The report of the statistician was received. The total membership of 33,520 persons at the end of 2023 consisted of 599 ministers, 24,645 communicant members, and 8,276 baptized children (non-communicants). This represents an increase of 897 persons (2.75 percent) from 2022’s adjusted total of 32,623 members.

Wednesday, June 19, 2024
Rev. John Fesko (RTS, Jackson, MS) and Rev. David Graves were nominated. Mr. Fesko was elected moderator.
Thursday, June 20, 2024
Mr. Hank Belfield, Stated Clerk, presented the report of the stated clerk. Mr. Belfield reported preparations of the 2025 edition of the Book of Church Order (BCO), set to be printed at the beginning of the new year. One amendment to the BCO was approved by a majority of the presbyteries since the last Assembly, and will be in effect in 2025: a change in Book of Discipline III, 2, so that the words “unavoidable impediments” will be replaced with the word “circumstances.”
The report of the statistician was received. The total membership of 33,520 persons at the end of 2023 consisted of 599 ministers, 24,645 communicant members, and 8,276 baptized children (non-communicants). This represents an increase of 897 persons (2.75 percent) from 2022’s adjusted total of 32,623 members.
Mr. A. Craig Troxel presented the committee’s proposed changes to the Recommended Curriculum for Ministerial Preparation in the OPC, a non-constitutional section of the BCO. The Assembly approved the advisory committee’s motion that the proposed revisions be returned to the CCE so that it can seek input from the presbyteries and their candidates and credentials committees, which was agreeable to the CCE.
The report of the Committee on Home Missions and Church Extension. Rev. Jeremiah Montgomery (general secretary of the committee) noted that CHMCE is the oldest committee still standing in the OPC, born at the first General Assembly on June 12, 1936. Almost one in ten congregations meeting each Lord’s Day is a mission work. The committee has set aside funding to support up to thirty-eight new and continuing mission works, fourteen RHMs, four church planting interns, and four special evangelistic projects.
Friday, June 21, 2024
The Committee on Foreign Missions presented its report. Rev. John Van Meerbeke (Living Hope OPC, Gettysburg, PA), president of the CFM, introduced the work of the committee. General secretary Rev. Douglas Clawson exhorted the Assembly regarding the vital, life-and-death, nature of our evangelistic work in the world. He passionately encouraged the members of the Assembly to answer the call of foreign missions as many fields are understaffed. There has not been a new evangelist sent to the field in the past year.
A missionary to Asia addressed the body, explaining his work training and examining candidates for ministry, teaching in a seminary, creating and translating online resources, and church planting. The church in Asia has seen a huge increase in church officers and licentiates.
Rev. Mark Richline (missionary to Uruguay) presented on his work with the Paysons in Montevideo, Mercedes, Maldonado, Ciudad de La Costa, Las Piedras, and the new Salvos Por Gracia mission. In the many ministries of the churches, he noted that ruling elder leadership has increased reflecting growth in the congregations. There is a need for more Uruguayan pastors.
The report of the Committee on Appeals and Complaints. There is one judicial appeal and nine complaints on appeal presented to this Assembly. The Assembly took up the one judicial appeal. In summary form: this involves an appeal of the judicial decisions of a session related to holding a trial in absentia and finding a member guilty of rebellion against the civil government and violence against government personnel, which verdict was upheld on appeal to the presbytery.
Saturday, June 22, 2024
The advisory committee assisted the Assembly by breaking up the appeal into four distinct specifications of error alleged against the session. Two specifications of error were denied and one was sustained. The Assembly referred the matter back to the advisory committee for its advice regarding what action to take with regard to the appeal as a whole.
Complaint 1. This is an appeal of a complaint by a session against the action of its presbytery in receiving and debating a report from its visitation committee and then using that report as grounds to appoint a committee seeking outside professional help to investigate allegations of misconduct by a session. The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Complaint 2. involving the same parties as Complaint 1. Complaint 2 is an appeal of a complaint of the session against the action of its presbytery in adopting a recommendation to appoint a committee seeking help from a professional, non-ecclesiastical, third party—thus surrendering its jurisdictional power of inquiry—in order to properly investigate allegations of misconduct by the session. The advisory committee recommended: “That General Assembly deny Complaint 2 on appeal. There was a minority report of the advisory committee recommending that the Assembly sustain the complaint. The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Monday, June 24, 2024
Overture 1 is a request for the General Assembly to amend the name of the Presbytery of New Jersey to the Presbytery of New Jersey and Puerto Rico effective September 28, 2024. The overture was approved by the Assembly.
