Monday, July 19, 2010

A Variety of Things

A friend recently recommended this blog on his Facebook page. He said, "Check out this blog. Good discussion on a variety of topics!" Now, my friend was very kind to recommend this blog, but he said something that I never intended to be said about this blog: "a variety of topics" is discussed here. When I started this blog, its purpose was to "document and discuss what it means to be a Ruling Elder." If you go back in the archives and scan through old posts, you would be tempted to say that I very quickly departed from that stated goal. My friend's recommendation gave me opportunity to reflect on this.

What I have come to realize is that being a Ruling Elder requires one to be familiar with a variety of topics. It's not all Confessions and Book of Church Order. As a matter of fact, higher levels of church government perhaps take up about 1% of a Ruling Elder's time. Don't get me wrong; it's a very important 1% and too often is neglected altogether. But 99% of the time a Ruling Elder spends doing "ruling elder" things does not involve parlimentary procedure. Instead, you are asked questions by members of the congregation about whatever topic is affecting their lives, whether it be issues of science or law or ethics or Bible study. Very rarely will a member of the church come up and ask you "What do you think of the latest Synod/General Assembly news?" Ruling Elders need to be prepared for Synod/General Assembly (and Presbytery, too), but Ruling Elders also need to be prepared for questions about a thousand other topics as well.

This blog does discuss a variety of topics, but I believe I have stayed faithful to my original intent to "document and discuss what it means to be a Ruling Elder" because being a Ruling Elder means discussing a variety of topics.

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