Author Archive
No Longer a Church
Posted by: | CommentsIn my most recent previous post on SBC Today, I discussed “The Unique Authority of the Local Congregations.” In the text of the original post itself, I mentioned my own uneasiness with Christ’s conferral of so much heavenly authority behind the actions of the local, gathered, covenanted church. In the ensuing comment thread, we discussed whether this local churchly authority could possibly supersede the authority of the New Testament or otherwise empower human believers to employ heavenly power to thwart heavenly aims.
The Unique Authority of the Local Congregations
Posted by: | CommentsI also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.
-Matthew 16:18-19
Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.
Again I say to you, that if two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in heaven. For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.
-Matthew 18:18-20
What Does Jesus Mean?
In one sense, these are not particularly easy passages to interpret. What will one construe of the two different words petros and petra in the passage from chapter 16, and consequently, does this have to do more with Simon Peter personally, with his confession of faith, with the community of confessors in like manner, or with the person of Christ? What, precisely, are the “keys of the kingdom of heaven”? Are there any limitations or specific contexts in mind with regard to the “binding” and “loosing” language of these passages? What does it mean to speak of one who is ubiquitous and omnipresent as being “there in [the] midst” of some group of people? Read More→
On Improvements and Advancements in Christianity
Posted by: | CommentsThe Celestial Railroad
by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Not a great while ago, passing through the gate of dreams, I visited that region of the earth in which lies the famous City of Destruction. It interested me much to learn that by the public spirit of some of the inhabitants a railroad has recently been established between this populous and flourishing town and the Celestial City. Having a little time upon my hands, I resolved to gratify a liberal curiosity by making a trip thither. Accordingly, one fine morning after paying my bill at the hotel, and directing the porter to stow my luggage behind a coach, I took my seat in the vehicle and set out for the station-house. It was my good fortune to enjoy the company of a gentleman–one Mr. Smooth-it-away–who, though he had never actually visited the Celestial City, yet seemed as well acquainted with its laws, customs, policy, and statistics, as with those of the City of Destruction, of which he was a native townsman. Being, moreover, a director of the railroad corporation and one of its largest stockholders, he had it in his power to give me all desirable information respecting that praiseworthy enterprise.
A Caution and Reminder
Posted by: | CommentsA CAUTION AND REMINDER
Unless wisdom flees from us, Baptists will ever see to it that churches, churches and the New Testament type of preachers, meritorious preachers, are, in the right sense, the constant center of their concern, the first objects of proper honor and credit for denominational accomplishments and acquirements—not Boards, nor Associations, nor even Conventions, not Secretaries. These four instruments or agencies are legitimate, highly proper, and useful, indispensable, but they and their funds all stem from the churches and preacher-pastors. There is no iota of discredit here, of course, for these four agencies, but it must be said that there is an alarming drift in thought and practice, particularly in some quarters, in the direction that responsibility and most credit belong to Boards, Secretaries and Conventions. The writer hastens to say that he sees no such drift in Arkansas. History and experience show that where credit is placed, sooner or later right there control will be placed. Where credit abides control will reside. Boards, Associations, Conventions, and Secretaries are necessary, we repeat, and worthy and deserve a great measure of credit, but major credit and honor should be laid at the doors of the blessed churches with their faithful pastors. That is right and just and it ought to be expressly said in reports and minutes and is said in Arkansas at present. It is not at all sufficient to say “that is understood” or “everybody knows that major credit belongs with the churches.” Safety with Baptists lies in staying close to the churches, in continuous and unfailing recognition of the churches and preachers. They by the grace of God made this day possible. They brought us where we are. They, after the Lord and the Bible, deserve credit for what we are and have today. What is “understood” in this case should be underscored. This book is written with the constraining impulse and conviction that churches and preachers, little churches and little preachers (if there are such) and big churches and big preachers deserve and must have consideration and first honor in any such enterprise. Baptist denominational “directors” will do well to “watch their step.”
-J.S. Rogers
Is there ever an era in our denominational life in which this “caution and reminder” is not timely?
Frank Tripp Is One of My Heroes
Posted by: | Comments
Detective Frank Tripp, character on "CSI: Miami"
OK, perhaps the title of this post raises some questions in your mind: Should a pastor be watching a violent show like “CSI: Miami”? Should a pastor find heroic a fictional character who divorced his alcoholic wife rather than employing the tough love necessary to see her through her time of struggle? Why is a pastor wasting time watching TV, anyway?
And to that I would find it necessary to reply, “You’re thinking about the wrong Frank Tripp.”
Read More→
2009 SBC Annual Meeting Review, Part 3
Posted by: | CommentsApart from the task-force motion, this year’s convention involved very few business items, although the few matters accomplished were important.
