The future of the Southern Baptist Convention

I ran across a very interesting article recommended by Tom Ascol, written by Danny Akin and Bruce Ashford at Between the Times. The topic was the future of the Southern Baptist Convention and there are a lot of important questions asked, sacred cows tipped, oxen gored and conversations started!

Here are a couple of choice quotes:

The SBC was formed as a network of local churches who partnered together for the sake of mission. In the last 50 years, however, she has become more and more of a denominational bureaucracy. We must help our denomination return to her roots. The SBC of the twenty-first century must be a missional network, just as the churches of Acts were a missional network. Our focus must be the gospel, and our means of cooperation must be primarily “churches partnering for the sake of mission.” Thom Rainer has urged our churches to simplify and streamline so as to maximize their effectiveness, and we think that this applies to our convention as well. The roadmap for revisioning the SBC, as well as any institution or entity within the SBC, will always involve two ideas: local church and missional cooperation.

Man, I love talk like that! I especially love it if people listen and take action. What a novel concept, seeking to see the SBC look like the church in Acts! I came to Christ in a Southern Baptist church and while I see the strengths of the SBC, I also see the weaknesses. One of the biggest weaknesses is that in a lot of the SBC, Baptists are enamored with being Southern Baptists and the size and strength of the SBC has made it ripe for bureaucracy and layers of hierarchy that inevitably lead to wasted resources and territorialism. Far too much of the giving in the SBC goes to supporting the bureaucracy, as if the churches exist to support the SBC instead of the SBC supporting the local church.

This is going to cause people to get riled up!:

One issue that we might examine is our name. We are the Southern Baptist Convention, but “Southern” neither describes who we are or who we want to be. Perhaps we should modify our nomenclature to better describe our nature as a transregional network of churches.

This issue has been whispered as long as we have been Christians and I am wholeheartedly in favor of revisiting the name. “Southern” may describe the historical nature of the SBC, but if the SBC wants to be a worldwide network of cooperating churches it may be worthwhile to consider nixing the American regionalism of the name. Right or wrong, “Southern Baptist” carries a lot of baggage (much of it self-inflicted) and I think that more than a unifier among SBC churches, it serves as a divider. Conversely, I also am not so naïve as to think that a new name is going to fix everything but it might be a step in the right direction and an admission that things need to change. Being a “Southern Baptist” convention is hard to do when you are in all fifty states and around the world.

What are some challenges ahead for the seminaries? One challenge the seminaries face is how to locate as much of our education as possible in the local church. Is there a reason not to return certain courses of study, such as pastoral ministries, to their native environment in the local church? Another challenge we might face is how to provide the most affordable seminary education. Are there ways we can streamline our institutions? A third challenge is for the seminaries to reject the temptation to be divisively competitive and instead commit to being a network of truly cooperative campuses. Such a network could, for example, provide a combination of on-campus and distance education to international missionaries in a way more beneficial that what is offered presently. A final challenge is for the seminaries to remain vigilant to ensure that our professors are doing theology primarily for the church and secondarily for the academy.

Oh my, that is outstanding! Right now, Southern Baptist seminaries are, IMHO, overly academic, incredibly expensive, divorced from the local church and insulated from the world. I have often complained that the process of sending young men away from the local gathering of the church to get an expensive seminary degree that “qualifies” them to do ministry and then having them move somewhere else to be in “ministry” is incredibly counter-intuitive and Biblically irrational. If the role of the seminary is to serve the local church, stop taking young men out of the local church and start doing more to disciple them right where they are, so that they can minister and serve locally until God moves them.

I spend a lot of time railing about the institutional church but the most important thing should be the most important thing and that is always the Gospel of Jesus Christ. These are questions and conversations that need to happen in the church. Every time someone has a knee-jerk visceral reaction to “the way things are done”, it hampers the Gospel ministry and serves the institution and not the church. If the SBC can get beyond institutional inertia, tribalism and barrier erecting, it can be a great force for spreading the Gospel. The SBC came back from the brink of heresy in the “Conservative Resurgence” but there is a long way to go. Conversations like this one are only a first step on a long road but any journey worth taking always starts with a first step.

