Did the PCA make a “Great Omission?”

The Presbyterian Church in America's annual national meeting included detailed deliberations over Rules of Operations, who may distribute elements of the Lord’s Supper, who may serve on church committees, and procedures for discipline. While attending to these details, a weightier matter was shelved. Do we recall Jesus’ words about straining gnats but swallowing camels, or tithing our spices but ignoring more consequential matters of justice and mercy and faithfulness? (Matthew 23:23-24).

The 52nd PCA General Assembly voted to indefinitely postpone Overture #50 from Chesapeake Presbytery: Encouragement to Discernment and Compassion regarding Immigrants — click to read. The majority vote was 706 for - 476 against.

I have taught and preached Biblical hospitality for decades. I was called to develop and lead the PCA's hospitality-based ministry for international students, one of only two denominational ISM's (international student ministries). So I am compelled to offer a gentle, respectful, but firm and insistent reminder to PCA Elders.

Local churches can only indefinitely postpone the practice of Biblical hospitality (filoxenia: redemptive, family love for strangers and foreigners) until that Great Day when all opportunities to welcome and receive the Lord Jesus will have passed … forever.

Lord, when did we see you? (Matthew 25:35)

We are commanded to both practice hospitality (Romans 12:13) and honor the emperor (1 Peter 2:17). We can support immigration reforms without being callous to asylum seekers, refugees, or legal immigrants. We can care for our legal guests, like international students and scholars (well screened, granted legal F- and J- visas).

Our politics (whether left, right, or center) must never control or corrupt our fidelity to God’s Word (Hebrews 13:2, Genesis 18:1-15). We were all once foreigners, but we are now, by God's grace, citizens of God’s Kingdom (Philippians 3:20-21).

The postponed Overture #50 seeks to encourage Gospel obedience: “Be it further resolved, that the PCA encourages its churches to speak and act toward the sojourner in ways shaped not by political rhetoric but by the gospel, remembering our own identity as once-strangers, now brought near by grace.” (Ephesians 2:13)

Jesus stands at the door as God’s ultimate resident-foreigner, knocking on our church doors. (Revelation 3:20). We must not close our ears to the voice of Jesus because we are too busy listening to worldly media or political ideology. We must not harden our hearts to the gospel.

Jesus came as our Kinsman-Redeemer. (John 1:11-12) PCA churches cannot claim to be obedient to Jesus’ "Great Commission" if Christian hospitality has become our "Great Omission," to be indefinitely postponed until Jesus Christ returns in glory.