So easily we lose the childlike simplicity of prayer; a child speaking to his/her father. We start to think more about the people around us that we can see than the God above whom we cannot. We pile up stock phrases or mumble our way to an amen as we prematurely reach for our fork. Even when we are trying it can be hard.

One night at the supper table our kids were taking turns praying before we started the meal. Moments earlier our second youngest daughter had been kicking and screaming because she didn’t get to sit beside her sister. Consequently, she didn’t feel like praying so I attempted to convince her that God still wanted to hear from her even if she was angry. Through sniffles and snobs she prayed: “Father Heaven, I’m sad. Amen.”
The essence of prayer is communication with God and that was what my daughter was doing; telling God how she felt. A significant portion of the Psalms do the same thing – the author pours out his heart and bares his soul to a God who listens. Consider the following from the pen of king David:
I am weary from my groaning;with my tears I dampen my bedand drench my couch every night.
PSALM 6:6
What is David doing in these lines? He’s letting God know how he feels. David is doing what we all do each and every day: communicating.
Prayer, when understood as communication with God, is a simple act, yet it becomes complicated by at least two factors. First, we cannot see the One to whom we are speaking.
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Written by R. Scott Clark |
Monday, October 18, 2021
Had we only this one case to which we could point to show the dangers of claims of extra-biblical revelation, it would be enough. Sadly, however, we have hundreds and probably thousands of cases to which we can easily point to show the dangers of claims of continuing revelation.

Introduction
I am catching up Christianity Today‘s podcast series, “The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill. The August 30, 2021 episode, “Questioning the Origin Myth: A Rise and Fall Short Story,” centered around what, in Reformed theology, piety, and practice, we call the internal call to ministry. In our understanding of Scripture and its outworking in the life of the church there are two aspects to the call to ministry, the internal and the external. The former describes that God-given sense within a man that he ought to become a minister of God’s Word, that he ought to become a preacher. The latter refers to the confirmation which comes from the visible church. In Reformed theology, piety, and practice, the two go together. To illustrate this there is an old story that circulates in the Reformed churches about the farmer who, upon looking up in the sky while plowing, sees the letters PC in the sky. He gets off his tractor, goes to the preacher and tells him what he has seen and that he thinks it means, “Preach Christ.” So, as the story goes, the minister tells him to write a sermon and then gives him the pulpit next week. The farmer does as instructed. After his sermon he asked the minister, “Well, what do you think?” The minister replies, “I think PC means Plant Corn.”
I suppose lots of traditions tell this story or they should but for us it means that the confirmation of the visible church is essential. We do not leave a man to decide on his own whether he is called to ministry. Thus, it was interesting to hear Mike Cosper narrate the story around Mark Driscoll’s sense of internal call. Here is a clip.
According to Cosper and others whom he interviewed for this episode, this is the story that Driscoll told over and again. Indeed, Cosper illustrates how often and consistently Driscoll has told the story of his call by playing several clips in succession. The discrepancy between the way Driscoll accounts for his call and the way the Reformed think about the call is notable.
Its Churchlessness
According to Driscoll’s repeated, public testimony he knew with certainty that certain things must happen: he must plant churches, study the Word, marry Grace, and train young men. He knew all this, however, as one of his friends at the time pointed out to him, before he was ever actually involved in a local congregation. This is remarkable. It is consistent with the nature and history of American revivalism going back, in some aspects, to the First Great Awakening in the early eighteenth century and entirely consistent with the theology, piety, and practice of the Second Great Awakening in the nineteenth century.
Often these movements frequently emerged outside the visible church. In this regard Driscoll is a classic American religious entrepreneur. He knew his market (or his marks), his message, and his method before he was ever accountable to a visible church. In Reformed practice, however, that should never be. In our understanding of the Scriptures and the life of the church, a young man usually grows up in a congregation or is at least a part of a congregation long enough for them to begin to see in him a giftedness for ministry. They take an opportunity to test those gifts in various ways. Only after they have had time to get to know him, after he has been catechized, after he has been evaluated do they ordinarily commend him to the church as a candidate for ministry. Then he made a candidate for ministry, i.e., put “under care” of one of the assemblies of the churches (e.g., consistory/session, classis or presbytery) and sent off to seminary to get the eduction a minister ought to have. He should learn the original Biblical languages so that he is not reliant upon English translations, the Old Testament, the New Testament, Biblical Theology, church history and historical theology, systematic theology, the confessions of the churches, and the practice of pastoral ministry. A serious and genuine ministerial education normally takes 3 or 4 years. As part of that process the candidate serves as an intern in a congregation under the supervision of an experienced minister. He is also ordinarily licensed by the churches to exhort in order to serve the churches (by providing pulpit supply) and to gain experience. Only then is he presented to the regional church (presbytery or classis) for examination prior to becoming available for a call.
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Since July 2023, Dr. Voyles has been serving as interim president of Covenant College in addition to his regular responsibilities….Dr. Voyles has been the Vice President for Student Development and Dean of Students at Covenant College since 2005. During that time, he has provided leadership in admissions and financial aid (2018 – 2019), in business operations and physical plant (2017 and again in 2021 until the present), and in response to COVID-19 (2020–2021).

