How should Christians respond when LGBT activists demand they compromise the truth of Scripture by endorsing same-sex marriage and transgender identity?
A global gathering of Anglicans just provided an excellent example.
In February, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the head of the Church of England and the “first among equals” in the global Anglican Communion, the third-largest Christian denomination, defended blessings for same-sex couples while insisting that the move did not violate the church’s doctrine that marriage is between one man and one woman for life.
“For the first time, the Church of England will publicly, unreservedly and joyfully welcome same-sex couples in church,” Welby said in a joint statement with Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell at the time.
Leaders at the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) wouldn’t stand for this. On Friday, they signed the Kigali Commitment, condemning Welby’s move as “blasphemy” and declaring that he and the Church of England had abdicated their leadership of the Anglican Communion.
“It grieves the Holy Spirit and us that the leadership of the Church of England is determined to bless sin,” GAFCON leaders wrote in the Kigali Commitment. “Since the Lord does not bless same-sex unions, it is pastorally deceptive and blasphemous to craft prayers that invoke blessing in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”
GAFCON, which met last week in Kigali, Rwanda, declared Welby’s leadership “entirely indefensible.” The Kigali Commitment declares that the Church of England has “failed to maintain true communion based on the Word of God and shared faith in Christ,” therefore noting that GAFCON’s “communion with them remains broken.” That represents a kind of revolution and excommunication from below, in which the top leaders of Anglican churches—referred to as primates—brush away the historic head of the denomination.
“We consider that those who refuse to repent have abdicated their right to leadership within the Anglican Communion, and we commit ourselves to working with orthodox primates and other leaders to reset the Communion on its biblical foundations,” the commitment reads. The statement notes that GAFCON and the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (which has also effectively excommunicated the Church of England) represent 85% of the primates in the Global Anglican Communion, the third-largest Christian denomination after the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.
It remains unclear what will happen next for GAFCON and its ally, the Global South Fellowship. “The GAFCON primates are still finalizing the practicalities of the statement,” a spokeswoman for the conference told The Daily Signal on Tuesday.
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Application is not only about the hands but also about the head and the heart. All three spheres can be considered legitimate ways to apply the Scripture. One of them (hands) involves doing. But that’s not the only thing application involves.

How do you know when you’ve successfully applied the Bible to your life?
Of course, obedience is a life-long practice, which we’ll never be finished with. But when you are studying a passage of Scripture, how do you know when you have arrived at appropriate application? At what point can you say you’ve done enough study? You now know what you must go and do, and you’re ready to go and do it.
I think it depends on your definition of “doing.”
The Definition of “Doing”
In my experience leading Bible studies, one of the most common conceptions I find people have is that application = doing. As in, until you have something concrete and particular to add to your schedule or task list, you haven’t yet done application. And if a teacher doesn’t give you specific actions for your schedule or task list, that teacher hasn’t yet helped you with application.
So I find it crucial to remind people that application involves more than doing. Yes, the Bible often calls us to do something. But sometimes it calls us believe something. And sometimes it calls us to love or value something. All such calls could be properly labeled “application.”
To put it another way, application is not only about the hands but also about the head and the heart.
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The SJC was considering two questions in this case. The first was whether the session at Midway erred in convicting Phil Dudt of the charges brought against him, and the second was whether the Northwest Georgia Presbytery erred in upholding that conviction. The SJC answered yes to both questions, and that ruling is the subject of pastor Johnson’s disappointment.

As a member of Midway Presbyterian Church who recognizes and appreciates its importance to both my region of the country and the denomination to which I have fled as an SBC refugee, I have made it a point to closely follow the various controversies that exist within my own church, though I am not personally a party to the disputes. I was dismayed to read pastor Terry Johnson’s article criticizing the SJC’s ruling which overturned the conviction of RE Phil Dudt, finding his critique both poorly reasoned and generally unhelpful in that it serves to obfuscate the matter rather than clarify it.
Pastor Johnson complains that the SJC does not understand the context surrounding the case, but he provides very little for his readers as he does not even explain what Dudt was tried and convicted for. It is necessary for anyone interested in the matter to read the summary of the facts here.
