Simple Presbyterianism - James McManus

I’ve developed a habit of coming to my church every Saturday evening to finish up my preparations for all that I am responsible for on the coming Lord’s Day. What I usually do is preach through my sermon - I have found that there are times that what I have written down doesn’t sound as good spoken out loud, so I make those necessary changes. After that, I walk around the sanctuary, and I pray for all that the Lord’s Day will include - which may include a session meeting, or a diaconate meeting … pre-Covid 19, it was Sunday School … and then for worship. I specifically pray for myself and the message, and then I walk through the sanctuary, and I try and pray for all the families of our church. Like many older churches, our folks tend to sit in the same pews … so I walk around the sanctuary, and I try and pray for these families by name. 

What I find that I am usually praying for with them, and for myself, is Simple Presbyterianism - which is knowing and loving the Scriptures, and knowing and adhering to the Westminster Standards. I heard this years ago, and it was attributed to Dr. Ligon Duncan, and he called it Vanilla Presbyterian. I adopted it and changed it’s name to Simple Presbyterian! That’s the main thrust of my prayer for people and myself, and not just on Saturday evenings, but in all of my prayer life. That is what I want for myself, and what I want for my people here at Bethel ARP - for us to know God’s word and love it as God’s word, and to know our Westminster Standards, so we can adhere to them and have it help guide our doctrines and theological growth. 

There is a lot that I can about how I think about this working it’s way in and through our lives and my ministry, and I just want to highlight a few of those ways:

Sermon Preparation - I find that when I am preparing for my sermons, I am referencing the Westminster Standards. I read my text, pray about it, take some notes … go to the commentaries and take notes … and then turn to the Standards, and look at the Scriptural reference or theological reference. This helps me make sure that my theology is Biblical and sound. 

Sermon - as it suits, I will either quote the Standards in my sermon, or paraphrase them. Of course, I want to quote the “big” Standard references: what is man’s chief end, what is prayer, what is saving faith, etc. Other times, I just paraphrase it so as to get the main point to my people. I do this because I want my people to be familiar with the Standards in language, doctrine and guide. 

Conversation - as I talk with my people, and the opportunity arises, I will point them to the Standards. I want to encourage them to be in on their own, so they, too, can grow in the wonderful doctrine it teaches! 

The challenge in all of this is to not embody the old joke about knowing that someone is a TR because they say, “this is what the Westminster Standards say! And, oh yeah, it says that someone in the Bible too.” We don’t want to be that guy! What I aim to do is to use the Standards in the same way they were written and intended, and that is to support what the Bible teaches, not supersede it. My sermon prep begins, continues, and ends with the Bible, and the Standards are there to help me understand the text. My sermons are from the Bible, and expound what the text says, and the Standards are there to support that exegesis. My counsel is always from Scripture, and I point to the Standards as a help in better understanding the situation at hand. 

To me, that is the practical outflowing of what it means to be a Simple Presbyterian. We are a people of the Book, of God’s Word. We are a people who major on God’s word, who are fed by it, sustained by it, feast on it. The Bible is central to all. The Westminster Standards are meant to come alongside that, to help us better understand God’s word, and to provide a guide in understanding, and a barrier from heresy. That is my prayer for myself, and for my people!