The PCA Has Fallen into Error, and Can’t Get Back Up: Part 1-Creation

Given the number of related meme’s populating the web, quite a few people still remember the 1980’s era TV commercial encouraging senior citizens to buy a device that would call for help in the case they fall and are not able to get up to reach a phone. Though a lot of people have made light of the commercial, underlying it was a serious issue that needed to be addressed.

The same could be said today of the plight of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). Though many elders, deacons, and members in local churches seem to be taking lightly the ongoing errors of the PCA, they are serious and must be dealt with in one way or another. If by God’s grace this means a revival in the PCA, it is likely that lay members are going to play a significant role in this.

In this series, I’d like to run through a brief history of the errors of the PCA in exegesis and application that have led us to where we are today. Founded in 1973 to escape the growing liberalism in the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS), it took about a quarter of a century for the liberalism to work its way back into the PCA. In Part 1, we will start with the days of creation. Specifically, the report of the Creation Study Committee to the PCA’s General Assembly in 2000.

Genesis 1 tells us that “God created the heavens and the earth” in six days, with each day being separated by evening and morning. The reality of the 24 hour days of creation cannot get much clearer than that. Jesus supports this in Mark 10:6 when He says, “from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female,’” indicating that Day Six was very close in time to Day One. And again when He says the “blood of Abel” was “shed from the foundation of the world.” The biblical text leaves no room for days that last for billions of years so that, for instance, the earth could have slowly formed out of the remnants of the big bang.

Perhaps the most popular non-24 hour day view in the PCA today is the Framework interpretation, which takes the position that “the scheme of the creation week itself is a poetic figure.” Its proponents come to this conclusion by claiming Genesis 1 and 2 are differing and conflicting accounts of creation by viewing Genesis 1 in light of the less clear Genesis 2:5-7.

Yet this stands sound hermeneutical principle on its head, which requires that “a clear passage … be used to shed light on a difficult, not-so-clear passage.” Of the two, Genesis 1 is much more straight forward: the world was created in six days. Going in this direction, it becomes clear rather quickly that Genesis 1 is a history of creation and Genesis 2 is a history of man, starting on Day Six. The plain meaning of the text in Genesis 1 helps us see that both are historical and without conflict–though still with some mystery. Which makes sense, since all of Genesis–including the creation account–is most naturally read as history.

While there is (a little) room for debate when looking at the scriptural account of creation, there is much less so when it comes to the Westminster Confession. It is not an ancient text written in a foreign tongue by men in a world very different from our own; instead, it was written only a few hundred years ago in English by modern men, most–if not all–of whom individually believed in a creation of six 24 hour days. Yet Framework proponents take the phrase, “It pleased God … to create … the world … in the space of six days,” and determine that it could mean something else, using reasoning like this:

the confessional language “in the space of six days” is substantially equivalent to Scripture, and … the clear expressed intention of the Westminster Assembly is thus to be no more or less explicit than Scripture itself.

Men who are willing to bend scripture to accommodate secularists on creation–God’s foundational act that revealed Him to us as Creator–are more likely to bend scripture to appease the proponents of the latest secular fad.

Unfortunately, that is proving true in far too many areas affecting culture and the church today. Next, we’ll examine the PCA’s errors related to race and racism.

p.s. I understand talking about error in a church setting can be serious. Yet a humble church also knows that it is often in error and thus willing to correct itself–as it has done throughout history. Therefore, I bring this to the table as the church brings discipline to its members; in a loving hope of repentance for all of us seeking to serve and love Christ.