Today, the Board of Trustees voted unanimously to affirm the recommendation of the Presidential Search Committee and appoint Dr. Brad Voyles as the next president of Covenant College. The Presidential Search Committee began its search this spring after former president Dr. Derek Halvorson was named director of the Brock-Barnes Center for Leadership.
Prior to the vote, Richard Bowser, Board Trustee and Chair of the Presidential Search Committee, said: “Having carefully considered all of the candidate’s materials, the candidate interviews, and having prayed earnestly the committee would be led to the person uniquely qualified to lead Covenant College, the committee strongly recommends the Board of Trustees of Covenant College appoint Dr. Brad Voyles as the next president of Covenant College.” The letter of recommendation to the board states, “Dr. Voyles has led with character and competence—taking initiative for the benefit of others… self-forgetting for the sake of the institution and the Kingdom.”

“I am humbled to be asked to lead in this season of Covenant College and understand the weight of the responsibility entrusted to me by the Board of Trustees,” said Dr. Voyles. “We are training up and sending young men and women into the world who are biblically rooted, expertly trained, and vocationally agile, and who the Lord will use for His purposes and His glory.”
Since July 2023, Dr. Voyles has been serving as interim president of Covenant College in addition to his regular responsibilities.
“I’m so grateful for the sacrificial service of faculty and staff and their willingness to lean in during this time of transition,” said Dr. Voyles. “Their eagerness to go above and beyond with regard to helping with enrollment has been a true gift.”
Dr. Voyles has been the Vice President for Student Development and Dean of Students at Covenant College since 2005. During that time, he has provided leadership in admissions and financial aid (2018 – 2019), in business operations and physical plant (2017 and again in 2021 until the present), and in response to COVID-19 (2020–2021).
“Dr. Voyles’ administrative and operational experience in higher education makes him uniquely suited for his role as president,” said Bowser.
His academic credentials include an Ed.D., Vanderbilt University, Higher Education Leadership and Policy (2014), a Master of Divinity, Reformed Theology Seminary (2000), a M.S. Ed., Southern Illinois University, Higher Education (1996), and a B.A., DePauw University, Biological Sciences (1994).
Dr. Voyles has been married to Kelli for twenty-five years. Kelli works at Covenant College in the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness. The Voyles have three children. Coby graduated from Covenant College in 2022 with a degree in Community Development. Will is an English major and just started his senior year at Covenant College. Cate is a freshman at Covenant College and plans to major in psychology.
The Voyles family worships at Chattanooga Valley Presbyterian Church, PCA, where Dr. Voyles has served as an ordained Ruling Elder since 2008.
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