The Lead has been passed along an essay entitled “Our Journey Into the Future” that is reportedly to be presented to the Global Anglican Futures Convention (GAFCON) which occurs later this month in Jordan. This is a new document and not the paper published by SPREAD that appeared a few weeks ago.
The essay attempts to explain why it is that GAFCON has been called, why it is at cross-purposes with other Anglican meetings such as Lambeth, and what the hoped for outcomes might be.
From the paper:
Firstly, action must be taken by leaders. The Bishops of the Church are called to uphold her faith. In their relationship to the Spirit and the Holy Scriptures, they are a sign of the unity that God gives to the Church. So GAFCON is a meeting of bishops of the Church, with clergy and laity too, who seek God’s way forward in our day, on the firm basis of the truth he has revealed.
Secondly, action has to be taken in public. The heroes of the faith, mentioned in the letter to the Hebrews, are celebrated for their public actions, not their feelings. Even when filled with fear, they overcame their intellectual and spiritual doubt, they discerned God’s presence and will, and they acted on their faith. So GAFCON is, of necessity, a public gathering, because the issue at stake is the possibility of knowing the truth, and of obeying the truth in the public domain.
…GAFCON identifies an area of public life today which is challenged to its heart by the gospel of the Lord Jesus. GAFCON is a statement that the truth of God can be known; that it is the gateway to fulfilling and fruitful life for men and women, in marriage or celibacy, and that obedience and witness to that truth cannot be confined to the space or the form that is offered by the powerful.
GAFCON is seeking to give public and institutional expression to the truth of the gospel in the public ordering of the Church. Far from accepting unlimited diversity and disobedience to the truth, this will mean respecting the order that God has given for authority in his Church and wholesomeness in society.
UPDATE: The Modern Church blog has a detailed analysis of this essay. Preludium has an analysis here.
You can read a summary of the paper below.
Our journey into the future
Over the past ten years the journey that we, as orthodox Anglicans, have taken together, has confirmed what we feared: some Churches in the Anglican Communion are radically redefining the received faith, and abandoning fundamental parts of it. We recognize that many in these Churches believe that the challenges they are making are Spirit-led, and necessary in order to respond to the challenges that the Church faces today.
Our own experience has been different. We have upheld the received biblical faith. We have found it to be relevant and powerful in addressing contemporary challenges. And we bear testimony to the gospel’s transforming power, in our own lives and in our churches. We have not claimed to possess the complete truth, but nor have we considered truth to be so provisional and partial, that one cannot possibly arrive at a clear judgment on theological error or unbiblical behaviour.
We recognize that the Holy Spirit of God leads God’s people to truth, as they act and reflect together. We also recognize, however, that this is not just a continual process of listening and sharing, in which people are suspicious of judgments, and where there are no clear guidelines on discernment or on how to arrive at firm positions.
To deny the possibility of any access to the truth of God, suggests that God has been inadequate in making himself known to his own creation and to his creatures. It also means that final decisions, about what will count as truth in any given situation, remain with the powerful.
As those called to lead the Church, we have the responsibility not just to testify to truth, but also to uphold it and commend it. But some in the Church, in their understandable desire not to exclude anyone’s voice, especially the voices of individuals and groups who are seen as vulnerable and oppressed, are now making the inclusion of all voices, opinions and testimonies into the primary means whereby we experience and commend God’s truth.
We note with deep sadness that such a view has led to a Church which includes much, but which does not recognize how it may have access to the truth of God. Therefore, having no good news about transformation of life, it has nothing to offer to the broken and disordered communities of our fallen creation.
Over the last ten years we have journeyed together in the search for a definition of faithful, orthodox Anglican identity. GAFCON is no new or reactive phenomenon. It is the culmination of years of witness, discussion, listening, engagement and prayer. The setting up of GAFCON came to be seen as a necessity, in order that we might meet together, affirm our identity as orthodox Anglicans, and identify the challenges to that identity, both from within the Anglican Communion and from without. We meet together as a people under Biblical authority, and as a people called to mission. We meet to maintain and to strengthen the unity of the Body of Christ.
We see a parallel between contemporary events and events in England in the sixteenth century. Then, the Catholic Church in England was faced with the choice of aligning itself with either Rome or Geneva. But, when forced to decide its identity, it sought to distinguish itself from both the practices of the Papacy and the excesses it associated with the more radical reformers. Now, after five centuries, a new fork in the road is appearing. Though this fork in the road may present itself publicly as a choice in relation to aberrant sexuality, the core issues are about whether or not there is one Word, accessible to all, and whether or not there is one Christ, accessible to all.
