A Question on Being an Instituted Church (2)

Introduction

In the previous installment of this series, I began responding to the position article of First Reformed Church of Bulacan (FRCB).¹ The article is divided into three smaller articles and questions the legitimacy of the organization of First Orthodox Reformed Protestant Church, Bulacan, (FORPCB) on June 12, 2022, and her existence as an instituted church. FRCB’s article also judges FORPCB’s installed officebearers as illegally put into office in violation of principles of the Church Order of Dordt. Thus the third part of FRCB’s article is titled “Instituted Church?”

However, at the time of my writing of this current installment, John L. Flores, missionary of FRCB, has written a heaping series of articles addressed to myself and to Rev. Nathan J. Langerak, which are posted on the official website of his church but mostly on Facebook.² Interestingly, Flores has overexcitedly declared that the controversy and disputations between FRCB and FORPCB are already closed since I did not engage in a public debate with him. On Facebook he wrote,

The deafening silence of Jeremiah Pascual sends a very clear message—he is not confident in his position. Deep down, he knows his accusations are weak and unsustainable. But what truly stings is not doctrine. It’s the painful truth that he was not the Lord’s will to become the pastor of the First Reformed Church of Bulacan.

With the attitude you’ve shown for the past three years, thanks be to God, He did not choose you to be the pastor of the FRCB. Soli Deo Gloria!

Case closed.

John Flores admitted that what truly stings is not doctrine. He continues to live with the delusion that what is important is that his opponent is not hurt by doctrine but by a regrettable clerical election. This admission makes a Reformed man wince. It is clear that Flores is not buoyed by cogent, rational arguments regarding the truth but by dark, disconcerting motives toward his opponent. Also the subtlety of putting an end to the debate by my “deafening silence” is delusional. If such a sophisticated premise were consistently applied to FRCB’s three years of silence, then the debate had concluded long before he announced his victory.

Moreover, Flores says that my silence sends a very clear message. However, I never have been silent. I have spoken since the beginning of the controversy. I have always spoken the language of theological and polemical discourse. I am considered silent only by those who dictate the ongoing debate. But I could do that also. I could dictate the debate by saying that FRCB’s silence over the past three years speaks volumes of her officebearers’ cowardice. But no, their silence was not qualified by their not speaking but by their constant refusal to answer objections publicly. FRCB has been hiding in the dark. Suddenly, the enthusiasm to post FRCB’s weekly sermons stopped. For that the officebearers of FRCB are cowards. But never did I require of them an imposition of my own liking. Rather, I only hoped that through my public preaching and writing I could encourage them to speak publicly.

FRCB must confess. FRCB must speak. FRCB must write. Sprawling out cannot help FRCB in our controversy.

Instead of providing an intelligent response, FRCB would rather require me to bow at her will. FRCB dictates, imposes, and decides. That is not only unfair but also absurd, to say the least. And this reflects the hierarchical behavior of FRCB’s mother, the Protestant Reformed Churches. FRCB attempts to silence her enemies, not by the truth but by the imposition of her own law as to how the debate and disputations should proceed.

My silence—that is, my not accepting the challenge for a debate—speaks clearly, according to John Flores. But what about my preaching? What about the official declaration of the truth that is being made in FORPCB? I understand. The pulpit has no power and is not a proper venue to combat false doctrine. Rather, it is a hiding place for cowardly ministers like me. On Facebook FRCB wrote (of course, with very familiar sounding emotional hostility),

In this public and brotherly debate, the presentation of both sides will be much fairer. But if you, Candidate Pascual, refuse to accept this debate challenge, then you no longer have the right to speak or write against FRCB regarding the baptism issue. The proper forum is this debate.

Don’t hide under the skirt of Sword and Shield or your pulpit!

According to FRCB, the “proper forum” for this controversy is not the pulpit nor the sweet freedom of the believer to write. The “proper forum” is public debate. For FRCB, the only way to end my silence is to engage in a public debate.