Broadway Baptist Church and Homosexuality
I take special comfort in several aspects of the convention’s action to acknowledge that Broadway Baptist Church of Fort Worth is in fact not in friendly cooperation with the Southern Baptist Convention:
2009 SBC Annual Meeting Review, Part 2
Posted by: | CommentsSome will regard this particular post as a delving into trivialities. Nevertheless, we all do well to remember that each individual messenger’s experience of a particular convention will not necessarily consist of the things that will mark the history books. We do well to set aside a moment to consider the messenger-experience of the Louisville convention.
2009 SBC Annual Meeting Review, Part 1
Posted by: | CommentsBefore I even made it home to Texas, I had begun to mull over my week in Louisville, Kentucky. I hope to spend a few posts in reflection over the week’s events, with a little bit of looking forward mixed in with my hindsight. To sum up at the outset, I think that we had a good annual meeting as Southern Baptists, and even I, an early critic of the GCR document, am hopeful about the outcome of the Reorganization Task Force. I am not giddy over it. I don’t think that “Years from now we’ll all look back and see that the SBC was saved forever from certain destruction in 2009,” and I don’t think that convention reorganization will make local churches better at pursuing the Great Commission, but I do think that we have a chance either to make the SBC worse or make the SBC better at this juncture, and I think that some of the folks serving on the Reorganization Task Force just might be able to accomplish the latter rather than the former. But now, to the details.
The dominant topic leading up to the meeting, the dominant topic in the hallways during the meeting, and the dominant topic in analysis after the fact has been the Great Commission Resurgence. Dr. Danny Akin of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary preached a sermon outlining the Great Commission Resurgence as a number of “axioms.” The folks over at SEBTS then launched a website for the movement. A number of signatories affixed their name to the statement, which went through some number of revisions as the number of signatures increased.
After the publication of the initial document, and with each revision, various Southern Baptists analyzed and opined about the document: on blogs (in no particular order: Trevin Wax, Nathan Finn, Marty Duren, Alan Cross, Micah Fries, and myself), in online streamed media, and in newspapers (SBTC Texan, Florida Baptist Witness). Axiom-by-axiom, people parsed the nuances of each and every word. Entity heads jousted in the denominational press over the implications of the document and the fate of the convention if we adopted it or rejected it.
And then it never even came to a vote.
A Solution to the Missouri Lawsuit Problem
Posted by: | CommentsThe Missouri Baptist Convention is considering the use of Cooperative Program funding to pay legal fees in their ongoing lawsuits attempting to regain the entities that were stolen from them. Ethics Daily has produced articles alleging that the MBC has already used CP funds to pay for legal fees. These articles bemoaned the use of missions money for the pursuit of these legal initiatives.
I, too, mourn to think that any Cooperative Program money should be employed to fund lawsuits between Christians. The primary problem is not that CP funding will go toward the legal fees, for CP money always has and always will go to a wide variety of general and administrative costs associated with our missionary enterprise. Part of the intended design of the Cooperative Program is to cover such costs. Lawyers have received CP dollars many times in the past for defending Southern Baptist entities from legal threats, and they will continue to do so in the future. Most of those instances do not earn much in the way of headlines, but they occur with an inexorable regularity.
The problem is not where the money originates, but rather that the lawsuit exists at all. The Bible is plainspoken in 1 Corinthians 6:1-7, commanding us not to take fellow Christians to secular courts. This has been my opinion all along regarding the unfortunate events in Missouri. The folks over at Ethics Daily have contacted SBC Today to indicate their dismay over the potential use of CP money to fund the lawsuit. These conversations have posed something of a dilemma for me. On the one hand, I am not a fan of the lawsuits. On the other hand, the reporting by Ethics Daily and the Baptist General Convention of Missouri is potentially self-serving and might not be motivated strictly out of a love for the Cooperative Program and a desire for reconciliation.
If the good folks at the BGCM and Ethics Daily are working out of the same concerns that I have, it will be easy enough to show it. A simple and fair path exists for those at Ethics Daily, the Baptist General Convention of Missouri, the Missouri Baptist Convention, and the renegade entities. 1 Corinthians 6:2 asks, “If the world is judged by you, are you not competent to constitute the smallest law courts?” Three verses later we read, “I say this to your shame. Is it so, that there is not among you one wise man who will be able to decide between his brethren…?” The biblical manner for resolving this sort of difficulty is for God’s people in the churches to settle the matter, rather than potential unbelievers in the courts.
Therefore, I call upon all of the agencies involved in the Missouri discussion to convene messengers from all of the churches that were a part of the Missouri Baptist Convention in 2000 according to the messenger formula in place in 2000. If Ethics Daily is genuinely alarmed about CP money being spent upon unbiblical lawsuits, then let them encourage the involved parties all to agree to binding arbitration by which the majority of messengers convened in this meeting shall be able to decide finally and irrevocably the disposition of the matters disputed in the lawsuits.
This is the biblical manner for resolving these questions, and I am confident that the Lord will be honored when all of those involved commit to follow this approach.
Southern Baptists and Sex
Posted by: | CommentsYou can comment on this post over at Praisegod Barebones
Caution: This post contains some language more explicit than my standard fare.
