About Us

Because the exalted Christ has given his gifts to his Church, with his Spirit equipping and upholding his covenant community from one generation to the next, we commit to a posture of gratitude. We are heirs, not founders, of a great tradition, called to be faithful stewards of a precious institution rather than to neglect it or treat it as a means for self-promotion. Mindful of our indebtedness to those who have gone before us, we will honor and build upon the rich theological and denominational resources with which we have been entrusted.

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Because the exalted Christ continues to lead and instruct his Church by his powerful Spirit, we commit to a posture of hope. Though the demonic dysfunctions of our society and the persistence of our indwelling sin tempt us to retreat into a bunker mentality or to capitulate to passive cynicism, Christ promises never to forsake us. Therefore, even as we look backward in gratitude for God’s previous blessings of theological understanding and fruitful ministry, we also look forward with confident expectation of the Church’s future blessings through Christ.

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Because we, Christ’s body, are united in our Head, and because Christ is alive and actively preserving and deploying all his body for service, we commit to pursuing a communion of trust. Though Satan sows seeds of suspicion among us—through evil deeds done in darkness and bad-faith actions; through slander and false rumors; through uncharitable assumptions and quickness to judge—Christ calls us to charity. We will respond to such suspicion by choosing to honor and submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Because Christ exerts his prophetic work through his Church, we will listen to each other and receive correction with humility and charity. As fellow priests in Christ, we will confess our sins and offer our forgiveness to one another. Because we share in his kingship, we will actively guard against all sinful behavior that breeds distrust.

Because Christ the Head of the Church births and grows his Church through his life-giving Word, “the only infallible rule of faith and practice,”

• We submit ourselves in every way to His holy and inerrant Scriptures, eschewing both progressive drift and fundamentalist perfectionism.
• We oppose any behavior that subordinates the Bible to human wisdom, whether in the form of adding extrabiblical constraints to faith and practice—for God alone is Lord of the conscience—or by taking anything away from the whole counsel of God.

Because Christ the Prophet directs his Church by providing a rule of faith and love, summarized in the Westminster Standards,

• We gratefully receive these standards as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures, and we eagerly seek to bring the riches of our entire Reformed tradition into engagement with whatever new opportunities our moment may bring. Confident in these convictions, we also believe “there are truths and forms with respect to which men of good character and principles may differ,” requiring us to exercise mutual forbearance.
• Sincerely subscribing to the “fundamentals of this system of doctrine,” we oppose terms of our communion that are either too lax, requiring only “substance subscription,” or too narrow, requiring “strict subscription.”

Because Christ the King gathers and governs his Church, disciplining his flock through the polity and order he has given,

• We commit to acting as faithful stewards of the institution we have inherited, diligently pursuing its purity, peace, and unity. We will actively engage in the labors required by its discipline and government, confident that through the orderly processes of Presbyterianism, Christ cares for his Church.
• We oppose all forms of divisiveness, such as empty proceduralism or mob-like adjudication, instead energetically pursuing the biblical and constitutional means for confronting and correcting fellow believers.

Because Christ the Apostle enlists his Church as ambassadors of the single gospel of Christ to all,

• We commit to the work of making disciples, desiring to see the loving rule of Christ take hold of every tongue, tribe, and nation. We believe it is the gospel of Christ alone that can bring this salvation. We also believe that this gospel proclamation must be thoughtfully adapted to its specific context and adorned with the Church’s good works.
• We oppose any contextualization of the gospel that compromises its message or any extrabiblical restriction that hinders the gospel from taking root in all cultures.

8. Christ-Shaped Elders

Because, as the gospel creates new church communities, Christ the Chief Shepherd pastors his people through elders,

• We commit to diligently training and carefully ordaining elders from various languages and cultures whose ministry, rule, and care reflect the strength and gentleness of Christ: godly men whose character is above reproach, exemplary in integrity, humility, and repentance, and whose competence in the Word of God enables them to instruct, correct, and guard against error.
• We oppose expressions of leadership that either abdicate authority or exercise it in a domineering and abusive manner.

Because, through His elders, Christ the Overseer of our souls equips his people to participate in this mission and to build each other up into a community that increasingly embodies him,

• We commit to structures of ministry that encourage among all members the godly exercise of spiritual gifts, so that these mutual expressions of “speaking the truth in love” produce a congregation rich in personal godliness, communal virtue, and wisdom for good works in every dimension of life.
• We oppose an egalitarianism that eradicates the order ordained by Christ or a clericalism that devalues the biblical use of his gifts in the ministry of the whole congregation.

