Fussin' Presbyterians

Why do we Presbyterians have so much fussin’ to do? Wouldn’t it be so much easier just to have bishops or popes make all the hard decisions for us? Perhaps it would be. And it is probably in such an attempt to avoid conflict that some presbyteries have delegated much of their decision-making power to committees or commissions, or even to paid staff members.

But when we look at the way the Church dealt with disagreement in Acts 15, we don’t see any of those early Christians appealing to powerful personalities to impose peace on the Church. No, whatever our Roman Catholic friends might believe about Peter being the first Pope, no papal power is on display during that first General Assembly. Yes, Peter is the first person whose comments are recorded, but he doesn’t insist on everyone listening to him because Jesus gave him the keys of the Kingdom. In fact, he doesn’t mention those keys at all. (And if you look at I Peter 5, you’ll notice that Peter speaks to his fellow elders – not exactly the language you’d expect from the vicar of Christ.)

Paul and James were also at the first Assembly, and both of them either had written or would write numerous portions of Scripture. But neither one of them appealed to their apostolic authority. Neither of them said the Assembly should listen to them because of who they were.

No, when we look at Acts 15, we can’t help but come to the conclusion that the early Christians made decisions the way that we Presbyterians still do: by coming together in councils of elders to make decisions as a group. And the only way a group of elders can make decisions, especially when matters can’t be compromised, is to have what verse 6 says they had: much dispute. There’s just no way around it. Governing ourselves as Presbyterians, governing ourselves in the way that the early Church did, means we’re going to do some fussin’.