“You are what you eat.” Evidently this saying was coined by the German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach, who was intending to make the point that humans are material beings and no more. We are composed of the equivalent stuff with which we stuff ourselves.
Then there is the “foodie” spin on this phrase, “You are what you eat.” What you eat (and also where and how) proves one’s sophistication and refined tastes. One food critic quips, “The unexamined meal is not worth eating.” The preparation and eating of meals have transformative potential, both psychologically and socially. According to an article in New York Magazine, “Food is now viewed as a legitimate option for a hobby, a topic of endless discussion, a playground for one-upmanship, and a measuring stick of cool. ‘It’s a badge of honor,’ says one young person: ‘Bragging rights’ ” (March 25, 2012).
Christians may enjoy food of all sorts as God’s gift (Gen. 9:3; 1 Tim. 4:4). Such is the commendation of the sage preacher: “There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, that it was from the hand of God” (Eccl. 2:24). Yet at the same time, believers are reminded that “the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 14:17).
What is the difference between the godly appreciation of food and “foodie-ism,” or gluttony? As a form of idolatry, gluttony assigns a transformative value to good that it inherently lacks. Do you expect what’s on the table in front of you to change and renew your inner nature? In connection with this, what is consumed can end up being one’s all-consuming focus. Are you serving your tastebuds and seeking to satisfy your stomach at all costs? Peter writes, “Whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved” (2 Peter 2:19). Augustine observes, “It is possible that a wise man may use the daintiest food without any sin of epicurism or gluttony, while a fool will crave for the vilest food with a most disgusting eagerness of appetite.”
As we read the Gospel accounts, we find rather uncanny resemblances between foodie-ism and Pharisaism. The Pharisees were consistently critical of Jesus and His disciples regarding food and related matters—suspiciously observing what the Lord and His followers ate, how they ate it, and with whom they ate. The shared supposition of foodies and Pharisees is that “filling ourselves with ‘clean’ food will translate into making us ‘clean’ people.” If we take into ourselves what is good and pure, then we will produce what is good and pure. It’s that easy and simple.
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The Law Amendment was our chance to put an end to this debate and to give clarity about which direction the SBC is going. The failure of the Law Amendment means that we are likely to see more credentials challenges brought directly to the floor at future meetings. In other words, the failure of Law means that this debate is going to continue to bedevil our annual meetings for the foreseeable future. I think we missed an opportunity to avoid that.

Last month, pastor Willie Rice said something about the Law Amendment that was prescient. He predicted that after the SBC annual meeting, we are going to find one of two headlines. Either “Southern Baptists oppose women pastors” or “Southern Baptists keep the door open on women pastors.” He said that messengers would decide through their vote which headline we would be written.
After the Law Amendment failed to meet the necessary supermajority earlier today, Rice’s prediction proved pretty accurate. Here are some of the headlines that began to appear almost immediately after the vote:
“Southern Baptists reject ban on women pastors in historic vote.” –USA Today
“Southern Baptists Reject Tighter Ban on Women in Pastoral Posts: The denomination voted against adding language to its constitution saying that ‘only men’ could be affirmed or employed ‘as any kind of pastor or elder as qualified by Scripture.’” –New York Times
“The Southern Baptist Convention… rejected a constitutional amendment barring women from all pastoral positions, a move that would have affected hundreds of churches, especially minority congregations…” –Washington Post
“Southern Baptists narrowly reject ban on women pastors.” –BBC
The group Baptist Women in Ministry also released a statement saying,
“Baptist Women in Ministry offers appreciation to all the messengers of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) who voted against the Law amendment BECAUSE of their commitment to support and affirm women serving as pastors of all kinds in the SBC.”
Casual readers not following all the ins and outs of SBC politics will likely conclude from such headlines that the SBC has indeed kept the door open to female pastors. But most Southern Baptists know that nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, there is no evidence at all for such a conclusion. So if these headlines give a misleading impression, then what does the failure of the Law Amendment actually mean?
It doesn’t mean that Southern Baptists are backing away from complementarianism. The fact remains that when messengers are presented with churches that have female pastors who clearly function as pastors, messengers vote overwhelmingly to remove such churches. It happened with Saddleback and Fern Creek last year, and it happened again this year with FBC Alexandria, Virginia. In such cases, the SBC votes about 90% or more in favor of removing such churches from friendly cooperation. This isn’t a close call. It’s an overwhelming demonstration of complementarian conviction.
