Evangelicals and the fall of the Church of Scotland

Though it was an inevitable outcome, there is still deep sorrow for the decision of the Church of Scotland at its General Assembly to allow ministers and churches to conduct same-sex marriages.

There are many lessons for the wider evangelical church to learn, not least the role that evangelicals played in this decision.

There were, and are, those who spoke out boldly in favour of the Christian position. For example, the Revd Phil Gunn, minister of Rosskeen Parish Church in Ross-shire, asked the Assembly: ‘A church that does not provoke any crisis, preach a gospel that does not unsettle, proclaim a word of God that does not get under anyone’s skin or a word of God that does not touch the real sin of the society in which it is being proclaimed, what kind of gospel is that?’ But overall, the weakness of the evangelicals and the lack of leadership meant that the opposition has been ineffective and fruitless. Indeed, some evangelicals even facilitated the change in doctrine – apparently more concerned about keeping their fellow evangelicals on board than they were for the truth of God’s word.