SBC EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MAY HAVE GOOD IDEA

The SBC Executive Committee passed a resolution at its Sept. 19-20 meeting in Nashville that was mostly a joke. The point of the resolution was to threaten state conventions that might be allowing their churches freedom in giving.

The resolution contained one idea that Texas Baptists might should consider. According to Associated Baptist Press, the resolution “humbly, respectfully and prayerfully” asks states considering broadening the Cooperative Program definition to “inform their constituents of the variances of theology and doctrine being embraced and espoused by some groups identifying themselves as Southern Baptists.”

It specifically calls for those states to ask messengers to their annual meetings if they want Cooperative Program monies diverted to organizations “with elected leaders that embrace and/or espouse theology and doctrines that depart from the ‘definite doctrines Baptists believe, cherish and with which they have been and are now closely identified,’ “ a quotation from the 1963 “Baptist Faith and Message” statement.

The SBC Executive Committee may be on to something here. Maybe the BGCT should appoint a committee of church historians to study if the BGCT and the SBC “elected leaders” over the past 15 years have been true to our historic commitments.

Texas Baptists could “inform their constituents of the variances of theology and doctrine being embraced and espoused by some groups identifying themselves as Southern Baptists” just like the Executive Committee requested.

We have no doubt that the results of such a study would show that the major group that is “identifying themselves as Southern Baptists” and has departed from historic Baptist theology, doctrine, and practice is the current leadership (Executive Secretary, presidents of seminaries, mission boards, Christian Life Commission, past presidents of the SBC, etc.) of the “Southern Baptist Convention.”

September 1994