The title of the book is intended to bring attention to the fact we have lost ecclesiastical authority. 2020 was a modern watershed in that regard. As more and more truth about the pandemic comes to light, hindsight proves that our uneasy suspicions were correct. The COVID pandemic was not a viral pandemic. It was a pandemic of tyranny.

In no small part, government officials used this pandemic as an attempt to strip authority away from the church.

The lynchpin of my argument is found in thesis #15:

The civil magistrate has no lawful authority in the church to command its worship, to forbid it, to regulate it, or to redefine it. (Theses, p. 16)

The motivation for this little book is that by July 2020, not only had my confessionally-Reformed church closed its worship services—twice—but it had split the congregation into pieces and imposed a long list of new rules for worship and fellowship which were written (and dutifully enforced) by the deacons (an ordained office, we note with alarm, which has no biblical authority over the members of the congregation). It was almost comical that our leadership was urging unity in the church while they were divvying up the congregation among multiple worship services and imposing strict distancing requirements for everyone in attendance. At that time, we were literally not permitted to interact with each other on church property.

In mid-July, I left this church in frustration and started looking elsewhere—starting with a small country chapel that I knew was gathering for worship.

Now it turned out that nearly every church in the land had done many of the same things, and even worse. Some closed for the rest of the year. Some imposed contact tracing protocols and mandatory registration for worship. I began work on my Theses in the summer of 2020 because I was doubting the official (government) narrative and beginning to distrust the judgment of the church, as well.

What was my diagnosis? That

Under the pressure of the moment, even the confessionally Reformed churches—with their rich history of civil disobedience—seem[ed] to be abandoning the foundational principle of scripture as the ultimate authority. (Theses, p. 4)

Three years later, the pandemic is over and the panic has mostly dissipated. But I am hard pressed to find a pastor who’s willing to admit that his church over-reacted and brought harm on his congregation. Most of them, it seems, simply want to “move on” as if nothing happened. Nothing to see here.

It’s no surprise that the litany of abusive government officials intend to escape accountability for their destructive actions. This is what bureaucrats typically do. But we cannot give the church a free pass if we care about her future. We cannot safely assume that 2020 was a once-in-a-lifetime event that none of us will live to see a second time.

Looking back on 2020 we see that:

• the church failed in her duty to rebuke the civil magistrate for an assortment of destructive abuses;
• the church simultaneously neglected and abused the authority she has by the charter of Christ;
• the church embraced the idolatries of virtual worship and virtual communion;
• the church made a mockery of biblical interpretation by approving the abusive authority of the state;
• the church became complicit in the state’s authoritarian surveillance tactics;
• the church fragmented her congregations into an assortment of real and “virtual” subgroups;

Even the “in-person” church services were fragmented by masked and unmasked divisions gathering in different parts of the church property. This is what “unity” looks like in an age of fear.

Of course, the church persisted in “virtual” worship long after the lockdowns ended. And we simultaneously wondered why many people were not coming back. If nothing else, the vacant pews demonstrate that we did not take time to consider the negative consequences of trying to virtualize the church. This was a completely predictable outcome.

In 2020, we forgot what it means to be Reformed.

What happened to sola scriptura?

What happened to our confessional standards?

What happened to the Regulative Principle of Worship?

It seems that they were all set aside in 2020.

After visiting nearly every church in my area with a “Reformed” stamp on it—as well as several independent churches—I settled on a small PCA church that hadn’t lost its marbles during the pandemic. This looked like the right landing place until an internal uprising last year resulted in the loss of the pastor, most of the officers, and a large part of the congregation. The church is now in a very tenuous condition and I am once again looking for a new place of worship. All that to say that I share in the frustration of those who have been displaced by their churches since the pandemic and who may still be unsettled in regard of church membership. I recently coined the term “Reformed Nomads” to describe a large group of us who have been wandering since 2020.

The two articles linked at the beginning of this post come from the perspectives of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) and the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP). Meanwhile, here in the PCA, we have been preoccupied with an assortment of disciplinary and procedural concerns that started long before 2020. As we finally bring some of these matters to a satisfactory conclusion—and continue to put measures into place that will guard against the same happening again—it behooves us to now consider our actions in 2020 with the same level of concern.

What went wrong?

Our confessional standards help answer the question. The Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF) traces some broad outlines regarding the authority of church and state, and how authorities are intended to work in harmony with each other and with individual conscience. We must combine parts of several chapters in order to assemble the basic framework. The picture remains incomplete insofar as the office of deacon is not mentioned, nor is the office of the householder; the Catechisms help fill in some of these gaps, particularly the overarching principles of institutional authority which are grounded in the Fifth Commandment. Authority starts in the home and radiates outward from there. “Honor your father and mother.” The authority structure in the home provides a framework for the charitable exercise of authority in all other spheres of society. Consequently, Larger Catechism #123-133 establishes the common ground that pertains to all spheres of institutional authority.

Two additional important principles are found in WCF Chapter 20 (Christian Liberty and Liberty of Conscience) that address the extremes: (1) submission to institutional authority does not mean absolute and blind obedience; and (2) individual Christian liberty of conscience does not nullify lawful institutional authorities. Whatever authorities God has established are designed “mutually to uphold and preserve one another” (WCF 20.4). In other words, it is a system. I would venture to call it the system of civilization.

The chief hermeneutical error of 2020 was interpreting Romans 13 as a statement of the relationship between church and state.

Every person is to be in subjection to the governing [civil] authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist have been appointed by God. Therefore whoever resists that authority has opposed the ordinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves. For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of that authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same; for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword in vain, for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil. Therefore it is necessary to be in subjection, not only because of that wrath, but also because of conscience. For because of this you also pay taxes, for rulers are servants of God, devoting themselves to this very thing. Render to all what is due them: tax to whom tax is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor. (Rom 13:1-7 LSB, with emphasis)

This passage outlines the duty of the Christian citizen in relation to the civilian state, not the relation of church and civil authorities to one another. In other words, Romans 13 does not make any allowance for the lawful authority of the state to overrule the lawful authority of the church. Each one rules in its own sphere without “intermeddling” in the affairs of the other (WCF 31.5). Even the Americanized version of WCF Chapter 23 makes it clear that the state has no authority to interfere in matters of religious observance.