great conference. Study your community. Okay, now one thing I've not done, and others are doing it, I'm glad for that, because I probably disappointed you here. Church planning, which is really my background experience-wise, in my view, every church plant takes on different little nuances uh based on where it is and who it's trying to reach. In other words, what I did in St. Augustine, Florida, might not work up in New York and would be a totally different animal in the Midwest or Pella, Iowa, I guess that is Midwest, California. Do you see my point? Uh before each church are local opportunities. And the ones in my backyard are not the ones in your backyard. But maybe one of the questions we ought to be asking is what are the opportunities that are literally like right under our nose? The ones you almost literally drive past on your way to church. Right? And who are those in the congregation that might already have a heart for some of those people that you know you're you're almost kind of holding them back by the back of their shirt and they're just kind of waiting to be let go uh with their church's permission and uh encouragement to engage some of these things. In my view right now, that some of the best exciting energy, most exciting energy that I see in our church is in our teenagers who find me sometimes slow, and I guess I'm getting gray-haired, right? And there's a there's a lot of energy for evangelism. Uh, this isn't gonna all come from us. A lot of it's gonna be just harnessing the energy that's already in our young people and giving that sense of, yeah, like this is your moment. Step up, own the covenant, reach the lost, love the church, right? So we don't have to do all of it, but we just need to study the opportunities in our community and uh in our congregation. Pick a realistic target and goal. Don't try to do everything at once, don't overreach, right? It'd be right, it would be better to do one thing well in a year than five things poorly. If you're excited about this, if you're persuaded, you go home pumped, you know, knock one out of the park instead of swinging and missing at five at the same time. Uh and this was a big deal to me. I've I I thought somebody else was gonna say it by now, but I think I'm maybe well never mind. Work yourself out of the job. You're not gonna be here forever. One of the crazy things for me about coming to this thing is some of you haven't seen in a long time, and neither one of us look the same. You're passing through, right? You're you're taking this thing and you're you're handing it off to somebody else. Work yourself out of the job. You've got a retirement plan, whether you know it or not. Whether you're self-conscious about it or not, somebody's gonna take your spot in the pulpit in the session in the diaconym. Uh, why not begin to train them now? Right? Uh disciple and delegate. I think this is something we're terrible at. Our our leadership model needs a lot of help. We're total doers. We're like hobbits. Right? I've never thought of that before, right? Seems pretty apt. We're we're really good at doing, we're not always so great at delegating, spreading the work around. And finally, uh, I think it'd be great to go home energize for a plan new work, more work that we can do, plan for a sabbatical. If I have my way, and I might not remember my session's here, so I need to be careful. Um, but if I had my way, I would plan a sabbatical cycle for every one of my volunteer officers, elders and deacons included. Uh, if they've ever had one, I'm not aware of it, and they all desperately need it. And you probably, I'm gonna guess 95% of the guys in this room have never taken a sabbatical from the office of deacon and really need it. But macro plan, instead of just micro plan, uh plan proactively and not just reactively. That's that's my point, including a plan for resting. Finally, keep the gospel central. This is what distinguishes us from the world, from liberalism, from empty humanitarianism, dare I add, BLM, and all of the secular analogies, copycats to what the church is, uh, but in some ways uh what the church is striving to be, which is the embodiment of the gospel of God in this world. Now finally. We've heard a lot about bologna in the last couple of days from a Sicilian whom I love and respect tremendously as both the father and a brother. I even ate the bologna pasta today in honor of uh our uh much beloved father in the faith. But there is one thing better than bologna, and that's pepperoni. Right? Uh so I'm not even really sure what I'm doing here. I just kept thinking about bologna and decided, you know, I want to close with pepperoni, right? I want to close with not what we shouldn't be doing or what we're not, right? That's baloney, okay, which has been helpfully pointed out. Uh, but what we really want to be is a bunch of pepperonis. We want to strive after what God calls us to be, which is the embodiment of his compassion, his mercy for the world. Uh, if it's right to say there's no safer place in all the world uh for the abused and marginalized than the church, and the church ought to be the epicenter from which all the ministry of mercy and compassion that the world needs should flow. And certainly God has brought the office of deacon into existence for that very beautiful point. And with that, I will stop and take questions. So uh questions, interaction? Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_08 54:44

Yeah, I put a question and left after thinking about the determined work that put in the one thing of the temple technical after drive that interval after people. How technically the actors have to work well together in terms of using the opportunity to graph the notes.