Another denomination splits

A movement has occurred among ELCA churches to split away from the denomination over the issue of homosexuality. This was inevitable and is a sad reminder of the influence of the world on the church, an influence that allowed to run unchecked invariably leads to heresy and schism.

Conservative members of America's largest Lutheran denomination announced that they are splitting from the Chicago-based Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, making it the second mainline Protestant church to undergo a major schism over the issue of homosexuality and related matters of biblical authority.

The U.S. Episcopal Church has experienced a similar split, with whole dioceses attempting to leave, new Anglican churches formed and a series of property fights in the years since the 2003 consecration of Bishop V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

On Wednesday, an 11-member steering committee of Lutheran CORE (Coalition for Renewal), meeting in New Brighton, Minn., said it cannot remain inside the 4.7-million-member ELCA after the denomination agreed at its August churchwide assembly in Minneapolis to ordain partnered gay clergy.

That decision, CORE said in a statement, created "a biblical and theological crisis throughout the ELCA and conflict in local congregations."

"We are not leaving the ELCA. The ELCA has left us," said Ryan Schwarz, a steering committee member from the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in McLean, Va. "A lot of people who are planning to leave are telling us, 'We need you to form a new body that is like a traditional church body.' "

Christ calls us to be unified but a unity based in anything other than the truth is a lie. It is unfortunate that this became necessary but Scripture is clear on this issue.

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people-- not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler--not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. "Purge the evil person from among you." (1Co 5:9-13)

Unrepentent sin cannot be brushed aside in the name of fellowship and unity. At some point though, these brothers and sisters need to recognize that the issue of homosexual acceptance runs in the same vein as female clergy. It may be a slight overstatement, but wherever we see normalization of homosexuality in the church, it is invariably preceded by the ordination of women. That may be very un-P.C. to say but it is a pretty easy line to draw.

Spurgeon on robes

I get a chuckle out of this every time I read it...

“Except a duck in pattens, no creature looks more stupid than a Dissenting preacher in a gown which is of no manner of use to him. I could laugh till I held my sides when I see our doctors in gowns and bands, puffed out with their silks, and touched up with their little bibs, for they put me so much in mind of our old turkey-cock when his temper is up, and he swells to his biggest. They must be weak folks indeed who want a man to dress like a woman before they can enjoy his sermon, and he who cannot preach without such milliner’s trumpery may be a man among geese, but he is a goose among men.”

—C.H. Spurgeon

Reproduced from Tony Reinke

(HT: Dave Black)

What makes a healthy church

joshgelatt.com: Podcast #2 - Counting Coconuts

My friend Josh has a new podcast out on what constitutes a healthy church. Give it a listen, but don't mind the banjo music.

The show must go on!

Or must it?

I have been reading the autobiography of George Muller and it is a wonderful testimony of a man of simple faith and powerful prayer. His writings are not lengthy and eloquent but they exhibit the sort of deep faith that I long for. Here is a quote from his writings:

The anointing of the Holy Spirit helps me greatly when I preach. I would never attempt to teach the truth of God by my own power. One day before preaching at Teignmouth, I had more time than usual, so I prayed and meditated for six hours in preparation for the evening meeting. After I had spoken a little while, I felt that I was speaking in my own strength rather than God's power. I told the brethren that I felt as though I was not preaching under the anointing and asked them to pray. After I continued a little longer, I felt the same and therefore ended my sermon and proposed that we have a meeting for prayer. We did so, and I was particularly assisted by the Holy Spirit the next time I preached. (The Autobiography of George Muller, p. 35)

I love that! If only I were humbler and more self-aware of my own infirmity in the way George Mueller was! If only more men in the church recognized their own inability and eschewed self-reliance. I know from personal experience, the more prep time and self-reliance in that preparation I had leading up to Sunday, the less effective the sermon was. I wonder how many men would have the self-reflection to recognize that their sermon is wandering and stop to pray with the assembled church? I also wonder how many people in the pews would freak out if he did? Any deviation from script can cause a great deal of consternation among the congregation and the preacher alike. If your gathering of the church is so orchestrated, so rigidly scheduled that there is no room to adapt as needed, I have to ask who you are seeking to please?

