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A Christian Observer editorial from sixty years ago – the Christian Observer, October 10, 1951 – Harry P. Converse, Managing Editor – William T. McElroy, Editor.

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The final report of the Senate Crime Investigating Committee [Special Committee to Investigate Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce - Chairman - Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver (D)] made public last month, the recent unhappy revelations at West Point [Eighty-three West Point cadets expelled for cheating], and figures issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding youthful crime, together with other less publicized facts indicate what J. Edgar Hoover defines as “a breakdown of the moral fiber of the country.” The whole nation is shocked– for the moment at least–over the proven alliances between the underworld and corrupt political powers, over what the traffic in drugs is doing to vast numbers of young people, and over the threat to the stability of our national life. What the nation will do about the present condition only the future will reveal. Our record in the past in such matters does not give reason for any great amount of optimism.

Many editorial writers express the belief that because the revelations indicate a general moral decline, court actions, the closing of obnoxious places, a superficial revamping of college athletics, and similar steps, will touch only the symptoms and have little or no effect on the real disease. One of our highly respected national leaders, John Foster Dulles, has expressed the thought in these words:

Something has gone wrong with our nation, or we should not be in our present plight or mood… What we lack is a righteous and dynamic faith. Without it, all else avails us little. the lack cannot be compensated for by politicians, however able; or by diplomats, however astute; or by scientists, however inventive; or by bombs, however powerful…. Our greatest need is to regain confidence in our spiritual heritage…. There is no use having more and louder ‘Voices of America’ unless we have something to say that is more persuasive than anything yet said.

Speaking particularly of the West Point revelations, the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, one of the nations most clear-spoken newspapers, in a widely reprinted editorial urges that “the time is here for moral regeneration.” It says further that “what happened at West Point reflects a present distorted attitude toward old-fashioned honesty and integrity,” and asks:

Where does the fault lie? In the home? Perhaps. In the schools? In part. In the churches? In part. But in the main the fault lies in that nebulous field of public morals and spirituality which was so highly cultivated by the founding fathers and which, of late has been so scantily tilled. Among too many of us the accepted premise is that anything is fair unless we are caught; that the world owes us a living; that an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay is almost unethical; that gyping the other fellow before he gyps you, is the only policy that pays off.

Another outstanding daily newspaper, the Christian Science Monitor, calls for a raising of “fundamental moral standards” and the quickening of the consciences of of all the people as well as those of our political and other leaders. The editorial says in part:

This newspaper is convinced that the most vital task before the American people today is the raising of fundamental moral standards. In the last year or two the alarm has been sounded in a dozen ways–disclosures of crime syndicates, mink coats and deep freezers, basketball “fixes,” cheating at West Point, divorce scandals, widespread tax dodging, “black marketing,” “chiseling” on inflation controls, “graft” on public contracts…We are weary of being told that we must accept such things, that “everybody does it.” This also is subversive doctrine. It must be rejected….There is danger that this issue will be lost in partisanship….The demand for moral reform rises above all party lines. It must be pressed on all fronts.

Nearly all the comments, both in the daily newspapers and in the religious press, point to the fact that we are facilg a “moral battle” rather than a political one, and that “high principles” are primary, whatever we may do toward correcting the current evils. “It all comes down to the fact,” says the Western Recorder (Baptist), “that the highest value that can be fixed in the young person’s life is high character–a will and determination to be right in thought and deed. We need men and women who have learned to thing and tell and act the truth and the whole truth, even at the expense of personal loss.”

Similar in viewpoint is the editorial in Presbyterian Life on the disclosures. “The integrity of our military leaders,” says the editorial, “is a matter of life and death to the nation. So also is the integrity of private citizens like you and me….America’s number one need is for a spiritual revival that will bring about a moral regeneration. We, who by our silence in the face of terrible revelation of corruption in public life have aided in promoting it, cannot escape our own personal responsibility for it.”

In a public address at Des Moines, Iowa, Ex-president Herbert Hoover, sometimes described as our nation’s “elder statesman,” said that what we are facing is really “mostly beyond the law,” and he challenged the nation to turn to the New Testament, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Ten Commandments for guidance. “Our greatest danger,” he said, “is not from invasion by foreign armies. Our dangers are that we may commit suicide from within by complaisance  with evil; or by public tolerance of scandalous behavior; or by cynical acceptance of dishonor.”

More alarming that the revelations of crime and dishonor, says Dr. L. Nelson Bell in the Southern Presbyterian Journal, is the “reaction throughout America.” The guilt, he says, seems to lie, not in what is done, but in “getting caught.” “To solve our personal and our national problems,” he continues, “we must recognize the source of those problems and that source is sin in the human heart. The primary message of the Church is redemption through our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Saviour said: ‘Ye must be born again,’ and such a birth is a supernatural transaction, a work of the Holy Spirit, operating in the heart of repentant sinners who turn to Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, as their only hope of cleansing and salvation.”

A like note is sounded by a prominent New York pastor in a recent sermon. As quoted in the New York Times, Dr. Ralph B. Nesbitt, of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church says:

The contemporary scene is not without encouragement and not beyond repair. The very fact that so many people are concerned is a hopeful sign. This is the first condition of amelioration. The ultimate answer is not in ourselves, but what man must have is a personal relation to God, the realization that “Thou, God seest me.” My life is open like a book before Him and it is to Him that I must at last render an account of my life. It is that supremely that produces high morality.

A word spoken more that two hundred years ago by the famous statesman Edmund Burke, is as pertinent to our present situation as if it were written today: “True religion is the foundation of society, the basis on which all true government rests, and from which power derives its authority, laws their efficiency, and both their sanction. If it is once shaken by contempt, the whole fabric cannot be stable or lasting.”

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[Editor's Note: Much of this article " is as pertinent to our present situation as if it were written today." The Christian Observer expresses our gratitude to a reader in Ft. Walton Beach, Florida, for sending a copy of the October 10, 1951 issue of the Christian Observer.]

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by Penny Smith

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[Editor's Note: Northminster Reformed Presbyterian Church (RPCNA) of Suwanee, Georgia, sends several people into downtown Atlanta, Georgia, on Sunday afternoons starting at 5:00 p.m. to minister to inner city residents. On Sunday December 4, 2011, an outdoor Bible study was being led by Northminster pastor the Rev. Dr. Frank Smith, when the realities of the inner city brought the Bible study to a premature halt. Dr. Smith's wife, Penny Smith, was present at the Bible study, and in this article provides an interesting account of their unexpected adventure that afternoon. Mrs. Smith is originally from the United Kingdom, which is reflected in the use of several British word spellings in the article.]

It was just after 5:30 in the evening when the first shots rang out.  The Bible study had been going very well.  It had started on time at five o’clock, and discussion on the topic of Thanksgiving had been lively.  We had a total of fourteen people in attendance, only one of which was a child.  I was sitting on the wall; Frank’s sister Gini, visiting from Richmond, Virginia, was standing at the end of the wall and, other than Frank, everyone else was sitting on the steps of the burned-out church building where we meet.  To begin with I thought little of the sound of the gunshots, as we had heard them before from at least half a block away, and on those occasions we had not been under any threat.  However, after a volley of about eight to ten of them, presumably coming from a semi-automatic weapon, it seemed prudent to slip off the wall and down onto the steps with the other folk.  Frank, still standing on the sidewalk, having seen the shooter in the intersection, shooting north up Brawley Drive, and then fleeing west on Kennedy, called the police.  When the shooting stopped I looked around and saw one person on the ground outside the convenience store, but he did not appear to have been hit.  Then the second round of shooting started.  Gini had not yet ducked down, and from her vantage point she saw another man running south on Brawley, in our direction, firing south down the road.  At this point, discretion being the better part of valour, she, along with the rest of us hit the steps again, and at this point it dawned on me that this was for real.  This time, my face was down on the concrete.  I imagine we were all praying that the Lord would protect us, and Gini was doing so out loud.  Frank was still standing on the sidewalk talking to the 911 operator who told him that she could hear the shots being fired, and Gini and I yelled to him to get down.  Some of the details are fuzzy, but at that point Gini and Billie saw a white SUV, with its windows down, come south on Brawley past our steps, with all four occupants bearing weapons.  Frank, still standing on the sidewalk, had his back to them and did not see them.  At that point they were not firing, and we are not sure which of the 12 – 15 shots that we heard just prior to this came from the car and which from the runner on foot.  Two cars, Amy’s and ours, were between us and the SUV as it went by, and at some point Frank sought the safety of the car.  Shortly afterwards a man came over and yelled us to get out of the area.  I wasn’t sure I wanted to stand up, but we all did so, and the group quickly dispersed.  The local folk just “disappeared” except for a lady and her son who have been attending for two weeks.  This lady, who lives in the neighbourhood, is actively involved in trying to bring about change in the Bluff, and appreciates our efforts every Lord’s Day.   We threw the board and easel and the cooler into the trunk in a haphazard manner and this lady, Amy and Frank backed their cars away from the intersection to Jett and, still in reverse, along Jett and around onto Griffin.  There we parked and regrouped.   There were no more gunshots.  Shortly after that, which was about five minutes from the time Frank dialed 911, the first police car arrived followed almost immediately by three more.  Blue lights, but no sirens.  The police were only mildly interested in the situation, telling us that what we had experienced was not unusual for this area.  They didn’t take a statement, taking note only of the fact that the car with the four gunmen was a white SUV.