SPEAKER_04 55:20

Yeah, so uh should I summarize the question? Yeah, so how how can sessions utilize deacons uh in the context of finish the sentence for me?

SPEAKER_08 55:31

In the context of kind of leading the congregation and yeah, and you said did you say you're a church planner?

unknown 55:38

Young pastor.

SPEAKER_04 55:39

Young pastor, okay. Um so I'm not sure how many of you were in the uh presentation on ministering to the spiritually immature Seth Williams. Yeah. So he had he had one line, and the whole thing was very edifying, but there was one line where I wish I were sitting in the room with a committee on home missions, because it would have been like this altar call moment for us, like totally putting our heads down, like, how have we how have we missed that? And can you guess what it is? It was it was the point that when we augment church plans in their oversight, we give them elders, but we never give them deacons. And as soon as he said that, I just I just felt like dark on the inside, like, oh, oh that totally makes sense, right? Because if it devolves, if the work, think about it, if the work of deacons in a session that has no deacons devolves to the session, right? And the session is already a session from another church now augmenting a church plan, what we're basically doing is condemning a church plan to no diaconal ministry unless it just happens to survive this awkward incubation stage and eventually has uh deacons, and we usually ordain them after we make sure we've got some elders. So I found that very convicting. I almost wanted to go home. Um and just to think about bringing the office of deacon into it much earlier. And if you're persuaded by what I'm describing here as the sort of mercy ministry evangelistic side of diaconal work, since so much of what church planning is, is trying to gather a core and finding ways, right, to minister to a community, to break into a community. Uh how about giving some deacons that have a little bit of a vision for this to come alongside the church planner in an overseeing session, uh, not just waiting to see when there are inreach opportunities, but maybe even help them to think creatively and put boots on the ground with outreach ministry. So I thought that was a brilliant and convicting uh suggestion that we need to get our deacons. I think we need to light the fire for deacons and church plants earlier than we probably do, which is just something we we probably all need to think about. It's a good question. Yes, sir?

SPEAKER_00 57:52

Um in my experience as a deacon uh through the years, worked a lot with people regarding employment issues, your church employment trying to find the right job. And some of the things that's come up lately in a lot of the talk and workplaces with surrounding the uh diversity, equity like the mandatory training for that. Yeah. I don't know if you speak to that maybe in regards to our counseling of college students in their future career, or people who are thinking on that. Like is that a non-starter? You know, what resources do we have to understand that how to prove that?

SPEAKER_04 58:30

Or yeah, it's a good question. So the way I want to reframe it is to say I think we should look at the opportunities that might be around us in our communities. Like Seth, you know, gave a couple of stories, anecdotal illustrations of things that he did. It was interesting how he used the language carefully, not even so much as a church, but as a Christian, teaching guys how to be men, good work ethic, and you know, that kind of stuff. And I, in my view, I think it could be both and in a certain sense, were that to flow uh from the office of deacon, which if I remember correctly, he said he was not. So could the deacons in some ways parallel that? I think so. In St. Augustine, one of the things that members of our church did, including my wife, uh, was after-school tutoring for kids that were going to substandard schools to help them raise up their GPA, including the young man in the picture, uh, but not just my family, there are other families doing it. And I I think there's a sense here which we not only want to study our community, we want to play to our strengths. Right? Like one of our Al's thing on hospitality, I could always listen to them talk about that. But one of the things that we do really well is eat. But but what happens now in many of our homes at the end of a meal? Family devotions. Right? Uh at least there should be. Um, so anyway, you know, I think playing to our strengths might be offering help, like with an after school thing and a meal at the end. And when I I can remember even as a young Christian in my 20s, how bizarre it was for me to sit at a table with a family, and there was like cooked food, and at the end, a dad would take out a Bible and read and pray, they would sing. I mean, it was like going to another planet. It's unbelievable, it's mind-blowing. And they weren't doing something overly sophisticated or threatening, they were just opening up their home. If you wed that to, what are some particular? So it's funny, years and years ago, I asked, I asked Bill Shishko and R.C. Sproul the same question, which was if you were to go to some place, you're gonna love this, uh, to start a church from scratch, which is what I was doing, going to St. Augustine, what would you do? And they both gave the same answer. I'd go where the pain is. Now, I know what that meant in Bill's context up in Franklin Square. I asked R. C., so what exactly do you mean by that? He's like, Well, okay, I was hoping you wouldn't ask. I I like to play golf, and I would play golf, and then I would write books in the country club, and these guys would kind of sit around after having a bad round of golf, and amazing how frail their egos are, and I would I would minister to them in their hour of need. I'm like, Okay. Alright. That's not exactly what I was looking for, especially since I I loathe golf. But to your point, ministering to the pain, wetting that to food on the backside is not overly complicated, requires a little bit of study, but just playing with sort of our natural strengths, not trying to invent something overly foreign. So Cheryl?

