The eternally glorious Son of God was treated as a stranger among His own people (John 1:10–11). But He came to make us heirs of the world to come. He came to fulfill the hope of Abraham, Joseph, and Moses. He entered that state of sojourning to secure redemption for His people. He identifies with the true sons of Abraham who also pass through this world as sojourners. 

After a decade of church planting and pastoring in the beautiful Southern coastal city of Savannah, Ga., my family and I moved on to a new place to begin a new ministry and a new season of life. As our time in Savannah came to a close, my heart began to fill with sadness over the fact that we were leaving behind beloved friends, a house we loved, and a delightful city. At the same time, I was reminded of C.S. Lewis’ statement about “pleasant inns” in his book The Problem of Pain. He wrote, “The settled happiness and security which we all desire, God withholds from us by the very nature of the world: but joy, pleasure, and merriment, He has scattered broadcast. . . . Our Father refreshes us on the journey with some pleasant inns, but will not encourage us to mistake them for home.”1

As believers, we are called by God to train our minds and hearts to firmly latch onto the biblical teaching that we are passing through this world as pilgrims and strangers. We can never allow ourselves to become comfortable here. We are merely sojourners passing through this world on our way to glory. From the first promise of redemption in the garden (Gen. 3:15) to the glorious heavenly vision of the City of God (Rev. 22), the totality of the Bible focuses on the pilgrimage for which God has redeemed His people.
When God called Abraham to leave his family and his homeland, he “went out, not knowing where he was going” (Heb. 11:8). “By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise” (11:9). Moving from place to place, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob walked by faith in the promises of God. The Lord had promised Abraham that he would inherit the land; yet, the only land he ever possessed during his pilgrimage was a tiny plot that served as a burial place for him and for his wife, his children, and his grandchildren. The act of burial was the last great act of faith. It proved that he was looking for something better—the hope of the resurrection. Abraham never had a permanent home until he died. When he died in faith, he settled in “the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God” (Heb. 11:10).
Joseph also lived and died as a pilgrim and stranger on the earth. Abraham’s great-grandson spent the better part of his life as an alien in a foreign land. He was cut off from his earthly family until the end of his father’s life. He was instrumental in the rest of his brethren coming and dwelling in a foreign land. When he died, Joseph “made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones” (Heb. 11:22). By charging his brethren to take his bones up from Egypt and into the promised land (which would not occur until some four hundred years after he died), Joseph was teaching the Israelites that there was a better city—one for which God would raise him up, body and soul.
After Moses fled from Egypt into the wilderness of Midian, he married the daughter of the Midian priest Jethro and fathered a son with her. Moses named his firstborn son Gershom (literally meaning “stranger there”). Scripture teaches us the rich biblical theological meaning of this name in Exodus 2:21–22, where we read: “Moses was content to dwell with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah. She gave birth to a son, and he called his name Gershom, for he said, ‘I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.’”
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We all struggle with the darkness of all types of sins.  My entire case for submitting the original overture is that the “public” announcement (like in Christianity Today) of constantly struggling with any particular sin disqualifies a man from holding office in the church.  The key word here is not the word “struggles” or even the word “sin,” but rather the word “public.”  What is public is a man’s reputation.  A man may fight privately with all types of sin which do not have dominion over him, but once he comes out of the closet and names those sins publicly to the whole world, he loses his eligibility to hold office. 

I appreciate the recent article in The Aquila Report, Clarity on Overture 15, by Ryan Biese.  It provided more precision in stating what Overture 15 actually says.  In this post, he takes issue with a public statement recently made by the PCA Stated Clerk summarizing the Overture as meaning that “the desire itself is disqualifying.” On the contrary, this Overture speaks of “men who describe themselves as homosexuals….” Mr. Biese is correct.  There is a big difference here.
Our Stated Clerk refers in this same public presentation to the fact that he had brought together in the same room those who are in opposition to each other on this issue.  Supposedly, this discussion produced a compromise resulting in Overtures 29 and 31. However, the Stated Clerk misjudged the PCA as a whole.  Overture 15 came out of nowhere like a misfired missile.
