Volume 1: Issue 1 | April 2018
Editorial: We Introduce Ourselves
Both editors live in Philadelphia, where our country declared its independence and wrote its Constitution. Here we grew up and attended school, here we heard and believed the Word of God, and here we bear testimony to Jesus our Lord.
Philadelphia has Christian origins, as do New York, Boston, and Providence, the other great cities in our Atlantic Presbytery. Our towns and villages have Christian origins as well. Many Christians live here, welcoming immigrants from a hundred countries. But our rulers do not bow to their true President, Jesus Christ.
By its very presence, our presbytery testifies that we belong to Christ, and that all who live here will one day stand before Jesus, their rightful Ruler and Judge. The goal of A Little Strength is to help our churches use the Open Door set before us to serve the Glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ. The format will be text only, like the Bible, but as our work progresses, we may supplement it with an online blog.
In every issue we want to write about someone from our Presbytery’s past. “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the Word of God.” (Hebrews 13:7). There will be something about a current political issue, a prayer request, a new member in one of our churches, and a sermon excerpt. Finally, there will be a commandment and a proverb, two ways God teaches believers how to live. If you know the Law and Proverbs, you will neither need nor be interested in people peddling seminars with their own special discipleship programs about how to live a Christian life.
Since the laborer is worthy of his hire, and you should not muzzle an ox when it is threshing grain, feel free to send a contribution towards the next issue of A Little Strength to “A Little Strength, 901 Cypress Ave., Elkins Park, PA 19027.”
-- Bill Edgar and John Edgar
What Did the Reformed Presbyterian Church Say About the First Restrictive Immigration Law?
Americans talk a lot these days about immigration. People argue whether to call those who illegally enter the United States “undocumented immigrants,” or “illegal aliens.” What should be done with adults, who were brought here illegally years ago when they were children? Is it right to favor one nationality, or religion, or skill set, over another in immigration decisions?
Until 1882, the United States had no important laws restricting immigration. Get on a ship or cross the border and you were in and on your own: no food stamps. However, in the middle of the Long Depression (1873-1896) California residents became enraged with Chinese workers for taking jobs. Agitators fanned fear of a “yellow peril.” So Congress passed a law forbidding Chinese immigrants, and only Chinese immigrants, and on May 6, 1882 President Chester Arthur signed the Chinese Exclusion Act into law. Congress renewed the law in 1892 and made it permanent in 1902. The Supreme Court upheld the law’s constitutionality in 1889.
The Reformed Presbyterian Synod and its papers discussed the Act. We had a mission to Chinese immigrants living in California, and consistently rejected racist attitudes and actions. In 1886, Synod adopted the following resolution.
"Resolved, that this Synod condemns the present restriction law against Chinese emigration as discriminating unfairly against this people, as violating the natural right of people to journey to, and sojourn in the land of their choice, (provided this choice has not been forfeited by crime or known conspiracy against the good order of society,) and as impiously regardless of that Divine Providence which is manifestly leading them to this country for the evangelization of their race.
"Walter T. Miller dissented from the above action."
(Minutes of Synod published in the Reformed Presbyterian & Covenanter, July/August 1886, p. 241).
In later years, Synod repeated its objection to the Chinese Exclusion Act, sometimes sending their protest directly to the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Do people have a natural right “to sojourn in the land of their choice?” That was our Church’s opinion in 1886. When non-Christians immigrate to our land, should we be happy that Divine Providence has brought them here where they can be evangelized? That was what our Church did with Chinese in California, Syrians in Pittsburgh, and Jews in Cincinnati and Philadelphia. Should we fear the alien influence of non-Christian immigrants? Is immigration law an issue the Church should even address, or was the 1886 Synod, and subsequent ones, wrongly intruding on the government’s job? What do you think?
-- Bill Edgar
Prayer Request: Hospitality
Request: Ask God to make you, your family, and your church hospitable to one another and to strangers. If you send us answers to this prayer request before we publish the next issue of A Little Strength, we hope we can print some of them in our next issue.