SPEAKER_02 1:01:31

Yeah, how do we communicate to our culture or generally assert or whatever that um we have an answer that is different from critical race theory and it is different from social justice, other than you know, how how do we encourage people to check that out?

SPEAKER_04 1:01:53

Yeah, I think that so how do we how do we show the world that we have an answer that's different than critical race theory? I I think it's both in word and deed. I think of the language of Colossians 4, 5 and 6 that says, walk in wisdom toward those who are outside. Uh let your words be seasoned with grace, uh, that you might know how you ought to handle each person. I may have not perfectly quoted there, but you get the point. And the point is, on the one hand, we are to walk toward those who that's that's not a defensive posture. That's not a fortress mentality, that's not running, right? That's walking towards. But the wisdom, I think there are times when what the world needs to hear from us is a word of truth, even a corrective word, right? 2 Timothy 3, uh, 16 and 17. I think there are other times where maybe what the world needs to, what it needs from the church is to see us lead in love. Now, you know, the debatable quote from supposedly Francis of the Sisai that I preach the gospel all the time and sometimes I use words, that's not really helpful. Machin would not have approved of that. But there is a point there, right? There's something to be said. You know, Jesus not only spoke, he acted, he did, he showed mercy and compassion. And one of the things that silences the mouths of our accusers, according to scripture, uh, is the things that we do. They will know that we are Christians by our love. And I think to be really clear, I think even more than the world needs to see this, our kids need to see it. You know why? Because they've heard, I can almost get a little emotional here, passionate, they've heard words like justice and mercy a billion times in our churches. But could they say they've seen it? Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_13 1:03:36

So earlier you said words of church, and the first thought that came to my mind was that we've grown comfortable in our little church bubble when we should be armying ourselves or being outside of that comfort zone. And your thought on that?

SPEAKER_04 1:03:56

I I I think it's I think it's somewhat true. So here's my perception. I have the you know small privilege of having visited a good number of our churches and getting to know some of the different characters. And I would say that there are some that strike me as a little bit sleepy and atrophied, comfortable. And I'd say there are others that are just like on fire and really, really passionate. And the, you know, the church in some ways and its spiritual health and warmth, vitality is quite analogous to the Christian himself or herself, right? We have our seasons where we're really on fire for the Lord and walking well. We have our seasons where we kind of dip down, cool off, keep our heads down, right? And so I think, you know, it's a pastoral question like asking how's your spiritual health or the health of your family? Uh they tend to wax and wane. So, yes, in some ways, but there are also a lot of things I look at, I'm like, wow, that's really impressive. Or I'll go somewhere, visit a church not uh terribly long ago, and just came back just almost overwhelmed with how much they're doing. And I'm I'm pretty high energy, and I was very impressed, like, wow, there's a lot of energy here. It's one of the things that really encourages me about the OPC. There are times where we're kind of quirky, inward-facing, and I would just want to go, oh, what are we doing? And there are other times I'm like, this is really wonderful. Like, praise God, and let's have more of that. Um, take the gentleman in the back because I saw his hand first, and that's very Presbyterian, I think.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:20

And talking about like raising up our cardinal kids, how familiar should officers in the church be with like critical race theory and like the primary texts of like this frame of thought?