Having lived in the Bluff prior to undergoing successful drug rehabilitation, a regular member of our group, Linda, had some valuable insights which she shared with Amy as she was being driven back to her apartment.  In fact, before Bible study began, Linda had indicated that she was not comfortable with so many people whom she didn’t recognise congregating at the intersection.  She had previously shared with us that the drug dealers and particularly the drug “kingpin” occasionally loiter in the area while the study is going on, and that if they did not give their approval to this activity they would have made sure that we would have been run off by now.  Linda also believes that if the kingpin had been there on Sunday, the gunfire would not have occurred, or that he would have made sure we were protected.  Apparently he holds an elevated status which is highly respected in the drug community.  Linda also said that, even though the police may not show much interest in black-on-black violence, there would be a lot of interest, and hence disruptions to the drug dealers’ business, if white workers were targeted or caught in crossfire.

Before we each went our separate ways, the lady who lives in the area was very encouraging to Frank, telling him that he doesn’t realise how much good he is doing.  She told him that the devil is at the intersection where we meet, and he wants to disrupt our ministry.

As Frank, Gini and I drove home, we noted the irony of the Bible study earlier, which was the second of two studies on the topic of Thanksgiving.  One of the things that Frank had been explaining to the group was God’s sovereignty, and that, even though we may not understand why certain things happen to us, we are to be grateful for all of God’s providences.  Naturally, our hearts were full of thanksgiving for the Lord’s watch-care and protection over us that evening.  We acknowledged that he had given us this experience for a reason, and that he was in complete control of every bullet.

Scripture tells us to have no anxiety about anything but to take everything to God in prayer.  Never-the-less, we need to show wisdom and discretion with regard to taking sensible precautions, and Frank, Amy and I have already discussed the possibility of some changes.  We don’t anticipate this being a regular problem, as it is the first time that gunfire this close has happened in twenty months of ministering here.  However, one thing we will do is to make sure that anyone who volunteers to join us on the steps understands the fact that issues can arise.

The real Battle of the Bluff is being fought in the spiritual realm, even as it plays out in the streets.  Nothing will happen to us that is not in accordance with the will of the real “Kingpin” of the Bluff, namely the King of kings and Lord of lords.  Please continue to pray for us as we continue the battle for the hearts and minds of the men, women and children who reside in this sad and violent area.  Psalm 34:7.

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by David Cloud

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[Editor's Note: The following article is republished with the permission of the publisher, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, and is included because of its critique of several movements within the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed community and of Calvinist theology.

Responses to this article will be considered for publication in the Christian Observer if written in the same dispassionate, objective, and respectful manner as was the article. Though the editor and presumably most Christian Observer readers are likely poles apart theologically with Mr. Cloud, his highly effective style of written communication should make him be considered a "force to be reckoned with" in the confessional Presbyterian and Reformed world.]

http://www.wayoflife.org/index_files/7003784d4efd952074e3d6b65044f458-941.html

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(First published November 3, 2009) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org)

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1. The Integrated Church has often led to the downplaying of the importance of the biblical church.

This is not always true, but it is often true. Vision Forum warns about “nomadic families that flit from church to church, or renegades who refuse to place themselves under the accountability of a local church,” and adds, “God requires His people to be under biblical local churches with biblical preaching, biblical church government, biblical ordinances, and biblical discipline.”

This warning is an admission that this is a problem.

In fact, the movement is rife with this error. Many have replaced a biblical church with “home church” where the fathers are the pastors. Others have tried to start “churches” with a few home-schooling families though they aren’t qualified and divinely called to the task.

The Integrated Church movement has turned the church into a “family of families,” but the church is much more than a “family of families.” The apostle Paul wasn’t even married and he emphasized the importance of the unmarried condition (1 Corinthians 7:7-8, 25-35). The church’s main task is the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:48; Acts 1:8), and when the gospel is preached effectively, the result is the salvation of single people and those from all sorts of broken families. If the emphasis is on the ideal family, on the church being “a family of families,” a great many are left out.

We see this in our church planting work in South Asia. One of our churches is eight years old, and a high percentage of the members are either unmarried young people or are men and women representing broken homes. Several of the women have unsaved husbands. Some of the husbands abuse them and try to hinder their faith in Christ; at least one is an abusive drunkard. The wife of one of the male church members left him after he came to Christ. We have only a handful of families so far that are composed of both husband and wife that are saved and are trying to raise their children right. In many cases the wives can’t read and the parents have only the slightest clue of how to raise their children for Christ, though we are trying to train them. If our emphasis were on “a family of families,” we would be a very discouraged group.

Our goal is definitely to produce godly Christian families, but our church is not a family of families. It is a church! We are busy teaching the people how to build godly homes and discipline their children biblically, but it is very slow and somewhat discouraging work, because it is all brand new to them. The Hindu culture knows nothing about such things. Most of our church members had never even seen a Bible until they heard the gospel through our evangelistic ministries. The vast majority are first generation Christians, saved out of endless generations of pagan darkness.

What we need are New Testament churches that seek to build strong families and that do not hinder the families by such worldly things as entertainment-focused youth departments. To that degree we agree with the Family Integrated philosophy, but only to that degree, because that is as far as the Bible allows us to go.

2. The Integrated Church lacks understanding about the danger of New Evangelicalism.

The Integrated Church is largely an evangelical movement rather than a fundamentalist movement. Popular speakers at their conferences include Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and other New Evangelicals. You will find frequent positive references to evangelical leaders. There is little or no call for ecclesiastical separation. This is no light matter, as the Bible emphasizes the doctrine of separation from false doctrine and compromise (e.g., Romans 16:17; 2 Cor. 6:14-17; 2 Thess. 3:6; 1 Timothy 6:1-5; 2 Timothy 3:5; Titus 3:10). (See “New Evangelicalism: Its History, Characteristics, and Fruit,” which is available from Way of Life Literature in book and e-book formats.)

3. The Integrated Church neglects the Great Commission.

If you look through Integrated Church literature and web sites, there is little emphasis on the Great Commission and preaching the gospel to the ends of the earth. I am not saying there is nothing at all, but there is far more emphasis on the family and other things. Their conferences are not missions conferences or evangelism conferences but family and dominionist/reconstructionist conferences (emphasizing the building of the kingdom of God in the here and now). Preaching the gospel to the ends of the earth is not even mentioned in Vision Forum’s mission statement.

There are exceptions such as Antioch Community Church in Elon, North Carolina, which lists the following as two of their distinctives: “commitment to local and world missions” and “planting other churches.”

This church appears to be the exception rather than the rule.

The family is not an end in itself. The objective of both family and church should be the fulfillment of the Lord’s Great Commission, which He emphasized greatly after He rose from the dead and before He ascended to Heaven (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:44-48; John 20:21; Acts 1:8).

The book of Acts models the working out of the Great Commission rather than the Family Integrated Church model. Though we believe in a strong emphasis on godly families, this should not be an end in itself. Paul, a single man who could not model the strong family emphasis, preached the gospel and started churches. Paul took the young Timothy away from his family and discipled him apart from his father and mother and grandmother, and there is no evidence that Timothy ever married.

4. The Integrated Church is legalistic, having gone beyond the Bible in making rules about family and church.

The Integrated Church tends to be very legalistic. There is much liberty within the biblical model for both the family and the church, and it is legalistic to make laws that go beyond the biblical bounds.

For example, there is the teaching that the church must always be “family integrated.” A lecture published by Vision Forum says, “The biblical example is that entire families are present for corporate worship. Age-segregated worship is rooted in evolutionary humanism, not biblical Christianity” (Doug Phillips, “The Role of Children in the Meeting of the Church,” 2002, Family Renewal Audio Library).

The Bible says nothing about this one way or the other. Segregation of the ages has its dangers, but there certainly can be a time and place to teach children and young people separately from the adults. This is not contrary to any Scripture. A segregated ministry has some dangers that we need to consider and avoid, but it’s not a heresy. As the pillar and ground of the truth and possessing the Lord’s commission to “teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have taught you,” the church has the authority to teach children and young people as certainly as the home has (1 Timothy 3:16; Matthew 28:19); and the church has the right to decide how to accomplish this in a practical sense. I believe there is a great benefit in having Bible classes for children and youth. The Bible nowhere says that they must always be with their parents. That is to make a law out of the Bible’s silence.

Sunday School is neither a pillar of the faith nor a heresy. It is simply a tool. The Sunday School movement began in England as a way of evangelizing children from poor families and did not meet in the church or even during normal church times. It was held in various places in the community on Sunday afternoons. The typical Sunday School today is part evangelistic and part discipleship. Each church must determine how it will fulfill Christ’s command to preach the gospel to every creature and disciple those who believe, and the Sunday School can be a helpful tool if it is conducted properly. Having or not having a Sunday School doesn’t determine whether a church is biblical.

If mom and dad want to keep their children with them at all times in church, and if they don’t want their children to participate in youth activities, that is their prerogative before the Lord, but to go beyond this and make such things a law for everyone is to go beyond Scripture.

Another example of the legalism of the Integrated Church movement is its teaching that daughters must remain under the father’s roof until marriage. The following is a review of a Vision Forum book and DVD by a fundamentalist home schooling mother that investigated their materials:

“The two items I have reviewed are the book ‘So Much More,’ a book to daughters about how to have ‘vision’ for the kingdom of God. And the DVD ‘The Return of the Daughters,’ a documentary on the whole idea of daughters staying under their father’s roof until marriage. On the surface these items seemed to be very God-honoring. Yet, I had an unsettled feeling that something just wasn’t quite right. On the DVD, it seemed very touching to want to ‘protect’ your daughters in the way they suggest. What Christian father wouldn’t want to do the best for his daughter? Being a home school father, my husband wanted to have an open heart to what the Lord may be leading him to in the future. We spent all these years training her to be a keeper at home and as she becomes an adult, we do not want to just ‘throw her to the wolves.’ This is exactly what the DVD suggests you are doing if you don’t keep your daughter at home until marriage. … The book had much material that seemed on the surface to be great. It mentioned modest dress, Christian femininity, etc. Yet, it warned daughters against an independent spirit and self-sufficiency to the point of calling working for anyone other than your dad, selfish and Marxist. It also mentioned if daughters did not have families that agreed with this vision, they should find a family that would adopt them into their families so they could fulfill this role. The whole idea was the family should not be split up at church and if you wanted to be a visionary daughter you better find a family in one of their Integrated churches so you could be a part. It was such nonsense as I have led ‘bus kids’ to Christ in junior church and have wondered how they would have fit in at church without any families to adopt them. There were so many other glaring flaws, often times they used Scripture quotes that were intended to be commands for our relationship to Christ, and they twisted it to be for our relationship to earthly fathers.”