As we, in our time, face this dividing of the ways, we will need to depend absolutely upon God’s guidance, discernment and judgment.
Jesus promised his disciples that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all truth (John 16:13). It is the Holy Spirit who provides the road map to truth, who leads God’s people to the destination of truth. So we seek his guidance, in prayer together and through the Word, so as to identify the direction in which he is pointing us.
Discernment is to do with seeing reality as God intends us to see it, and clarifying how God calls us to respond to it. King Solomon sought the gift of discernment, as being the most necessary gift to lead God’s people (1 Kings 3:9). He asks for a disposition of heart and mind that will enable him to discern God’s purpose and act for the welfare of God’s people.
When St Paul addresses the divisions in the church in Corinth (1 Corinthians chapters 1-3), he identifies the heart of the problem: God’s wisdom and his purpose cannot be understood by human wisdom; they can only be ‘spiritually discerned’, by spiritual persons taught by the Spirit (1 Cor. 2:14-15). We come together to receive the Spirit’s wisdom, a disposition of heart and mind that makes spiritual discernment possible.
We recognize in humility that we are called to share our testimonies of how God’s truth judges and transforms us. We also recognize that we must uphold God’s truth and act on it. Paul asks the Corinthians ‘not to judge before the appointed time’ (1 Cor. 4:5), but to wait till the Lord returns. However, this is not a call for inaction and endless process.
In the very next chapter, Paul does not hesitate to tell the Corinthian Church that he has already passed judgment on one of their members (1 Cor. 5:3). In prayer we seek God’s judgment on his Church, and seek to act on that judgment. What might this look like in practice?
Firstly, action must be taken by leaders. The Bishops of the Church are called to uphold her faith. In their relationship to the Spirit and the Holy Scriptures, they are a sign of the unity that God gives to the Church. So GAFCON is a meeting of bishops of the Church, with clergy and laity too, who seek God’s way forward in our day, on the firm basis of the truth he has revealed.
Secondly, action has to be taken in public. The heroes of the faith, mentioned in the letter to the Hebrews, are celebrated for their public actions, not their feelings. Even when filled with fear, they overcame their intellectual and spiritual doubt, they discerned God’s presence and will, and they acted on their faith. So GAFCON is, of necessity, a public gathering, because the issue at stake is the possibility of knowing the truth, and of obeying the truth in the public domain.
The possibility that there may be a truth that can be known is good news for people who want to see change. Those who deny that access to the truth is possible define everything in terms of power. Their own power, of course, is challenged by the very appeal to the higher court of truth. The fundamental question is whether the Church is the message, or has the message. Some people want to say that the Church can share experience, and worship, and work, but that it cannot share faith because expressions of faith are so personal and diverse. So, they would say, the message of the Church is that its own diversity, and its ability to live with plurality and contradiction in its own membership on matters of faith, is precisely its witness in a plural society.
But the tensions and contradictions inherent in this position have become impossible to maintain. GAFCON is saying that there are Anglicans who are unwilling for the clarity of the Bible’s message to be clouded by confusion, by those who directly contradict its teaching.
Our journey is witness that the truth of God is accessible. We are convinced that God has made himself known, sufficiently for us to be able to respond to him, and make truly moral choices between obedience and disobedience. This is critically important for evangelism among the poor.
Our journey has been to challenge those who would exercise institutional power to suppress the truth. We make this challenge in the name of God’s love, and in order to honour the dignity and identity of the ordinary person, who does have access to God through the Scriptures.
Our journey is to seek our identity in relation primarily to that truth.
GAFCON identifies an area of public life today which is challenged to its heart by the gospel of the Lord Jesus. GAFCON is a statement that the truth of God can be known; that it is the gateway to fulfilling and fruitful life for men and women, in marriage or celibacy, and that obedience and witness to that truth cannot be confined to the space or the form that is offered by the powerful.
GAFCON is seeking to give public and institutional expression to the truth of the gospel in the public ordering of the Church. Far from accepting unlimited diversity and disobedience to the truth, this will mean respecting the order that God has given for authority in his Church and wholesomeness in society.
Bishops have responded to God’s call to action by holding a public gathering at GAFCON. As they gather, they will look again to God’s call for future action in faithful leadership of their Anglican Churches.