As the 37th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America approaches, business is being wrapped up from the 36th GA in the form of voting on a Book of Church Order change.  In addition, three more overtures to this year’s Assembly have been posted.

The one amendment to the Book of Church Order approved by the Assembly and sent to the presbyteries for concurrence is a clarification of the procedure for membership vows.  The profession of faith section of BCO 57-5 begins with “The minister may then address…” and then gives an introductory statement before the membership vows.  The section continues with the membership vows so that the last prescriptive word is “may.”  The proposed change would insert between the introductory statement and the actual vows the following “shall” statement:

The minister shall then ask the following questions (or alternate questions that communicate their substance):

The official vote tally, updated last Tuesday March 17, has 35 presbyteries approving and 16 against.  That is 69% approval, slightly ahead of the 2/3 (67%) of the presbyteries that must concur for adoption.  With 77 presbyteries in the PCA, 51 must agree to change the BCO.  There are 26 presbyteries yet to vote or report their votes.

The G.A. Junkies will be well aware that the PC(USA) is voting on a similar amendment to their Book of Order that would require new members to take membership vows as part of the reception process in front of the congregation.  At the present time that amendment is approaching passage with the official tally reporting a vote of 70 to 39.  (Concurrence of 87 presbyteries required for approval.)

The Overtures web page now has numbers 11, 12, and 13 posted.

Overtures 11 and 12 are similar in that they deal with the physical boundaries of presbyteries.  Overture 11, from Iowa Presbytery, seeks to “Redraw Boundary between Platte River and Iowa Presbyteries.”  At the present time Iowa Presbytery is the whole of the state of Iowa, including Council Bluffs, Iowa, across the river from Omaha, Nebraska.  They make the reasonable proposal that Platte River Presbytery, which includes Omaha, is interested in, and better positioned to, plant churches in the Omaha metropolitan area and request the transfer of the one Iowa county containing Council Bluffs to Platte River.  (Note:  The overture refers to the second presbytery as Platte River, while the PCA list of presbyteries and the Presbytery’s web site call it Platte Valley Presbytery.  That will no doubt be cleaned up as an editorial adjustment.)  We can probably expect the customary concurring overture from Platte Valley.

Overture 12 from Ohio Valley Presbytery requests the Assembly “Form Central Indiana Presbytery.”  The overture points out that the region of Central Indiana currently in Ohio Valley Presbytery has reached the requisite number of churches and members, and has the necessary potential for growth, and that splitting it off to form its own presbytery would make church planting more efficient.  Nine southern counties in Indiana would remain in Ohio Valley.

Overture 13 comes from Presbytery of Grace and proposes a possible statement on gender issues.  The overture title, “Adopt Danvers Statement on Gender Issues” refers to a 1987 statement by the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood that came out of a meeting in Danvers, Mass. —  The Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.  This overture, for the sake of the Assembly and denomination speaking on the issue, proposes adopting the Danvers statement in whole while making one phrase specific to the PCA.  In Affirmation 6 the phrase would be changed from

In the church, redemption in Christ gives men and women an equal share in the blessings of salvation; nevertheless, some governing and teaching roles within the church are restricted to men.

to

In the church, redemption in Christ gives men and women an equal share in the blessings of salvation; nevertheless, in accordance with the teaching of the Holy Scriptures, the offices of Elder (Ruling and Teaching) and Deacon are restricted to men.

(full sentence included for context)

As you would probably expect the Danvers Statement is very much a complimentarian statement and sets forth a rational and ten affirmations that I think many in the PCA would be in agreement with.

Commentary:  As I look over this overture and the Danvers Statement I have to admit that I don’t see how this is a contribution to the current polity debate.  It may be useful as a general, big-picture statement, but even in its modified form it really seems like it adds nothing beyond what is already in BCO 7-2 that offices are open only to men.  The current debate is not so much about women serving as ordained deacons, although that is in there for some, but about another commissioned status that begins to look like an ordained deacon.  Am I missing something about the usefulness of the Danvers Statement in this discussion?

Well, we are now less than three months from the convening of the General Assembly.  There should not be too much more business still out there. (That completely closes at 60 days.)  Registration is open, a draft docket is posted, and the more than 50 seminars listed, including a discussion/debate with TE Ligon Duncan and TE Tim Keller titled Discussing Deaconing Women.  The whole GA promises to be interesting.