The Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC) is an American church body holding to

presbyterian Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their n ...

governance and

Reformed theology Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Calv ...

. It is most distinctive for its approach to the way it balances certain liberties across congregations on "non-essential" doctrines, such as

egalitarianism Egalitarianism (), or equalitarianism, is a school of thought within political philosophy that builds from the concept of social equality, prioritizing it for all people. Egalitarian doctrines are generally characterized by the idea that all h ...

in marriage or the ordination of women, alongside an affirmation of core "essential" doctrinal standards. The motto of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church is " In Essentials, Unity. In Non-Essentials, Liberty. In All Things, Charity; Truth In Love." The Office of the

General Assembly A general assembly or general meeting is a meeting of all the members of an organization or shareholders of a company. Specific examples of general assembly include: Churches * General Assembly (presbyterian church), the highest court of pres ...

is in

Orlando, Florida Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures re ...

History

The EPC began as a result of

prayer meeting A prayer meeting is a group of lay people getting together for the purpose of prayer as a group. Prayer meetings are typically conducted outside regular services by one or more members of the clergy or other forms of religious leadership, but the ...

s in 1980 and 1981 by pastors and elders increasingly alienated by

liberalism Liberalism is a Political philosophy, political and moral philosophy based on the Individual rights, rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law."political rationalism, hostilit ...

in the "northern" branch of Presbyterianism (the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., a predecessor of the

Presbyterian Church (USA) The Presbyterian Church (USA), abbreviated PC(USA), is a mainline Protestant denomination in the United States. It is the largest Presbyterian denomination in the US, and known for its liberal stance on doctrine and its ordaining of women and ...

). Two cases served as important catalysts in their separation: the Kenyon Case of 1975 and the Kaseman Case of 1981. Wynn Kenyon was a seminary graduate who in good conscience declared that he would refuse to participate in the ordination of a woman, although he affirmed that he would willingly serve in a pastorate with ordained women on the staff. Though he had been ordained by the Pittsburgh Presbytery, in 1975 the Permanent Judicial Commission of the UPCUSA General Assembly overturned Kenyon's ordination because accepting women's ordination was "an explicit constitutional provision." Mansfield Kaseman, meanwhile was ordained as a minister by National Capital Union Presbytery in 1979 and accused of denying four traditional attributes of Christ: his deity, sinlessness, vicarious atonement, and bodily resurrection. By 1981, his case had worked its way to the Permanent Judicial Commission of the UPCUSA, which affirmed his ordination. In contrast with the UPCUSA, the EPC permitted differing views on women's ordination and emphasized traditional teachings on the nature of Jesus Christ. The first general assembly of the church met at Ward Presbyterian Church in

Livonia, Michigan Livonia is a city in Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 95,535 at the 2020 census, which ranked it as Michigan's ninth most-populated municipality. Livonia is a part of Metro Detroit and is located about west of th ...

in late 1981, drafting a list of essential beliefs. This list was intentionally short in order to help preserve the unity of the church around the essentials of the faith in theology, church government, and

evangelism In Christianity, evangelism (or witnessing) is the act of preaching the gospel with the intention of sharing the message and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians who specialize in evangelism are often known as evangelists, whether they are ...

. At its foundation, the EPC adopted a list of essential beliefs, "The Essentials of Our Faith," to state what the EPC views as the ''sine qua non'' of Evangelical Christianity (see below), in part to seek to guarantee that it would not succumb to the theological problems that had plagued its parent denominations during the Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy. "The Essentials" is a fuller version of the " Five Fundamentals" that many PCUSA ministers had rejected in the Auburn Affirmation of 1923. Originally titled "The Fundamentals of Our Faith," the name was changed to avoid the negative connotations that the term "fundamentalism" had gained. This document has served to assure that the EPC has always kept what is of primary importance for all

evangelical Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being " born again", in which an individual expe ...

