I just got back from the Annual Meeting of my network of churches, the Southern Baptist Convention. The Convention met in Indianapolis, Indiana this week, and I enjoyed seeing many old friends and meeting new friends. I came home excited for mission and ministry. Here are some of the things I’m thinking about after our meeting.
The Southern Baptist Convention
The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) is a network of local churches that work together for mission. We are united in our beliefs and our desire to reach the world with the gospel. Every year, the SBC gathers for a two-day meeting of business. The business meeting follows the parliamentary procedures of Robert’s Rules of Order. If you’ve ever been in a meeting that wrote down minutes and had voting, you’ve experienced this kind of thing. Or maybe you’ve seen it in Congress on C-SPAN.
The SBC only exists for two days a year, as thousands of churches send “messengers” who can present business and vote on all sorts of things. Someone said this week, “The point of this meeting is to get all our business done in two days, so we don’t have to think about it for the next 363 days. Then we can do the frontline work of mission and ministry.” I appreciate that, because the “drama” and “politics” of the SBC can take a lot of focus and energy on social media, but that’s not where Jesus is saving people or disciples are being made.
The Importance of Convictions
The heart of our Christian life beats with the belief that some things are true. Rock solid. Absolute. Our convictions center around God, the gospel, and the Bible. God is a Trinity, “the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19). God made the world, and people in the world. But people turned away from God. They sinned, and separated from God.
So God the Father sent God the Son to become a human being, Jesus Christ the God-man, who lived a perfect life without sin. Jesus died for sinners on the cross, was buried and raised from the dead. Anyone who turns away from their sins (repents) and turns toward Jesus for forgiveness (faith) will be forgiven and given eternal life.
God and the gospel are revealed in the Bible, God’s perfect Word. The Bible is inerrant, perfect without any errors. This conviction is the center of Southern Baptist life and churches. Everything hangs on this reality.
Southern Baptists have decided together to list our beliefs about God and what the Bible teaches in a statement of faith, called “the Baptist Faith and Message” or “BFM.” A statement of faith is also called a “confession,” because it “states” or “confesses” a group’s beliefs. The SBC adopted the first version of the BFM in 1925, and then revised it in 1963 and 2000. Last year, someone made a motion at the convention to change something in the statement of faith. Even though I agreed with the change, I was concerned that we could make the change so quickly and easily. Many others were equally concerned, so this year the process was changed.
This year, a few people made motions to add the historic Nicene Creed to the statement of faith. The Nicene Creed outlines the doctrine of the Trinity and basic Christian beliefs. All Christian groups believe it, so I think we should add it to our statement of faith. The motions did not come up for debate or vote, in part because of the decisions made to the process for changing the statement of faith. Some online accused the SBC of “rejecting the Nicene Creed.” This accusation misrepresents the reality. The Creed never came up for discussion or vote. I hope we will add it to our statement of faith in the future, and this addition is a real possibility.
The Value of Cooperation
The Cooperative Program
I grew up in a non-denominational church context. So driving 2,500 miles from California to Kentucky to a Southern Baptist seminary shocked me. It shocked me culturally, for sure. It also shocked me because I learned that Southern Baptists had developed a program to cooperate together for missions and theological education. In 1925 the SBC began the Cooperative Program, which allows all Southern Baptist churches to pool their resources. The money ends up in Nashville, where a central committee (the Executive Committee) distributes it to two mission boards, six seminaries, an annuity board, and more. This cooperative effort gives Southern Baptist seminary students half-price tuition. It also fully funds missionaries around the world and substantially funds church plants in North America (like ours, Cross United Church).
One person said this week that he realized that another network would have to spend 150 years to develop such an institutional infrastructure. Cooperation makes it worth enduring the difficulties that sometimes surround the SBC. We commissioned 83 missionaries, many silhouetted behind screens because they couldn’t show their face publicly, being called to dangerous places across the world. I am a Southern Baptist by choice, because of the power and value of cooperation.
The Votes on Female Pastors
Cooperation has its tensions, at times. Years ago, a number of SBC churches started to become more theologically liberal. A group of leaders, from the late 1970s through the 1990s, worked to reform the SBC, and it became more theologically conservative and orthodox again (this is called “the Conservative Resurgence”). Some churches have remained in the SBC who are theologically conservative and orthodox enough to want to cooperate, although they have a less conservative view of women in pastoral ministry. They believe that women can be ordained as pastors, a theological position called “egalitarianism,” which says that men and women are equally able to serve.
In the last two years, the SBC has “removed from friendly cooperation” a number of churches who ordain female pastors, including a church in Virginia this year. The vote to remove the church was 92% in favor, because the SBC is a network that believes that “pastor” is an office reserved for men. This theological position is called “complementarianism,” because it that holds and men and women are equal in value but complementary and different in calling and role.