Verses to pray over regarding hospitality:
1. Hebrews 13:2 – “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”
2. I Peter 4:19 – “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.”
3. James 2:1-4 – “My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, ‘You sit here in a good place,’ while you say to the poor man, ‘You stand over there,’ or ‘You sit at my feet,’ have you not become judges with evil thoughts?”
Send answers to this prayer request either to Bill Edgar (b.edgar@verizon.net) or to John Edgar (johnevniki@comcast.net).
Get to Know Your Members
James and Sarah Vinson, Elkins Park RPC
Where are you each from?
Sarah – I grew up in Port Jervis, NY.
James – I am from the Philadelphia area.
What did you believe about God growing up? What did your family teach you? Did you go to church? Where?
Sarah – My family was Catholic, so we attended St. Mary’s Holy Catholic Church. When I was very young, we went almost every week and attended Sunday school. All my siblings and I were baptized and celebrated our First Communion. I knew about prayer, the Trinity, the story of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection but I can honestly say it was a big mystery to me. I didn’t make any connections between what was being taught and my own life. I didn’t feel like I knew God in any real way, it was just something we did as a family.
James –My mother left when I was a baby, so I never knew her, and my father who was my primary caretaker was in and out of jail my whole life. I have a few family members who are Jehovah’s Witnesses and I lived with them periodically while my father was in prison. I went to their services a few times as a child, where I learned about God, Jesus, and the importance of reading the bible.
How did things change as you went through high school and beyond?
Sarah – As we became teens our family turned into one of those Christmas/Easter only attendees. My mother, being divorced, was not allowed to be a member of the church and was not allowed to participate in many of the church’s functions, even as a volunteer. That left a nasty taste in my mouth and I was very vocal about my feelings towards the Church. There was one short period of time in my youth when I really felt connected to God, the summer before going to college when I worked as a lifeguard at a Salvation Army Camp.
James – I didn’t attend church at all during those years.
How did you meet? Get together?
Sarah / James – We met at the Culinary Institute of America in New York. We were neighbors in the dorm. We started dating, fell in love and got an apartment together. When we found out Sarah was pregnant, we broke up. Being only 19 years old, we thought our lives were completely ruined and considered abortion. But something just didn’t feel right about that, so we decided since we were keeping the baby, we should at least try to stay together and so we got married. Then, James joined the Air Force and we moved to Missouri, where we had no family or friends at first. Having only each other to rely on forced us to really come together as a team. The majority of both of our families are divorced so we had no role models for marriage. Our first few years were very hard but also very beneficial for us. God was definitely behind the scenes working for our best interest.
What led you to God?
Sarah – When we lived on the military base, even though we lived far from our actual family, it was like we had another family with our military friends. So, when James’ contract was over and we moved to Philadelphia that support system was gone. At the same time, our daughter (who was around 5) was asking some hard questions. (What happens when you die? Who is God? Etc.) I knew I didn’t have those answers! That’s when I started looking for a church. I didn’t have my faith in mind at all, it was primarily to find her the answers she was seeking, and find us a local support system. But God had me in mind all along, He led me to him.
James – I have always felt a connection to God and his hand working in my life, but Sarah was very against going to church. But then one day she informed me that she found a church, researched the pastor, and we were going on Sunday. So we went.
What led you to visit Elkins Park Church?
Sarah – Well, I knew I didn’t want a Catholic Church, an old priest, or a huge congregation, and I wanted to be able to walk to it. So that limited my search considerably. Then when I found the website for EPC, and saw that John was married, had kids, and used to be a school teacher, it just clicked. I thought this was someone who my husband could talk and relate to, this was someone who could teach my child what she wanted to know.
James – My wife.
What led you to join Elkins Park Church?
Sarah/ James – We respected John, and the elders and deacons. The more we went, the more we liked it. How the church is run, psalm singing, and not having every Sunday service turn into a big show just made sense to us. Everyone was very welcoming and helpful in our spiritual growth both individually and as a family. So, we made it official.
How has God helped you in the last few years?