Well, I was not in the room! I have always been an outlier. Maybe I should have been in the room, since I was the originator of Overture 15 that came from Westminster Presbytery (in Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee).  It originally came from the Session of my former Church who asked for my advice before they submitted this overture to our Presbytery several years ago.  The Overture was approved by our Presbytery, and then in good and proper parliamentary fashion disappeared at the 48th General Assembly in St. Louis.  This was what I call the first disappearance.
Early this year (2022) before the meeting of the General Assembly in Birmingham, I submitted the overture again to Westminster Presbytery, but it was lost when it was sent to a Committee. I think it was inadvertently lost in the transmission from the Clerk of Presbytery to the Chairman of the Committee. This was the second disappearance.
Because it was lost, I later reminded Presbytery that it had vanished.  I also reminded them that I had submitted it at the previous Presbytery meeting.  At this point I had finally made a decision to withdraw it altogether.  I was thinking that the Lord must have a purpose in what appeared to be some type of providential evaporation of this overture.  So, the overture was sent back to the same Presbytery committee to act upon my request to withdraw it from any further consideration. Later, a member of that Committee, representing the Committee as a whole, called me and asked that I not withdraw it, and that it be presented to Westminster Presbytery a third time.  I agreed, and it was adopted by Presbytery and sent to the General Assembly.  So, the “big one” (now Overture 15) almost did not make it to the General Assembly.  God works in mysterious ways. Just think—and we would never have heard the famous speech by Dr. Palmer Robertson!
As I have mentioned before (Overture 15 – The Tipping Point for a Split in the PCA? – July 18) in The Aquila Report, I expect BCO Changes in Overtures with numbers 29 and 31 to be to be adopted by 2/3 of the presbyteries and then pass by a majority vote at the next General Assembly.  Victory will be declared and everything will go on the same in the PCA, except there will be a few more churches leave our denomination.  From a statement that Greg Johnson made on the floor of the General Assembly this year, he appears to be able to live with these changes in the Book of Church Order, so that should tell you all you need to know about them.
Let me add a little more precision to the meaning of the original overture which was slightly edited by the Overtures Committee in Birmingham.  The word “Identify” was changed to “describe.”  Evidently, for some major reason, the word “identify” is a bad word in this context.  Better to speak of those who “describe themselves as homosexuals.” I don’t particularly like this change in wording, but the Overture belongs to the Church now and not to me.
My original intent in what has become Overture 15 was not to disqualify from office in the PCA anyone who struggles with sin, either homosexuality, incest, or even bestiality (or even theft or murder). Don’t be shocked about incest and bestiality, especially as some college students are now taking litterboxes with them to their classrooms.  This is not the reason I submitted the original overture.  I do believe that homosexuality, incest, or even bestiality are more heinous sins.  They are perversions of God’s created order. They are more specifically called abominations by God.  However, even this was not the reason I submitted the original overture.
We all struggle with the darkness of all types of sins.  My entire case for submitting the original overture is that the “public” announcement (like in Christianity Today) of constantly struggling with any particular sin disqualifies a man from holding office in the church.  The key word here is not the word “struggles” or even the word “sin,” but rather the word “public.”  What is public is a man’s reputation.  A man may fight privately with all types of sin which do not have dominion over him, but once he comes out of the closet and names those sins publicly to the whole world, he loses his eligibility to hold office.  The biblical basis for this is that a man who holds office must be of “good repute with those outside of the church” (1 Tim. 3:7).  In a wicked society like today, this public announcement that a man is a homosexual may be viewed with admiration by those outside the church, but in the context of the biblical era, it was shameful. Letting people know that we struggle with sin in general is biblical (Rms. 7), but once we begin to name them particularly and talk about them all the time, then we move beyond the exemplar of the Bible.
Thus, I believe that a man may struggle constantly with homosexual desires and still hold office in the church.  As long as it is private and he keeps it private.  We all have private sinful thoughts and tendencies that are only known to us and to God.  However, if we have concluded that they do not have dominion over us, and by God’s grace we can handle them in a biblical fashion, then we may legitimately deduce that we are not disqualified from holding office.  There is no biblical requisite that we publicly broadcast our particular struggles. Once a man comes out of the closet, especially as he identifies himself with the genre of homosexuality in terms of dress and various other signals, he loses his reputation and the right to speak God’s Word authoritatively.