Christians (namely the Gospel, or Good News about Jesus), as well as to maintain the irenic orthodoxy that has always been the hallmark of the denomination. (See "Ethos," below.) Central Presbyterian NYC 2020

In the more than thirty years of its existence, the EPC has become active as a missional church, through church planting in the United States as well as in a variety of foreign fields, particularly in the

10/40 Window The 10/40 Window is a term coined by Christian missionary strategist and Partners International CEO Luis Bush in 1990 to refer to those regions of the eastern hemisphere, plus the European and African part of the western hemisphere, located betwee ...

. One significant step was the incorporation of the St. Andrews Presbytery (Argentina) as one of its presbyteries. This presbytery was released to independence as the national St. Andrews Presbyterian Church of Argentina after many years of mutual cooperation and benefit. At 2007 General Assembly, the EPC created a temporary, non-geographic "New Wineskins Presbytery" (NWEPC) to provide a home for churches associated with the New Wineskins Association of Churches (NWAC) that are seeking to find a new denominational home after finding that their home in the PC(USA) is no longer suitable to them theologically, organizationally, or missionally. The New Wineskins Presbytery was dissolved in 2011, as its mission was completed. Jeff Jeremiah, the stated clerk (2006 - 2021), announced at the 2012 General Assembly, held at the First Presbyterian Church of

Baton Rouge, Louisiana Baton Rouge ( ; ) is a city in and the List of capitals in the United States, capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. Located the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, it is the county seat, parish seat of East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana, E ...

, that the number of EPC congregations had increased from 182 in 2007 to 364 in 2012, exactly doubling in number. The number of congregations had further increased to more than 600 by August 2017.

Statistics

Between 1982 and 2016, EPC grew steadily. In 2016, the denomination reached 150,042 members. However, since then, it has reported a decline in subsequent years. In 2020, it had 125,418 members and 630 churches.

Essentials

The church has an official seven point statement of the "Essentials Of Our Faith". These Essentials are set forth in greater detail in the

Westminster Confession of Faith The Westminster Confession of Faith is a Reformed confession of faith. Drawn up by the 1646 Westminster Assembly as part of the Westminster Standards to be a confession of the Church of England, it became and remains the "subordinate standard" o ...

. The EPC has also adopted an explanation of the relationship between the "Essentials of Our Faith" and the Westminster Standards.

Place in American Presbyterianism

As its name suggests, the EPC is an evangelical denomination. It associates mainly with Reformed bodies holding similar or identical beliefs regarding Christology, ecclesiology, and ethical/moral stances. As with practically all orthodox Presbyterian bodies, the EPC is committed to Biblical interpretation governed by the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms. The EPC is member of the

World Communion of Reformed Churches The World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC) is the largest association of Calvinist churches in the world. It has 230 member denominations in 108 countries, together claiming an estimated 80 million people, thus being the fourth-largest Chris ...

Being within the Reformed tradition, the EPC is more conservative than the PC(USA) on matters of theology and ethics, yet is more moderate than the major conservative Presbyterian denominations in the United States—the

Presbyterian Church in America The Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) is the second-largest Presbyterian church body, behind the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the largest conservative Calvinist denomination in the United States. The PCA is Reformed in theology and presb ...

(PCA), the

Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church The Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC), as it exists today, is the historical descendant of the Synod of the South, a Synod of the Associate Reformed Church. The original Associate Reformed Church resulted from a merger of the Associate ...

(ARPC) and the

Orthodox Presbyterian Church The Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) is a confessional Presbyterian denomination located primarily in the United States, with additional congregations in Canada, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico. It was founded by conservative members of the Presbyter ...

(OPC). The EPC's middling stance is similar to ECO: A Covenant Order of Evangelical Presbyterians, which was formed in 2012 from churches leaving the PC(USA). The EPC's ethos (summarized in its motto) allows a greater degree of freedom in areas deemed to be non-essential to Reformed theology than the PCA, ARP and OPC. The EPC, like ECO and PCUSA, but unlike PCA or OPC, belongs to the World Communion of Reformed Churches.