Overture 2 is a request from a presbytery for the General Assembly’s advice regarding when and if those with serious sin and/or criminal history might be considered to serve in ordained office in the church. This includes such grievous sins as murder, sexual assault, and offenses requiring a man to register as a sex offender. The advisory committee made two recommendations. The first was: “That the General Assembly adopt the following statement: ‘In light of the transformative and renewing power of the gospel (e.g., 1 Corinthians 6:9–11, Ephesians 2:1–10, Titus 3:3–7), and in consideration of the biblical examples of Moses, David, and the Apostle Paul, we affirm that those with a criminal past can serve faithfully in ordained office in Christ’s church. However, there are some crimes and some contexts in which ordination should not be pursued, due to the scandalous nature of some sins, and the necessity for ordained officers to be exemplary in character, above reproach, and well thought of even by unbelievers. This decision must ultimately be left to the wisdom of local sessions and/or presbyteries, who ought to ask the Lord of the harvest to provide men fitting to rule His church.’”
The advisory committee made a second recommendation, amended by the body, and in summary form: To elect a study committee of three ministers and two ruling elders appointed by the Moderator to study the matter, to offer recommendations to the presbytery, and to report back to the 91st General Assembly.
Complaint 3. It involves the same parties as Complaints 1 and 2. In brief it is an appeal of a complaint by a session against the action of its presbytery for entering into a specific contract with a specific outside organization through its committee acting effectively as a commission. The Assembly sustained Complaint 3.
The Assembly adopted the following amends for Complaint 3, in summary: “That the presbytery acknowledge and record in its minutes its error in contracting with the outside organization to investigate and communicate this action to the session filing the complaint. That the presbytery refrain from using in any way the executive summary and recommendations generated by the outside organization (in fulfillment of the presbytery’s contract) in relation to the allegations concerning the members of the session and take all appropriate steps to restore the good name of the members of the session.”
Complaint 6. Involves the same parties as Complaints 1-3. In Complaint 6 the session charges its presbytery with error in failing to dismiss charges against the session’s pastor which were filed more than two years after commission of the alleged offense, despite wholly inadequate evidence of “unavoidable impediments” to earlier filing of said charges (Book of Discipline III, 2). In other words, at the heart of this complaint is the two-year limit on filing charges. The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Complaint 4. This is an appeal of a complaint by a member against his session regarding its position paper entitled “Can a Woman Teach a Mixed Sunday School Class?” that was sent to the congregation. This study paper set forth the session’s view on women, as part of the general office of believer, being biblically permitted to teach a mixed class of adult men and women in settings outside of divine worship (like Sunday School and other Christian educational opportunities). The paper sees prohibitions in 1 Corinthians 11 and 1 Timothy 2 relating to authoritative office. The Assembly sustained Complaint 4.
The following amends were approved for Complaint 4: “1. That the session retract this position paper. 2. That the session commit to allowing only men to teach mixed adult Bible studies or Sunday School classes that involve teaching Scripture. 3. That the session notify the congregation of the above actions.”
Complaint 5. This is an appeal of a complaint by a member against the actions of his session relating to the initiation of disciplinary proceedings against him. The member charges the session with error “for improperly initiating judicial proceedings against [him], carrying out the proceedings in a misleading manner, violating decorum due in judicial proceedings, and … failing to follow the rules of the Book of Church Order,” as well as “piercing his headship as a husband,” and breaching his confidentiality. The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Tuesday, June 25, 2024
Complaint 7. This is an appeal of a complaint by two members against the action of their session in adopting the position that it “should not admit into membership any who are unwilling to give the sign of covenant baptism to their children.” The complaint focuses on the categorical refusal to admit such rather than the right, in specific cases and for compound reasons, to refuse membership to those unwilling to present their children for baptism, which the complainants affirm. The complaint alleges that the session’s position is unbiblical, unconstitutional, and unwise.