Sarah/James – God has helped us be better people overall. Some big things are learning to look internally at our own sin, being humble, handling stress in a positive way and showing patience with each other and our kids.
What are you most thankful for at this point in your lives?
Sarah/James – We are most thankful for our marriage and children. Our walk with Christ has really strengthened our marriage and our relationships with our daughters.
God's Will for Your Life: Proverbs Exposition
“A man who isolates himself seeks his own desires;
he rages against all wise judgment.”
-- Proverbs 18:1
When friends and families abandon them, some people must live alone. Psalm 27:10 gives them hope. “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take care of me.” This proverb is not for such people, nor for the occasional Robinson Crusoe shipwrecked on an island. Rather, it is for the likes of the loner mathematician, Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber.
How does a loner think? “People are fools.” “No one recognizes my genius.” “Other people let me down.” “I make my own decisions alone.” “I don’t fit in here, I am a foot, not a hand.” (I Corinthians 12:15) Elijah was a loner when he fled to Sinai, whining, “I, only I, am left,” earning God’s rebuke. “Elijah, what are you doing here?” (I Kings 19:9-10)
Some Americans claim to be Christians, but proudly steer clear of the Church, His Body, even heaping scorn on “organized religion.” All by themselves, they watch TV preachers. Alone, they read Christian books. Some hold “church” at home. Not for them, believers who require patience, or who differ on some point of doctrine, or even worse, offer advice. Better alone! Like C.S. Lewis’ inhabitants of Hell in The Great Divorce, they move ever further away from other people.
What does a loner hate with all his heart? Advice! Tell such a one that God Himself said, “It is not good for a person to be alone,” and he will evade or reject the truth. (Genesis 2:18) Like the Prodigal Son, he moves as far away as he can from people who might know and love him.
Every proud loner needs to come to his senses like the Prodigal Son did, seek human companionship, and learn to love correction and advice. God made us to live with others, where we can obey His second Great Commandment, “to love your neighbor as yourself.” Therefore, the Bible teaches that true Christians are in His Church Visible, “outside of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation” (Westminster Confession of Faith, 25.2).
-- Bill Edgar
The Fourth Commandment: A Brief Exposition
Given at Elkins Park Church on February 18, 2018
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
Exodus 20: 8-11
Read the fourth commandment in Deuteronomy 5:12-15. What stands out? It's long – even longer than in Exodus 20:8-11. When it comes to the Sabbath, God has a lot to say. Next, why is it longer in Deuteronomy? There is more on letting other people rest. Notice the additional phrase, “that your male servant and your female servants may rest as well as you.” Notice the different reason given at the end, “you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord brought you out ... therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.”
Who does not attend church in today's America? You might think of the highly educated, but in fact a fair number of those with advanced degrees go to church. Look around this room. It is those with only a high school education or less who rarely attend church. Why not? Here's one major reason: they can't. They have to go to work. They have to be at the restaurant to serve all the church people going out for lunch after church.
God did not design the fourth commandment so the wealthy and highly educated could rest and worship. God designed it for all people. He even designed it for the animals! So when you go shopping or order food on Sunday, you break this commandment by making your servant work for you.
I am not referring to those in medical or public safety fields. Jesus pointed out various situations that called for labor on the Sabbath, and so we speak of works of necessity and mercy as being right to do on the Sabbath. It is good to care for the hospitalized patient on Sunday. It is good to fix your neighbor's flat tire.
I refer to those things that can be delayed to other days. Until around 1960, Pennsylvania had laws forbidding stores from opening on Sunday. It did not hurt our economy. People learned to plan ahead. Your boss might tell you it is necessary to work your shift on Sunday. It is not, if it is not necessary for the business itself to be open on Sunday.
So on the basis of Deuteronomy 5:12-15, I charge you to remember your male and female servant, and not make them work for you on Sunday. Do not say they will have to work anyway. Let every Christian obey God's command, and let the profit of being open on Sunday dwindle. Even if it does not, you have a commandment from God to obey.
You say you are a middle class American, and therefore do not have a servant? The person who must miss church to work the cash register is your servant. Observe the Sabbath day, that your male servant and female servant may rest as well as you.