Women's ordination and charismatic movement

Two examples of the EPC's centrist position within American Presbyterianism are women's ordination and the

charismatic movement The charismatic movement in Christianity is a movement within established or mainstream Christian denominations to adopt beliefs and practices of Charismatic Christianity with an emphasis on baptism with the Holy Spirit, and the use of sp ...

. The EPC considers the ordination of women to be a non-essential matter that is left to the ordaining body. That is, EPC presbyteries decide whether to ordain female ministers, while individual churches decide whether to ordain female elders and deacons. In contrast, the ARP does not ordain female ministers or elders but allows individual churches to ordain female deacons, and the PCA and OPC do not ordain women. The EPC is far more tolerant of the charismatic movement than other conservative Presbyterian bodies; some of the more prominent charismatic Presbyterian churches in America are members of the EPC.

Ethos

The EPC has been described as the modern-day version of New School Presbyterianism,Fortson, S. Donald, The Presbyterian Creed: A Confessional Tradition in America, 17291870, Paternoster Press, 2008. while the PCA, ARP and OPC are essentially the modern-day equivalent of Old School Presbyterianism. The way that this is expressed is in the motto of the denomination: "In Essentials, Unity; In Non-Essentials, Liberty; In All Things, Charity. Truth in Love." Functionally, this works out with a three-tiered approach to theological issues. These may be thought of as "A," "B," and "C" issues. "A" issues are those which have to do with the "Essentials of Our Faith." This is a summary of those issues which are foundational to Christian faith. In the EPC, there is no allowance for disagreement among church officers (ministers, elders, and deacons) on these issues. Indeed, it is expected that all communicant members will affirm these tenets of the faith. "B" issues are those which are essential to the Reformed understanding of the faith, such as the so-called "Five Points of Calvinism," Covenant Theology, Presbyterian government, etc. The definition of "B" issues for the EPC is found in the

and in the Westminster Larger Catechism and

Westminster Shorter Catechism The Westminster Shorter Catechism is a catechism written in 1646 and 1647 by the Westminster Assembly, a synod of English and Scottish theologians and laymen intended to bring the Church of England into greater conformity with the Church of Sco ...

. As these issues aren't as foundational as the Essentials of Our Faith, the EPC allows ministers, elders, and deacons to state exceptions to the Westminster Standards, so long as these exceptions do not violate the system of doctrine contained therein. While non-ordained members aren't expected to adhere to the Westminster Standards, it is understood that the teaching position of the EPC is found in the Westminster Standards. Finally, "C" issues are those on which Reformed, orthodox Christians can disagree, and which do not violate the system of doctrine of the EPC. As stated above, this would include the issues of women's ordination and the charismatic movement, as well as issues such as

eschatology Eschatology (; ) concerns expectations of the end of the present age, human history, or of the world itself. The end of the world or end times is predicted by several world religions (both Abrahamic and non-Abrahamic), which teach that nega ...

(views on the End times), worship preferences, or liturgy.

Notable Members

Andrew Brunson Andrew Craig Brunson (born January 3, 1968) is an American pastor and a teaching elder of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church. Brunson was an evangelical pastor of the Izmir Resurrection Church, a small Protestant church with about 24 cong ...

- A missionary to Turkey who was imprisoned and then released after pressures by President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...

R. Craig Strickland - Founding pastor of Hope Presbyterian Church Dr. Dean Weaver - Stated Clerk

Josh Hawley Joshua David Hawley (born December 31, 1979) is an American politician and lawyer who has served as the junior United States senator from Missouri since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, Hawley served as the 42nd attorney general of Mi ...

- Junior Senator from Missouri (R) Dr. Paul Branch - President of Central American Theological Seminary
SETECA

References

External links

*
Book of Order for the EPC
* http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/412024/New-School-Presbyterian-Church * {{Presbyterian Church in the United States of America Presbyterian denominations in the United States Evangelical denominations in North America Members of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches Christian organizations established in 1981 Presbyterian denominations established in the 20th century Members of the World Communion of Reformed Churches Members of the World Reformed Fellowship Members of the National Association of Evangelicals Evangelical Presbyterian Church (United States)