The Committee on Appeals and Complaints noted: “A version of this question came before the Thirty-second General Assembly: Does the Constitution of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church permit church sessions to receive into communicant membership those who refuse to present their children for baptism? The Thirty-third General Assembly declared that the admission to membership of those who cannot in good conscience present their children for baptism is a matter for judgment by sessions. All things else being equal, a session may determine to receive or refuse into membership those who cannot in good conscience present their children for baptism. The position of the Thirty-third General Assembly has become something of a precedent in the OPC, though it should be noted that the Ninetieth General Assembly, as the highest judicatory of the OPC, is not bound by that precedent.” The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Complaint 9. This complaint by a former OPC minister, now a member, charges his presbytery with error in its decision to consider divesting him of office without censure. The complaint does not concern the presbytery’s decision to divest but its decision to contemplate divestiture. The motion to consider divestiture came as a recommendation of the presbytery’s shepherding committee, on the grounds that the minister appeared to lack certain gifts requisite of a minister of the gospel. The Assembly denied the Complaint.
Complaint 8. This is an appeal of a complaint, originally filed by an elder on sabbatical, against the action of his session in approving to ask a ruling elder emeritus to resume voting in light of Form of Government XXVI, 7, which complaint was upheld on appeal to the presbytery. The session now complains against the presbytery for sustaining the complaint. The advisory committee recommended that the complaint be sustained on the following grounds: “‘Performing, on occasion, the functions of that office’” Form of Government XXVI, 7 does not have in view a retired elder being returned to service on the session, by the session, as a voting member, unless by way of congregational vote (FG XXV, 2) and installation (FG XXV, 7). There were no ‘extraordinary circumstances’ (FG XXV, 1) that would have prevented the congregation from re-electing their emeritized elder and the session properly installing him.  The Assembly sustained the Complaint.
The Special Committee to Help Equip Officers to Protect the Flock next presented its report to the Assembly. The committee assembled two handbooks in its mandate—“Protecting the Flock against Sexual Predation” and “Strategies for the Protection of the Flock against Domestic Violence”—as well as a sample child protection policy, a short guide to preparing to bring a charge in the OPC, a recommended safety checklist for sessions, as well as a table of citations from the Westminster Standards relevant to this subject. With respect to the committee’s report, including the resources it produced, the Assembly approved the committee’s recommendation to communicate the report to the churches for study and edification.
This report was written by ruling elder Josh Downs, Redemption Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Gainesville, FL.
Source
Related Posts:

Written by R. Scott Clark |
Wednesday, November 3, 2021
For us Christians, let vaccines be vaccines and not sacraments. Let science be science and not a new religion. If something may not be questioned, however, it is a religion and not science.

John Calvin (1509–64) famously wrote that the human heart is a “perpetual factory of idols” (Institutes 1.11.18).
What he meant is that since human beings are irrevocably and naturally religious and, after the fall, profoundly corrupted by sin, our religious inclinations do not disappear but are misdirected. The question is not whether humans will be religious but how? Yesterday on Twitter Jules Diner posted a quotation from a certain Thomas Sheridan, a writer hitherto unknown to me:
The ‘Pandemic’ has been a kind of religious event for most people. For the first time in [their] entire existences they had something meaningful to live for. It gave them rituals, fear of damnation, and hope for redemption and salvation with the vaccine[s] being the keys to ‘the kingdom of heaven.’ They could point fingers at heretics and unbelievers like their ancestors did back in the Middle Ages. [Ed. note: revised for punctuation and grammar]
I do not know if this is an original analysis but it seems true. There is a religious quality to some responses to the pandemic (and to other crises too). Consider the global cooling [1970s]/global warming [1980s–90s]/climate change [2000s] crisis. There are reasonable grounds for questioning the claims being made about anthropogenic [man-made] climate change but increasingly debate on this issue is being silenced. By definition science operates on the principle of doubt not trust. Anyone who knows just a little about the history of science or even its most basic principles knows that it operates on doubt, questions, discussion, and even debate. When scientists publish their results the first thing that happens is that other scientists try to replicate their methods and results to verify them. Science does not trust. It doubts and tests. Anyone who tells us to “trust the science” is advocating a dogmatic, unreasoning religion not science. Christianity, by contrast, has dogmas to be sure but it is not unreasoning. It is grounded in historical claims. We claim that the bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth is a historical event the evidence of which (i.e., Jesus of Nazareth) was witnessed by hundreds of people. We have written accounts, produced by sane, reasonable people of these historical events. Further, we claim that there is more evidence to come: Jesus will return bodily and there will be more bodily resurrections.