-- John Edgar
Notable Reformed Presbyterian Ministers Serving in Atlantic Presbytery Churches
Alexander McLeod
(1774-1833)
In 1799, New York State began the gradual abolition of slavery, but the last New York slave was not free until 1827. Thus when the Coldenham and New York Reformed Presbyterian Churches called the newly licensed Alexander McLeod in 1800 as their pastor, some signers of the call owned slaves. McLeod refused the call.
The Reformed Presbytery (organized 1798) agreed with McLeod, taking the occasion to rule that no slaveholder could take communion in a Reformed Presbyterian Church. Then it appointed McLeod, along with James McKinney, as a Commission to ride to Rocky Creek, South Carolina, where there was a Covenanter congregation. The Commission ordered every Rocky Creek member who held a slave to free him or her immediately. Amazingly, they all complied, all except the old pastor, William Martin. Instead of freeing his slave, he sold him. The Commission thereupon deposed him for selling his slave and also for drunkenness, and the congregation called James McKinney to be its new pastor. McKinney, unfortunately, died before he could take office.
Back in New York, Alexander McLeod published Negro Slavery Unjustifiable, a biblical argument against American chattel slavery. His basic argument was that Mosaic slavery and American slavery were not the same institution. First, the Law of God said anyone who kidnapped an Israelite, held him for sale, or sold him should be executed. (Deuteronomy 24:7) The Bible included slave traders among those who are “lawless and disobedient,” “unholy and profane,” and provides no support for the slave trade. (I Timothy 1:10; the King James translation “men stealers” is an evasive etymological translation.) Second, the excuse that Africans deserve slavery because they bear the “curse of Ham,” is biblically ignorant. Noah cursed Ham’s son Canaan, not Ham. Africans are not descended from Canaan. (Genesis 9:25) Third, slave holding denied the benevolence towards others that Jesus taught. Jesus said, “Do to others, as you want people to do to you.” (Matthew 7:12) No one would choose to be a slave.
There was much more to McLeod’s argument, but these three points illustrate his biblical reasoning. For many decades, McLeod’s book was in most Covenanter Church libraries, giving a biblical answer to the sophistries of apologists for southern slavery like the out and out racist Robert Dabney (see his A Defense of Virginia, 1867) and James Thornwell.
McLeod accepted the joint call from Coldenham and New York in 1801, but resigned the Coldenham pastorate in 1803 to give his full attention to the rapidly growing New York church, where he served until his death. He wrote a number of books, notably drafting Reformation Principles Exhibited by the Reformed Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, adopted by the Reformed Presbytery in 1806. This Testimony, as later generations called it, remained the Church’s Testimony until 1980. McLeod’s Lectures Upon the Prophecies of the Revelation (1814), a traditionally historical post-millennial commentary, also influenced the Reformed Presbyterian Church for a century.
A prominent preacher in New York City, McLeod was involved with the American Colonization Society (later repudiated by the RP Synod in 1836), the New York Society for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, and the American Society for Ameliorating the Condition of the Jews. In his last years, McLeod suffered from lung infections, but continued working until his end, writing, teaching, and preaching. He died in 1833, still a relatively young man. Appropriately, many later Covenanters were named for Alexander McLeod, who led the way in the Reformed Presbyterian Church’s thorough biblical rejection of racism and American chattel slavery.
-- Bill Edgar
Christmas Tomorrow
Sermon Excerpt: Bill Edgar, December 24, 2017
Tomorrow is Christmas Day. There will be no church service here, or in any other Reformed Presbyterian Church that day. On Easter we will not have an “Easter service” either. Why? Because each Lord’s Day is already both Christmas and Easter! It is the day we worship our Savior King, who was born in Bethlehem two thousand years ago. It is the day we remember that Jesus rose from the grave on the first day of the week. Every Lord’s Day is both Christmas and Easter!
