All Articles For Case, Eugene

The Rev. E.C. Case is a teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). He is pastor of two PCA congregations in Mississippi. Memories of twenty years ago were evoked for many as approximately 150 people, most of them members of the Presbyterian Church in America, assembled at the Ebenezer Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, NC on March 23, for what was billed as “Concerned Presbyterian Day.” Dr. Morton H. Smith, Dean of the Faculty at the Greenville (SC) Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and former Stated Clerk of the PCA General Assembly, made direct reference to this twenty-year connection...

Prof. H.C. Hoeksema 4975 Ivanrest Ave. S.W. Grandville, Mich. 49418 Dear Prof. Hoeksema: In my recent article concerning the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, I made certain critical remarks about the moderator of the Assembly, Dr. G. Aiken Taylor, which remarks I feel were out of place. I am speaking specifically of my comments on the way in which Dr. Taylor conducted himself as moderator. I should point out that what I wrote was based on personal feeling. It should be obvious that there is some problem in establishing an objective basis on which to judge arrogance....

The Fifth General Assembly of the Presbyterian J Church in America, meeting in the auditorium of the First Baptist (that’s right folks, Baptist) Church of Smyrna, Georgia, was called to order by retiring moderator William A. McIlwaine on the evening of September 12, 1977. The Baptist facility was used because there is no PCA building in the Greater Atlanta area, nor in many other areas for that matter, large enough to handle the 600 plus commissioners who would eventually come together for this meeting. 

By the time this report is printed, most of the readers will have heard something about the Second General Assembly of the National Presbyterian Church. At the very least, they will most likely know that we are no longer the NPC, but have become the Presbyterian Church in America. Therefore, the purpose of this effort will be to consider some of the decisions made by the Assembly from a point of view that is very similar to that held by most of the readers of theStandard Bearer.

In the middle of the last decade, at which time it had long since become apparent that the denominationally controlled theological seminaries of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (commonly referred to as the Southern Presbyterian Church) were irreversibly apostate, a group of conservative leaders in that denomination began to lay plans for the establishment of a seminary which would train men for the Gospel Ministry in the Biblical Faith. Those plans led to the founding of what is now known as the Reformed Theological Seminary, located in Jackson, Mississippi. 

The Memorial Auditorium in Greenville,, South Carolina, provided the setting as the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America was gaveled to order by Retiring Moderator, Judge Leon F. Hendrick, on Tuesday evening, September 14. This was the fourth meeting of the court to be held in the nearly three years’ existence of the PCA, and the first to be held some other place than in one of the denomination’s churches. There are now some 400 churches in the PCA, all of which are entitled to send at least one commissioner to General Assembly.

Those who read the report of the Second Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, published in this paper last October, will remember that the spirit of that report was very critical. At that time, there were strong doubts whether the PCA would amount to anything even remotely resembling a Reformed and Presbyterian Church. Happily, there is cause for guarded optimism in the wake of this year’s Assembly. Certainly, it is not yet time to be at ease in Zion, but the outlook is generally brighter than some of us would have dared to predict a year ago. 

By the time this report is printed in the pages of the STANDARD BEARER many of the readers will have no doubt heard something of the grand and gala assembly of the NAPaRC (North American Presbyteri an and Reformed Council) denominations which took place on the campus of Calvin College during the third week of June.