The "Jonesboro 7" Submit to Edicts of Session
When the "Jonesboro 7" appealed their case, the Temporary Session of Elders took an additional step to keep the censure in place during the appeal and then resigned from service to the little church.
Zach Lott and six other men from a small church plant in Jonesboro, Ark. wanted to see a Reformed and Presbyterian church in their town; they wanted to be part of the PCA. Covenant Presbytery had dispatched TE Jeff Wreyford to the small city as the organizing pastor. The work was going well, but Lott and several others were concerned about the trajectory of the work and the philosophy of ministry of TE Wreyford.
They had detected some “progressive” tendencies in the organizing pastor.1 They perceived a “controlling and unyielding nature” in TE Wreyford’s ministry. They also believed TE Wreyford’s philosophy of ministry did not sufficiently emphasize Reformed and Presbyterian distinctives, but instead focused on what would make the “church most appealing to the masses.”2 And finally they were frustrated by how frequently TE Wreyford was absent from the pulpit; they wanted a pastor who would preach the whole counsel of God, but TE Wreyford seemed “quick to give up the pulpit,” they believed.3
Accordingly, when it seemed the church plant was moving closer to particularizing as a congregation of the PCA, Lott and six other men approached both the organizing pastor and the Session expressing their desire for other candidates to be considered when the time came to call a pastor.
The Session’s response to their concerns was not what they anticipated.
Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the
discipline and instruction of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)
In response to the concerns expressed by the Jonesboro 7, members of the Session emphasized the qualifications and credentials possessed by TE Wreyford.
Also present at the meeting was TE Clint Wilcke of the Midsouth Church Planting Network; he suggested that if the men did not agree with Pastor Wreyford’s philosophy of ministry, then they might need to find “another denomination” and “the PCA isn’t it.”4
The men wanted an ordinary Presbyterian and Reformed Church. One of the men put it this way,
…we wanted that teaching, we wanted that meat. We wanted something of… substance. We wanted a reformed Presbyterian church here, PCA church.5
How curious that the “Coordinator/Catalyst” for the PCA’s Midsouth Church Planting Network, TE Clint Wilcke, would suggest that such people find a different denomination if that was the sort of church they wanted.
Despite the objections and concerns of the seven church members, the Session continued to press forward with their belief TE Jeff Wreyford should be offered to the congregation for the position of pastor.
When the men, the Jonesboro 7, did not withdraw their objections to TE Jeff Wreyford being offered as pastor, the Session investigated, indicted, and found them guilty of violating their membership vows as well as sins against the Fifth and Ninth Commandments. The men appealed the Session’s judgment, but the Session - largely comprised of pastors and ruling elders from IPC Memphis - took the added step of leaving the men suspended from the Lord’s Table even while their appeal made its way through the courts.
After the Jonesboro 7 appealed the Session’s judgment, the Session resigned.
Suspended from Communion at Christmas
As noted in other articles, the judicial philosophy apparently embraced by the elders on the Session was peculiar. They had not provided the men with specifics as to their alleged sins. A panel of the SJC would note later the men could not mount a defense at trial, since Session had not told them what their sins were particularly, but instead only that they had generally and vaguely violated the Fifth and Ninth Commandments at some point in “the days leading up to and following August 3, 2020.”6
But nonetheless, despite suffering under a Session which the SJC would note “abused” the process, the men were committed to being PCA. So they submitted to the discipline and waited on the Lord’s deliverance.
The weight of the Session’s actions hit home for Zach Lott on Christmas Eve. He and his family were visiting an ARP congregation in North Carolina where his brother was a pastor. He tells it this way,
I approached [my brother] to ask whether or not I could take communion, knowing that my prospects were not good. Even though my brother is an ARP minister, he has many friends in the PCA, and he keeps a PDF of the BCO on his iPad. He wanted to know specifically what the censure entailed. I explained that, even though the judgment is technically suspended during an appeal, there was a provision in the BCO permitting the Session to withhold the Table from us during the appeal process. He consulted the BCO, and he really wanted to find a way to permit me to partake, but he found that my understanding was correct and told me that, as a minister in a NAPARC church, he had to respect the disciplinary decisions of another NAPARC church.
Mr Lott was committed to submit to the Session’s authority, to abide by his membership vows even though the Session’s decisions seemed unjust. He explains:
It obviously hurt a lot to not be able to partake in the Body and Blood of our Lord. This was especially true in my own congregation, where there were many communion Sundays where I and the other accused men were forced to sit and watch during the administration of the Sacrament….