Every Lord’s Supper is also Christmas. Jesus’ words, “Take, eat, this is my body,” remind us He was born of a woman, truly and fully a man. The words, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you remember his death until he comes,” testify to Jesus’ Resurrection. Every Lord’s Supper, like every Lord’s Day, is also both Christmas and Easter. Today, December 24, the Lord’s Day, is the real Christmas, even though tomorrow is America’s Christmas.
How did a stingy once a year Christmas come about? Over the centuries, the Christian Church added feast after feast alongside the Lord’s Day. These feasts became grander than the weekly worship of God. For many people, “Christmas and Easter Christians,” they became the important religious days. So the English Puritans and the Scottish Presbyterians, from whom we are descended, said no more of these religious feasts, not even Christmas and Easter. They divert people from weekly worship of God, He never commanded them, and they are unnecessary: every Lord’s Day is Christmas and Easter.
Until the 1840s our country hardly celebrated Christmas, but in 1870, December 25 became a national holiday. What happened? Charles Dickens’s 1843 story, A Christmas Carol, became immensely popular, with its portrayal of gift giving, family gatherings, and feasting. It also stigmatized anyone indifferent to Christmas as a Scrooge. At the same time, Roman Catholics from Ireland, Germany, and Italy immigrated in large numbers and brought with them the feasts Puritans and Covenanters had eliminated. Santa Claus became famous in a beloved poem published in 1823, “The Night Before Christmas.” Finally and probably most importantly, enterprising merchants saw how to make money from Christmas. The result is the everything-mushed-together American Christmas we know: carols both Christian and secular, decorations, trees (imported from Germany), crèches (brought from Italy), a day off work and school, sales, sales, sales, and family gatherings. Christmas is America’s favorite holiday by far.
In God’s Providence, Christmas is the most enduring public expression of Christian truth in America. What do American non-Christians know about Jesus? What Christmas tells them: that Jesus’ mother was the Virgin Mary, that He was born in a stable, that wise men followed a star to his home, and that angels sang to shepherds. Christmas is Christian enough to upset non-Christians, who object to crèches on public property and want to substitute “Happy Holidays” for “Merry Christmas,” and prefer the schmaltzy “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas,” (or worse) to the profound, “Oh Come All Ye Faithful.” Like the “wise men,” whose false astrology led them to the true King, so America’s popular Christmas holiday sets some of the truth about Jesus before all Americans once a year. And for that result we are glad.
But the Church has no need or warrant for a special Christmas worship service. In fact, we could greet each other and even visitors every Lord’s Day, and at every Communion, with the words, “Merry Christmas.”
Obituary:
Carmine Cafasso, Cambridge RPC
On February 15th, our friend and brother Carmine Cafasso went to be with the Lord at the age of 84.
Carmine had been a Christian for decades when he began worshiping with us in 2005, and by the time he joined a few months later, he was eagerly serving others in our church. He continued to bear good fruit in his old age, and he was deeply loved.
He led an interesting and vigorous life. After high school, he was drafted by the Red Sox but instead joined the Army and fought in the Korean War. He worked as a stockbroker, a salesman, and a taxi driver. He owned a gas station during the 1973 oil crisis and worked for Airborne Express for 20 years. He helped raise nine children. In his seventies, when most folks are retired, he bought a UPS store and worked there until he was 81.
I’d known Carmine for a few years when I invited him to share his testimony in an adult Sabbath School class. He began this way: “When I was eight years old, my father hanged himself in our basement. My mother, who found him, refused to go near our basement for the rest of her life. This made it possible for me to shoot dice there with my friends, which was the beginning of my addiction to gambling.”
Carmine was a man who knew many sorrows: addiction, the loss of a son to suicide, the weight of caring for a wife dying of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis and a daughter dying of cancer. But many people never knew these things about him. In the Cambridge congregation and at White Lake Camp, he was known for kindness, generosity, and his love for Jesus and his people. In his last months, the loss of freedom that accompanied his increasing need for medical care greatly frustrated him. But now he is with his Lord; his frustrations are ended. When we see him next, I fully expect that Carmine will greet us with the closing words of his answering machine message: “Praise the Lord Jesus Christ!”
-- Tom Fisher