Making a Dirty Splash in a Little Puddle: An Attempt to Amend BC 14 (6)

The seasonal holidays are past, and it’s time to resume our analysis of the BC 14 confessional revision proposal being circulated for discussion and decision among the Canadian Reformed Churches.

We have devoted enough space to the issue of the Ninth Commandment, but we need to explain a more wholesome and responsible course of action.

Church orderly

Part of what we have been defending, positively, is the need to follow a church orderly (Dutch: kerkrechtelijk) approach, an ecclesiastical-judicial approach, to this matter. There are protocols and procedures in place for dealing with a person and his/her views. As we have argued, embedding unprocessed and/or unvindicated personal accusations in a proposal to revise BC 14 is neither churchly nor just.

In this connection, at least three lessons have emerged from the Christian Reformed (CRC) experience of seeking to defend biblical truth in the controversies involving the teaching of evolution.

Beating the air with loud assertions about a person’s alleged heterodoxy can easily become a substitute for doing the hard work of preparing and presenting an ecclesiastical-judicial case.


That hard work of following a responsible ecclesiastical path, one that honors individuals as well as the churches, one that honors the process as well as the doctrinal principles at stake, takes much time, perhaps years.


Without doing that hard work of honoring persons and procedures in these matters, those who sow the wind will, inevitably, reap the whirlwind. That whirlwind can be described as a “wild West” approach to church polity, a style of brutality against persons and their reputations, and the widespread distrust of fellow leaders.

I know full well the capacity for people wanting room to teach heterodoxy to manipulate and twist the processes and protocols of church polity. Rules and church orders and protocols cannot and do not guarantee a righteous outcome. I am fully aware of that. But this I also know: ignoring rules and church orders and protocols cannot and does not guarantee a righteous outcome, either.

A suggested protocol

For those who are concerned about the beliefs and teaching of a person who is a member in good standing in his or her congregation, I would like to suggest these steps as a process that would honor both the person and the principles involved.

Step 1. Communicate with, meet with, and discuss with this person, with a view to ascertaining with precision what this person believes and teaches. This step could well take (as in: consume) long months, many meetings, and much patience in seeking to understand fully and fairly the views in question.

Step 2. If legitimate concern remains, if this person is given opportunity to change his or her views in light of the concerns, and if the person does not change the views in question, then address the person’s consistory, with a view to this consistory exercising the requisite discipline toward this individual. At that point, the person becomes a defendant, those seeking discipline become the plaintiffs, and the assembly becomes the jury.

It seems both prudent and just, for the peace of the church, that if, at Step 2, a judicial process is initiated, the defendant ceases promoting his or her views until the case is settled and the defendant is acquitted.

Step 3. If, however, the defendant’s consistory acquits the defendant, and thereby refuses to place that person under discipline, then that consistorial decision must be appealed by the plaintiff to that consistory’s classis, and if necessary, to the regional synod, and eventually to the general synod. Conversely, if the consistory convicts the defendant and proceeds with ecclesiastical discipline, the defendant has the right of appeal, all the way, if necessary, to the general synod.

However, if one of those intermediate assemblies (say, a regional synod) acquits the defendant, then that decision of that assembly must be appealed by the plaintiffs to the assembly next in line (say, a general synod).

These steps, I suggest, comport with a church orderly approach for dealing with controversial teachings.

To be continued.