Editor’s Note: Rev. Philip Vinod Peacock, general secretary of the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC), addressed the Synod of the Christian Reformed Church in North America prior to the latter voting to leave the WCRC. Below is the text of that speech.

Mr. President, General Secretary, delegates of Synod, sisters and brothers in Christ, 

Grace and peace to you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

Allow me first to express my gratitude for the opportunity to address this Synod, and for the long and faithful witness of the Christian Reformed Church in North America. The CRCNA has made an extraordinary contribution to the life of the global church through mission, theological reflection, education, diaconal service, and ecumenical engagement. Across many parts of the world, churches have been strengthened by your partnership, your generosity, and your witness to Jesus Christ. Over these past days I have witnessed the discernment of this Synod, and I have admired the prayerfulness and the seriousness with which you have sought together the mind of Christ. 

I come before you not only as the General Secretary of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, but as a fellow Christian and a fellow member of the Reformed family. I come not to relitigate questions that this Synod has weighed with seriousness and prayer, but to speak about communion: what it means for churches to remain in fellowship with one another as members of the one body of Christ. 

The World Communion of Reformed Churches is not a church over churches. We do not govern our member churches, determine their doctrine, or diminish their autonomy. We are a communion of churches who freely choose to walk together in common witness, mutual learning, and shared service to the gospel. 

The word communion itself is important. Communion is not the same as agreement. If communion required complete agreement on every matter, there could be no communion at all. Communion exists precisely because Christians and churches continue to discern together the leading of the Holy Spirit while confessing the same Lord. The New Testament bears witness to communities wrestling with disagreement, and again and again the apostolic word calls the church not first to uniformity, but to faithfulness, to charity, and to unity in Christ. 

Our tradition has long understood itself through the phrase ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda secundum verbum Dei, the church reformed and always being reformed according to the Word of God. This phrase is often misunderstood. It does not mean that the church should endlessly change with the spirit of the age. Nor does it mean that the church should abandon what it has faithfully received. It is a confession that the church belongs not to itself but to Jesus Christ, who continually calls the people of God to renewed faithfulness through Scripture and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

At the heart of our tradition lies a profound confidence: that God has spoken fully in Jesus Christ, to whom Holy Scripture bears faithful witness, and that in him we encounter the truth by which all else is measured. Yet that same tradition teaches us, with Calvin, that God accommodates the divine self to our weakness, and that we who receive this Word remain finite, fallible, and always in need of correction. Our confidence rests not in the perfection of our own understanding, but in the faithfulness of the One who reveals God’s self to us.

When the Apostle Paul says that now we see in a mirror dimly, he is not doubting that there is a face to be seen. He is confessing that the Word stands over us, judging and reforming even our most cherished certainties. To be Reformed, therefore, is not only to confess; it is also to listen. This humility does not weaken conviction. It sanctifies it.

I want to be clear about something, because honesty is the truest form of respect between sisters and brothers. I do not hear the concerns raised in this Synod as a distaste for difference. I hear in them the desire of faithful people to be obedient to Scripture and to Christ. That desire I honor, because I share it. The question before us was never whether to be faithful. It is whether faithfulness requires us to walk apart. 

And just as I honor the discernment of this Synod, I would ask you to honor ours. The communion to which I belong has also discerned, in conscience and through prayer, commitments that it holds as matters of faithfulness and justice. Among them is our conviction regarding the full dignity and calling of women in the church and in the world. We do not hold this lightly, and we cannot unsay what we believe the Spirit has shown us. I name it not to reopen the argument, but because we would not honor you by pretending our convictions are smaller than they are. Respect between churches is not the absence of conviction. It is the willingness to remain in relationship while holding it. 

Perhaps this is one of the gifts of communion. We remain at the table not because we have resolved every difference, but because we trust that God is not finished with any of us. We continue to speak, to listen, to pray, and to discern together, believing that the Spirit who has guided the church through the centuries has not ceased to guide it today.

Our Lord prayed that his followers may be one, so that the world may believe. Our unity is therefore not merely institutional. It is missional. At a time when the world is increasingly marked by polarization, fragmentation, and division, there is something profoundly countercultural in churches choosing to remain in relationship across their differences. To do so is not a sign of weakness. It is an act of discipleship and a witness to the reconciling work of God in Jesus Christ. 

I recognize that this Synod carries significant responsibilities and must act according to conscience and conviction. Whatever decision you make will be received seriously and respectfully. Yet I would humbly ask that, in your deliberations, you weigh not only the differences that separate us, but the witness we have borne together, the friendships we have forged, the ministries we have shared, and the possibilities that remain when churches continue to walk together in faith. 

For communion is not ultimately our achievement. It is God’s gift. We do not create the unity of the church; we receive it from Christ, who through his life, death, and resurrection has already made us one. 

And because this unity is God’s gift before it is our task, no decision taken in this hall can finally undo it. Whatever you choose, you will not cease to be our sisters and brothers in Christ, and the door of this communion will not be closed by us. 

For we trust that the God who has begun a good work in us will bring it to completion in Jesus Christ our Lord. 

Whatever is decided here, I pray that it may be marked by charity, by wisdom, and by grace, and that above all we may continue to recognize one another as those who seek, however imperfectly, to follow Jesus Christ faithfully in our time. 

May the Spirit guide your deliberations, grant you wisdom, and lead us all more deeply into the truth and love of God. 

Thank you.