Supporting murder as a religious act

Words can hardly describe how tragic this is:

Religious Leaders and First Amendment Advocates Call on Senate to Ensure Full Access to Reproductive Health Services in Health Care Reform

Washington, DC - Heads of Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, interfaith and First Amendment organizations today called on the Senate to ensure the final health care reform bill respects diverse religious beliefs.

“It is now up to the Senate to keep health care reform free of religious doctrine and restrictions that will prevent women from making their own reproductive health care choices,” said Reverend Dr. Carlton W. Veazey, President and CEO of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC), which convened today’s news conference.

RCRC includes more than 40 denominations and religious organizations that respect diverse religious beliefs and individual decisions about whether and when to have children. The participating organizations together represent more than 10,000 religious leaders and millions of people of faith who believe that abortion must be safe, legal and accessible.

“We speak as people of faith who support religious freedom and reproductive options,” said Reverend Veazey. “Women must not lose access to abortion services they may need because of a small but vocal group of anti-choice activists.”

Speakers included Linda Bales Todd of the General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church; Sammie Moshenberg, Director of the Washington Office of the National Council of Jewish Women; Jon O’Brien, President of Catholics for Choice; Sandra Sorensen, Director of the Washington Office of the United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries, and Reverend Barry W. Lynn, Executive Director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

They say that their purpose is: "RCRC includes more than 40 denominations and religious organizations that respect diverse religious beliefs and individual decisions about whether and when to have children". I support that as well. If you don't want children, don't have sex. But if you do have sex and become pregnant, you have no right to murder that child in the name of "choice". This organization is nothing more than an advocacy group for infanticide. To form a religious coalition with the goal of making it easier to murder an unborn child is abhorrent. I don't care what the name of the organization is, or what "churches" it represents or how noble they make their group sound, at the core this is little better than the idolatrous inhabitants of Samaria who worshiped other gods, sacrificing their own children in the fires.

The men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the men of Cuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites burned their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim. They also feared the LORD and appointed from among themselves all sorts of people as priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places. So they feared the LORD but also served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away. (2Ki 17:30-33)

You cannot serve God and Baal, you cannot say you fear the Lord and also serve this bloody god called "Choice". You want to be "Pro-Choice"? I say fine. Here is your choice: God or Baal. Choose one or the other because you cannot serve both.

Download 'Deep Church' for .98!

Christian Audio is offering a download of Jim Belcher's Deep Church for only .98! Check it out here. I encourage you to spring for the .98, I already read the book and I am downloading it anyway to listen to in the future! Use coupon code DEEP09

(Hurry, only lasts until noon on the 18th!)

On religion and terrorism

Dinesh D’Souza has an interesting editorial in USA Today’s On Religion column, Don't blame God for terrorism. The impetus is the recent shooting at Fort Hood by Nidal Hassan, a man with links to Islamic radicals. D’Souza argues that the all too common charge by atheists that religion leads to violence is patently false. It is the rallying cry of many a best selling atheist author and it sells books, so there is little wonder the claim that religion is awful and leads to violence is repeated so often and so shrilly.