Originally, the invitation was to debate with FRCB’s best man, Rodolfo “Jake” Magturtor Jr., one of FRCB’s most able deacons. On FRCB’s website, Flores wrote, 

I challenge you now, Candidate Jeremiah Pascual—to a public debate in the presence of your members and FRCB members. Representing FRCB will be Deacon Rodolfo ‘Jake’ Magturtor, Jr.³

Notice that Flores challenged me, but Jake was to be the representative. That is laughable. Jake was like a pawn tactically positioned to initiate the Bishop’s Opening since his diagonal attack was evidently weak and unsteady, unlike the bishop’s. Not Jake but Flores predominantly wanted to control the center of the board. This is apparently a warlike tactic of John Flores. Clearly, the brain behind all the brawling is this con man. Flores has no empathy whatsoever for Jake—he is just a pawn.

Then the urbane invitation to debate became ecclesiastical. FRCB’s council decided that John Flores, not Jake, would debate with me on the subject of whether the error of baptizing an infant of non-members is a doctrinal matter or simply a procedural error. On Facebook FRCB continued: “The consistory made a decision: Deacon Jake Magturtor will no longer debate you—it will now be Rev. John Flores.”

Nevertheless, I appreciate the bravery. Finally, John Flores and his minions are stepping out of their silence after three years of running a circus in his church. To speak up is courageous. To finally speak up takes a lot of courage, but doing so with sobriety is different. Make sure that you do not expose your nakedness when you speak. Semper ubi, sub ubi.

With an untrained spirit and an unbridled tongue, John Flores challenged a public debate. He is just a bellicose person who takes up space in an ecclesiastical context. When one reads his heaps of articles, his words easily betray his posture in theological debate. The tone and the substance are altogether not germane. Clearly, this problem arises when a supposed theologian is devoid of Reformed principles and confessional subjection. He simply displays the consequences of incompetent clergy in church history. In his challenge to public debate, he is like one who sells boneless chicken, but it turns out it is an egg. One surely will be disappointed if one expects an intelligent debate.

Be that as it may, I plan to respond to his articles, which are disseminated online, but first I must finish my refutation of FRCB’s position article, which questions the existence of FORPCB, my mother. FRCB’s article consistently deems FORPCB as a mere group and claims that all her officebearers have been illegitimately and illegally installed or ordained into their respective offices. The article revolves around those assertions, which are an attempt to dismantle FORPCB’s existence. Thus everything that is written arcs back to one thing: First Orthodox Reformed Protestant Church, Bulacan, is not an instituted church.

Synopsis of FRCB’s Article

FRCB’s website has three position articles against FORPCB. The interest of my article is the third position article of FRCB, which is titled “Instituted Church?”⁴

FRCB’s article recounts that a new group, First Orthodox Reformed Protestant Church, Bulacan, was organized on June 12, 2022. The group was led by Candidate Jeremiah Pascual, former elders Ben Catalan and Jorge Baguhin, and deacon Matt Raguirag. According to the article, the candidate was a novice, the former elders had questionable credentials since they had resigned from their respective offices, and the deacon had abandoned his office.

The article abruptly quotes article 38 of the Church Order. The article explains that the spirit or principle of the Church Order is that organizing a Reformed church needs “much care and prudence.” However, the said principle is not taken from the Church Order itself but from the footnote decision of the Protestant Reformed Churches pertaining to article 38. Footnote B states,

The classis shall thereupon deliberate whether such organization is possible or desirable, observing whether there be, among the signatories, persons suitable for consistory members, at the same time taking into account the neighboring churches. In case classis, with the concurrence of the delegates ad examina, decides to grant the request, it appoints a committee to carry out the organization. (Confessions and Church Order, 392)

Without further explaining the said principle, FRCB quickly moves on to deal with a technicality. FRCB’s article states,

