Pursuing a Unified Vision for Mission and Renewal in the PCA
At this year’s PCA General Assembly, the Alliance for Mission and Renewal (AMR) hosted a candid and hopeful conversation on the state of the denomination. Led by Joel St. Clair and joined by Jenilyn Swett, Sean Lucas, and David Cassidy, the panel explored the health of the PCA, its greatest challenges and opportunities, and the role AMR can play in cultivating unity, trust, and mission. The discussion ranged from denominational “vital signs” to the recovery of listening, the renewal of trust, and the call to re-center on the Great Commission.
Listen to the seminar below.
Listen to the rest of the seminars from the 2025 PCA General Assembly.
Highlights from the Seminar Discussion
1. The Health of the PCA
Local churches are often thriving, showing vitality and growth.
At the denominational level, mistrust, missed opportunities, and fatigue have taken a toll.
“Two things can be true at once”—the church can be both fruitful and in need of healing.
2. Main Challenges and Opportunities
Mission Drift: The PCA risks turning inward at a moment of evangelistic opportunity.
Generational Engagement: Younger believers long to be part of something larger than themselves; the church must invite them into mission.
Loss of Trust: Scandals and division have weakened confidence in institutions; rebuilding trust requires long, slow, relational work.
Loneliness in Ministry: AMR can help foster connection and co-labor among pastors and leaders.
Women in the Church: The PCA is “impoverished” when half its members are sidelined; AMR encourages recovering women’s full gospel calling.
3. AMR’s Role
Producing content that models charitable, thoughtful dialogue on contested issues.
Encouraging co-labor and relational trust through listening, lament, and shared learning.
Advocating for women’s meaningful participation in ministry.
Hosting forums and media that embody Christ-like speech and honest disagreement.
Serving as a connective tissue for leaders who feel isolated or discouraged.
4. The Big Tent Vision
The PCA’s diversity of worship and ministry expression is “a feature, not a bug.”
Founders resisted centralization; grassroots mission should remain the norm.
Despite growing polarization, the Big Tent remains worth defending as a beautiful expression of shared faith and cooperation.
5. Encouragement for the Weary
Replace venting with lament—bring discouragement before God together.
Hope grows through community: “Despair thrives in isolation; hope is our superpower.”
Remember: “This is still Jesus’s church—He bought it with His blood.”
6. Practical Steps Toward Health
Listen: Seek out someone you disagree with and ask them to tell their story.
Participate: Serve on committees, attend presbyteries, stay engaged.
Include: Men—listen to women in your congregations and learn from their experiences.
Connect: Build relational networks of encouragement and shared mission.
This makes me distressed and angry. I have been in the PCA for thirty years. My hands and feet are worn out from service. We are told that our hard work that we are *already doing* -- raising children in the home, exhaustion from homeschooling, helping our brothers and sisters in the church -- prayer, small groups, food, teaching little ones, getting spit on in the nursery -- isn't "meaningful." I have a worn-out body from all the work I do. I do it because I love the Lord, and I would rather be a doorkeeper in His service than be "recognized" in some worldly way by mere men. Stop demoralizing women because Progressive Elders are too lazy to do their own jobs.
Sidelined? I have not encountered this. And exactly what IS this "women’s full gospel calling" that needs to be recovered? It was never defined. What exactly are we missing? Those of us who have served for decades in the church because of our love for our Lord and His body have Jesus as our Great Reward, and that is enough.