It certainly is true that many horrible things have been done under the cover of religion. The Inquisition springs to mind along with Islamic terrorism and the Catholic-Protestant wars that have raged and influenced European and American politics for centuries. It is also true that many men have used religion as a tool to gain power, no different than nationalism or racism. Having acknowledged that freely, let me also throw some numbers at you: 11,000,000 + people murdered in the Holocaust. Nazism was essentially an secular state religion with nationalism and racism as its creed and Adolf Hitler as its focal point. Over 1,600,000 Cambodians murdered by the Khmer Rouge which officially outlawed religion. More recently we see North Korea, by all accounts of the most repressive nations in the world with barbaric living conditions. Atheistic Cuba is another of the world’s great oppressors of her own people. Communist China has been a repressive nation for decades. Of the highly religious states that are also the most repressive, they are universally Islamic, which should further discredit the blanket condemnation of religion as repressive we cavalierly hear from atheists speakers and authors who profit from their empty rhetoric.

As D’Souza points out, an absence of religion is hardly a recipe for a utopian existence. There is not a more religious developed country in the world than the U.S. and we are the envy of the world. The most horrifying conditions in modern times are most often found in the most secular of developed states, places like the former Soviet Union, communist China, Cuba and North Korea. There is far more danger to liberty and freedom (individually and corporately) from a powerful state than there is from a powerful religion.

There have always been and until Christ returns always will be people who are so power hungry that they will employ any means to obtain and retain power. That is not fatalistic, that is simply reality. While Adolf Hitler clearly had a murderous, irrational hatred for Jews they also provided him with a patsy, someone to focus attention on and help propel his rise to power. As the daily news shows us, human nature hasn’t changed much. There is still plenty of hatred and perversion in the world.

Atheists who point the finger at religion for all of the world ills miss the bigger picture. The Bible gives us the reason for all of the evil and suffering in the world and its cause (sin) and the solution (Christ). The Bible never paints a bucolic picture of life in this world. The difference between the bleak picture of humanity presented in the Bible and the hopeless view of life promoted by Thomas Hobbes of a life that is “poor, nasty, brutish and short” is hope. In spite of all of the talk about “hope” we have endured over the last year or so the reality is that outside of Christ there is no hope in this world and we are forced to endure a Hobbesian existence of pain and suffering, mercifully coming to a swift and probably unpleasant end.

In the end, atheists make a fatal error by blaming God and belief in Him as the cause of all human suffering when in fact it is God alone who provides a way to alleviate and ultimately conquer that suffering. I will concur with the dangers of religion, but I find the dangers of religion to be of eternal consequence rather than temporal. Empty religious expression, whether Islamic or Buddhist or even pseudo-Christian religious expressions, have eternal consequences but in this life it is hard to make a serious argument that the presence of religion worsens human life or that the absence of religion improves it. History itself refutes that claim, sealed with the now empty buildings in places like Auschwitz and in the blood soaked ground of the killing fields in Cambodia.

If multi-site is OK, why not online?

Eric Carpenter linked to a CNN article about online churches and it reminded me of a prior post where I made the argument that this is just the logical next step for churches.

Hjalti á Lava was searching his iPhone for a Bible app when he stumbled across Church Online, a service of Web site LifeChurch.tv. Soon he was regularly logging into the Oklahoma-based cyber-church -- some 4,100 miles away from á Lava's home in the Faroe Islands, west of Norway.

"It allows me to connect with others and have conversations about the message," says á Lava, who shares his faith with other believers in the site's live chat room. "Technology allows us today to have fellowship across borders and cultures."

In doing so, á Lava joined growing numbers of Christians worldwide who are migrating from the chapel to the computer. A map on the Church Online site showed users from 22 countries logged into a recent service.

Online religious services offer convenience to those who are too isolated or infirm to attend a real-world church. But can worshipping via a computer offer true spiritual fulfillment?

Internet pastors and parishioners cite their 24-hour access to interactive tools and social-networking platforms to show their online experiences are as meaningful as those that take place with face-to-face congregations.

Even this seemed in step with modern evangelicalism:

Links allow congregants to "raise their hand" and publicly commit to Christ, while prayer requests and one-on-one guidance are a click way. Sermon notes can be shared and discussed. And many online churches are aided by volunteers, allowing them to hold services several times each day.

Well, how much different is that from "making a decision" in response to a sermon, walkin' the aisle, signing the card, raising your hand? Clicking a button from a computer is as Scripturally as walking an aisle.

