Jan

Kudos to the SBC (Southern Baptist Convention)

By admin

I’m 31 years old. For 31 years, I’ve attended or served in Southern Baptist Churches. I attended a Southern Baptist Seminary. During my college years, I had to examine the question of WHY I was a Southern Baptist. During my childhood, the answer was simply because that was where my parents took me to church. As I became an adult, that childhood answer was no longer sufficient. As I studied and prayed about the answer, the 3 main reasons I continued to serve in an SBC environment were #1: the commitment to God’s Word, #2. the commitment to missions, #3. the autonomy of the local church (simply put, even though you align with the denomination, you are not “forced” into any literature, programs, etc. and are free to lead your church as God leads). All that said, there were many areas on the periphery of ministry where I did not agree/had concerns with the SBC. To be quite honest, there are still areas where I have concerns. But I will go on the record and say that as of late, I have been very encouraged with some of the things the Convention is doing.
The SBC recently unveiled the GCR (Great Commission Resurgence) which contained some pretty encouraging things. I’ll highlight a few points that I found particularly encouraging:

A commitment to church planting. One conviction that I hold fast to is that every church should be a life-giving church. New churches with new methodologies are essential in reaching new people. Every church has to be a part of that process. The GCR states, “We long to see a Convention where every church is a church planting church in its unique Jerusalem, its Judea and Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth.” Each community is unique, and will require unnique churches to reach the people that live there.
A commitment to love. Jesus taught us that the greatest commandment was to love God and to love people. I loved this statement in the GCR: “We believe too many of us have lost some of our love for God and others somewhere along the way. This has devastated our witness. If we love Jesus as we should, we will love sinners as we ought and pursue them as He did. Though we believe that God calls believers to speak out against moral ills, this must not be done in a way that is hateful toward unbelievers or trades gospel priorities for political influence.” As pastors/believers, our job is to speak the truth. But it must be spoken in love. We have to build healthy, loving relationships with people and leverage those relationships to help people become closer to God. It’s hard to love someone and invest Jesus into their lives when you are boycotting them. I was very encouraged to see this.
Major on the majors, minor on the minors. Some of my concern with SBC life over the past several years was an inability to focus on the majors of the Gospel because of an intense focus and constant banter on minor theological/practical issues. The GCR states, “The promise of the Conservative Resurgence was that eventually we would find enough common biblical and theological ground that we could focus on the Great Commission…as we attempt to discern the difference between primary, secondary, and tertiary issues….” Getting back to the main issues of the Gospel, missions, love, and the hope of Jesus changes the focus of the convention from dissecting words and splitting hairs to acting out the love of Jesus. Speaking of tertiary issues, I was sort of hoping they would also mention quarternery issues.
A “Committment to Methodological Diversity that is Biblically Informed.” In laymans terms, it’s okay to be different. It’s okay to speak timeless truth in contemporary methods. It’s okay to do things that have never been done before. The GCR went on to state, “In the past, Southern Baptists were characterized by a remarkable uniformity in both style and substance, but those days have long passed. Though we must remain united in substance, we must embrace a healthy, biblically informed diversity in our methodology if we are to effectively evangelize North America.” Wow! This is one of the healthiest statements I’ve ever read from the SBC. Although the Gospel NEVER changes, the way we present HAS TO. Why? Because culture changes.

And on that note, I am excited to see that the SBC is making a conscious effort to invite young pastors and leaders to be a part of the process and dialogue. The GCR task force (fancy Baptist term for committee haha) is made up of an extremely diverse (in a healthy way) group of leaders across all ages and ministry styles. Also, I was blown away (in a good way) to see who the SBC Pastor’s conference was bringing in to speak this year. They’re putting their money where their mouth is and bringing in well-known and admired pastors who are reaching people through cutting-edge, “diverse-methodology” means. Pastors like Andy Stanley. Francis Chan. Matt Chandler. David Platt. Tony Evans. Wow. Click HERE to view the speaker line up for the conference. Color me impressed.