The 11th Stated Meeting of Evangel Presbytery met at First Presbyterian Church, in Jasper, Indiana on Thursday, February 16th, 2023. This is the home of one of Evangel’s four church plants, and is pastored by Joe Helt. Thank you for hosting us!
As always our meeting began with morning worship. Pastor David Abu-Sara from Clearnote Church, Indianapolis, preached from the 1 Corinthians 3:10-15, “Each Man Must Be Careful How He Builds.” Using the apostle’s analogy, Pr. David exhorted us to make sure our people are built on the only sure foundation there is: Christ Jesus. We often want quick fixes to difficult problems, but a good pastor will not give in to such demands. It was a very helpful sermon.
After worship we went into business. We heard an overture from Trinity Presbyterian Church in Spartanburg, SC, regarding paedocommunion. Currently Evangel’s BCO (Chapter 60) does not have language that explicitly addresses the practice, so the overture would add language to prohibit it. Sessions will vote on the overture prior to the next stated meeting along with another overture regarding the fencing of the Lord’s Table.
We then held a views exam for Gary Knapp. Gary is the Executive Director of Still Waters Biblical Counseling Ministry in Maumee, OH and is a member of Christ the Word Church in Sylvania, OH. He passed his views exam and was warmly welcomed as a pastor working out of bounds. Later in our meeting we were blessed to hear personally from one of our pastors who has been laboring out of bounds in Milwaukee, Rev. Brian Bunn.
Afterwards we broke for lunch: pulled pork sandwiches and mac n’ cheese. Many thanks to those who hosted us!
After lunch we heard updates from our churches. Please pray for all of Evangel’s churches and especially our mission churches. We were excited to hear that Pr. Andy Halsey (Christ Church Columbus, IN) has recently gone full-time. Also, please pray for Pr. Jason Chen (Chinese Reformed Church Bloomington, IN) that God would send a Chinese speaker to assist Pr. Jason with his work in the church.
We then heard from the Ad interim Committee on Abortion. This committee has been at work for 14 months. The fruit of their work has been Evangel’s Statement on Abortion. A new audio version can be accessed here, with subsequent parts being released as they are recorded. The Committee reported on a “concise summary version” of the Statement which the presbytery will consider adding to the BCO at a future meeting. As to the original, full statement, the funds were approved for Warhorn Media to publish a printed version this year.
Elder Abram Hess was then elected as the new moderator, and John Kluge was approved as treasurer. As always, we closed with prayer.
Evangel’s next stated meeting will be at Christ Church in Cincinnati, OH, on Thursday, June 1, 2023. We look forward to seeing you there!