Ultimately my point again is that if the primary purpose of "going to church" is to hear a sermon and some music, why not just do it online?

Jim Belcher on Mission and Unity

Good stuff. Jim's basic point is that mission and healthy unity run hand in hand. If the church isn’t missional, it can’t be healthy and if the church isn't healthy it can’t be missional.

I like this quote: The Reformed tradition has splitting down to a science.

Why is church dull?

Why is church so dull? A psychotherapist diagnoses the Sunday ritual. - By Stephen W. Simpson - Patrol Magazine

Ok, let me start by saying that Patrol Magazine looks like a pretty standard "post-evangelical" liberal webzine/magazine that makes its living in part by taking shots at conservatism. I certainly don't endorse all or even much of what they write. I am sure that I would have a vehement disagreement with many of the writers on a myriad of issues. Having said that, I find that the substance of what Stephen Simpson wrote to be right on target. It is very thought provoking and the issues it raises are worthy of consideration even if (or perhaps especially if) you find yourself in disagreement with what is being said.

You may also find the title of the article offensive and provocative. I am sure that is the intent and by getting in a froth out of the gate, you kind of are reacting exactly as expected. I will also say that if you are honest, even a "good" church can be kind of dull. At churches that are vibrant and exciting, I am in agreement with this statement from the article:

As much as postmodern evangelicals bandy about the word “community,” our gatherings have changed very little. Stylistic alterations might add some hipster flair, but the focal point of the liturgical week remains theater. A dozen or so people perform for a few hundred that sit, stand, kneel, pray, and sing on command. We squeeze real community into the gaps, between events with a hierarchical structure. Not only is this a long way from Biblical models of the early Christian church, it’s a breeding ground for messy group dynamics. And, again, it’s boring.

Church today, whether a cathedral, a mega-aluminum warehouse, or a little wooden building in the country, has little in common with the New Testament church. In the first century there was still teaching, prayer, and worship, but the early church was about community. Paul’s letters paint a picture of people living together and collectively figuring out what it meant to follow Christ. The authority of the leaders and teachers wasn’t a forgone conclusion. They were in dialogue with their congregations. Paul himself often had to defend his position of authority and many of his letters are part of an ongoing doctrinal debate. You get the sense, however, that even theological issues were somewhat secondary. The focus was a meal, not a class or a worship service. Some early Christians enjoyed the community meal so much that Paul had to tell them to tone it down because they were partying a little too hard.

Nowadays, it’s hard to imagine most Christians getting too carried away having a good time together. Church is an adjunct to professional and familial communities. We get up on Sunday, drive, park, sit, listen, sing, pray, chat, and go home. Even if we’re involved in a small group, the relationships are usually secondary. The early Christians learned and grew through relationship. It’s plastered all over the New Testament. Yet, we still structure our religion around one guy, and it’s not Jesus.

Churches often grow for the wrong reason. If you don’t find church boring, it’s probably because of a talented preacher. He’s smart, but moreover, entertaining. Big, active churches are cults of personality, not communities. Try to imagine the Mars Hill in Oregon without Mark Driscoll. Try to imagine the other one without Rob Bell (though at least he had the wisdom to abdicate his throne). Try to imagine Lakewood Church without Joel Osteen. You can’t. When the focus turns to Christ, it’s because a showman gets our attention first. We don’t find God in each other. The Body of Christ has an enormous head atop a weak, flabby body.

I find myself in a lot of agreement with that. As I have said before, you don't get huge turnouts to hear the local country preacher preach, you get huge turnouts to hear the famous preachers preach because they are enjoyable to listen to. Ask anyone involved with a Reformation Society how easy it is to get interest in a meeting with a relatively unknown pastor versus how easy it is to generate interest in a "name brand" Christian leader. Even the idea of community, one of the most vital aspects of the New Testament church, has lost almost all meaning in the modern church. Relegated to an occasional "fellowship meal", a handshake in the foyer and perhaps a small group under the supervision of the pastor, community has become secondary, losing out to "relevance" on one end of the spectrum and "doctrinal precision" on the other. In my mind, the gathering of the church can only be relevant if it is firmly grounded in Biblical orthodoxy aand doctrinal precision is woefully incomplete if it fails to include the community of believers as more than an empty ritual.

