Yesterday, Sarah and I met with the Judicial Commission from Heritage Presbytery over our recent complaints. It was difficult for me to imagine it possible for anything but a decisive answer to come from the Commission, so it surprises me now to say that I really have no idea how it went.

Of course, if success could be measured by the number of photocopies made, it was an extremely successful meeting. 🙂

We arrived at Heritage Presbyterian Church about 15 minutes early, and the Commission was already there. When we walked in, they let us know that they weren’t quite ready for us, so Sarah and I waited outside. We were very surprised when Elder Ray Doreian showed up 5 minutes after us, sick as a dog. He told us that he’s been suffering with a bacterial infection for the last two weeks. He definitely looked it. We were glad he was there, though.

I did ask Ray what his status was with being on the session, as the last I heard, it was announced that he was stepping down from the Session as of the first of the year. He said that he was staying on indefinitely, but didn’t elaborate, so I didn’t press the issue.

Around 9:30, we were invited into the meeting to begin. Jim Sauer and Wayne Brauning had not arrived yet, but Ray, Sarah and I went into the area where they had a table set up. The commission had set up at one end of the table, and Sarah and I sat in the middle of the table at the other end.

Bruce Howes, the Clerk of Heritage Presbytery, gave a little background on the complaint, and said there was some shuffling of commission members. I’m not sure if I wrote about this or not, but the commission meeting was originally scheduled for last week, but due to another Presbytery matter, it had to be rescheduled to this week. I was favorably impressed, though, with the men who were chosen to be on the commission, and appreciate the time they took out of their Saturday to sit down with us.

Here are the pages the Session included in their handout. There is a lot of information there that Sarah and I didn’t know about until the meeting. (page 1, 2, 3, 4).

We started out going over the first complaint regarding Simon and Mike being excluded from the Session meeting. If you read the complain, my argument is strictly a polity issue, so it surprised me when the Session took the “we thought it was best” defense. Of course, if you’re not allowed to do it, it doesn’t matter how altruistic your motivation is. I continually tried to steer it back to the polity question, and I think the commissioners understood the question. We probably spent about an hour back and forth on that issue, and honestly, I have no idea how the commissioners are going to decide.

Of course, the second complaint took must more time than the first. It touches on a much more personal issue, since, in a nutshell, it directly accuses the Session of not doing their job properly. It started out rather oddly, since it seemed Jim and I seemed to be talking past each other a lot. I think we reached the root of the confusion when Jim said, “I really don’t understand this complaint… initially, Tom had issues because we were pursuing charges, now he’s complaining because we’re not pursuing charges.” Thankfully, it was not left to me to correct him, since several members of the commission saw the problem with Jim’s perspective (and they were correct). They noted that the issue was not that the session failed to file charges… the issue was that the session seemed to be going down the road towards process by appointing an investigation committee, and then short circuited the whole thing by instituting punitive measures.

We went back and forth for a while, and you can tell the commission was made of men who really cared, since they were all trying to find out what the root problems really were. Sadly, it was not their job to actually counsel us, but to decide on the complaints. Perhaps the Presbytery will get the opportunity to counsel in the future.

Overall, I have no idea what the result will be. Dad said there is a Presbytery meeting this Saturday where the decision will be given. The commission gives the decision, and the Presbytery signs off on it. It’s totally out of my hands now, and I can only trust the results to our sovereign God.