Because Christ’s mission finds its culmination as Christ the Great High Priest leads his people in worship of the triune God,

• We commit to congregational worship that conforms to his instructions, confident that we encounter Christ through the ordinary means of grace: Word, sacrament, and prayer. We believe that these means should be appropriately adapted to the particularities of each local, embodied gathering, through the gifts of Christ’s people and under the authority of Christ’s officers.
• We oppose the use of elements of worship not regulated by his Word or any enforcement of unbiblical restrictions that bind where Scripture gives freedom.

Before it is anything else, the PCA must be a denomination with Christ at our center. The Father has appointed his Son to be our cornerstone, our builder, and the head toward whom we grow. There is nothing more important, nothing more glorious than our calling to be a community in whom Christ richly dwells, through whom he fills the world with the glory of God.

We are constantly in danger of losing sight of this. Ever since Christ confronted the church in Ephesus for abandoning its first love, every generation of believers has been tempted in its own fashion to turn its attention away from the one who is preeminent in all things.

This is why Paul repeatedly warns us against quarrelsomeness. When believers become mired in controversy—when, for example, we view everything only in terms of being on the left or on the right, we stop focusing on what is central. And because he who stands at the center of all things is also the one in whom all things hold together, when Christ is moved to the periphery of our attention, everything begins to fall apart. Missional creativity and theological seriousness are suddenly pitted against each other. Suspicion replaces trust as we forget the true basis of our unity.

AMR’s conviction is that renewal happens and mission flourishes only when Jesus is given his rightful place. The health of any denomination requires more than simply believing and loving the right things. Right proportion is also necessary: we must keep central what is central. AMR’s efforts—drawing leaders together relationally, elevating the quality of our common conversation, and patiently engaging in the formal structures that shape our common life—are rooted in our passion to see Christ increasingly at the center of the PCA.

Expressing this desire only in general terms is insufficient for accomplishing our goal. Clarity of vision is required. What does it mean to be a denomination that maintains a right sense of proportion? What does keeping Christ central look like when it comes to our posture toward each other? How can a Christ-centered vision clarify our unity and give focus to our shared mission? And, even as we must focus first and foremost on what we are for, what does this commitment call us to oppose?

Over the last few months, several of us have worked together to articulate in written form our answers to these questions. The result is what AMR’s board has now adopted as its new Theological Vision statement, declaring AMR’s defining commitments. This statement also describes what we believe the PCA is called to be.

It begins, as it must, by describing the foundation that we have in Christ:

“Our world will experience its full and joyful consummation once all things have finally been brought perfectly together in Jesus Christ, the risen and exalted King who now reigns and is putting all things under his feet. Astonishingly, God has chosen to accomplish this glorious plan through the Church. It is the Church that God has redeemed and called to be Christ’s body. It is as the Church obeys God’s call upon it that Jesus, its head, fills the world, causing even the heavenly authorities to marvel at God’s manifold wisdom. Alongside all other branches of Christ’s Church, our denomination’s sacred task is, in Christ, to help the Church increasingly fulfill this calling.”

Built upon this foundation are ten articles. The first three describe the posture to which Christ calls us. The Christ-shaped community is a community of love, and within a denominational context, this love must manifest itself specifically in the virtues of gratitude, hope, and trust. Gratitude, because having inherited a rich and grace-filled tradition and history, we are called to be stewards who respectfully conserve what we have been given. Hope, because the ongoing presence of Christ’s Spirit gives us confidence that we will continue to be refined as we apply the truths of his Word to new challenges. And trust, because Christ has bound us to each other, calling us to work together in this endeavor.

The next three articles affirm and articulate our denominational identity: as the PCA, we are committed to being unapologetically biblical, Reformed, and presbyterian. For this is our shared understanding of what it looks like for us as a denomination to submit ourselves in faith and practice to Christ’s ongoing rule.

The statement concludes with four articles that describe the work we believe is entailed by seeking to be obedient to Christ’s Great Commission. We move from Christ-exalting mission, which rests in the power of the gospel as it is thoughtfully proclaimed and faithfully embodied by the church, to the appointing of Christ-shaped elders, to the Christ-filled ministry that comes when the entire church community is equipped and exercises its gifts, to the Christ-saturated worship of God that is the goal of all that we do.

In the coming weeks, we will be posting essays meant to further clarify the content of each article. Our purpose in these efforts is not to offer a detailed theological standard or to provide a comprehensive articulation of good polity, for the PCA already has these things. Rather, this Theological Vision statement is presented as a lens to help provide focus. Our prayer is that God will use these efforts to help us ever more deeply turn our attention toward our King.

“With joy we dedicate ourselves in Christ to this sacred calling. We resolve to persevere in this work until that glorious day when the earth is as full of the glory of God in Christ as the waters that cover the sea.”