Technically, for a ‘reformed’ church to be organized, they should have at least 2 elders and a deacon to constitute a valid consistory, even when there is no ordained minister of the Word and Sacrament yet. An elder and a deacon does not constitute a ‘valid’ consistory. Plurality of elders is the biblical norm necessary in order to prevent hierarchical tendency in the congregation. The election of office bearers shall be from a nomination made by the local calling church council (or at least by a steering committee or by a committee of membership from this group) and such election shall take place in harmony with Articles 22 and 24 of the Church Order. In other words, even under their unique circumstance, they should have taken utmost care in ensuring decency and good order to even be considered a legitimate reformed church. This presupposes that such decisions require considerable time and careful consideration in organizing a legitimate ‘reformed’ church. Furthermore, being an ‘invalid’ consistory from its very onset, this group has no authority to further install nor ordain any other office bearers to add to their current ‘so-called consistory’ just to make it appear that they are legitimate and, consequently claim their so-called ‘church’ to be ‘instituted.’

Then suddenly, the subject shifts from treating the Church Order articles to giving an interpretation and evaluation of the secession or, should I say, breakaway. The article claims that the group exaggerated the baptism of the infant of non-members as a controversy. FRCB has “reason to believe” that the group “surreptitiously” planned its breakaway while ignoring “the prescribed manner of organizing a legitimate instituted ‘reformed’ church.”

Then Church Order article 22 is quoted with a “big question” afterward: “Did they, in principle, comply with this article in consideration of their unique circumstance?” And then another question: “Do they really revere the confessions and objectively submit to it?” The latter question comes in light of the supposed conviction of the group, that is, their “deep conviction and apparent full submission to the Reformed Creeds and Confessions, (over and above their reliance on the sound biblical principles, i.e., sola scriptura).”

After this, Candidate Jeremiah Pascual is described as a novice in church polity, though the group considers him to be their “seemingly infallible guide to their faith and practice.” This description is further supported by the fact that only the candidate sent a letter of concern, and then suddenly members of the group blindly followed his lead. Group members wrote their respective withdrawal letters, consistently stating the error in the baptism.

FRCB continues its slander by claiming that after the group’s breakaway, Candidate Pascual was ordained as the minister by the laying on of hands by illegitimate officebearers. The questionably ordained minister

continues to regularly conduct public bible studies online on this exaggerated issue and maliciously present the consistory of the FRCB with careless and baseless biased allegations. Even his faulty critique of the preaching of the missionary and pastor of the FRCB is unfounded and debatable.

In light of this, an interpretation of Idzerd Van Dellen and Martin Monsma on Church Order article 8 is quoted. This is in connection with the fact that Mr. Pascual became a candidate because he applied for article 8 and was found eligible for a call after passing his public examination on January 24, 2022. But FRCB writes in the article, after quoting Van Dellen and Monsma, that Mr. Pascual “is exceptionally gifted as what he thinks he is.”

The article then acknowledges that the

group has every right and duty to guard the truths of the reformed confessions with zeal; these confessions being faithful interpretation of the doctrines of the Sacred Scriptures. However, they ought to be very careful in pronouncing hasty judgments of other congregation’s doctrinal position or practice. They should refrain from making hasty conclusions or verdicts against other congregations, but instead, through careful study and deliberation they ought to patiently study the matter for the love of the truth.

The article admonishes the group that rather it

ought to be busy in their main mandate of faithfully proclaiming the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Their incessant rantings on these unfounded issues are not edifying to their group nor to the denomination they so eagerly want to affiliate with.

FRCB continues by writing that the

group seems to have forgotten or has outrightly ignored that salvation is never dependent upon anyone’s own righteousness but only on the imputed righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing is able to pluck us out of our Father’s hand. It is good to exercise careful submission to the Word of God as well as the confessions and creeds, but even falling short of such compliance will not thwart nor frustrate God’s will for His people, specially, in the matter of their salvation. No one has the right nor the authority to judge nor claim that any congregation is in peril as far as their salvation is concerned simply because they have tagged them as a false or apostasizing [sic] church; and that they presuppose that they are the only true ‘church’; at least in the Philippines as what they constantly boast!

