Presbyterians
By Kenneth B.E. Roxburgh
Special to The Alabama Baptist
Presbyterians derive their name from a particular understanding of Church government, which is governed at a local and national level by representative assemblies of ordained elders, including pastoral leadership from local churches. Its origins are located in Geneva under the leadership of John Calvin and in Scotland through the ministry of John Knox.
Different Presbyterian groups emigrated from Europe to North America, especially from Scotland and Ireland, and became significant leaders in the 18th century. The only ordained minister to sign the American Declaration of Independence was John Knox Witherspoon, who served as a minister in the Church of Scotland in the early part of the 18th century, and moved to Pennsylvania to become president of the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University).
In 1789 various Presbyterian groups joined together to form the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. Through the years, various divisions have affected this original grouping of churches and today the largest of the denominations are represented by the Presbyterian Church USA with more than 1.5 million, the Presbyterian Church of America with 350,000 members and smaller groups such as the Cumberland Presbyterian Church with 75,000 members. Representative congregations of all these groups can be found in Alabama.
Most people know only a few things about Calvin, principally, that he believed in predestination. For many people the caricature of Calvin as a cruel tyrant, a morose, bitter and utterly inhumane figure is hard to change. At the other end of the scale from Calvin-phobia is the equally biased position of viewing Calvin as the infallible exponent of biblical Christianity. Timothy George, founding dean of Samford University’s Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, suggests, “We do no service to the truth by depicting Calvin as either angelically good or diabolically evil.” However, it is clear that the resurgence of Calvinism in Southern Baptist life — through the influence of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky — is a significant movement within the denomination.
Calvin’s influence
Following the death of the first generation of leaders within the European Reformation, Calvin’s influence continued to be significant. He was a prodigious writer. Ninety-six editions of Calvin’s works had been published in England alone by 1640. He proved to be a seminal figure in European as well as ecclesiastical history, changing the outlook of individuals and institutions as he sought to bring a true reform to both Church and State, which linked the expression of God’s rule over the community of saint and sinner alike. Calvin believed that Christianity is not concerned with abstract theology but engages directly with social and political realities.
Busy pastor
Calvin lived an incredibly busy life. He was not only an academic, but also a busy pastor. He conducted marriages, arranged for baptisms, held appointments with parishioners, engaged in visiting the sick, investigated cases of discipline and preached twice on Sundays and three times each alternating week. Along with his wider work as a commentator and theologian, he was involved in the pastoral concerns of everyday people.
He believed God uses preaching to be a pastoral event and that through regular exposition of the Word souls are brought to an assurance of God’s love and forgiveness. Yet pastoral work for Calvin did not end in the pulpit, because he believed pastors should have contact with parishioners. He formulated a rule that nobody was to be ill for more than three days without informing one of the pastors in the city of Geneva to come and visit them. Commenting on the need to not only preach but to pastor, Calvin said people are to be “cared for much more closely and vigilantly” than merely preaching to them.
Philip Melanchthon called Calvin “the theologian,” and it is undoubtedly in the realm of theology that Calvin made his most important and lasting contribution. It is because he sought to structure his theology as a theology of the Word of God that his influence has been long and lasting, but not without controversy.
One of the main themes which undergirded the whole of Calvin’s thought was that of the grace of God, understood within a Trinitarian context: the work of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The decisive factor of Calvin is not, as many suppose, a view of a sovereign God, but rather a much more biblical view of the essence of God’s nature being that of love. Calvin speaks of the grace of God as the “grace of Christ” or as the “grace of the Holy Spirit.” He speaks of how, as a result of the grace of God, we experience “communion with Christ” which is accomplished by the “secret energy of the Holy Spirit” by which we come to “enjoy Christ and His benefits.” Calvin’s emphasis on the grace of God taking the initiative in salvation is seen in his view that faith is a gift of grace: Christ is the object of faith but “faith itself has no other source than the Spirit.”