Until I sat down and thought it through, I hadn’t realized how much the topic of sex has dominated the online conversation of Southern Baptists in recent months. In a speech in Scotland Mark Driscoll promoted fellatio to the status of Christian ordinance, to which John MacArthur reacted recently, drawing the attention of Southern Baptists. MacArthur in the same series of articles (posted at the bottom of the link given) took aim at the daily sex challenges promoted by people like Ed Young, Jr. Jonathan Merritt finagled an op-ed spot in USA Today ostensibly announcing a softening of the Southern Baptist position on homosexual activity and all-but-endorsing homosexual civil unions. Southern Baptist blogs reacted to that, as well. Sex, sex, sex! If we could just inaugurate a good reprise of the alcohol debate (drugs) and follow on with some wrangling over styles of worship (rock-and-roll), then we could have a blogging trifecta.
On the one hand, it is good that Southern Baptist voices are up-in-arms against Merritt’s half-baked essay, but on the other hand, I don’t know why anyone is at all surprised. Merritt is merely applying to homosexuality the arguments that long ago entirely defined the position of his father’s generation toward divorce. And what has the outcome been? Divorce rates within the church have skyrocketed. From ignoring the implications of divorce upon spiritual health and church membership we’ve moved to an impending compromise of biblical limitations upon divorce in church leadership. Merritt’s philippic against past Southern Baptist intolerance indirectly broaches the subject of divorce, reminding us that Southern Baptists already fall short of God’s design in marriage. He rightly sees that the widespread acceptance of divorce as no big deal in Southern Baptist churches puts us in the place of the hypocrite when we dare to raise our ire against those engaged in homosexual acts. Not that divorce and homosexuality are biblically equivalent-Moses authorized no certificate of sodomy in the Old Testament. But specific exegetical questions aside, our general laissez-faire attitude toward carnality in Southern Baptist pews makes it disconcerting when we find our collective backbone.
Merritt’s argument amounts to a call for us to treat homosexuality the way that we’ve been treating divorce. I think we might be well advised to do the converse and treat divorce a bit more in the manner that we’ve been treating homosexuality. Certainly any objective analysis would reveal that the de-facto Southern Baptist policy toward divorce has been an abject failure (unless one’s entire goal is accomplished in the mere seduction of people to attend).
Driscoll, Young, and Merritt are the vanguards of an SBC that will talk exponentially more, and more freely, about sex and yet say all of the wrong things. In the midst of a culture full of people who so desperately need to find their solitary hope of genuine identity and fulfillment in their spiritual potential for a relationship with Christ, we’re busy about showing the world that we, too, are capable of obsessing over our genitalia just as well as the next person. At least Augustine knew enough to pray for chastity, on whatever timetable. It would be better, I think, for us to look down at the ground around us and see where 1 Corinthians 7:1-9 might have fallen when we excised it from our Bibles. We should paste it right back in there and ponder a moment to see whether it doesn’t offer us some important truth to balance out our mirthful contemplations of Hebrew 13:4 and the Canticles.
A healthy Southern Baptist attitude toward sex, I think, would make us neither Arthur Dimmesdale nor Larry Flynt. I’m impressed by the treatment of sexuality that C. S. Lewis gave in his autobiography Surprised by Joy:
One thing…I learned, which has since saved me from many popular confusions of mind. I came to know by experience that it [Joy] is not a disguise for sexual desire….I learned this mistake to be a mistake by the simple, if discreditable, process of repeatedly making it…. I repeatedly followed that path-to the end. And at the end one found pleasure; which immediately resulted in the discovery that pleasure (whether that pleasure or any other) was not what you had been looking for. No moral question was involved; I was at this time as nearly nonmoral on that subject as a human creature can be. The frustration did not consist in finding a “lower” pleasure instead of a “higher.” It was the irrelevance of the conclusion that marred it. The hounds had changed scent. One had caught the wrong quarry. You might as well offer a mutton chop to a man who is dying of thirst as offer sexual pleasure to the desire I am speaking of. I did not recoil from the erotic conclusion with chaste horror, exclaiming, “Not that!” My feelings could rather have been expressed in the words, “Quite. I see. But haven’t we wandered from the real point?” Joy is not a substitute for sex; sex is often a substitute for Joy. I sometimes wonder whether all pleasures are not substitutes for Joy.
We need to show the world that sex is not a bad thing, but neither is it the thing. There is something more important than sex! Paul apparently thought that the highest and most fulfilling aspirations of life could be had without sex at all-an heretical statement in our culture and in a great many of our churches today. But it is a statement that needs to be made not only in words but in action. Depraved and perverted souls all around us need not so much to learn how Christ relates to their sex life as to be led away from the poles of Asherah and introduced to something more eternal and more real…to be called to discover something so high and pure and beautiful and joyful that they would gladly abandon sex altogether, if needs be, just to have it in their lives.
