This past Wednesday evening I had my third official Vice-Mod visit to a church in my own presbytery. I visited St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in North Raleigh, whose pastor, Mike Nevling is a good friend of mine. St. Andrews is a growing congregation that is seeking do greater outreach to its local community and they are doing great things! I spoke to about 20 people who wanted to know how the actions of this past GA was going to impact the church at large as well as the local churches.
As opposed to my previous visits, there was more of a focus on actions related to the proposed changes to the ordination standards. Some good questions/comments were directed to me, such as:
1. Since the previous AI is no longer in effect and force, can a candidate for ministry become ordained who is homosexual?
2. Why is it that while our membership numbers are shrinking our per capita (as in per person) giving is up? How does the denomination view that?
3. A comment was brought up that although the focus of the Heidelberg Catechism is Question 87, there was another question that dealt with standards for correct conduct of persons seeking a church office.
4. Another question was brought up as to what the denomination is doing with missions and missionaries.
There were a lot of good questions - some that I couldn't necessarily answer - and I could tell there were a lot of people concerned about the direction of the PCUSA. I have no idea for what God has in store but I do know that whatever happens, God will be right there with us. Thanks once again to Mike Neveling and the good people at St. Andrews!
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