Another vote came up about whether we should add a legal requirement to the SBC constitution that would prohibit partnership with churches who place women in any pastoral role. Separate to the statement of faith (the confession), the SBC has a constitution, which is its legal charter. Currently, the SBC has three points in the constitution and by-laws that prohibit partnership with churches that enable homosexuality, racism, or sexual abuse.
The change or “amendment” that we debated this year was called “the Law Amendment,” named after Mike Law, the pastor who proposed the change. The Law Amendment would have added a point in our by-laws that would prohibit cooperation with churches who have women as pastors. The by-law needed 66.67% (2/3) of the vote to be adopted, but it was narrowly defeated, getting 61.45%, about 400 votes short. I didn’t think the Law Amendment was necessary, because our convictions are clear in our statement of faith. That said, I ultimately did vote for it, because I believe it reflects our convictions, and my own.
Many who voted against the Amendment did so because they believe we should address this issue differently, not because they believe in ordaining female pastors. In fact, the SBC already showed this year that at least 92% of the gathering was fully complementarian. Likewise, the 8% who voted not to remove the egalitarian church are almost all complementarian themselves. Despite that complementarian belief, they also hold to a wider view of cooperation. Obviously, such a view is a very small minority. The SBC clearly believes that the office of pastor is reserved for men, though a large minority doesn’t think we need to add that point to our legal bylaws.
Above All Things: Love
In all of the work of the SBC this year, I remembered again how much I love this network and family of churches. Some of these folks, as many point out, are like “crazy uncles.” Some of them drive me crazy. But I love them and I want to pursue the Great Commission in cooperation with them. I believe there are three basic groups in the SBC. All are theologically conservative. The word “conservative” in relation to theology can cause confusion, because people can confuse it with political conservatism. I am both theologically and politically conservative, but those are two different discussions. The theological use of “conservative” is the most common way to describe “orthodox” theology, so I will use it here.
Conventional Conservatives. Conventional Conservatives make up the largest group of conservatives in the SBC. They are about 50-60% of the SBC. This group aligns with the SBC’s convictions and cooperative goals. This group is complementarian and theologically conservative, with about half supporting the Law Amendment (some of these descriptions aren’t original to me). The half that voted for the Amendment is more fully aligned with the theological vision of Southern Seminary in Louisville, and a focus on theological precision. The half that voted against the Amendment would align more with the theological vision of the Send Network, and Southeastern Seminary in Raleigh, North Carolina, and a focus on urgent mission. I resonate with both halves, and I’m probably straddling the two in many ways.
The blessing this group brings to the SBC is a collaborative, unifying impulse, that focuses on theology and mission. The blind spot of this group might be a “go-along to get-along” mentality, or “following the crowd.”
Concerned Conservatives. Concerned Conservatives are those I have often called “neo-fundmantalists.” I have decided to retire this term. Even if I don’t mean it as “name-calling,” many take it that way. This group makes up about 30% of the SBC, and is very concerned about liberal drift in the convention. They voted for the Law Amendment and also for the very conservative candidates for SBC President. They resonate with the concerns of Founders Ministries, the Center for Baptist Leadership, and the Conservative Baptist Network.
I told some of these brothers recently that I love them, and I appreciate their continual call to the SBC to remain faithful to the Bible. I don’t always agree with their tactics, but I have grown to appreciate them more than I had before. The blind spot of this group might be divisiveness or an overly narrow definition of what “faithfulness” is.
Compassionate Conservatives. Compassionate Conservatives are more social justice and compassion oriented Southern Baptists. They are 10-20% of the SBC. They are theologically conservative, but more open to cooperation with others than some Southern Baptists would like. This group voted against the Law Amendment, and a decent chunk of the group voted against removing egalitarian churches with female pastors from the SBC.
This group consistently reminds the SBC of those on the margins, whether those vulnerable to abuse or prejudice. The blind spot of this group might be a draw into more social forms of the gospel or unorthodox theology in the name of inclusion.
All of that to land on this main takeaway from this year’s SBC gathering: we need to pursue mission together in love. I love the SBC. I love all of these folks, even the ones who drive me crazy. There is a generosity and joy that fills the rooms and conversations at the SBC. It isn’t tense. It’s a delight.
As Kevin Ezell, President of the North American Mission Board and the Send Network said, “Southern Baptists are not a perfect people, but we love Jesus and we love our missionaries.” The SBC is a family worth working with, and worth fighting for. Let’s love one another, believe the gospel, and get it out to the neighborhoods and the nations.