SPEAKER_04 1:05:33

Yeah, that that's that's a good question. How familiar should officers in the church be with things like critical race theory? I'm gonna say I think they should be familiar with it, although I don't like the stuff and I'm not trying to commend it, but I it's kind of a know your enemy sort of thing. And you know, we've taken time, you know, Machin was careful to give us things, even for lay people, that we might understand, you know, the mind of the unbeliever philosophically uh. Supposition wise, Van Tilde did the same kind of stuff. This is the third rail. And to pretend that this is gonna go away soon is not okay. To put our head in the sand, I think is not a wise and protective posture. I think, you know, as shepherds, we need to understand what the wolves are up to. And because here's here's the bottom line. You may choose not to study or get to know critical race theory. That doesn't mean that you're gonna keep it away from your kids. Social media, college, it's just it's in music, it's Disney. I mean, who saw that coming, right? Right? Let it go, let it go. It's gone. And I don't know if you're gonna get it back. So it's it's out there in ways. I almost feel like there needs to be more Christians writing on the subject and almost like a primer for high school kids. Like, kind of like the book uh Surviving Christianity 101 by Michael Krueger. He wrote it for his daughter. I almost wonder if there needs to be like an analog to that on critical race theory and identity theory uh in this context. One, I'm not actually sure how many more questions we can take, David. Oh, great, love it.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:09

Well, my question is you referenced Martin Luther King Jr. in your presentation. And he's an individual that I also highly respect in some of what he has done. Have you found that there is um uh an attempt to discredit him and what he has said?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:28

Next question. That's a tough one. First of all, I gotta say, great MLK story. So the university I graduated from, the Netherlands, has no academic colors for their academic regalia. And so my wife, being a very frugal Scottish woman, uh went online at eBay and found me this beautiful academic cap and gown from Boston College. Same colors uh that MLK likely might have um had. Anyway, I love this thing. It's the coolest looking academic robe. That was for free. Yes, there are people that have sought to dismiss them, but let me kind of go both and here because this is a this is a tricky one for a couple of reasons. Uh number one, MLK would take it, is, has taken you know quite a beating, even by the contemporary social justice world for his views on gender. He would be anti-homosexuality, you know, a lot of things. Uh so you know, his moral values would not line up uh with the social justice movement today, and many of the things that social justice activists are advocating for today go completely against what he was striving for in the first place, including ironically the presence of blacks in white churches. Like the very thing that he strove for, ironically, now has been undone by the Exodus out. So there's, you know, there's been kind of a, in my mind, uh a painful thing to watch there. The other thing is, you know, I don't want to look over or gloss over the fact that there were some significant theological problems and moral issues with MOK that if you're gonna give a serious appraisal of his work, you at least have to tell. It's kind of like my life has good, bad, and ugly, and only by the grace of God do I enter the kingdom. Uh but the theological stuff, particularly on the cross, for me is is is troubling. Uh, you know, the view that he studied under, he seemed to walk with. Uh now we're as OPC folks were very critical of his theology, perhaps rightly so at points, but remember, he tried to get into conservative uh Christian colleges and they wouldn't take them. So you can't kick them out and then blame them for you know not getting our views. Right? So it's a little bit of a tricky thing. I I think the irony uh to me though is as regards the movements today compared with what he stood for, there are a lot of things uh that white evangelicals very properly supported in the civil rights movement. But you can't, as a Bible-believing evangelical, get behind things like BLM and the package deal of wokeness because it is so unambiguously anti-Christian, full stock. Even where it pulls a couple of threads of justice or writing, you know, certain wrongs that way too much, way too much of a big pill comes along with that to just say this is okay for evangelicals to embrace. So I I just I just don't negotiate with it. I know that gets me, and I you know had somebody tell me recently, you may look like a bodyguard, but you're gonna need to hire a bodyguard talk like that.

SPEAKER_09 1:10:33

Uh actually I was gonna ask a question kind of follow up right to what you were just saying. Um I've always thought that as we're looking to teach people and such our kids to uh to dissuade them of something, you also have to at the same time be willing to admit where the thing has a point. Otherwise, somebody will learn about the thing, it has a point, and say, well, maybe the person's copy doesn't actually have, didn't you double picture here doesn't exist? So you gotta give the devil his view that some kind of the best anecdote against the thing. So my question is twofold. You don't have to answer if you don't have a body RFU, you're gonna have a problem. But first is what exactly is critical case theory? That it feels a lot like in our conversations uh it gets tossed around as um extreme as uh something on the other hand that's uh inane or uh uh what what's the word? Um anyway, it's not a big deal. Um but so what exactly is it? What is it what are we talking about? And second, what does it get right and what does it get wrong? What can we monitor? Hopefully, what we need to pass. That might be a huge question, but the answer is much.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:53