On July 8, 2020, the session called a congregational meeting for the purpose of electing three assistant pastors as associate pastors to take place on July 19, 2020. Phil Dudt sent an email to the congregation in which he asked the congregation to support a substitute motion to postpone the meeting until January, 2021. The full text of his email can be read in the summary of the facts. He gave several reasons for this motion, one of which was the fact that Midway had only recently been involved in another controversy regarding the handling of officer nominations in which the SJC ruled against the session. His motion to postpone the meeting failed, and the congregation subsequently voted to install the three candidates as associate pastors.
The session at Midway then brought charges against RE Dudt, alleging that his email was a violation of the 5th and 6th ordination vows, as well as the ninth commandment. Dudt was convicted of the charges, appealed that conviction to the Northwest Georgia Presbytery, and then to the SJC.
The SJC was considering two questions in this case. The first was whether the session at Midway erred in convicting Phil Dudt of the charges brought against him, and the second was whether the Northwest Georgia Presbytery erred in upholding that conviction. The SJC answered yes to both questions, and that ruling is the subject of pastor Johnson’s disappointment.
Johnson’s first stated reason for his disappointment was that the SJC does not recognize the larger context within which the complaint was made. He speaks of a contentious minority that has been engaged in a prolonged battle against the will of the majority. The complaint being considered by the SJC was an appeal filed directly by Phil Dudt himself, not by any third-party members of the church. The context for the complaint is the actions of Phil Dudt and the trial that ensued, not the actions of other people within the church that took place before or after. There does exist a portion of the congregation which is vehemently opposed to the session at Midway in general and pastor David Hall in particular, but Phil Dudt has never publicly identified with them. Many of these members are anonymous in their opposition and therefore would be impossible to identify with in the first place. His only association with them is the fact that he is an officer of the church (which is a connection to this faction shared by all members of the session, not just Dudt) and the fact that they agreed with his arguments for postponing a congregational meeting called for the purpose of voting on a motion to install three associate pastors.
The second point made by Johnson in his critique of the SJC decision is the one I find most disappointing by far. The SJC agreed that there was no evidence in the ROC to support the charges that were brought against Dudt. Specifically, what the session failed to show was that Dudt’s actions constituted an offense according to BCO 29-1. This led to the sustainment of specifications of error 4, 5, 6, 14, and 24. Johnson argues that this constitutes an argument from silence and that the proper course of action by the SJC would have been to investigate further because, “the benefit of the doubt, or shall we say, the presumption of innocence, should be given to the majority in the local lower courts.”
This is extremely flawed logic. Pointing out that the prosecution failed to substantiate the charges is not an argument from silence. An argument from silence is when the absence of evidence for one proposition is taken as evidence for the truth of a contrary proposition, particularly in the field of historical analysis. The question being decided by the SJC was not whether Phil Dudt was innocent or guilty but rather whether or not the session erred in finding him guilty. The accused party has the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. The point is not that the lack of evidence of his guilt proves his innocence but rather that the failure to provide evidence of guilt renders a conviction unjustified.
More importantly, Johnson’s reasoning here shifts the burden of proof from the accuser to the accused. The burden of proof when bringing charges against any member of the church, let alone an elder, is on the one bringing the charges (BCO 29-1), not on the one being accused. This was addressed in specification of error 31, which was sustained in the SJC ruling. If no evidence to sustain the charges is provided, the proper course of action is for the court to render a verdict of “not guilty,” not to delay judgment until evidence can be found. The question being decided by the SJC was whether or not the conviction of Dudt by the court was warranted. To “presume innocence” on the part of the majority of the court on that question is to presume guilt on the part of Phil Dudt. Pastor Johnson’s logic essentially amounts to saying that the SJC should have upheld the rulings of the lower courts because they were the rulings of the lower courts. That is obvious question-begging and would defeat the entire purpose of the appeals process.
Johnson’s third point, that technical errors of process should not be given undue weight in light of the larger context is wholly irrelevant to the question at hand. He made no effort to explain how exactly the SJC gave undue weight to technical errors of process, and the facts do not support the claim. The SJC did not overrule Phil Dudt’s conviction on the basis of procedural errors but rather on the basis that the charges upon which he was convicted were unfounded and unproven. Furthermore, a number of the specifications of error listed by Johnson as technical errors of process are not in fact mere technicalities but rather are errors which fundamentally undermine the character of justice, particularly errors 25, 30, and 31.