And finally the article concludes:

This group, who zealously and proudly call themselves Orthodox Reformed Protestant Christians, is grossly contradicting their very own confessions and church order.

Article 38

The main dispute of FRCB’s position article is that First Orthodox Reformed Protestant Church, Bulacan, is not an instituted church. FRCB does not want FORPCB to forget that assertion. The article’s treatment of article 38 of the Church Order appears to be ostentatious. The article flaunts article 38 because FRCB thinks that article 38 of the Church Order drives home its argument.

Though I am deemed a novice in church polity by my enemies, I am nevertheless duty-bound to adhere to and defend the Church Order.

The present version of article 38 reads, “In places where the consistory is to be constituted for the first time or anew, this shall not take place except with the advice of the classis” (Confessions and Church Order, 392). The main principle of article 38 is not organizing a local congregation in a certain locality but constituting or reconstituting a consistory. This is in light of the article’s original version and context, when Dutch believers had been persecuted by Spain and there came a time of respite from persecution and they sought to reorganize their churches by reconstituting their respective consistories. Herman Hanko clarifies,

It is important to notice that the article speaks not of the reconstituting of a congregation, but of a consistory. We speak of the organization of a congregation, but strictly speaking, this is not correct.⁵

The institution of the church must be examined from the viewpoint of her special offices. Believers must put men into office first so that the church may be instituted as an official manifestation of Christ’s body in a locality.

Moreover, the context of article 38 should not be divorced from the idea of the extended unity of a church, as she is a member of a denomination governed by a classis or a synod. Such an idea should not be slighted in understanding the article. This is important because a classis, which is specifically mentioned in the article, has no power to organize a church. Again, Hanko asserts, “No classis or synod does or can organize a church. Nor does a congregation need the approval of a major assembly to organize a church.”⁶ A broader assembly, such as a classis, cannot decide the existence of a congregation. Rather, a classis can only give advice. But such advice is limited to the voluntary request of a group of believers to be constituted as one that is also applying to become a part of the classis or a denomination.

Regarding a group of believers who desire to be organized as a congregation and who also desire to be a part of a federation of churches, as a matter of good order and for the sake of unity, a broader assembly may advise the requesting group to proceed to the organization according to the provisions of the assembly. In this case the members of the group may not organize themselves as a church in that denomination without the consent of the classis. The same holds true with reconstituting a congregation in the federation. Clearly, the right to be constituted belongs to the churches in the federation if the requesting group voluntarily puts itself under the jurisdiction of the broader assembly. That group cannot proceed unless the classis decides to grant their request. If the classis is against it, the group may not proceed. Nevertheless, of course, the group has the liberty to organize itself, but, as Van Dellen and Monsma explain (speaking to Christian Reformed readership), that group “would simply not be recognized as one of our Churches but as an independent and perhaps schismatic Church.”⁷ This is also the evaluation of Rev. G. Vanden Berg, who wrote, “This means that a church independently organized will not be admitted into or recognized by the denomination unless this advice of the Classis is first sought.”⁸

However, the initiative to organize should come from the group of believers. The classis does not have the power or right to organize a church. The classis cannot take upon itself that right. To do so would be hierarchical. Even within its jurisdiction, a church can only be organized by the petitioning group of believers with the help of the classis. A classis can guide and assist the believers in what to do in order to materialize their desire to constitute as a church.

From here we can assert that the church order is concerned not only with the unity of the churches but also with the ancient truth of the office of the believer. However, such an office should be exercised as it is organically united to the church. For such an office is a blessed privilege that comes from the anointing of Christ as her chief prophet, high priest, and eternal king, and only through a living and true faith do believers share of his anointing (Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 12). Christ exercises his offices through the church, as the church is constituted through her special offices. Believers depend on the official exercise of these offices in the institute. The exercise of the office of all believer depends on the special offices, not absolutely, but ordinarily, as believers depend on the preaching of the gospel, Christian discipline, and the dispensing of the mercies of God.