To teach that young women cannot leave their father’s roof unless they are married is going far beyond Scripture and putting man-made yokes on God’s people. Though we agree that we are not to follow the dictates and ways of today’s feministic-influenced society (Psalm 1:1; Rom. 12:3) and children are to obey their parents in the Lord (Ephesians 6:1), this does not mean that we have to submit to man-made laws that go beyond this. The Bible is our sole authority for faith and practice.

Is a young woman to be treated as a child? For a young woman to go to a godly Bible College and even to become a single missionary within the ministry restrictions of the New Testament Scripture (e.g., 1 Timothy 2:12) is not unscriptural. My wife was saved as a teenager when she was living in home broken by divorce. Her father and step father were unbeliever,s so she had no earthly father to help her spirituality. She faithfully attended the best church in her area, and after she graduated from high school she attended a godly Bible College, worked in a church, and was called to be a missionary. Before we were married, she worked as a nurse at a missionary hospital, and I do not believe that she was disobeying the Bible. A single woman can operate under the authority of the church as surely as she can under the authority of a father. Consider Phebe (Romans 16:1-2). She was sent by Paul on a ministry journey to Rome and Paul instructed the church at Rome to assist her, yet no father or husband is mentioned.

To instruct young women to leave their own fathers and put themselves under another father, because her own father is not following the Integrated Church model, is actually rebellion to God’s Word. Where does the Bible teach this? The Bible says, “Children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right” (Eph. 6:1). It doesn’t say, “Daughters obey your father in the Lord unless he refuses to follow the Integrated Church philosophy.”

Beware of Integrated Church legalism.

5. The Integrated Church will bring you into association with heresy.

As I have been examining the Integrated Church Movement, I have found many heresies that make this a dangerous movement. These are in addition to the errors that we have mentioned under the previous four points.

There is the heresy that salvation is by endurance.

Consider the following statement at a Family Integrated Church web site:

“While the dedication and discipline and athletic prowess is commendable, I fear that it may be at the expense of the child’s salvation. I know that on earth it isn’t fancy, it isn’t glorious, millions of people won’t be shouting your or your child’s name, but I want to encourage you, as a father, to daily drill the Christian fundamentals with your children. There are no medals or crowns or tiaras or sashes. But this is an endurance race and if we remain steadfast until the end, we will receive the crown of salvation that will last for eternity” (Richard Boureston, “Will Your Child Throw a 100mph Fastball in Hell?” Walk of Faith Church, Orange County’s Family Integrated Church, http://ourwalkoffaith.com/articles/orange-county-church/will-your-child-throw-a-100mph-fastball-in-hell.html).

That is work’s salvation, and it is a heresy of the first order.

There is the heresy of dominionism.

Vision Forum is devoted to dominion theology, and Vision Forum has a vast influence throughout the Integrated Church movement. They to impart a “family vision for cultural reformation.”

One of their DVD presentations is entitled “Training Dominion-Oriented Daughters.”

Vision Forum’s movie God’s Next Army presents the goal of training young people to enter the halls of government and become national leaders for kingdom reconstructionism.

Vision Forum is associated with Patrick Henry College, an institute of higher learning for home schoolers that is devoted to a theocratic agenda of “the transformation of American society” through preparing “Christian men and women who will lead our nation and shape our culture.”

Patrick Henry College, which has associations with Vision Forum, was founded by Michael P. Farris, who is also the head of the Home School Legal Defense Fund (HSLDA) and the founder of Joshua Generation Ministries. The latter is devoted to training young people 11-19 to “become a force in the civic and political arenas” to banish pluralism from America, a dominionist, kingdom-now agenda.

Gary Demar’s American Vision organization is another reconstructionist outfit that has influence among home schoolers and integrationist churches. American Vision’s objective is to “restore America to its Biblical Foundation–from Genesis to Revelation.” The vision is of “an America that recognizes the sovereignty of God over all of life and where Christians are engaged in every facet of society.”

This fails to recognize that America was never built solidly upon the Bible. It was always built on a mixture of Bible and humanistic philosophy. Some of the founding fathers were Bible-believing Christians, while some were not. In fact, some of the chief of America’s founders were unbelieving rationalists who despised doctrines such supernatural revelation and Christ’s atonement. These included Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. There is no pattern in the New Testament for a “Christian nation.” There is a pattern for the church and the home and for civil government but not for a Christian nation. The kingdom of God will only work in this world at a level beyond the churches when God Himself comes to sit on the throne. There is no kingdom without a king!

In his book Ruler of the Nations, Demar describes the dominionist philosophy as follows:

“All government requires a reference point. If God is to be pleased by men, the Bible must become the foundation of all their governments, including civil government. This means that Biblical law must be made the foundation of all righteous judgment in every government: personal (self government), ecclesiastical, familial, and civil.”

When we look to the book of Acts and the New Testament Epistles we look in vain for a dominionist agenda. The apostles and preachers in the early churches didn’t have an objective of “bringing the Roman Empire back to God” or establishing the kingdom of God within the Roman Empire. Rather, they fulfilled the Commission given by Christ to preach the gospel to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). They preached the gospel, discipled the brethren, established churches, lived holy lives as light in a dark world, considered themselves pilgrims in a strange land, citizens of a heavenly country, and waited on the imminent return of Christ (1 Thess 1:9-10).

There is the heresy of Calvinistic sovereign election.

Vision Forum is founded upon and permeated with Reformed Calvinistic theology. The statement of faith includes the following:

“All who were chosen in Christ from eternity past are born again by the Holy Spirit, respond from their new hearts with repentance and faith in Jesus, are justified on the basis of the shed blood of Christ, become children of God, and are indwelt, sanctified, and sealed by the Holy Spirit until they are glorified at Christ’s return.”

Vision Forum books include the following: John Calvin: Man of the Millennium, The Story of the English Puritans, The World’s Greatest Reformation History Library, The Geneva Bible Calvin Legacy Edition, Children’s Stories of the Reformation, Stories of the Covenanters in Scotland, Reformation Heroes, Famous Women of the Reformed Church, Puritan Fathers Classics Library, Gill’s Body of Doctrinal Divinity (hyper, hyper Calvinism). They even sell a statue of John Calvin.

There is the heresy of Replacement Theology and the misuse of the Law of Moses.

This heresy replaces Israel with the Church. It is for this reason that the Family Integrated Church movement brings so many things from the Old Testament directly into New Testament church, which is a gross error. The Apostle Paul taught that the Law of Moses is not the Christian’s law (2 Corinthians 3:6-18). In 2 Corinthians 3:6, the “letter that killeth” is the Law of Moses. (This verse is frequently taken out of context by New Evangelicals and ecumenists and liberals to support the heresy that the Bible should not be interpreted literally or that it should not be obeyed in all points.) Those who hold to Replacement Theology teach that the “moral code” of the Law of Moses is enforce in the Church, but Paul was specifically talking about the “moral code” in 2 Corinthians 3. He was talking about the Law that “was written and engraven in stones” (verse 7). That is the Ten Commandments! Yet he calls this Law “the ministration of death” (verse 7) and “the ministration of condemnation” (verse 9). This is because the Law of Moses requires perfect obedience in ALL points (Deuteronomy 27:26; Galatians 3:10; James 2:10), and sinful, fallen man cannot live up to it. Thus, the purpose of the Law of Moses was to show us God’s holy character and righteous demands and man’s fallen condition in order to lead men to safety in Christ (Romans 3:19-24; Galatians 3:24). Once a man places his faith in Christ, he is no longer under the Law of Moses (Galatians 3:25; Romans 7:1-4). Paul said the Law of Moses, specifically the Ten Commandments written and engraven in stones, is done away for the believer (2 Cor. 3:11). The New Testament believer has a different, an even higher law, and that is the “law of the Spirit” (Romans 8:2). The believer’s law is to be conformed to the image of Christ by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18). The Christian’s law is also called “the law of liberty” (Jam. 1:25), because while the instruction of the New Testament faith is a requirement that God places before His people, it is a law of liberty because we obey God out of gratitude for His grace in Christ and we do not have to fear eternal condemnation.

There is the heresy of denying the imminency of the return of Christ.

The Integrated Church movement largely denies an imminent Rapture, but the doctrine of the pre-tribulational Rapture is both Scriptural and important. (See “The Pre-Tribulation Rapture” at the Way of Life web site.) It is not a peripheral doctrine. Christ, Paul, James, and Peter taught that the Lord’s return is imminent and is to be expected at any time (Mat. 24:44; Phil. 4:5; Jam. 5:8-9; 1 Pet. 4:7). The early Christians lived in expectation of Christ’s return and the literal fulfillment of the prophecies. “For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10). The doctrine of a pre-tribulational Rapture is a great motivator for purifying one’s personal Christian life. It encourages the believer in trials and persecutions (1 Thessalonians 4:17-18). It keeps the church’s focus on the Great Commission. D.L. Moody had it right when he said: “I look upon this world as a wrecked vessel. God has given me a lifeboat and said to me, ‘Moody, save all you can.’” The pre-tribulational Rapture motivates us to be busy in the Lord’s work (1 Cor. 15:58). It motivates us to live obedient lives (1 Jn. 3:1-3; 1 Th. 5:4-7). It motivates us to separate from evil (Tit. 2:13-14). It keeps believers on the outlook for heresy and apostasy (2 Timothy 4:3-4; 1 John 2:24-28).