Contrary to the PCA Stated Clerk, the mere existence of the desire of homosexuality is not the issue.  The issue is neither self-identification (or self-description) as long as that self-identification is private.  However, public acknowledgement to the world is a whole different matter.  At least it was to the Apostle Paul.  My intent of the proposed amendment to the BCO was specifically about those who publicly describe themselves as homosexuals.  The publication of the existence of a man’s lust to those outside the church makes it very dangerous to the individual, to those who sit under his oversight, and to young people who are tempted to experiment with the unknown. It will definitely change the attitude of the next generation. It spreads like cancer, especially in a woke culture.  In addition, it hurts the reputation of the church.  It damages the gospel of Jesus Christ. It disqualifies a man from being an ordained representative of our Savior.
A generation known for humility and extreme privacy (such as the World War II generation) has produced a generation that appears to need public recognition, whether it be for righteousness or for sinfulness.  So, it is not a matter of temptation, sinful thoughts, or even private self-assessment. It’s a matter of the public reputation of a man who has been given the right by the visible church to speak publicly in the name of God.
Larry E. Ball is a retired minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and is now a CPA. He lives in Kingsport, Tenn.
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Perkins held to double-predestination is well-known: it was memorably laid out in the large fold-out chart which accompanied his work, A Golden Chain (rev.1592). In that work Perkins describes individual human destiny as sovereignly determined by God, with all persons either being predestined to salvation in Christ, or damnation apart from him. The idea of a “golden chain” comes from Romans 8:29-30, expressing the idea that each of God’s elect people will be called, justified, sanctified, and then glorified, and that this sequence is unbreakably invincible.

A Seminal Reformed Theologian & Father of Puritanism: Why You Should Read William Perkins (1558-1602)
William Perkins (1558-1602) is remembered today as ‘the father of English puritanism.’ This is largely because his work managed to combine Reformed predestinarian theology with a highly practical approach to Christian living and piety. This kind of ‘practical divinity’ came to characterise the puritan movement of the seventeenth century. Yet even in his own day Perkins came to be regarded as a pre-eminent Reformed theologian, preacher and author. From his position at Cambridge – first as a university academic, and then as a local preacher – he managed to combine accessibility with theological depth in ways that appealed to academic and non-academic audiences alike. If you visited Cambridge in the 1590s you would find Perkins’s sermons and lectures eagerly attended by students and townspeople, and the output of the official university press being dominated by his books. Perkins became the best-selling English Christian author of his generation and the next, and his influence only spread after his death as his works were gradually translated for foreign audiences. On my count, no fewer than 550 editions of Perkins’s various works were printed in the early modern period, including editions in English and Latin, and translations into Dutch, German, Spanish, French, Czech, Hungarian, Irish, and Welsh. His influence can be detected in the deliberations of the Synod of Dort (1618-19), the Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), and in the theology, piety, and approach to pastoral ministry of virtually the entire puritan movement in England, New England, and beyond.
Perkins’s practical approach to predestination.
Perkins’s contributions were many. He made especially important contributions to Protestant preaching, ethics, pastoral counselling, and the role of conscience in the Christian life. But his most notable contributions were in theology, especially relating to predestination and Christian assurance.
That Perkins held to double-predestination is well-known: it was memorably laid out in the large fold-out chart which accompanied his work, A Golden Chain (rev.1592). In that work Perkins describes individual human destiny as sovereignly determined by God, with all persons either being predestined to salvation in Christ, or damnation apart from him. The idea of a ‘golden chain’ comes from Romans 8:29-30, expressing the idea that each of God’s elect people will be called, justified, sanctified, and then glorified, and that this sequence is unbreakably invincible.
The implications of this theological paradigm have bothered many, especially considering how unabashedly it is portrayed in Perkins’s chart. Many have simply inferred what they expect to be its implications from looking the chart itself, leading to accusations of fatalism and of inducing despair.
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