Relevance of the reformed church polity principles: An analysis of the constitution of the Reformed Church of East Africa (RCEA)

Abstract

This paper drawing to the foundations of both Presbyterian and Reformed church polity principles, evaluates the constitution of the Reformed Church in East Africa providing a proposed church order for the future of RCEA. The distinctiveness of church law is that it must also derive from the Bible what entails Christ’s will for His church and then implement it for contemporary times (Coertzen, 1998, p. 7). In Church and Order, A Reformed Perspective the principles of Reformed Church law and church government are exclusively and extensively treated as well as the historical development of Reformed church government and the practice of the subject as part of the theological curriculum.Presbyterianism negates that all church power vests in the clergy: that the apostolic office is perpetual, and that each individual Christian congregation is independent. It is upon this principle that RCEA was born having adopted the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church of East Africa (PCEA) in 1963 prompted by the government’s requirement to be registered as an organization. However, whether the Reformed Church in East Africa (RCEA) is Reformed or Presbyterian in its government is a question to be discerned.