There is the heresy of modern textual criticism.

The writings, videos, and web sites promoting the Integrated Church are filled with quotations from the modern versions, including the English Revised Version and the New International Version. There is a complete capitulation to the heresy of modern textual criticism and the smorgasbord approach to the Bible version issue. (See the following articles at the Way of Life Literature web site: “Textual Criticism Is Drawn from the Wells of Infidelity,” “Modern Textual Criticism’s Role in the Breakdown of Society,” and “The Ungodly Fruit of Modern Textual Criticism.” For a more extensive study, see the books “Modern Textual Criticism’s Hall of Shame” and “Faith vs. the Modern Bible Versions,” which are available in print and eBooks editions at the Way of Life web site.)

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CONCLUSION

The Integrated Church movement has some good points that need to be emphasized in every church today, but the good is wrapped in a theological package that has many dangers for Bible-believing fundamentalists.

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The Role of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee in the Establishment of the Presbyterian Investors Fund (PIF) and Cornerstone Ministries Investments (CMI)

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Part Three

by Bob Wildrick

In part three as in part two, documents found on the Internet, bankruptcy court documents, CMI documents, and information given to the author by other CMI investors will be presented showing that the principals and other employees of PIF/CMI to this day  retain their connections with the PCA. The Bankruptcy Court Documents (BCD) cited in this article can be read and downloaded from the bmcgroup.com website by searching  case number 08-20355. [1] The author recommends that BCD 437 [2] and BCD 530 [3] be examined before continuing to read this article.

On December 24, 2008, the United States Trustee for the CMI bankruptcy appointed an examiner. This should have happened in July 2008, when requested by the bankruptcy trustee, but the debtor (CMI, Ottinger) as well as the Creditors Committee opposed the appointment of an examiner. Had an examiner been appointed in July 2008, there might have been more evidence of corruption found in the investigation. The examiner, Pat Huddleston, was given until March 15, 2009 to complete the examination and report his findings to the bankruptcy court. The report is contained in BCD 530. [4]

The author first scanned BCD 530 on March 18, 2009. BCD 530 details the double-dealing, self-dealing, and fraud of John Ottinger and John Wehmiller. The following day the author and his wife carefully studied BCD 530 in order that the complexity and the deviousness of what had happened at CMI could be better understood. Later that morning, the author telephoned Mr. Jamie Sickert, CMI Vice-President and Director, and asked if he had read BCD 530.  The author remembers clearly Mr. Sickert’s answer; “I read it, turned off my computer, sat down and cried.” The author asked Mr. Sickert if he or the rest of the board knew about the corrupt goings on at CMI, and Mr. Sickert replied with an emphatic “NO!”. Mr. Sickert and the board of directors were negligent in their duties which included fiscal and spending matters.

The eHow.com website “Money” section describes the role of a corporate board of directors:

A for-profit corporate board of directors must be cognizant of certain issues. Initially, the for-profit board has to keep a watchful eye on the chief executive officer (“CEO”) of the corporation. The board must assist the CEO and offer assistance to the CEO whenever necessary to achieve the board’s goals. Also, the board must determine whether to relieve the CEO from his or her duties or whether to continue with the CEO when his or her term expires. Furthermore, for publicly-held corporations, the for-profit board must have responsibility for fiscal matters and all spending issues. [5]

On June 23, 2009 on the Internet and June 24, 2009 in the paper edition of the Atlanta Journal Constitution, there was an article titled, “Cornerstone Ministries Betrayed Them by Straying from Mission, Investors Say.” [6] The following day, June 25, 2009, PCA TE the Rev. Cecil Brooks died.

Prior to Mr. Brook’s death, the author was preparing a complaint to file with the PCA’s Metro Atlanta Presbytery (MAP), asking for discipline of the Rev. Cecil Brooks and the Rev. John Ottinger. The complaint was then changed to reflect only Mr. Ottinger. Seven CMI creditors including the author filed the complaint with MAP in July 2009 citing  Scripture, applicable sections of the Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter XXX, Section III, questions and answers from the Westminster Larger Catechism, and applicable sections from the PCA Book of Church Order.  As evidence, the author cited various sections of BCD 530.

MAP met October 9, 2009, and appointed a commission to investigate the complaint. The author received at least one email from the commission chair wanting to know if the author had more information over and above what had previously been sent.  The author suggested that the commission contact the individuals listed on BCD 530-1, which was a list of all the principals, directors, and others that had been associated with CMI.  The author additionally made himself available to meet with the commission.  On May 8, 2010, the author received a letter from the MAP Stated Clerk saying; “this commission finds insufficient grounds for Metro Atlanta Presbytery to discipline TE Ottinger for the sins of which he is accused by the complainants.”

On May 21, 2010, the author sent a letter to the MAP Stated Clerk asking for a full report of the commission.  Sometime after June 10, 2010, the author received a letter from the MAP moderator stating that MAP had received my request for a written copy of the commission report, and writing:

“For context, our presbytery received the commission’s report on May 4; it was delivered orally, and was done so in executive session.  As such, we did not distribute written copies to any of the attending elders. It is also our practice to keep confidential the details of matters we discuss in executive session. We must therefore decline your request.”

The author additionally filed a complaint against John Wehmiller with his church, First Baptist Church of Gainesville, Georgia, which was never answered.

John Ottinger was allowed to remain in charge of CMI until Sept. 25, 2009.  Beginning with that date, Glass Ratner Advisory & Capital Group LLC (GRACG) took over management of CMI. One of GRACG’s first appointments was Jason Collins of Reid Davis TSAI LLP, for the purpose of litigating and settling the claims against CMI.  Mr. Collins’ biography was on the Internet and included the following entry on the list of cases he is handling:

Recently hired as special counsel to the Plan Administrator of Cornerstone Ministries Investment Inc, to pursue claims arising out of a $140 million Ponzi scheme. [emphasis added]

The words ‘Ponzi scheme’ were later changed to ‘financial fraud’. [7]

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission defines a Ponzi Scheme as “…an investment fraud that involves the payment of purported returns to existing investors from funds contributed by new investors. Ponzi scheme organizers often solicit new investors by promising to invest funds in opportunities claimed to generate high returns with little or no risk. In many Ponzi schemes, the fraudsters focus on attracting new money to make promised payments to earlier-stage investors and to use for personal expenses, instead of engaging in any legitimate investment activity.” [8]

On July 31, 2009, Mr. and Mrs. John Ottinger bought a house at 500 Fawn Hill Place, Sanford, Florida for $937,500.00 cash. The 2011 taxes on the Florida house are $9,469.00. [9] Prior to buying the Florida property, on May 12, 2008, three months following the CMI bankruptcy, John T. Ottinger transferred ownership via a revocable trust to Julie J. Ottinger of their residence at 6020 Providence Lane, Cumming, Georgia. [10] The 2011 taxes paid on the Ottinger’s Georgia residence were $7,219.46, for a total of $16,868.46 in property taxes paid by the Ottingers in 2011. Many of the 3500 CMI creditors that lost the majority of their CMI investments in the February 2008 bankruptcy experience continual financial difficulties due to their CMI investment losses and live on far less income than what the Ottinger’s paid in property taxes in 2011.

In a previous article, the author said that more information was forthcoming on a man named John Lowery.  The author telephoned Jayme Sickert at home one night in the mid-2000’s, and during the course of our conversation Sickert said that he needed to go to bed because of an early flight the following morning. Sickert said that he was going to Dallas, Texas, for the CMI annual meeting, and that CMI had plans to make a large investment with a developer and a doctor who owned a fitness center in Dallas. The developer was John Lowery and the corporation was named Wellstone. Wellstone from 2006 to 2008 was a major sponsor of what in 2006 and 2007 was called the Wellstone Dallas White Rock Marathon. [11] [12] [13]

On 1 December 2008, Wellstone’s Craig Ranch development, an undeveloped tract of forty-two acres in the middle of a 2200 acre development in McKinney, Texas, declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy in order to force fellow bankruptee CMI to release its mortgage on the Wellstone property to which CMI had loaned $3 million. Wellstone had the Craig Ranch property under contract for sale to a rehabilitation hospital, but CMI’s refusal to release its mortgage on the property prevented its sale. The primary lender to Wellstone thus was attempting to foreclose on the property to satisfy its $5.2 million loan to Wellstone. [14]

The writer has been investigating the CMI debacle since early 2009 and believes this scandal isn’t much different than the Roman Catholic priest pedophile scandal. The reader may wonder at this point: “What is the difference between abuse of young boys by priests and the abuse of elderly senior citizens by PCA ministers?” Some might say the difference is that the pedophile scandals involved physical harm being done to the victims. Included among the 3500 defrauded CMI investors was a gentleman named Don Lebate. Don, as co-chair of the Creditors Committee, overextended himself investigating the bankruptcy, then in April 2009 suffered a massive heart attack and died. Another lawyer who had been investigating CMI told of one man that told him that he was contemplating suicide because of his losses. The author suggests that the reader examine letters that were sent to the bankruptcy judge that are filed on the BMC group web site detailing their losses and plight to get an understanding of the widespread despair and hardship suffered by so many as a result of the CMI Ponzi scheme. Two prime examples are BCD 590 [15] and BCD 667. [16]

The author additionally has contacted several of the fathers of the PCA denomination to garner support into investigating the CMI scandal.  One of the gate keepers said that the doctor would not become involved at that point in time. Another correspondent who was sent extensive documentation of the CMI scandal did not bother to respond at all. It seems that no one cares about this massive stain upon the church of Jesus Christ except the author’s pastor, a TE in another denomination, and the Christian Observer; said publication began reporting on serious financial and fiduciary irregularities with CMI’s predecessor organizations seventeen years ago in 1994.