That is why believers can be abused by the men who are put into office, and by that, the church is inevitably corrupted. When the men in special offices ascribe much power to themselves, the church is ascribing much power to herself as well because the church exists from the viewpoint of her special offices. By virtue of their calling to separate from a false church, believers leave such a church, and they are like sheep scattered by the pastors, like a flock without a shepherd (Jer. 23:1–2). Where believers are abused by the officebearers, the exercise of the office of all believer is no longer dependent upon the special offices in the church because the church is full of corrupt officebearers, full of priests who eat up the sin of God’s people, that is, the gospel of Christ’s absolute atoning death is no longer in that church. What is in that church is the power of man. The profanity of doctrine and life is within that church’s walls.

Believers are left without a choice but to leave and constitute the church anew. Commenting on article 38, Van Dellen and Monsma maintain that this right to organize the church belongs to the believers:

Essentially, any group of believers has a right to organize itself into a Church…Would anyone care to maintain that the resultant Church was really non-existent simply because no major ecclesiastical assembly has sponsored, effected, or advised its organization? Only he who belongs to a strict hierarchical Church organization would care to champion the suggested contention. By this admission we grant that believers have an essential right to organize themselves into a Church if they so desire.⁹

Once believers depart from their church, that church has already lost her marks as a true church of Jesus Christ. This presupposes, of course, that the believers who left are true believers, that is, they are elect. Ordinarily, elect believers do not depart from a true church, for Christ is there. But where Christ is not found, they leave and seek him elsewhere. If there is no true church in their locality, constituting the church anew ought to be their priority. 

In the case of FORPCB, when FRCB became a false church by profaning the covenant in her error of baptizing an infant whose parents were not members of FRCB, and when she proved herself to be impenitent just like the reprobate wicked, members decided to depart from that synagogue. Members of FORPCB exercised their office of all believer by organizing themselves as a church through the institution of the special offices. Two qualified men were chosen from the assembly, a former elder and former deacon of FRCB.

We had the inherent right to do that out of our liberty since our priority was to constitute the church anew, and we were virtually alone in the locality of Bulacan. We could not in good conscience exist as a mere group because we had qualified men to be installed as officebearers and families to constitute a church. “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching” (Heb. 10:25).

None of the Reformed fathers deny the inherent liberty of believers to organize a church. Unlike FRCB, the Reformed fathers of Dordt were not hierarchical. Thus article 38 cannot be used against First Orthodox Reformed Protestant Church, Bulacan. The Church Order in general cannot be used against the existence of FORPCB, for regarding Reformed polity the Church Order is for the “well-being” of a congregation and not for its “being.” The Church Order cannot dictate the existence of an institution; rather, the freedom to become a church is upon the believers who happen to be alone in a locality.

When FRCB misuses the Church of Order of Dordt against an instituted congregation, she clearly manifests her hierarchical disposition. No doubt, organizing a church should not be hasty. It should be done with much care and prudence. But, strictly speaking, that is not the principle of article 38 as FRCB believes. Rather, what is at the root of the article is the unity of the churches and the freedom of believers. That freedom of believers is none other than the exercise of the office of all believer. Thus “much care and prudence” lies more heavily on the side of a classis or a broader assembly, which are prone to despise the office of all believer for the sake of technicality and collective exercise of ecclesiastical power.

A piece of advice to FRCB: Instead of hunting down an already instituted church, why not condemn her as a false church? That is more confessional than insisting on a hierarchical interpretation of the Church Order. I do not care if an Arminian church is instituted with much care and prudence; I do not care if a Roman Catholic church has an insufficient number of elders; I do not care if a Baptist church has plenty of elders or deacons; I do not care if FRCB has installed unqualified men; I do not care if this or that is just a fellowship and not yet a church.

Rather, my contention would be consistently against the preaching and doctrine of such churches. I have plenty of time to refute their gospel, but I am not taking time to argue against their existence. To contend against false doctrine is not only wise and confessional but also worthy of my time and labor.

17. Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.

18. For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple. (Rom. 16:17–18)

I will conclude my response in my next article, the Lord willing.