Obviously, I felt that the disciplinary action against me and the other six men was unjust (a feeling later borne out by the verdict of the SJC). But the Fifth Commandment requires us as Christians to submit to those authorities God has placed over us even when we do not agree with them. After all, if we only have to follow directives with which we agree, in what sense can we be said to be in submission? Such an understanding would invert God's appointed order and make us individually the ultimate power and authority over our lives.
Mr Lott and the others of the Jonesboro 7 were committed to the PCA. Members of the Session and Covenant Presbytery would adopt a curious interpretation of their actions:
I always felt like our submission (or, from the perspective of the Session, our lack of submission) to the government of the PCA was, until we reached the SJC, deeply misunderstood by the other courts with which we interacted. The Session and the Presbytery presented a picture of us as defiant rogues looking to subsume to ourselves the authority that rightfully belongs to the courts of the Church.
But do those in rebellion against the government of Christ's church stick around when they’re under discipline? Do they make correct use of the courts of the church to combat what they believe to be abuse on the part of their shepherds? I presented our defense before the judicial commission of the Presbytery, and I made this exact point to them. Rebels against the government of the church don’t seek to make use of the means appointed by that government to mediate and adjudicate disputes.
They take their ball and go home, which, ironically, is what I believe that Session wanted us to do all along, as shown by statements such as those made by RE Olson at the trial. TE Clint Wilcke of the Mid-South Church Planting Network explicitly told us in the initial meeting with the Session that, if we didn't like TE Wreyford's philosophy of ministry, we needed to contact the church planters of some other Presbyterian denomination to come and plant the kind of church we wanted. Of course, we wanted nothing more than a normal, ordinary means of grace church. I think this attitude within some elements of the PCA’s missions apparatus is deeply frightening.
The elders of the PCA should not be trying to run off those sheep whom God would have them shepherd.
Mr Lott’s costly willingness to submit to those in authority over him would have an impact on a recent seminary graduate also present at that congregation, TE Jonathan Brooks. At the time TE Brooks was a licentiate of the Tennessee Valley Presbytery. TE Brooks would later remark on the sacrificial, faithful submission of Mr Lott:
His brother, Alex, was administering the Lord’s Supper, and he fenced the table, mentioning specifically that those under discipline should not come to the table. Zach did not partake, and afterwards was visibly saddened by it….
So, I can say from first hand experience, that the men censured were absolutely in submission to the authority of their session, and I gained a considerable amount of respect for Zach when I saw him submit to that. It couldn’t have been easy at all.
Despite the “unfair” process deployed against the Jonesboro 7 by the Temporary Session, the men nonetheless demonstrated the strength of their commitment to the Scripture, to their membership vows, to Presbyterian Church government, and to the Reformed Faith.
Baptisms Delayed
After the Jonesboro 7 appealed the decision of the Temporary Session to Covenant Presbytery, the Temporary Session resigned and recommended the church plant be closed. This left the congregation with little spiritual care and oversight.
The congregation, however, needed pastoral and spiritual care. Seven heads of households were barred from the Lord’s Table; surely this was reason enough to continue to exercise shepherding. Additionally, the members of the congregation continued to get on with life as best the could. That meant the young families continued to grow and babies continued to be born.
But there was no Session to care for them and there was no Session to baptize the covenant children, since the elders had resigned after the Jonesboro 7 continued to exercise their rights under the PCA Book of Church Order. But Christ was a faithful Shepherd to the little congregation even though the under-shepherds from IPC Memphis having resigned and described the church plant’s culture as “toxic.”
Despite the recommendation to shutter the church plant from those who seemed influential in Covenant Presbytery, the Presbytery nonetheless determined to keep the church plant going (you can read about that remarkable day here). A Session from Cleveland, Miss. was appointed to serve as the new Session for the Church plant.
Not deterred by a three hour distance, the elders of Covenant Presbyterian Church (CPC) were committed to shepherding Christ’s lambs in Jonesboro.
In the Summer of 2022, TE Tim Starnes - the senior pastor of CPC would make the long journey to officiate at the baptisms of a number of children who were born to families of the Jonesboro 7.
The quest for justice was far from over, but at least the church plant would continue. In spite of the designs of the elders from IPC Memphis and even Presbytery’s MNA Committee, the little congregation would remain open and the whole counsel of God would be proclaimed in that city.
The men - and whole congregation - had suffered and would continue to suffer the lingering effects of the Temporary Session’s presumption of authority.7 But now they had a new Session committed to the spiritual welfare of the flock and they had learned that even in the face of grave hardship, God would continue to show His love for His saints, conform them to Christ’s own image, and build His Kingdom in Jonesboro.
SJC 2022-07 ROC, p. 81.
op. cit., p. 44.
op. cit., p. 23.
op. cit., p. 132.
op. cit., p. 87.
GA 50 Handbook, p. 2066.
op. cit., p. 2069.