Philip Doddridge (1702-1751) was a Church of England pastor and hymn writer. Seven of Doddridge’s hymns are in the Trinity Hymnal. Doddridge’s biography contains the biblical solution for church members who seek bankruptcy:

April 2nd, 1741

After this follows a number of cases presented to the Church for suitable admonition and discipline. One entry we will quote, as deserving the attention of the Churches of Christ at the present day:—

It is the unanimous judgment of this Church, that the frequent acts of bankruptcy which have happened in Dissenting congregations, as well as elsewhere, have brought so great a dishonour on religion, and occasioned so much mischief and reproach, that we think ourselves obliged in duty to enter our public protest and caution on this head; and we do hereby declare, that if any persons in stated communion with us shall become a bankrupt, or, as it is commonly expressed, fail in the world, he must expect to be cut off from our body, unless he do within two months give to the Church, by the elders, either in word or writing, such an account of his affairs as shall convince us that his fall was owing not to his own sin and folly, but to the afflicting hand of God upon him; in which case, far from adding affliction to the afflicted, we hope that as God shall enable us we shall be ready to vindicate, comfort, and assist him, as his friends and brethren in Christ.

Signed, in the name and presence of the Church, this 1st day of May, 1741, by the pastor and deacons. [17]

Brothers and fathers of the Presbyterian Church in America, you have a responsibility to clean up the sin that remains from the 1994 General Assembly. There are 3500-plus CMI investors whose lives have been seriously altered by the corruption of PCA Teaching Elders. The Legal Audit will remain an albatross around your necks until it is uncovered, exposed, and repentance be made by those responsible for twenty-plus years of corruption and coverup, both active and passive.

The question in the title of this series of articles appears to have been clearly answered.  The Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee for 1993-1994 may very well be responsible for the existence and bankruptcy of PIF/CMI.  If so, those men may also need to be held responsible for their actions and placed under appropriate discipline.

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There is still unfinished business in the Presbyterian Church in America.

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Our Guest Editor Bob Wildrick is one of 3500 CMI investors still waiting to receive settlement proceeds from the February 2008 Chapter 11 bankruptcy of Cornerstone Ministries Investments, Inc., a.k.a. the “$140 million Ponzi scheme.”

Opening Day - 23 October 2011

The congregation of  Grace Presbyterian Church of Lexington, Virginia, held the first service in its new church building at 11:00 a.m. on Sunday 23 October 2011. The new church building is located off Greenhouse Road in Rockbridge County about three miles north of the former church building.

The call to worship was led by the church’s first official pastor, the Rev. Ed Walker, who was called to the church in in the mid-1950′s. A former Welsh missionary to Africa surnamed Ackland served the new church in an “interim” capacity from its founding in 1952 until Mr. Walker was called as pastor. Grace’s current pastor, the Rev. Paul Carter, was called in 1984 and has now served the church as pastor for twenty-seven years.

The Opening Day Congregation

Planning for the new church building began over ten years ago, when the size of the congregation grew to where the capacities of downtown on-street parking and the size of the church building became inadequate. Two Sunday morning church services were held during the school year in an interim effort to address the capacity issues.

Grace Presbyterian Church was founded in 1952 by several members of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS) who were concerned about the growth of theological liberalism in

L to R - The Rev. Paul Carter, and the Rev. and Mrs. Ed Walker

the PCUS characterized by actions such as the introduction of the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, which waters down key Christian doctrines such as the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, and by the growing movement in the PCUS questioning the historicity and infallibility of the Bible. Grace’s founders sought to build a church based upon the whole counsel of God contained in the Bible, and upon the Westminster Confession of Faith.

The denominationally-independent Grace Presbyterian Church congregation first met in the Pine Room of the Mayflower Hotel on South Main Street, now Mayflower Assisted Living, before moving to the now-former church a few hundred feet south and on the opposite side of the street from the Mayflower.

In the late 1960′s, Grace Presbyterian Church joined the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod (RPCES), then became a church of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) when the RPCES merged with the PCA in 1982.

The second Sunday service at the new church building was held on 30 October 2011 during Parents Weekend for Lexington’s Washington & Lee University. Following the opening of the service, Pastor Paul Carter sat with the congregation as the Rev. John Talley, minister of the Reformed University Fellowship chapter at W&L, presented the sermon and presided over the remainder of the worship service attended by several W&L students and their parents.

Students from W&L and from Lexington’s Virginia Military Institute are a significant part of the Grace Presbyterian Church congregation, and are served well by the ministries provided by the church to students of Lexington’s two higher education institutions.

Bob Williams, Managing Editor

Photographs by Janis Wilbur

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The Role of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee in the Establishment of the Presbyterian Investors Fund (PIF) and Cornerstone Ministries Investments (CMI)

Part One

by Bob Wildrick

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Not one person associated with the PCA as a member or an investor in CMI, Inc., has written an article that I have read on it’s demise, therefore I believe someone with experience with both organizations should write about this mess.  I am deeply disturbed that PIF/CMI was founded upon the remnants of a PCA endeavor, Investors Fund for Building and Development (IFBD), that was faulty and I am disheartened that teaching and ruling elders in the PCA refused to exercise their responsibilities in 1994 to put the peace and purity of the church ahead of loyalty to other teaching elders.

At the 13^th General Assembly (GA) of the PCA in 1985 a recommendation was made:

“that the Committee on Mission to North America be authorized …to form and implement a revolving building fund to operate as a trust for the purpose to receive monies and make loans for the primary purpose of church building construction.” [1]

At the 14^th GA of the PCA in 1986,  the assembly adopted the basic policy guidelines for revolving building loans.  Furthermore:

“the trustees of the Investors Fund for Building and Development were directed to complete the policy manual and submit it to the 15^th GA” [2]

That assembly also approved the articles of incorporation and  bylaws for IFB&D, as well as the proposed FY87 budget and the Basic Guidelines for Revolving Building Loans. [3] At that same GA there was a report and minutes of the organizational meeting of IFBD attached to the minutes. [4]

Skip ahead to the 20^th GA of the PCA in 1992.  The minutes note:

“that the 20^th General Assembly requires all committees and agencies to participate in the Legal Audit Questionnaire.” [5]

Why a legal audit?  What was going on at Century Place (the denominational office building)?  Notice that it was the General Assembly that ordered the Legal Audit.

The minutes of the 21^st GA of the PCA 1993 state:

“That the AC [Administrative Committee] be directed to assemble the recommendations in and responses to the Legal Audit by the various committees, boards, and agencies and to present such reports through the appropriate committees, boards and agencies to the 22^nd GA, and that the parts of the Legal Audit referred to each committee, board and agency be made to the Committee of Commissioners reviewing its work at the 22^nd General Assembly and that the entire legal audit and responses be made available to the Committee of Commissioners on AC at the 22^nd General Assembly.”[6]

See the difference?  The results of the Legal Audit should have been given to the GA.  The GA ordered it; the GA should have seen it.  However, only a relatively few members of the Assembly ever saw the Legal Audit, and those that did had to sign a confidentiality agreement, pledging not to reveal the contents of the Audit.  As a result, the majority of the 1994 GA never saw what was in the Legal Audit.

I will now attempt to present what happened at the 22^nd GA of the PCA in 1994.  Here is what we read in that Assembly’s minutes:

Legal Audit

The working definition a Legal Audit of the Committee of Commissioners on Administration is as follows:

1.07 The End Product—The Legal Status Report and Chart

The legal status report should be designed to (1) give the status of the legal affairs of a business; (2) make recommendations for future action, and (3) assist management in evaluating the present legal risks in the business. [7]

The minutes go on to say that a report of certain matters can be prepared for public distribution but things that could be used in a lawsuit should be kept confidential.  OK I’ll agree with that.  Further on in the minutes it states:

“At present the legal audit is protected by attorney-client privilege and its contents may not be used against the PCA in a court of law.  The very reason for having the legal audit conducted in the first place was to determine whether there are areas of civil vulnerability that should be corrected before being discovered by someone wishing to file suit against us.” [8]

Further on under “d” of the grounds it states:

“The legal audit report is copyrighted by the Christian law firm of Gammon and Grange…” [9]

However, when a law firm undertakes a job for a client, any material that is copyrighted is to be thus protected for the benefit of the client, not the law firm…

So what are the facts that have been kept from us for twenty-three years? You won’t find anything in the minutes of the 22^nd GA other than a hint.  Under the Committee of Commissioners on Investors Fund the statement is made:

“We are not allowed to discuss the details of the Legal Audit.”

Skip down a few lines and it states:

“We found nothing in the IFBD portion of the Legal Audit, in the response of legal counsel, in the response of IFBD staff, or in the IFBD trustees to cause concern of anything amiss.  In Summary, from the information given and received, we found no substance to rumors that have circulated that there is impropriety in the IFBD” [10]

Further on in the minutes it states:

“Therefore the Trustees recommend with the endorsement of the Committee on Mission to North America and the Administrative Committee the following:.. it is recommended that the relationship of IFBD to the General Assembly be reordered in such a way as to make IFBD a separate, non-integrated supporting organization.” [11]

In simple English IFBD was dissolved by the 1994 GA.

Was there impropriety at IFBD?  Within the PCA there was a group of teaching elders called Concerned Presbyterians.  This group of men were concerned about the drift within the PCA away from historic Biblical and Presbyterian standards and polity.  A report was presented at Concerned Presbyterian Day in 1994 by attorney Walter Porr who had found twenty corporations registered to suites 130 and 150 in the PCA building at 1852 Century Place, Atlanta, Georgia, many with the names of the principals and employees of IFBD as CEO, CFO, Secretary or Registered Agent.  Mr. Porr made the statement that “the suites must be awfully large suites or very diminutive people.” Recently Mr. Porr wrote the following to me:

“I am deeply chagrined, but not sadly surprised, that the Church declined to impose any discipline.  My experiences at the GA made it clear that the moral fiber and courage for such action was woefully lacking.”

