The Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) has voted to take a deep dive into Jesus Calling, one of the best-selling books in modern Christian literature. Some 45 million copies of the book, written by the late author Sarah Young, have been sold.
Delegates to the PCA’s 51st General Assembly voted last week to launch the investigation by a vote of 947-834 with 20 abstentions.
Two church committees will spend the coming year investigating Jesus Calling. Their work will include assessing the book’s “appropriateness for Christians” and preparing reports for the PCA.
“The committees must look at the denominational agencies’ history with the book and must ‘assess the book’s appropriateness for Christians in general and PCA members and congregations in particular….’” according to Christianity Today.
Therein Lies the Problem
Young wrote the book, which contains 365 devotionals, as if Christ were speaking directly to the reader — and therein lies the problem for many. “Pastors in the denomination are concerned that Young’s use of the voice of Jesus in the book undermines the concept of sola Scriptura and might amount to heresy,” Christianity Today reported.
Sola Scriptura means scripture alone, explained Ligonier Ministries, an international Christian discipleship organization. In other words, the Bible is the supreme authority and the only truth we need.
Christians have debated the belief for centuries. Catholics venerate tradition as well as scripture, while Protestants rallied around sola Scriptura during the Protestant Reformation in the early 16th century and continue to do so.
About Jesus Calling
Jesus Calling “originated from Young’s spiritual practice of ‘listening prayer’ where she would journal what she felt the Holy Spirit was telling her,” explained Ministry Watch, an independent evangelical organization.
“These messages eventually found their way to Integrity Publishers through a women’s prayer group. The publishers liked what they read and asked if she would write a year-long devotional based on her entries.”
Young, a biblical conservative, authored numerous books that she intended as encouragement to readers. She said she hoped her books would help people connect with God’s infallible and inerrant Word and find their own intimacy with Christ, according to Ministry Watch.
The author, who died in 2023, had a master’s degree in biblical studies and counseling from Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Ministry Watch said. A member of the PCA, she worked with the PCA mission board for many years and served – along with her husband Steve — as a missionary to Japan and Australia for many years. Steve Young is an ordained minister and PCA elder.
Investigating Jesus Calling
Benjamin Inman, the PCA pastor who brought Jesus Calliing before the PCA General Assembly, has said the book “promotes ostensibly grave errors and has been firmly rejected by influential public figures within, and theologically akin to the PCA.”
He objected that in the book, “(Jesus) speaks. He comforts. He counsels. He calls for devotion, These readings are not about Jesus, rather they are pithy paragraphs spoken by Jesus….
“Imagine the same procedure shifted into public worship: the preacher pretends to be Jesus, from start to finish for 30 minutes like a method actor, never breaking character.” The sermon would be memorable, Inman said, but “theologically, the contents are a carefully crafted abomination.”
Inman has specifically cited criticism of Jesus Calling by Kathy Keller of Redeemer Church in New York, author and blogger Alan Miller on CNN and Canadian Reformed Baptist theologian, pastor and author Tim Challies.
Keller criticized the book, saying, “If Sarah Young, the author of the words attributed to Jesus, had only used ‘He’ instead of ‘I’ in her book, about half of my objection to it would be gone. However, in publishing these as messages she received from ‘listening to God,’ she has left us in a quandary.”
Young acknowledged in the introduction to Jesus Calling that the book isn’t inspired scripture and that the Bible is the only inerrant Word of God, Keller said. She then questioned why Young wrote about Jesus in the first person in the rest of the book. “If it is not truly Jesus speaking, she could have said ‘Jesus wants you to come to him and have rest in him.’”
Alan Miller criticized Young and others who “yearn for more” than the Bible in his CNN Belief Blog I’m-Spiritual-Not-Religious. “(This) attitude fits with the message we are receiving more and more that ‘feeling’ something somehow is more pure and perhaps, more ‘true’ than having to fit in with the doctrine, practices, rules and observations of a formal institution that are handed down to us.”
Challies said Jesus Calling is “a deeply troubling book” and called out 10 “serious problems” with it:
- Young speaks for God, which is “far and away the most troubling aspect of the book.”
- The author says the Bible is insufficient and wants to hear from God outside of it.
- She claims “listening” is the “chief spiritual discipline,” rather than turning to scripture.
- Young was inspired by “untrustworthy models” such as the book God Calling.
- Her “revelation” is lesser than the Bible’s.
- Young’s book “mimics occult practices” such as automatic writing.
- Her emphasis is different than the Bible’s.
- The tone of Jesus Calling is unlike the Bible’s tone.
- Young causes confusion.
- Jesus Calling has been revised, including some of the words she claimed came directly from Christ.
Defending the Author
Steve Young spoke against the investigation into his late wife’s book during the PCA’s debate over investigating it. “Sarah (was) a sister in Christ and wife who delighted in the law of the Lord, and on his law she meditated day and night. She was led to share her meditations with the world,” he insisted.
He said his wife’s writings “did not add to Scripture but explain(ed) it. She would stand with Martin Luther and declare that her conscience was captive to the Word of God.” Young, herself, said people should read the devotionals with their Bibles open.
During the PCA’s debate, church leader Jerid Krulish called the investigation “a fishing expedition” and “a waste of these committees’ time.”
Christianity Today pointed out that the original legislation came from an individual pastor – Benjamin Inman. “Most pieces of legislation come from a presbytery. The lack of support for the measure from a presbytery didn’t bode well for its chances at a denominational level.”
A PCA committee amended the original legislation to “be milder and more palatable to the assembly.” The changes included removing “language condemning Young for publishing a book guilty of idolatry….”Christianity Today said. It was an amended version that the PCA General Assembly approved last week.