Wow. Aristotle said brevity is a mark of clear thinking. It's hard to define. So I don't do I shouldn't ask you this. If you read the piece that I did for uh Ligonier, uh Christianity or critical theory, I take a stab at this, and one of the things I make is it's not easy to give something like this a definition. It's easier to describe than it is to define, kind of like postmodernism. It's like saying what shape is a jellyfish? It kind of moves as soon as you get your hands on it, it's changing a little bit. I think that's part of the problem here. But you can say it's a secular ideological movement growing in some ways, but not entirely out of Marxism, uh, that grew into a movement that's designed with the in run of activism, with sensitivity to various contexts in which justice has not been applied or injustice has been experienced by minority groups, both ethnically and gender-wise. What it gets right is pointing out there are illustrations of economic or legal disparity in the country generally speaking, right? What it gets wrong is it's incapable and unwilling to analyze those things from a biblical perspective or provide a biblical solution, and it fundamentally it is completely askew on what is man is the image of God.

SPEAKER_09 1:13:22

Can I ask a quick follow-up on that? Would would that relate to like responsibility? So you say that it would say that CRT it's it correctly there are some some uh injustices in say the way things are in our world, and yet doesn't it doesn't um it's uh this sort of uh ignores the image of God and somebody like uh holding people responsible for actions and what would you think?

SPEAKER_04 1:13:50

Yeah, so uh so the the importance of the image of God is it's the starting point of what it means to be human, right? So though you know much of critical race theory really attaches to gender theory as much as ethnic theory, um, which I actually think its real agenda is L B G Q T and the other signs, not ethnic equality. I I think that's actually the cloak that the gender agenda is wearing uh rather brilliantly and demonically. Um but if you you know if you if you start with image of God, then you move to doctrine of the fall, there you go to the gospel. And the problem with critical race theory is it looks at worldly problems through a worldly lens, which is purely horizontal, but you can have no true reconciliation with God or with man apart from the vertical, right? So there never ends up, this is a problem with history, French Revolution, Marxism, is that horizontal justice never actually happens. You just end up with a new oppressor, right? So the godman has to come and endure our oppression to reconcile us to himself so that we know what reconciliation with one another looks like.

SPEAKER_07 1:14:54

I think Hebron's tennis trying to define racism. And he said anything that's inherently racist and circular, you don't get a good definition.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:04

Yeah. Yeah, the de So this is the to the postmodernism thing, I'll take the gentleman in the back. But in my view, the genius of postmodernism and the and the tight corner we find ourselves is that whoever gets to define terms wins the conversation. And Christians, without realizing it, have allowed the secular marketplace to define terms, racism being you know in MLK's day, it was a ethical category culpable to an individual. Now it's been reconstructed along postmodern lines. It's sociological you're racist even if you're not a racist. So you have two very, very different, you know, civil rights, uh, social justice today redefinition of terms, and that's just one illustration of a thousand. So the definition thing is pretty important. Gentleman in the back?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:54

This is more of a comment on this train of thought, I promise I'll keep it brief. But one thing that I've really that that's really helped me in talking with uh Christian friends of mine, not in the OPC, who are um grappling with these issues, is that uh one of the biggest differences between critical race theory and between you know the Christianity that we espouse is that we preach forgiveness. Critical race theory, if you are a member of the oppressed class, you will always be an oppressor. And vice versa, or sorry, sorry, mix that up. If you're an oppressed person, you'll always be oppressed. If you're an oppressor, you will always be an oppressor. And there's no way, no matter what you do, to get out of that. Christianity teaches the opposite that through Christ, redemption from anything and everything is possible.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:42

Yeah, my so my analysis of the paradigm of reconciliation, restoration in the CRT web, it's all law, no gospel. And it gets, by the way, just kind of keep things light here for a second, because I'm sure you need to breathe or run away, um, but it becomes really confusing for people like me and my mom, right? So my mom who marries a black guy, you know, when it was illegal. Like my parents lived in Indiana and had to go to Michigan to get married, right? Uh, because they weren't allowed to marry where they lived in the state where they both grew up. So they went to another state, and my dad recruits, but my mom is white. So is my mom a racist? And according to Robin D'Angelo, yes, uh, because in some way she's higher up on the on the ladder. So then, you know, then it becomes almost comical, right? Like, do I owe myself reparations? This is gonna get really confusing. And what about, you know, my my very first picture of my family, right? Two black kids, two white kids, all adopted. I mean, it gets really complicated at family reunions if you use these categories and there's no gospel in any of it. Uh so I do want to say one more thing on this subject, trying to be positive. But let me ask a question. Why do hund why do counterfeit hundred dollar bills exist? Because real hundred dollar bills exist. Satan is the father of lies. He is the deceiver, and he is the accuser of the brethren. And the world is counterfeiting the gospel in something it calls justice, which is at the end of the day, not true justice at all. There is no true justice apart from the gospel, there is no true reconciliation apart from the gospel, there's therefore no true mercy and compassion apart from the gospel. But there's a side man that wants to say, yes, you know, we need to recognize fakes when we see them. We need to talk about CRT and recognize uh the error within it. But to the $100 bill thing, one of the best ways I think we ought to deal with this uh is with the word of God, study the real thing, embody the real thing. It's it's the best offense. We don't want just defense. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:57