After Gammon and Grange had completed the Legal Audit, Cecil Brooks, the CEO of IFBD took a copy of the IFBD portion of the audit to Charlotte, North Carolina in May 1993 and gave it to a banker by the name of Chuck Ledford for his perusal.  Mr. Ledford states:

“I was asked by some individuals to review some information regarding the PCA Investor Fund and make comments on the legal/financial structure.  He has since then, and as per letter enclosed dated May 19, 1993, requested that I send this information, specifically a legal audit on the Investors Fund back to him.  I am doing this memo in accordance with his request.  When he was in Charlotte I did state to him that I would not copy nor reproduce any material given to me and I certainly will not do so.  The purpose of this memo is to record my own private thoughts and comments regarding the information contained within said document.  I will as of this day send all original documents, without any copies or reproductions made whatsoever, back to Mr. Brooks.”

Mr. Ledford’s memo was four pages long, but the second paragraph on the fourth page is exceptionally revealing:

“They (Gammon and Grange) made another extremely important notation in the document.  Tim Mersereau is the auditor of the Investors Fund.  He said to the audit committee, according to this document, on March 5, 1991 a discussion draft calling to their attention five reportable conditions that in his judgement could adversely affect the organization’s ability to financially and legally function.  Gammon and Grange stated that it was appropriate that this letter go to the audit committee which could have required a written response from management addressing each of these concerns and how to resolve them.  They stated that apparently no written response was requested or provided but it was brought up in the field audit and Jack Ottinger addressed them.  Such issues, briefly are:

1. the loss of a $200,000.00 savings certificate which Ottinger stated was later found

2. deposits in excess of FDIC limits

3. RTC interest computation error

4. improper rate of adjustments during the calendar year

5. personnel files lacking documentation authorizing pay raises.

They made no comment on whether Mr. Ottinger’s responses to these five things were satisfactory but went on to the next and final recommendation.

Mr. Ledford’s next paragraph was on Gammon and Grange’s recommendation to the Stated Clerks office requiring management of IFBD to submit reports in a timely manner and to respond to noted deficiencies.  He now ends with this final paragraph:

“I have briefly summarized this limited legal audit by this memo.  No copies or reproductions of the document have been made and as of today I am sending the original all of the Investors Fund financial statements for 1991 and 1990, along with a letter from Jackson McDaniel back to Mr. Cecil Brooks.  It is my financial observation that even with a cursory review of the information contained within this memo, that it is absolutely imperative that this issue be addressed in an immediate manner.  Even as I cannot give these documents out because they are copyrighted and I did give my word to Mr. Brooks that this would not be done, I feel I cannot be silent on this information contained within and must and will pursue the appropriate actions to report this information to the proper functions.”

So, did the Stated Clerk and Administrative Committee of the PCA in 1993-1994 help form PIF/CMI by what appears to be a cover up and whitewash of impropriety within IFBD?  Should Mr. Ottinger have been disciplined for the five reportable conditions that were documented by Mr. Mersereau? Why didn’t the IFBD audit committee report to civil authorities the offences of Mr. Ottinger that Mr. Mersereau found in 1991?

It is my understanding that the only discipline that Mr. Brooks and Mr. Ottinger received was a severe tongue lashing by the Stated Clerk along with the requisite tears and boohooing by Mr. Brooks, who then according to men who were at the 1994 GA, walked about with his proverbial tail between his legs.  It appears to this writer that the members of the 1994 GA were kept in the dark by the Stated Clerk about what had gone on at IFBD and therefore made a bad decision by dissolving IFBD and allowing Brooks and Ottinger to move their corruption to other companies which they formed, namely Presbyterian Investors Fund and Cornerstone Ministries Investments Inc.

Isn’t it time that the Legal Audit is revealed, or doesn’t the need for sunshine exist on Brown Road, Lawrenceville, Georgia ( the present PCA denominational offices)?   Mr. Porr said:

“there was a lack of moral fiber.”

Where are the Teaching Elders with courage or moral fiber that are willing to clean up the perceived cover up?  Where are the Concerned Presbyterians?  Are they a figment of ones imagination?  Where are the men that had their negative votes recorded at the 1985, 1986, 1993 and 1994 GA’s?  I don’t see any gold becoming dim; rather, I see the gold leaf peeling.

As Bob Williams said in his March 14, 2011 article in the Christian Observer, there is “unfinished business in the PCA.”

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Endnotes

1. Minutes of 13th GA 1985 page 114.
2. Minutes of 14^th GA 1986 page 171
3. Minutes of 14^th GA 1986 pages 172 & 173
4. Minutes of 14^th GA  1986 pages 261-273
5. Minutes of 20^th GA  1992 page 135
6. Minutes of 21^st GA  1993 page 181
7. Minutes of 22^nd GA  1994 page 256
8. Minutes of 22^nd GA  1994 page 269
9. Minutes of 22^nd GA  1994 page 270
10. Minutes of 22^nd GA  1994 page 189
11. Minutes of 22^nd GA  1994 page 191

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Our Guest Editor Bob Wildrick is one of 3500 CMI investors still waiting to receive settlement proceeds from the February 2008 Chapter 11 bankruptcy of Cornerstone Ministries Investments, Inc., a.k.a. the “$140 million Ponzi scheme.”

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by the Rev. Graeme Craig, Moderator, Free Church of Scotland (Continuing)

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A variety of false religions, philosophies and teachings are attacking the Gospel today. One of these is modern-day historical science. Both the disciplines of historical biology – that is to say the study of evolution – and historical geology teach much that is mere pseudoscience – assertions that are not genuine science. Despite the claims of many scientists and the media, it can easily be shown that much that passes for historical science is not truly scientific at all but dangerous pseudoscience. It is a danger not only to the Church and individuals, but to science and society at large.

Outside the Church many consider such claims to be utterly bizarre. Within the Church some see them as bringing the Gospel into disrepute or feel the subject is not very spiritual. However, such thinking is shallow and betrays a lack of faithfulness to Jesus Christ, our great Prophet and King. It is a biblical principle that all truth is God’s truth and has its origin in him. He is the God of truth who cannot lie. He has revealed the true origin of the universe in his Word and it is the duty of everyone everywhere to believe and profess it. Moreover, the One who spoke in the Scriptures, has also revealed himself in creation. David could sing “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.” Psalm 19:1-3. The hand prints of the Creator must therefore be consistent with the Creator’s voice speaking in the Scriptures. Sadly, for many years, there has been a tendency to accommodate Scripture to mainstream historical science, rather than seeing it for what it is, dangerous pseudoscience. Even some of the great heros of Church history have failed us. The result has been disastrous as well as dishonouring to Christ. The truth of God as Creator is being vociferously attacked today by many including Richard Dawkins. It is therefore the duty of the Christian and the Church to resist error. Luther’s words at the time of the reformation are equally applicable today. He said “If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest expression every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however, boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved, and to be steady on all the battlefield besides, is mere flight and disgrace, if he flinches at that point.” We shall therefore consider why today’s historical science deserves to be called pseudo-science and why it is dangerous and must be resisted.

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Much which passes for historical Science is modern-day pseudoscience

What is science?

Today, there is a common perception that science has the ability to answer all of man’s questions. Many speak as if science has exposed God as a hoax. Some even look to it for meaning and morals in life. How foolish. Those who speak this way, betray the fact that they do not really know what science is. This is not surprising, given the failure among many scientists themselves to remember the limits of scientific knowledge or even consider the influence preconceptions can have on the results of scientific thought. The first thing that must be considered is the question, “What is science?” Science has been defined as ‘the use of evidence to construct testable explanations and predictions of natural phenomena’. Thus scientists produce results through observation and experiments which are repeatable. These lead to the production of general laws and theories which are viewed as objective knowledge but are open to falsification. In this way many useful scientific discoveries have been made. It put man on the moon and has provided medicines to protect people’s health. However, when it comes to the study of origins, whether in Biology or Geology, an often-overlooked problem is encountered. Origins has to do with unobservable and unrepeatable past events. During the creation period, there was no one present (apart from the Creator) to observe or record what happened. It was an unrepeatable past event. Thus, while today’s observations may produce general laws about what is happening now and could have happened in the past, they cannot tell us what did happen. To counter this, some scientists speak of the principle of uniformity, which views present-day processes as the key to the past. However, this is a philosophical assumption and is not objective scientific knowledge. Thus evolution as an explanation of origins presupposes various beliefs. When it comes to Geology, the same lack of objectivity is evident. The only objective scientific facts are the location, nature and composition of the rocks and associated fossils. How they got there and their age are matters of  interpretation which depend on the assumptions and presuppositions of the geologist. Geology cannot therefore give objective scientific support to the theory of evolution or speak infallibly about things which no one saw occurring. Thus, despite the claims of many geologists and evolutionary biologists, the assertion that the earth is millions of years old and that “goo to you” evolution has actually occurred, is based on philosophical assumption and dogma, not on objective scientific knowledge. Whilst Christians who take the history of the Genesis narrative seriously readily acknowledge that their investigation of origins are shaped by their belief in a historical, 6 x 24 hour day creation, many old-earth and evolutionary scientists don’t even realise they have presuppositions in the first place.

This does not mean, however, that the study of origins is impossible or that observational science has nothing to say about origins. It can be used to assess whether the historical inferences made by creationists and evolutionists are tenable. When this is done creation is seen to be a much more reliable explanation of origins whilst evolutionary Biology and old-earth Geology are seen to be merely pseudoscience or science fiction.

Evolution is pseudoscience

Many biologists assert that all living organisms alive today have evolved from more primitive organisms, and that somehow, billions of years ago, life arose spontaneously of its own self in a ‘primordial soup’. The facts, however, do not support such an idea, but rather point to God’s creative actions. That evolution is mere pseudoscience can be shown from a few strands of evidence.

