The Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Bible Presbyterian Church

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church originated in 1936 when a group of pastors and elders departed from the Presbyterian Church-U.S.A., prompted by the suspension of J. Gresham Machen and J. Oliver Buswell, Jr., who had supported an independent mission board to ensure biblical teaching on Presbyterian mission fields.[1]

The two denominations diverged almost immediately. Internal conflict emerged quickly, with doctrinal differences, ethical disagreements, and church governance disputes leading Buswell, Carl McIntire, Allan MacRae, and others to separate and establish the Bible Presbyterian Church in 1937.[1] While the Orthodox Presbyterian Church focused on classical Reformed theology and church life, the Bible Presbyterian Church emphasized cultural engagement, including alcohol abstinence, and premillennial theology—the belief that Christ’s return is both necessary to save the world and imminent.[2]

At its first synod, the Bible Presbyterian Church amended the Westminster standards to teach premillennialism, established a piety requiring abstinence from alcohol, created a church government allowing greater local autonomy, and developed a distinctive denominational “testimony” for biblical authority that produced a separatist stance demanding separation from apostasy and those in fellowship with apostates.[1] This separatist posture ultimately isolated the denomination and hindered evangelistic efforts.[1]

Both denominations experienced fragmentation. Disagreements during the 1950s over the Bible Presbyterian Church’s association with Carl McIntire’s councils and agency autonomy prompted McIntire’s withdrawal in 1956, while the majority continued until 1961, when they renamed themselves the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.[1] The Bible Presbyterian Church, led charismatically by McIntire, experienced multiple subsequent splits into smaller pieces, with McIntire maintaining leadership of the continuing core group until his death in 2002.[2]

Despite institutional decline, the Bible Presbyterian Church’s cultural influence proved significant, producing Francis Schaeffer, the first minister ordained by the denomination, and founding both Covenant College and Covenant Theological Seminary, now institutions of considerable strength and influence.[2]

[1] Daniel G. Reid et al., “Bible,” in Dictionary of Christianity in America (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1990). [See here, here, here, here, here.]
[2] Timothy J. Demy and Paul R. Shockley, Evangelical America: An Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Religious Culture (New York, NY: ABC-CLIO, 2017). [See here, here, here, here, here.]