What I find most troubling is that it seems that the liberal, theologically squishy brothers are often closer to the mark on "the church" than my conservative, theologically orthodox brothers. There is a definite struggle within the conservative wing of the church between brothers like Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll and Jim Belcher on one hand and John MacArthur and the White Horse Inn gang on the other. What is worse, these conversations about the purpose and function of the chuch are virtually verbotten among many brothers as if any question of the traditional model of the church is borderline heresy and tantamount to church abandonment. I think the reaction in some corners to Jim Belcher's Deep Church is demonstrative of how ingrained this defense of church tradition has become. When you are unable to differentiate between church traditions like liturgy, paid clergy, ritualized services on one hand and Gospel issues like how a sinner is justified, there is a deep problem with your theological system.

I would encourage you to read the whole article and comment on what he says.

Business Missionaries

Interesting editorial today on business missionaries, Earning Commissions on 'The Great Commission':

Christian missionaries have always brought institutions from home and planted them in foreign lands. Schools, hospitals and social services are staples of missionary activity. But recently those who spread the faith overseas have realized that it's not enough to educate and provide health care. In the midst of a world-wide recession, people need jobs, and a growing number of missionaries—many of them working outside traditional missionary organizations—are taking their business skills and starting for-profit companies in the mission fields.

Missionary activity is in decline because of the recession. The Southern Baptist Convention and the United Methodist Church, two of the largest Protestant denominations, are making steep cuts to their missionary institutions. Yet Jesus' command to disciple all nations still pulls strongly on the hearts of many Christians. While mission agencies are tightening their purse strings, many business owners are turning to their practical, 9-to-5 skills to help fulfill this Great Commission.

The Business as Mission movement began in the 1990s, when globalization allowed Christian business people to build companies overseas. Often they did so without the help of churches. This missions model required some initial capital but no long-term subsidies. Business missionaries could become integral parts of a community, build trust with locals through business relationships, and minister every day of the week—not just Sunday—to employees, vendors, suppliers and customers. In the late '90s Neal Johnson was at Fuller Seminary in California planning a career change. He'd worked overseas in banking and law for decades, and he wanted to combine his business skills with missionary work. But his initial dissertation proposal on business as mission was rejected. "I was told it was not a subject for someone pursuing a Ph.D.," he said. Eventually, the committee relented. Today, Mr. Johnson is the dean of the business school at Bakke Graduate University—an international Christian school based in Seattle but offering courses from Hong Kong to Hungary—whose business program focuses solely on training students to integrate faith and missions with business. When I spoke with him, he was teaching an MBA course in the Philippines.

In the past decade, the movement has exploded, at least in interest among missionary agencies. Steve Rundle, an economics professor at Biola University in California, has been studying business as mission for 15 years. Prof. Rundle says that much of the movement is still informal, led by individual entrepreneurs. Because many business owners work outside of traditional mission agencies, it can be hard to quantify their numbers. But surveys of U.S.-based agencies found that about 5% of their missionaries are working in business, up from almost nothing 20 years ago. At a handful of agencies, as many as a quarter are using business as mission principles of profitability, the production of marketable goods and services and integration of Christianity and evangelism into the business.

The normal model of mission work, at least as we have experienced it, is of full-time professional missionaries doing mission work in a far away land supported by the offerings of Christians back in the U.S. I think I like this idea of missionaries starting businesses in foreign countries and supporting themselves while integrating themselves into the community plus perhaps providing jobs to the community they are ministering in. Instead of some Westerner coming to your country and telling you your religion is wrong, you have a neighbor and someone who lives in your community as part of your community.

What do you think?