This emphasis on grace led Calvin to a particular view of predestination and election. This doctrine was not at the heart of his theology. He did not, after all, deal with the topic of election and predestination until the third part of his “Institutes of the Christian Religion.” However, many of his followers appear to think otherwise and stress it as a primary aspect of biblical truth.
In 1536 he did not treat the doctrine as a separate one at all and it is only mentioned in two places, although by the final edition it assumes a prominent place. He admitted it was an “awful decree,” but said God’s inscrutable will must never be questioned.
Calvin’s view was not unique in the 16th century. Apart from some radical Anabaptists, it was a viewpoint that was shared by the majority of the 16th century reformers. Calvin, however, did not shrink from speaking of double predestination, although he was aware of the difficulties it brought to light. He believed God created and chose some people for salvation and created others and chose them for damnation. He argued we should be astounded by the wonder of God’s mercy that He has spared any people the retribution which all deserve. He stated that if God had saved all people then His justice would have been suspended. To the question of why He created many only for reprobation Calvin suggested life in the world, even for a short time, was better than nonexistence.
However, Calvin said what we preach is not reprobation but the gospel, which ought to be preached promiscuously, although the doctrine is given to the believer as a stronghold in times of temptation and trials and a way of offering praise and glory to God. He said, “Because we do not know who belongs to the number of the predestined or does not belong, our desire must always be that all may be saved.”
For Calvin predestination was absolute, particular and double. It was absolute in that it was not conditioned by any outside of God’s will. It pertained to particular individuals and not toward groups, and was both for the purpose of salvation and damnation. If foreknowledge determined predestination, then it would only be a foreknowledge of merit, and this would be opposed to the message of the Bible.
Although he always understood the election of human beings was founded on the grace of God, he also stressed that the proximate cause of reprobation was man’s sin and rebellion. He wrote that “when God adopts severity toward men, He indeed does so willingly, because He is the judge of the world: but He does not do so from the heart, because He wishes all to be innocent.”
Calvin’s views on election brought many people to doubt whether they were indeed saved. Yet, Calvin argued we should not seek to look within ourselves to see if we are one of the elect, but respond in faith to the promises of God. With regard to assurance of salvation, Calvin pointed people to Christ and their relationship with Him and the comfort that came through the Word and sacrament. He spoke of how Christ is the only mirror in which we ought to “contemplate our election” and “if we are elected in Him, we cannot find the certainty of our election in ourselves; and not even in God the Father, if we look at Him apart from the Son.”
Calvin’s theology was captured in the 17th century in the Westminster Confession of Faith, which is still viewed by most Presbyterians as a statement of doctrine whose authority lies subordinate to the Scriptures. Teaching elders, however, are required to subscribe to its teachings.
Presbyterianism focuses its worship on the Bible and the sacraments of baptism and communion. They practice the baptism of infants and also baptize believers who were not been baptized as infants. They celebrate communion on a regular basis, believing that those who receive the bread and the wine are nurtured in their faith as they experience the presence of Christ in a special way through this act of worship. Calvin believed the benefits which God grants His people in the Lord’s Supper are nourishing, refreshing and confirming them in their faith by a vivid re-enactment or renewal of the ratification of the covenant in Christ’s blood.
‘Kirk session’
In its organization for church government, Presbyterians believe local teaching elders and lay elders come together in a “kirk session; to administer the spiritual life of the congregation.” Representative lay elders and teaching elders are then appointed to attend local area meetings called presbyteries. The presbytery then sends representatives to a broader regional or national assembly, generally known as the General Assembly. This is representative of the entire denomination and seeks to discern the will of God for the denomination as a whole on issues relating to mission, theology and moral and ethical issues. Like many mainline denominations, Presbyterians have suffered decline in membership and issues such as human sexuality have caused divisions within the movement.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Kenneth B.E. Roxburgh is professor of religion at Samford University in Birmingham and serves as pastor for preaching and teaching at Southside Baptist Church, Birmingham.
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