We had classis this week. I’ve long been “an old guy” at Classis. That
comes quickly. Classis is still often run by “the old guys” but we
watch the times change. I put some of it in a video.
https://youtu.be/WDYRJ5StRrI
I couldn’t convey all the nuances in the video. The big take aways:
- Rising housing costs disrupt inter-generational transmission of the
church, now even in a place like Ripon CA as they face rising housing
costs. - RC Sproul was the most mentioned “theologian” for this particular
new crop of church leaders examined at this meeting.
2a. the CRC circulatory system is withered to the point of near death.
The leaders and churches that look to CRC institutions for leadership
are nearly gone if you get far enough away from CRC institutions. We
did send some people back to the Calvin Worship Symposium but it is
more like visiting a curiousity than something you take back with you.
2b. The two Calvins don’t have the gravity they had. Online training
at CTS helps keep some tie but it also facilitates the decline.
Trade-offs.
2c. The transformation at classis as a body also happens because the
SF Bay Area churches that were the “Progressive wing” of the classis
are not more. The other big issue on our docket is the ecclesiastical
equivalent to Cathy’s post. 12 churches with attendance under 50. 22
churches with attendance under 100. Some of these churches were the
big Bay Area churches that led the charge on WICO. They were the
“Calvin Alumni Association West”. They sit on land valued at millions
of dollars and they are increasingly unable to afford not only a full
time minister but also to maintain their facility. Even if these
churches were to rapidly close and give all the money to the classis
Classis doesn’t have a viable church planting strategy that it feels
confident in to re-evangelize the Bay Area. The evangelistic program
for the conservative region of classis tends to be taken from the YRR
movement.
- The Builder-Boomer generations are increasingly offline. Busters
are again a tweener group. Millennials and down are far more
influenced by the far larger church spirits of the culture than the
CRC’s own culture. Mainline (the losing side in our current war),
Neo-Puritan/Young Restless and Reformed, Megachurch, etc. Out here YRR
is winning.
3a. Carping about “Abide” which I hear coming through the Inter-webs
is NOT the issue. It’s convenient for CRC-Mainliners to blame a cabal
of evil neo-puritans for changes but Abide is really an expression of
the changes rather than a driving force.
- yet it’s not “Leave it to Beaver” all over again as CRC
Progressives like to project. Our classis, which is very much more
conservative than it was 27 years ago when I got here is still sending
2 men and two women to Synod. A male and a female pastor, a male elder
from a Sacramento church and female deacon from the conservative
church in the Bay area. Just looking at the slate shows how complex
the changes are. You can’t just look at it and say “conservatism”.
Only one of the four delegates comes from Ripon, two from the
Sacramento cluster and the third from the Bay. I’ll be in Sacramento
making videos. I’ve got two sons getting married this spring and
summer.
So the picture of change is very complex. It isn’t just a conservative
resurgence or a progressive departure. It’s way more complex than
that. The larger cultural/economic forces of North America are
scrambling the CRC in ways we didn’t predict. Changes in different
places will be different.
pvk
I chatted with Chris Schoon who was at classis to give a presentation
for Thrive. He is the US Director of the “new” agency which is made up
of all the old offices. I was cynical (my confession) about the move
but after the presentation saw the wisdom of it. In a period of
decline the CRC neither needs nor can afford all of those old
“offices”. They are consolidated down into one agency where some
semblence of the missions can be maintained without the cost of the
separate structures.
I had lunch with Chris at classis. I was chair so had to wolf down my
lunch but we touched on many of the topics I mentioned above. He’s
been visiting classis meetings and has been seeing similar things,
plus some others because he gets around more than I do.
We talked about online influencers which I suppose I should confess I
am one of, if only a small one. He wondered why the CRC couldn’t
generate their own. The number of big online influencers will always
be a very small group and the odds of the CRC developing one is very
small. So the portions of the CRC assimilating into the bigger
environment tend to find their influences. Bookish mainliner leaning
people will look to authors. YRR will look to preachers. Keller was a
bit of a tweener that could span a gap for the CRC but he’s now passed
and his influence peaked during the “neutral world” phase in Renn’s
schema. Since 2013 he was regularly assaulted from YRR and other
culture warrior types to his right which really retarded his
influence. Louder, angrier, less winsome voices (Doug Wilson-esqe)
types ascended.
Portions of the CRC “find” leadership and most of what they find is
outside her. I think again of James Schaap’s 150th anniversary piece.
Quotes from Schaap’s 150th CRC Anniversary Piece | Leadingchurch.com
(paulvanderklay.me)
https://paulvanderklay.me/2009/06/19/quotes-from-schaaps-150th-crc-anniversary-piece/
It didn’t have a compelling enough vision to out-compete other church
visionaries in the broader culture. This is the trial of an immigrant
church. We stopped looking over the Atlantic (they didn’t seem to have
any answers for Holland after WWII either) we divided and started
picking up answers more local. It didn’t really matter if we burned
the wooden shoes or not. We’re no longer living on dairies.
The visionary leaders we had were mostly academics, as was true in the
old world, but this new world is way bigger than the old one. I get
that impression every time I visit the Old World. England? Wow, it’s a
small place that is centered around London. All the major leaders all
went to Oxford (and the other Oxford named Cambridge). Holland? Yeah,
we know some of that drama between city and farm. America? Wow. It’s
big and diverse. Canada? It’s geographically big, but more sized like
Europe in terms of a European country, but also small and hugely
diverse and right now fragmenting. Toronto really isn’t enough to keep
it together. Toronto vs. Calgary vs Vancouver really and then lots of
fringe.
The state church of America was always an invisible church. The split
happened early in the 20th century and the winning team (Team WASP)
has been deconstructing itself since the Civil Rights movement gave it
a confidence crisis. The fundamentalists, sort of like Abide, were
able to undercut the vision of the WASP coalition but had little
interest in actually inheriting the institutions. Trump really is the
symbol of that chaotic populism. (Dare I utter his name…) Can the
center hold?
As institutions (which are really trust extender technology) fall
circles will tighten back to things that are more relationally
manageable. Relationships can be carried by images, screens, tapes,
preachers. We’re in a re-visioning phase and the CRC has no real
candidates on the broader stage. We’ve long been a “me too”
denomination. Kuyper? me too! Radio ministry? Me too. Civil rights? me
too. Seeker mega-churches? Me too. Progressive Liberationism? me too.
YRR? Me too. We’re just a girl that can’t say no. Kissings our
favorite thing! https://youtu.be/A18kYnP4Pec?si=0nq8zV7bNlAkVTVl
Was there ever a center to the CRC beyond the immigrant experience?
There is a Christian center in Christ, yes. Even a Protestant sense of
gravity, but that’s breaking down as the deep issues of the
Reformation are being worked through in Modernity and slowly being
resolved or passing away.
Yet the day to day relies on real life institutions and relationships.
The CRC doesn’t just go away. We have to have the proxy fights because
are part of the bigger battlefield. We are having them. Votes will be
counted. Churches will leave. Many will close. New things will emerge.
Immigration only lasts so long especially as time speeds up and the
generations themselves are divided by technologies.
pvk
Leadingchurch.com 