Evidence from Fossils

Despite the exaggerations of evolutionists and the media, there are too many gaps in the fossil record to back up evolution. Under the old-earth timescale, the major animal groups all appear suddenly in the fossil record without any intermediate forms. Over the years, various types of fish have been suggested as evolutionary intermediaries between fish and the first tetrapods, the four-footed land animals.

Coelacanth, Tiktaalik and Panderrichthys, all allegedly dated around 380 million years old, have been suggested as intermediaries because, it was suggested, the multiple digits at the end of the bony part of their pectoral fin was thought to be similar to digits on tetrapod limbs. However, even allowing for a similarity, it is a long way from a few digits on the end of a fin to the sort of limb required for walking.

Moreover, when a live Coelacanth was caught off Madagascar in 1938, it was observed that its so called limbs were actually used for the deft manoeuvring of its fins. The digits had nothing to do with walking. Only wishful thinking could turn it into the missing link between fish and tetrapods. Interestingly, there are many examples of the discovery of living fossils like the Coelacanth – live animals once presumed extinct which have shown no evolutionary development over what is allegedly hundreds of millions of years. This suggests that evolution does not actually happen.

Whether it be tetrapod, horse or human evolution, the fact that fossils can be lined up which look similar to provide a hoped for line of descent proves nothing. There are no missing links, just finished products re-arranged to produce the appearance of lineage and descent. Just because apes have some features similar to humans is no proof of evolution from an ape like ancestor. The changes required are vast. The human knee joint is a masterful piece of engineering enabling the femur and fibula/tibia to lock into place in an upright position. An ape cannot walk upright because it has no such knee joint and is not designed to do so!

Evidence from DNA

When it comes to DNA, the amazingly sophisticated genetic code and information at the heart of life, the laws of physics, chemistry and information theory are against its formation without a Creator. Evolutionists are at a loss to even begin to come up with a credible explanation for its origin. They are not being objective scientists when they demand that we accept that DNA arose by chance.

Evidence from Mutations

Genetic mutations together with natural selection are allegedly the driving force behind evolution. However, recent research has discovered that such is the nature and frequency of genetic mutations that within a relatively short space of time (100,000 years maximum), the decay and degeneration of our genetic code would lead to the extinction of the human race. In other words, there is no time for evolution to occur. All mutations are essentially damaging, even although they may occasionally provide beneficial side effects. They cause, amongst other things, cancer and ageing. “All multicellular life on earth is undergoing inexorable genome decay because the deleterious mutation rates are so high, the effects of the individual mutations so small, there are no compensatory beneficial mutations and natural selection is ineffective in removing the damage.” Thus “evolutions’s engine, when properly understood, becomes, evolution’s end.”

A recent study in The Open Evolution Journal observed that like computer programs, living organisms have built-in error detection and error correction systems for the copying and transmission of their DNA. These systems are required to maintain the information’s integrity, which would otherwise be eroded by constantly accumulating random mutations. Evolution, however, requires various genetic alterations which the mutation repair mechanisms guard against. Thus for evolution to proceed, mutation protection would have to be switched off, yet if this occurs, errors quickly build up and wreck the system. This “mutation protection paradox” exposes the unjustified pseudoscientific claims of evolutionists, but is no paradox to those who believe in creation.

Much historical Geology is pseudoscience

Most geologists claim the earth is 4.6 billion years old and adhere to uniformitarianism, the principle that the observation of present geological processes provides the key to past earth history. However, many of their pseudoscientific theories and explanations are actually contradicted by field observations and laboratory experiments. Three brief examples will show this.

Granite Formation

Traditionally it has been assumed that granite melts slowly and then rises through the earth’s crust as a diaper or molten balloon-shaped mass of magma until after a long time it eventually solidifies. Yet writing in 2005 in The Proceedings of the Geologist’s Association Vol.116, old-earth geologist Prof. John Clemens, has shown that magma production, transportation and solidification occurs very quickly, almost instantaneously. He claimed that the idea that the earth is 4.6 billion years old had “a psychological effect of tempting one to consider geological processes as slow and continuous. After all, there is all that time to fill” and concluded that granite production belongs with an increasing number of geological processes that were “catastrophic in their suddenness”. This accords with what young-earth creationists have been saying for years.

Mud Deposition

For many years geologists have thought that extremely fine clay particles suspended in water are so light, that even if some were to flocculate (clump together), any turbulence in the water would keep them in suspension, preventing their deposition. Thus they assumed very long periods of tranquil water were required for the deposition of mud and shale. However a recent study published in the journal Science Vol.318, 2007 has indicated that mud can actually be deposited from rapidly flowing waters. The lead researcher stated “All you have to do is look around. After the creek on our university’s campus floods, you can see ripples on the sidewalks once the waters have subsided. Closely examined, these ripples consist of mud.” After conducting experiments in a flume tank to simulate natural conditions, they concluded that mud was settling and moving along the bottom of the flume (producing ripples) “at flow velocities that are much higher than anyone thought would have been expected.” Flow rates sufficient to move much larger sand grains still allowed for the deposition of mud layers. It now appears that conventional geologists may have to reappraise their thinking on how many sedimentary rock types are formed. Flood geologists have long challenging the flawed, pseudoscientific interpretations of geologists. Once more the observed evidence favours the geological paradigm of a Noachic flood.

Flat Gaps in Sedimentary Rock Layers

Throughout the world there are places, such as the Grand Canyon, where successive layers of sedimentary rock have been laid one on top of another. Often these flat rock bands can be traced over vast areas. According to uniformitarian geologists, these rocks were laid down successively over hundreds of millions of years. One problem, however, is the presence of flat gaps, called paraconformities, in the rock record where sediment representing millions of years is said to be  missing. If sediment was not being deposited, then erosion would be expected to have take place. In some areas, there are clear erosional surfaces and contact between one rock group and another. One example is the Torridonian Sandstone of Northwest Scotland which overlies Lewisian Gneiss. However, in the Grand Canyon there are assumed flat gaps allegedly representing from 10 million to 100 million years, where there is no obvious erosional contact and geologists often have difficulty identifying the boundary between strata which are allegedly of vastly different ages. Despite the fact that there is no evidence of any gap, other than on the basis of uniformitarian assumptions, it does not appear to the geologists that the proposed millions of years never occurred. Many of the flat gaps are not localised but extend over vast areas. The uniformitarian explanation does not work. The evidence, if reinterpreted in terms of a Noachic flood model, fits much better.

Much which passes for historical Science is dangerous pseudoscience

A danger to Science

If evolutionary biology and much historical geology are mere pseudoscience, then it follows that they are dangerous. This danger is not only to spiritual things which they contradict, but to science itself.

Firstly, it undermines the rational basis of science. It is not rational to demand that science must conform to unprovable presuppositions. In no other field would this be allowed, yet scientific materialism holds sway under the guise of being scientific. There is tendency to define science as “a process of seeking natural explanations for natural phenomena.” This excludes the possibility of Intelligent Design or a Creator because of its presuppositions. As Dr Scott Todd put it “Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such an hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.” Nature, 30/9/1999. This is madness. No wonder G.K Chesterton could say that Darwinism is “an attack upon thought itself.”

Secondly, it leads to the arrogant rejection of any scientific endeavour which refuses to accept the presuppositions of scientific materialism. This was admirably revealed in the documentary film Exposed, which revealed the prejudice and at times, persecution meted out to those who reject the prevailing view in favour of Intelligent Design or Creationism. That this should occur to researchers in historical science is not unsurprising, but often those castigated and attacked are involved in fields of observational science far removed from historical science. Those who do this in defence of pseudoscience never consider that it may be their critics’ scientific training that has made them aware of how unscientific historical science is.

Thirdly, it leads to the squandering of precious research resources. If the opening premise of an argument is flawed, truth will never be discovered. For 200 years uniformitarianism has held sway amongst geologists. Over the last fifty years, the creationist movement has exposed much of their reasoning as flawed, pointing out that most of the sedimentary rocks seen today can better be explained in terms of catastrophe, the Genesis Flood. Only recently have unbelieving geologists begun to recognise that some geological features, such as the English Channel, have been formed due to catastrophic flooding. There are many other examples. However, of more concern is the effect of evolutionism. Much biological, medical and even psychological research is conducted on the premise that evolution has occurred. The results will be flawed because the starting point is wrong. For example, the usefulness of the human appendix was ignored for years because it was presumed to be a vestigial organ.

A danger to the Church

Were the errors of historical scientists limited to scientific research, the discussion could be left to the scientific community. However, their claims directly challenge theology and therefore the Church. Scripture unequivocally indicates that “It pleased God … for the manifestation of the glory of his eternal power, wisdom, and goodness, in the beginning, to create, or make of nothing, the world, and all things therein whether visible or invisible, in the space of six days; and all very good.” CoF IV.ss1. However, on the basis of a pseudoscience riddled with presuppositions, Christians have been challenged to reject the plain teaching of Scripture in order to accommodate the so called teachings of science. “The Bible is not”, so we are told, “a scientific manual. It only spoke to men in their own times using concepts familiar to them.” Granted this is generally true, the statements are irrelevant. Scripture is the Creator’s revelation to man who knows about creation, not through his own concepts and thinking, but because God has made him to know he is a creature and has explained something of his work in his Word. Many, however, have allowed their view of the authority of Scripture to be subtly undermined in the face of a godless pseudoscience. For them, rather than allowing Scripture to speak for itself, it must be twisted to fit the latest views of science – which themselves are open to change.

This undermining of the authority of Scripture affects more than the opening chapters of Genesis. Throughout Scripture, a literal six-day creation, with a literal Adam and Eve, in a literal paradise is assumed. As R.L. Dabney stated in 1851, “The position to which they consign God’s word is that of a handmaid, dependent for the validity of the construction to be put upon its words, on their (the scientists’) permission. Now this we boldly assert, is intrinsic rationalism…..exalting the conclusions of the human understanding over the sure word of prophecy.” It is little wonder that during the 19th century, the Scottish Church largely capitulated to rationalism and liberalism, when even its great leaders often failed to see this. We are reaping the bitter harvest of their failure. The lesson of that failure is that the Church needs to assert the full authority of Scripture in all that it teaches and asserts, however unpopular this may prove. Whether it be in lifestyle, origins, the place of women in Church and society or how the Church worships, loyalty and love to Christ our Prophet demands complete submission to the authority of his infallible and inerrant Word. Indeed the Church’s welfare demands it; not to maintain its authority will lead to the grieving of the Holy Spirit and the withdrawal of his influence in the Church. Without him, individual Congregations and Denominations will soon cease to exist as true Churches of Christ.

It is also a fact that today in Britain militant atheism is attacking the Church, especially in the area of origins. Only a robust defence of the Scripture doctrine of creation and with it the exposure of historical pseudoscience, will meet the enemy and repel him. All other compromise positions on origins are unsatisfactory, weak and undermine the foundational truths of Scripture.

A danger to individuals

If historical pseudoscience is a danger to the Church it follows that it is also a danger to individuals. Those outside the Church are vulnerable to being taken in by pseudoscience and thus failing to see their own danger as sinful creatures accountable to their Maker, Sustainer, Lawgiver and Judge. In evangelism we must be able to give a robust reason for the hope that is within us, showing people where they have come from and where they are heading unless they repent. Paul’s method at Athens must be ours. We must make known the God who is unknown to the present generation and call them to repentance.

Those brought up within the Church are also in danger unless they come to Christ. In the nurturing of our covenant children both everyone involved needs to ensure the Church’s youth are enabled to resist dangerous pseudoscience and the anti-Christian world-view associated with it. For too long our own Church failed. In recent years things have changed, but are equipping our youth as they should be? For how long will parents tolerate handing over their precious children to be taught in a godless secularized education committed to pseudoscience? The sooner the Church and individuals embrace the concept of a thoroughly Christian education, the stronger the Church will become.

A danger to society

The pseudoscience that endangers individuals, also endangers society, for no man is an island. .  Evolutionist Daniel Dennett likened Darwin’s evolutionary idea to a “universal acid: it eats through just about every traditional concept, and leaves in its wake a revolutionized world-view, with most of the old land-marks still recognizable, but transformed in fundamental ways.”  This, it would appear, includes any ethical and moral system it encounters, for behaviour and morality must be read in the light of darwinian evolution.  Such transformed  morality, is, as can be shown, not a real (or objective) morality at all.  Indeed, evolutionism tends to the abandonment of any search for morality and meaning in life, something many evolutionary advocates desire.

There is also a tendency to use it to explain human behaviour and justify immorality (even rape). However, as Phillip Skell noted in The Scientist (29.08.05), “Darwinian explanations for such things are often too supple: Natural selection makes humans self-centred and aggressive—except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed—except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behaviour, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery.”

It is beyond doubt that the Eugenics movement which sprang up in the late 19th Century gained an influence it did not deserve through the respectability and authority of science and its promotion by a small cabal of committed darwinists. This gave rise in the 20th Century to the racism and anti-Semitism of the Nazi era. Although the view “that black people were closer in evolutionary scale to apes than white people is seen by scientists as ghastly mistake” its traces remain today. Nobel Laureate James Watson was quoted in The Times in October 2007 as saying “[I am] inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa [because] all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours—whereas all the testing says not really.” This was explained in evolutionary terms. Indeed he spoke of the reasonableness of abortion being used to enable mothers to chose various characteristics of their children, including sexual orientation. This is already happening in children with potentially minor birth defects. The same thinking has apparently motivated some mass killers, including those involved in Columbine High School Massacre in 1999.

G.K. Chesterton said “Darwinism can be used to back up two mad moralities, but it cannot be used to back up a single sane one. The kinship and competition of all living creatures can be used as a reason for being insanely cruel or insanely sentimental; but not for a healthy love of animals … That you and a tiger are one may be a reason for being tender to a tiger. Or it may be a reason for being cruel as the tiger. It is one way to train the tiger to imitate you, it is a shorter way to imitate the tiger. But in neither case does evolution tell you how to treat a tiger reasonably, that is, to admire his stripes while avoiding his claws.”

It is therefore little surprise to note that one author has written of the “the historical fact that Darwinism has been the most significant contributing cause in the de-christianisation of the west.” This is not to deny the natural depravity of man’s heart. However, it must be recognised that the Devil uses various strategies to blind the hearts of men to the truth, and major success in the west has been achieved through the pseudoscience of evolutionism and historical geology.

Conclusion

Given such an attack on reason and the Church, individuals and society, there is a need for Christians today to stand against the virulent attacks of dangerous pseudoscience. The Scripture of truth is being attacked vigorously by those who foolishly adhere to historical pseudoscience. The Church herself, has for too long tried to compromise and has allowed the authority of scripture to be undermined in the face of what was perceived to be truth, but is in reality, unprovable assumptions. What is required is not an accommodation of Scripture to the latest fads and assertions of unbelieving pseudoscience, but adherence to the truth and the bringing of every thought into submission to Christ. For the good of perishing sinners, for the good of the Church and for the good of society, we must hold fast the plain teaching of Scripture and reject the oppositions of science falsely so called.

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Moderator: the Rev. Graeme Craig

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Graeme Craig was born in Paisley in 1964 and was educated at Dundee University and the Free Church College, Edinburgh. Prior to being called in 2009 to the key congregation of Stornoway he was minister on the Ardnamurchan peninsula and later in Lochalsh & Glenshiel where he also took responsibility for Genelg and Arnisdale.

In the struggles which engulfed the Free Church in the years prior to 2000 Mr. Craig, although at that time a relatively junior minister, played a pivotal support rôle for those loyal to the constitutional position of the historic Free Church of Scotland, ensuring that those of them who were members of Assembly had ready access to accurate and relevant information. In recognition of the abilities shown during that critical period, when the Free Church divided in January 2000 Mr. Craig was appointed Assistant Clerk of the General Assembly of the Free Church (Continuing).

He is married (1989) to Roberta, a languages graduate from Rathfriland, Co. Down, Northern Ireland, and they have eight children aged from four to twenty.

Perhaps unusually for a minister, Mr. Craig has an honours degree in Geology and, contrary to some public perceptions of geologists, has a special interest in “young earth creationism” and the creation-evolution debate. Very much opposed to the secular, scientific materialism agenda being promoted through the education system and the media, he occasionally writes exposing the folly of such things. He sees many of society’s problems due to the rejection of biblical truth and the acceptance of pseudo-science, pseudopsychology and false relativistic morality. He believes that the Church needs to recover confidence and point this out in world.

In his youth a keen badminton player, he now has little opportunity for it in his busy life. He continues, however to pursue his longstanding interest in singing. With a wry sense of humour he admits to enjoying arguing and being pedantic, characteristics allegedly common among Assembly Clerks.

Mr. Craig comes to the Moderatorial Chair much younger than most, but with a vast range of experience and very wide respect.

Rev. John MacLeod, Senior Press Officer and Principal Clerk of Assembly

To the Editor:

Thank you for an excellent, thoroughly researched article “Unfinished Business For the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) published on 15 March 2011. My family has been intimately involved in the Cornerstone Ministries Investments (CMI) debacle, at many levels, and I would like to share some of the details with you.

A third generation Presbyterian, my young family arrived in Miami in 1972 from Trinidad when I accepted a position of Assistant Professor at the opening of a new state university, Florida International, a mile away from Trinity PCA [Lakeland, Florida]. My family made Trinity our new church home. The Rev. Cecil Brooks arrived at Trinity in 1976 at which time I was a deacon and church treasurer. The Ottingers were hired two years later and we got know them very well. I later served as a ruling elder with Pastor Brooks.

My family knew the Brookses intimately. Trinity was our family and Cecil was our leader. One of the many things we did together was establish a ministry in Haiti. When Mr. Brooks resigned in 1981, he passed on the Haiti ministry to me. This 501(c)(3) ministry continues today, but has lost about $4,000 in investments made with CMI.

When Brooks began the Presbyterian Investors Fund (PIF), we gladly participated. By this time, other Trinity folks were absorbed into the PIF, including Jack Ottinger, Shirley and Robert Covington, and later, one of my former fellow elders, John Underwood. This only served to enhance our trust in the ministry of PIF. After all, these were our friends, or so we thought!

We were involved in the PIF and its succeeding organizations throughout the life of these bodies. We always believed that our purchase of bonds was within a non-profit, with the funds employed to build churches and life-care facilities. We had no idea, and were not informed, that a long list of for-profit corporations were eventually established and that  the Brookses and Ottingers made millions of dollars from through dubious double-dealing activities later carefully detailed in the bankruptcy Examiner’s Report.

For years, we received glowing reports from Brooks about the Fund’s success assisting with the building of churches. We had no access to information that we now understand the PCA administration had since about 1990, and which they apparently sat upon. When Ottinger informed us around the beginning of 2008 about issues at CMI, he put a very positive spin on it, assuring all that the funds were secure and that reorganization would take care of everything. Instead, my family has apparently lost thousands of dollars and my grandson has lost his college account.

I have been a member of the PCA  since its inception. I have served as an elder, active and inactive since 1981. I am horrified to learn that for-profit corporations were established, sharing the same address, and in some cases the same officers with that of the PCA.  I sincerely hope that the PCA authorities make a meaningful effort to confront  the challenges that this issue has indirectly raised for the denomination.

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Ken Boodhoo, PhD

Emeritus Professor

Florida International University

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