Pastor Johnson’s fourth point, which he calls the heart of the issue, is another exercise in circular reasoning. He asserts that Phil Dudt “does not have the right to send private communication without the knowledge of the session, especially one which contradicts, and in the contradiction denigrates the session.” We can all agree that he does not have the right to denigrate the session, but the whole point here is that he did not denigrate the session. Phil Dudt only denigrated the session if you consider the act of arguing in favor of a substitute motion to be denigrating in itself. Such a position would be absurd. Dudt expressing disagreement with a decision of the session to call a congregational meeting to elect three associate pastors no more denigrates the session than pastor Johnson expressing disagreement with an SJC ruling denigrates the SJC. Dudt’s reasoning for delaying the meeting in no way denigrated the session. He did not even voice opposition to the session’s proposal to install the three associate pastors. All he argued for was to postpone the meeting until the following January. Johnson’s characterization of Dudt’s actions presuppose his guilt, and then he uses that presupposed guilt as a basis to criticize the SJC’s ruling overturning the conviction.
Pastor Johnson goes on to point out how the SJC decision has injured the ministry of a veteran, faithful, and devout minister. I assume he is referring to pastor David Hall. This is true, and I largely share the concern. Johnson explains that Hall, “has sustained constant, false, and destructive attacks from an organized and determined minority. At the foundation of their bitter opposition was an orderly process whereby the session voted to nominate assistant ministers to serve as associate ministers, and the congregation voted to concur with the recommendation to call the assistant ministers as associates. The minority did not like the decisions or the processes, though both were in order. They simply refused to submit to the majority.”
First, it is worth noting that Johnson’s assertion that both the decision and processes were in order is not a matter of unanimous agreement. The question of the orderliness of the process became the subject of another controversy when thirteen ordained members of Midway signed a 40-5 credible report alleging various BCO violations stemming from that meeting. That report was viewed as legitimate enough for the Review of Presbytery Records Committee to unanimously recommend that it be referred to the SJC for adjudication. That recommendation was ultimately rejected by the General Assembly by a 54% – 46% vote. Whichever side one might take on the questions surrounding that meeting, I do not think it is properly charitable to assume that these issues were raised out of nothing more than a stubborn refusal to submit to the will of the majority. It strikes me as unlikely that so many people—including many who were not themselves involved—would see legitimacy in the objections if those objections could not have been raised in good faith.
More importantly, even if you agree that the actions taken by the minority after the congregational meeting is a stubborn refusal to submit to a legitimate decision of the majority, that has nothing to do with the case of Phil Dudt. The actions for which he was tried and convicted occurred before the meeting, not after. He was not one of the signers of the 40-5 report. At no point did he indicate any unwillingness to submit to the results of that congregational meeting, and has taken no action to undermine it.
While I share pastor Johnson’s overarching concerns about the fact that many members of Midway have made use of this SJC ruling to launch all sorts of attacks on David Hall, it does not follow that the SJC made the wrong ruling in the case. Consideration should be given to the fact that Phil Dudt is also a veteran, faithful, and devout minister, and that his conviction did injury to his ministry as a ruling elder. To uphold a wrong conviction which injured one minister for the sake of protecting another from criticism would have been blatant partiality on the part of our denomination’s highest court, and I am thankful that did not happen.
As I see it, the true heart of the issue here is whether or not Phil Dudt deserved to be convicted of the charges that were brought against him on the basis of his email to the congregation. How an email advocating the postponement of a congregational meeting which contained no false statements, no accusations or assignment of ill motives, and no opposition to the proposed action itself constitutes violence to the unity, peace, or purity of the church, lack of subjection to the brethren in the Lord, or a violation of the ninth commandment is beyond any reasonable comprehension. That is why the SJC unanimously overturned the conviction, and I do not believe they erred in their judgment in doing so.
Jonathan McElrath is member of Midway Presbyterian Church in Powder Springs, Ga.
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