Indeed, even though the Law Amendment did not meet the 66% supermajority, it did win the support of 61% of the messengers who voted. In other words, a near supermajority wanted the Law Amendment to pass while only a 38% minority wanted it to fail. This is a remarkable result given the fact that the new leader of the executive committee, important pastors like J. D. Greear, and President Barber were all on the record opposing the Law Amendment. Given that formidable opposition from mainstays of the platform, it’s incredible that the Law Amendment retained a solid majority of support.
It’s also worth mentioning that in the presidential election, there were three ballots. On all three ballots, a decisive majority of messengers voted for candidates who publicly supported the Law Amendment.
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Who may (or ought to) read scripture in public worship is severely limited by the words and implications of our standards and even sanctified common sense. And I hope PCA officers will consider that our fathers in the faith may have been right about these things.

The reading of scripture in public worship is an essential, though undervalued, part of worship for confessional presbyterian churches, whose greatest distinctive (aside from their eponymous form of government) is their doctrine of worship. Reading is an element of Reformed worship, meaning it cannot be omitted and must be done properly.1 The Westminster Divines understood this and evidently they believed that the weightiness and importance of public scripture reading meant that not just anyone could do it:
Is the Word of God to be read by all?Although all are not to be permitted to read the word publicly to the congregation, yet all sorts of people are bound to read it apart by themselves, and with their families: to which end, the holy Scriptures are to be translated out of the original into vulgar languages.—Westminster Larger Catechism 156
For 300 or more years after John Knox began reforming the Scottish church, all presbyterians understood that trained, ordained men (or those being trained) ought to read scripture in public worship services. This fact is obvious to any fair-minded student of ecclesial history. There have been no presbyterian Shakers or Quakers…at least not until recently.2 So it must be that either our forbears were wrong or that things have changed.
It’s a rare week when I don’t receive a message from someone in the conservative Presbyterian and Reformed world reporting a practice that the scandalized sender has witnessed in a NAPARC3 church. Often the report is of females reading scripture or leading some other part of worship, such as the call to worship, confessions, “pastoral” prayer, distributing Lord’s Supper elements—pretty much anything except sermon and benediction. Unsurprisingly, these reports usually concern PCA churches—unsurprising, I say, for two reasons. First, the membership of the PCA makes up about two-thirds of the 600,000 members in NAPARC churches, so there are proportionally more PCA churches to, well, do stuff. Second, there is simply more diversity of practice (i.e., doing stuff) in the PCA. This diversity of practice, some will aver, is because of the diverse geographical and cultural contexts that PCA churches and church plants inhabit compared to their stodgier NAPARC cousins. Missional faithfulness, some will say, requires contextualization, and contextualization requires adjustments. But the question may be asked: What is the real (or first) context that ought to govern practice in a presbyterian church?
I would argue that the primary and governing context of a confessional, constitutional presbyterian church is…the confessional, constitutional presbyterian church and her standards. Church websites often extol a congregation’s unique “DNA,” but all presbyterian churches in a given denomination have the same DNA: their biblical (not to say biblicist) confessions and constitutions. Such a presbyterian church ought not be so “outward-facing” (a popular concept) that it turns its back on its confessional-constitutional core. Nor should it be pharisaically legalist…but more about that below.
The Fifth Commandment enjoins us to honor our fathers and mothers, and the Westminster Standards apply the commandment to the honoring of our betters and our elders more generally. As presbyterians who stand on the shoulders of five centuries of churchmen in our tradition, the principles of the Fifth Commandment imply that we should consider what our faithful fathers in the faith found in the scriptures and passed on to us.4
The PCA Historical Center has done helpful work which allows us to trace the mind of the presbyterian churches on the matter of public scripture reading. This is the Historical Center’s data, presented in reverse order (compared to the original article) with bolding added:
The Directory for the Publick Worship of God; agreed upon by the Assembly of Divines at Westminster, 1645, III-1 & 2Reading of the word in the congregation, being part of the publick worship of God, (wherein we acknowledge our dependence upon him, and subjection to him,) and one mean sanctified by him for the edifying of his people, is to be performed by the pastors and teachers.Howbeit, such as intend the ministry, may occasionally both read the word, and exercise their gift in preaching in the congregation, if allowed by the presbytery thereunto.
PCUSA, 1786, DfW, 2d DraftThe reading of the Holy Scriptures in the Congregation, is a part of the public worship of God; and ought to be performed by the Ministers and Teachers.
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