At Synod and throughout the next year, the CRC will be considering whether or not the Belhar Confession should become one of the confessions of the denomination. The RCA voted to include the Belhar in its confessions last year. I suspect there will be plenty of discussion around this decision, and there will be valid points raised on both sides of the issue. I’m far less concerned about whether or not the Belhar is an official confession of a church, and far more interested in seeing it lived out by the Church.
My experience with the Belhar confession has been one in which some are immediately drawn to it and passionate about it. Those who have shown a desire to bring the Belhar into our Reformed traditions include many church planters, those in racial/ethnic congregations, seminarians and youth leaders. This is a generalization and obviously, not everyone listed above would agree with this or fit into this category.
I really want to focus on how the Belhar confession relates to youth ministry. If you haven’t read the Belhar, please do so. There are also Belhar study guides from Faith Alive and from the Reformed Church in America that are useful in understanding the confession. This confession and the vision of unity and reconciliation in the Church of Christ “preaches” to youth. It supplements our existing creeds and confessions, it’s Biblical, and it’s an outward expression of the love, patience, and forgiveness of Jesus to our lost and broken world. If you are looking for a youth group topic or additional material to bring on service projects, check out the Belhar Confession.
So there you have it. A short, opinionated blog. I figure that if I keep this short, you’ll have time to check out the Belhar Confession on the link provided.