Yes MamaD, it makes you wonder:1) Who was Jim McCotter accountable to back then?2) What opportunities did Jim and others have to cover up sin? Probably didn't happen in the beginning...but how about when business ventures came along? Sick50...newspapers...other media...Jim had to have a beginning of the molding of character that he now has.3) It is a challenge to think of the problems GC now has and then try and work your way back to the beginning...finding those "core beliefs" and what came from Jim McCotter. Does anyone know which specific GC doctrine, beliefs, habbits or tendencies which came from Jim?
Finally, I know this is a hodge podge comment, but you can't talk about authority without talking about how someone rises to that position and what limits their authority has (back to the jurisdiction comment).
Keep in mind, at some point in the early 70's a few men got together and "recognized" themselves and from that point on the leadership chain has been self-perpetuating.
One other thing that haunts me. At the meeting when it was clear to us that we had to leave (after Mark Darling suggested it would be better if we left rather than stay and try to change things and we realized that things were as they were by design), I said, "You know that plurality of leaders thing can work as a cover up for sin. It seems like a pastor could have an affair and the elders would know about it, but the congregation never would find out about it."
To this he (Mark Darling) said, "I'm sure it's happened."
Now, I have no idea what he was talking about, but the fact that a pastor would admit that there was a possibility that sin had been covered up among the elders is astonishing and frightening. It is especially frightening in a system where people are taught to obey their leaders.
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