Amen.

SPEAKER_11 1:18:58

Amen.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:58

Where are we at?

SPEAKER_11 1:18:59

Sounds like a really good note to let me pray for us.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:04

Oh, I'm sorry, I'm gonna give uh my good brother the last word here.

SPEAKER_05 1:19:08

Oh, you need to get the last word. Just as far as knowing your community, the southern Baptists have a service, which is called knowing your community, paper. That is the most valuable thing got it broken in a while, the kind of radius where people come from.

unknown 1:19:26

And if you all church that's something like that.

SPEAKER_05 1:19:34

But if I think about scenario, I don't have to do it because I believe that more than likely some of us will face something like this. That 19 children have been killed in a school release and two adults. None of them happens to be an attender of or a member of the church that you're pastoring in that community. What do you do?

SPEAKER_04 1:20:12

And I'm in the community, or this is something that you're in the community.

SPEAKER_05 1:20:16

Nobody that's well, somebody would be connected with, but it's no parents or anything like that.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:22

Yeah. Yeah, that that's that's tough. So I'm gonna give a a couple things, but I feel nervous about all of them, so maybe I should say that first. Um one is I I think one of the things that we do as Christians, and we can do it not only with other Christians, but even those outside the church, is to weep with those who weep. When George Floyd was murdered, I'm good friends with law enforcement, you know, elders in the OPC who are law enforcement who had a pretty strong take on, yeah, that was bad. Like not trying to make it look like no, it wasn't that bad, just wait. It was that was bad. So at least that was, you know. And so our church actually bonded together with other churches. I had a friend, young uh black uh minister who took over his dad's church. His dad marched with MLK in St. Augustine, one of the places that he went to and marched, and uh his dad uh had rocks thrown at him along with MLK. And I have members of my congregation who remember that, older, older members. So, you know, when George Floyd died, uh it was highly painful for this guy, and he and I were in a prayer meeting uh collection with a bunch of other pastors uh for whom this was just deeply traumatic. So we did this thing where we uh we we called churches in St. Augustine to come down to the city center for a time of prayer, and uh I was asked to preach, and my uh ruling elder Terrence was asked to lead in prayer, and so I preached on the city square, police everywhere. White people, black people, young people, older people, different churches. Um, you know, we're down there and they they let me preach. And then Terrence got up and led in a season of prayer, and people that were crying, there are people that were angry. We went out of our way uh to go to the law enforcement people there and say, uh, we we support you, we love you, we're praying for you. Our church, after that event, uh, we did this thing called Pies for Police, which included not only baked pies, but the best kind of all pies. And we took them to state trooper, city, uh, sheriff, and we had people in church uh write notes, and I had black teenagers come with me to deliver these things and watched middle-aged white police officers cry. Being handed food by a black teenager. So that's not to say we did you know anything really great, um, but I think that you know, taking the opportunity to empathize and to weep with those who weep, and in a sense of studying community, you know, on that point, I do think there's a perception, if I can say it like this, as one has had to listen and learn to be quiet. I think a perception is we think we know everything, we don't ask any questions, we we walk in and you know, we just try to start doing things like plant churches in a black neighborhood without recognizing that in a certain sense what we're saying is young people come to our church and leave your parents and your grandparents' church and unintentionally harm you know that church and its community, but because those are the few fathers the community has, but all with good intentions. So there's a lot of things where we just don't always listen well, and in moments of pain, maybe we should do a lot less talking and a little bit more weeping and praying. Okay, okay. I think we're gonna stop there.

David Nakhla 1:23:46

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