It has been observed that lab-coated scientists are the priests of Modernity. They are the clerics who diagnose the ills of our bodies (e.g., medicine) and souls (e.g., pyschiatry) and it is they who prescribe the cure of bodies and souls. Steadily through the Modern period their pronouncements have become unquestionable and dogmatic. So, the turn of the culture, during the pandemic, to lab-coated priests is understandable. It is interesting that Dr Fauci’s NIH staff photo shows him in a lab coat. The lab coat, of course, is the vestment for the new priesthood and Fauci is arguably the new pope of the new priesthood. Consider why Dr Fauci would have his lab coat on for his staff photo? It is not because he had just stepped out of the lab for the photo. He has been an administrator for years. His actual working uniform is a business suit not a lab coat. My grandfather, who was a farmer, did not wear his overalls for the family photo. Fauci wore his lab coat for his staff photo for the same reason a priest wears his vestments for a photo: to signify his office.
Yesterday afternoon my better half was remarking on the comments she was reading below a story in the New York Times about the airline strikes and the vaccine mandates. As she described the tenor and language of the comments I was struck by how much they reminded me of the angriest of witch-hunting medieval mobs. This is quite striking because I imagine that the subscribers of the NYT think of themselves as enlightened and tolerant but there was precious little of either evident in the comment box.
Read More

Numbers also reminds us of the pervasiveness of sin and our need for a savior. It can be frustrating to read a book like Numbers because we just want the people to behave and the heroes to act like heroes. But they often do not. The only consistent hero in Numbers is Yahweh, God himself. Everyone else fails or shows themselves to be flawed. How we need to come to God in humility, asking for grace to live in God’s world without making a fool of ourselves! Numbers helps us in these ways and many more. 

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, Thus you shall bless the people of Israel: you shall say to them, [24] The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. “So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them.” – Numbers 6:22–27 (ESV)
The worst thing about the Book of Numbers is its name. Those who expect a divine spreadsheet will be disappointed because the book contains much more than that. Numbers contains stories of plagues, miracles, espionage, political intrigue, divination, war, talking animals, and angels. And that is only a start. Far from being a book devoted to lists of names and tabulations, Numbers continues the story of the people of Israel’s exodus from Egypt and narrates the rest of Israel’s time in the wilderness.
This series continues to work through the books of the Bible, landing now at Numbers. An unsuspecting reader coming off of Exodus may expect Numbers to be a generally happy book, narrating how the people of Israel followed the freshly revealed glory of Yahweh into the Promised Land. But Numbers does not do that. Instead, we find in Numbers the story of how an entire generation failed to enter the Promised Land because of disobedience.
The Big Idea of Numbers
I have taught that the big idea of Numbers is that Yahweh is his people’s guide to the promised land. Although the passage cited above does not explicitly address Yahweh’s guidance of the people, it does address his intention and disposition toward his people. It also addresses Yahweh’s guidance and leadership of the people as a whole as he directs their way to Canaan.
The blessing Yahweh commanded the priests to pronounce upon the people represents a distillation of the hope of God’s people at all times and in every place. There is no greater hope than to see the face of God. It is shorthand for the entire experience of being fully in communion with God.
An Outline of Numbers
Numbers can be divided into three main sections according to the people’s location. The story picks up where Exodus leaves off at Mount Sinai, then tracks the people in the wilderness while the first generation dies off, and ends with the journey to Moab as the next generation finally prepares to enter the Promised Land.
Chapters 1-10 cover less than a year’s worth of time while the people are getting organized and ready to depart Mount Sinai. In this section, the people are divided and arranged in camps to prepare for their move. More instructions are given to the priests and Levites with various jobs assigned and various offerings made. The time at Sinai ends with the people celebrating Passover and departing from Sinai under the direction of Yahweh.
Chapters 10-20 cover the people’s journey to and stay around Kadesh Barnea. This is a span of about 38 years. Many interesting things happen during these years. Yahweh strikes down many in a great plague after raining quail on them (ch. 11). Aaron and Miriam find themselves in trouble for questioning Moses’ leadership (ch. 12). Spies are sent into Canaan to scope it out, only to return and recommend that the people not try to take it.
Read More
Related Posts: