The only things that don’t change in life are dead.[1] I remember hearing that during a weekend retreat a few years back. I appreciated the perspective. So often we look at change as threatening and undesirable, and my personality gives those feelings a hearty, “amen”! So it was good to be reminded that change in life is inevitable and the point isn’t to avoid change but to change in the right way, to grow more and more in the knowledge and understanding of our God and into the likeness of Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit.
In a previous article, I discussed the idea of having a homosexual “identity”.[2] I offered an (admittedly minimalistic) definition and noted our general unity as a denomination of warning against “identifying with” our sins. We may have differences of opinion on exactly what that means in some practical situations (what is the dividing line between admitting sin and identifying with sin?), but it seems we are generally together on this issue today.
The fight to achieve that unity is both perplexing and frustrating to me in some ways because of the changes that have happened in the past two years to get here. As we seek to rightly understand God’s word on this issue, it seems that some have sought to find common ground, while others have pulled further away on this particular question. I want to talk about the journey we’ve taken in the past two years over the idea of “identifying” as homosexual.
What Was the Debate?
In the fall of 2023 many around the EPC began to hear news that Memorial Presbyterian in St. Louis, and her senior pastor Greg Johnson, were seeking to join the EPC after officially disaffiliating with the PCA. Pastor Johnson admits to a continuing struggle with same-sex attraction, while clinging to an orthodox position on the nature of marriage and the sinfulness of homosexual lust and sex.
This raised hackles and set off alarm bells for many across the denomination. Many of us have long and traumatic histories with homosexuality and the Presbyterian church, and we don’t want to go back. Personally, I trusted Mid-America Presbytery to make a careful study, to look long and hard at both Johnson and Memorial as a whole, and then to make a biblically informed decision.
But for many, that trust wasn’t an option. Whether it be explicit changes to the book of order, or a study committee to suggest such changes, both there and in our paper and letters, direct action was needed. Many presbyteries sought a study committee and one presbytery (New River) asked for an explicit change to the book of order. The final wording of their overture’s proposed revision of the book of government, seen below, proposed to add this paragraph to BoG 9-3 on ordination…
“Men and women who identify as homosexual, even those who identify as homosexual and claim to practice celibacy in that self-identification, are disqualified from holding office in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.”
I remember the atmosphere of General Assembly that summer. There was significant tension. High profile figures were pushing for specific outcomes and there was a real “powder keg” effect. It felt like we might have an explosive floor fight coming. At the 11th hour, members of the leadership teams for both the New River and Mid-America presbyteries agreed to commend to the GA a study committee as well as a statement urging churches and presbyteries to not take action on issues bordering upon the topic until that study committee completed their work. New River’s stated clerk called the compromise “an answer to prayer” on the platform of the Assembly. There was a real sense of accomplishment among many to whom I spoke. A sense that we had stared outright conflict in the face and avoided it. Not by refusing to deal with it, but by trusting each other to wait until the AIC (Ad Interim Committee) could get us better definitions and a starting place for conversation this coming summer.
In the years since, a narrative has emerged[3] that advocates of the NRP (New River Presbytery) were cheated out of their chance to advocate for the overture and have the debate. It seems from conversations I have had that some of those advocates were certain that it would pass. How they reached that conclusion, when none of the votes leading up to that point seemed to go their way and the standing committee of ~80 members recommended the compromise overture with only 2 “no” votes, is beyond me. But the narrative has become that the “red line” is the natural descendant of the NRP overture of 2024.
How Do the AIC Recommendations Align With the NRP Overture?
There are two huge problems with this narrative. The AIC recommendations align with the explicit wording of the NRP overture, and the advocates of the “red line” overture have not taken seriously the position expressed in the original NRP overture over these past couple of years.
The NRP overture sought to forbid ordination for any candidates who, “identify as homosexual.” Part of the issue with the NRP overture brought up at the time was that it never defined “identify”. Does that mean calling myself a “gay christian”? Confessing to having sinned in a homosexual way in the past? Confessing to ongoing homosexual temptations? Identifying with the LGBTQ alphabet soup agenda? Being in a Christian, one-man one-woman marriage but experiencing continuing same sex attraction? I don’t know for sure. I’m sure the authors had a clear picture in their mind, but I didn’t and I know many others felt the same way.
So, the AIC report has taken more time and proposed much deeper edits to our book of government, pastoral letter, and position paper on the topic. Have they countermanded this suggestion of the NRP overture? Determined that identifying as a gay Christian is fine and dandy? Suggested affirming homosexual “orientation” as a category? Not in the least! If anything, I think the AIC landed FAR closer to the NRP overture than I personally had ever guessed that they would.
The AIC recommendation for the book of government, while more precise than the original NRP overture, also denies the legitimacy of “identifying” as a gay Christian. It says, “Whether single or married, officers must conform to the biblical requirement of chastity and sexual purity (see WLC Q&A 138-139) in their descriptions of themselves, their convictions, character, and conduct.”[4] [Emphasis mine] This statement clearly fulfills the request of the original NRP overture.
The edits to the pastoral letter do not weaken this statement. Where before, our strongest statement on the issue essentially reduced it to a “live and let live” semantic difference, the letter now reads, “in our culture, the term “gay” is normally understood as affirming or engaging in homosexual practice. Although the term “gay” may refer to more than sexual activities and attractions to persons of the same sex, it does not communicate less than that. It is sinful to intentionally approve of sin and missionally foolish to invite that misunderstanding. Our identity is in Christ as his new creation, and we should not inadvertently communicate to the world that Jesus approves of sin. It is inappropriate to use terminology, including “gay Christian”, that welcomes confusion from the church and world.”
If you had told me when this process began two years ago, that this language would be in the AIC’s recommendation, I would’ve assumed the NRP advocates would be overjoyed. The AIC report (with, in my opinion, better and more careful language) validated the position that identifying as homosexual or as a “gay Christian” is not a viable action for someone who would be considered for ordination.
And yet, here we are. With “red line” advocates denouncing the legitimacy of the AIC recommendations and swearing that they will lead us into a liberal hellscape. What has happened?
How the “Red Line” Position Changed
I have friends who are part of the “red line” advocacy group. Men that I know and respect and love. So, when this was all bubbling in 2024, I made calls. I think I was seen as a “gettable” vote. I am a chosen child of the EPC. I’ve been EPC since college, went to a Reformed, conservative undergrad and a Reformed, conservative seminary. I studied under and went to a church pastored by leaders in the “red line” group (those supporting the NRP overture at the time).
In those conversations, it was “identity, identity, identity.” I heard repeatedly about the dangers of “identifying” with our sins. I didn’t fully disagree, but I also had reservations about the squishiness of the NRP language (not defining identity) and about the potential 9th commandment violation of speaking of brothers and sisters who “claim” to be celibate, doubting their word without cause.
But over the next year, identity language faded away and different terminology became the driver. I suddenly heard nothing about the dangers of “identifying” as homosexual. I would guess that this was at least in part because the early indications out of the AIC were that the NRP overture was likely to be smoothed out, but not rejected. That its antipathy toward “identifying” as homosexual would in fact be echoed in the AIC report.
Instead, I started hearing about attraction and unnatural desire. I started hearing about homosexuality, the super sin. Somehow so much worse than other sins that even temptation toward it, no matter how little, was disqualifying from ordained ministry. The truly troubling thing, in my view, was when I watched “red line” advocates moving from saying “identifying as homosexual is bad because our identity is in Christ, not our temptations!”[5] To actively calling other Christians “homosexuals” because of a struggle with same-sex attraction, whether they rejected that temptation or not. I watched an argument changing before my eyes. “Red line” advocates went from saying someone identifying as homosexual because of temptation was disqualifying, to identifying other Christians with their sinful desires and not their identity in Christ by calling them “homosexuals.”
Only things that are dead don’t change, I understand that. But this particular change left me feeling hollowed out. In part, because I had changed too.
My Change
When this issue came up, I was strongly opposed to the NRP overture. Some of my reasons for that remain the same today. I think the “claims to be celibate” line was probably a violation of WLC 144-145 on the 9th commandment (assuming the best of others). I think they needed to better define “identify” in their language. I think targeting one sin (homosexuality) instead of a category of sin (sexual sin) or sin in general was an unnecessary mistake.
But another of my reasons at the time was that I simply didn’t see that this was an “always and forever” issue. There were Christians in the 1960s who called themselves gay Christians and that didn’t carry the underlying messaging that it does today. I suppose I still see that to some degree. But I’ve also come to think that, I don’t live in the 1960s. And saying, “I’m a gay christian” today broadcasts to the vast majority of Americans that you have decided that your sexual desires trump God’s word.
I changed. I like the AIC language much, much more than I did the NRP overture language. But I’ve come to the point where I don’t mind having guidance at the denominational level that “identifying” with sinful desires is wrong. I think with better language, many of the folks who started exactly where I did have also come around to being willing to broach that particular topic.
And so I end up finding myself where I thought the NRP advocates were two years ago. And I look around and they’re all gone. The people I was moving toward have moved away from me. Identifying as “homosexual” apparently isn’t that dangerous anymore since they can call Christians “homosexual” to describe their pattern of temptation and identify them as someone unworthy of ordination. The position of two years ago has been abandoned and I find myself here trying to make peace with an empty room.
Implications
When I was coming into the EPC in the late 2000s, I got involved in the PCUSA controversy. Not directly, my church was already in the dismissal process when I was hired. But I was a cheerleader. I was a billboard for the joys of the EPC. And one thing I heard repeatedly from other EPC pastors, and which I repeated myself, was the general sentiment that, “homosexuality isn’t a super sin, we don’t hate or look down on people who suffer from and struggle with same-sex attraction, but it IS a sin, and we can’t lie about that, we have to be faithful to the plain reading of scripture.”
I still feel that way. But the amount of change I’ve seen in the position of “red line” advocates in the past couple years makes me wonder if they believed it, or if it was only the right thing to say to make the break with the PCUSA as painless as possible. I took a class on “homosexuality and the church” with an RTS professor who is now a leading “red line” advocate. I took the class because I was and am concerned about the ways so much of the church folded to cultural pressure. Calling evil what is good and good what is evil.
I went back through my notes today. At one point we were told, “Calling them same-sex strugglers rather than homosexuals is a practical step to communicating a belief that homosexual activity is a lifestyle and sin behavior rather than an identity or orientation.” And yet now many in the “red line” group refer to those “same sex strugglers” as “homosexuals”. We talked repeatedly about how the greek word for homosexuality is an action verb, men having sex with men, showing that homosexuality is a choice not a biological orientation. That it was about your actions, not your attractions. We were supposed to say that to non-Christian “gays” we were ministering with to help them see hope. Was that true, or was it convenient?
I think it was true. To the Plumbline/”red line” aligned folks out there, I’d urge you to see, I’m still here, where you told me you were just a couple years ago. Where you taught me to be in my conservative, reformed seminary. I’m where you started, but it doesn’t seem like you’re here anymore. And it makes me wonder whether you were here because of conviction, or because of convenience? It makes me feel like this is a “if you give a mouse a cookie” situation, and that even if I were to move closer to you now, I don’t know if you’d still be there down the line anyway.
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Slightly differently stated by Louise Erdrich here – https://www.azquotes.com/quote/420709 ↑
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https://entishtheology.org/2026/05/11/what-are-we-talking-about/ ↑
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Heavily pushed by the Plumbline. ↑
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All AIC Recommendations can be found here — https://epconnect.org/adinterimonssa/ ↑
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I agree. ↑