Political Correctness with a Side of Ambiguity

San Jose has some great, little restaurants. My job doesn’t usually take me too far from home, so my eating out regime typically consists of the No. 9 lunch special at El Rodeo or two chicken enchiladas at Bajio. There are the occasional mission trips to Romania with Dave Gall. Everyone there seems to know that when Dave’s in town, it’s time to serve up some sarmale—which is a fancy name for cabbage wrapped meat pods. In additon, we typically get served a challenging dose of the traditional Romanian staple marmaliga, an all too generous bowl of boiled corn meal. But here in the multicultural hot bead of techno geeks and sunshine, there is a real commitment to freshness and taste.

The main reason I’ve traveled two thousand miles west, however, is to represent ZPC at our denomination’s biannual national conference known as General Assembly, or GA (acronyms are big around here). The food is simply a bonus. It has also come to provide a metric. A single skewer of grilled ahi tuna on a bed of spinach leaves (an outstanding value for under $9) not only looked and tasted good, but it was good for me. I was hoping for similar outcomes from Saturday evening’s election for the Moderator of General Assembly.

There were four candidates running for the office—a job that empowers the individual to facilitate the agenda of GA for the coming week and to represent the denomination for the coming two years. The early book narrowed the election down to two individuals, Bruce Reyes-Chow and Bill Teng. The election process allowed the candidates to speak for five minutes to the gathered assembly. The place was packed. Bruce, a 39-year-old pastor of a 150 member, emergent church in San Francisco, represents a left of center theological position. Bill is 50-plus, evangelical, and a positive, calming presence. I was pulling for Bill, whom I first met in April when I joined a covenant group in which he participates.

Bruce had the freshest approach. He openly addressed the “elephant” in the room. Without couching his words, he talked about the issues that have divided our denomination. I appreciated the honesty. He went on, however, to declare his position to be in favor of all people having access to ordination, including practicing homosexuals. Bill, on the other hand, served up the healthiest understandings. He spoke of the importance of keeping Jesus at the center of everything and focusing on mission and evangelism.

Bruce won the night—by a significant margin. I’m not sure if his victory was due to his relative youth, his ideas, his charisma, the fact that he’s from San Francisco and had a sizable and vocal group of supporters, or his let’s-not-mince-words approach. Bruce seems like a nice guy, but his theology is troubling.

The same troubling theology showed up in the worship service the next morning. We were served a mixed salad of good-for-you principles and non biblical affirmations. The style was much more liturgical than what we experience at ZPC (that’s a fancy way of saying that there was a lot more standing up and sitting down and speaking in religious jargon). The Moderator from the last GA, Joan Gray, gave a wonderful sermon that called all of us to love one another. The various readings, prayers, and hymns also emphasized loving one another and others outside the church. The problem wasn’t that we were speaking about love. It’s that we weren’t speaking about purity.

Our denomination has been using a three word mantra: Peace, Unity, and Purity. The service on Sunday highlighted the first “P” and the “U,” but ignored purity. There were calls for social justice and declarations of our commonalities. We sang a hymn called O For a World, sung to the tune of O For a Thousand Tongues. It began, “O for a world where everyone respects each others ways.” It left me asking, “How about a world where everyone respects the ways of Christ?”

Peace and unity are wonderful goals. I’m grateful that we share these goals in common with the rest of our denomination. When ZPC made the commitment last year to stay and make a difference, we demonstrated a desire to work for denominational peace and unity. The difference I believe we can make, however, is to help our denomination understand and embrace the purity to which God calls us—the total alignment of our lives to the ways of Christ. ZPC’s commitment to Christ and to discipleship is the value meal our denomination needs.

I’m not sure what I’ll be served at the two meals I’m attending today, just as I’m not sure what decisions and positions this assembly will adopt by week’s end. I do know, however, that Christ will win the day, and Christ will be victorious. He is the freshest and the healthiest. O for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer’s praise! Sing praise to Christ today. It’s by far the best thing on the menu.