THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION: WHERE THE CONTROVERSY AFFECTS EVERYONE

“This is just a big preachers fight. I do not pay any attention to it.”

For years, the above statement reflected the sentiment of many Baptist lay persons as well as pastors. The entire SBC controversy was just a power struggle and it did not really matter who won. Things would stay the same. Pendulums always swing, so what is the big deal?

Now you have the answer. The biggest deal of all is theological education and it impacts nearly every Baptist, at least all who have or hope to have a seminary trained minister.

The SBC takeover is no pendulum swing. Sixteen years is way past a swing. The SBC has fundamentally changed forever, and if you can find much connection between the old SBC and the new SBC, you are seeing things! It is not there.

Theological education is where this takeover truly will effect nearly everyone. SBC seminaries are firmly under the control of fundamentalism. Southeastern is led by Paige Patterson. You know what is being taught - indoctrinated - to the students there.

Al Mohler is President of Southern. What is the future for Southern Seminary? Mohler says the “Abstract of Principles,” the doctrinal “creed” everyone must teach within, embraces five-point Calvinism. The implication is that all professors must adhere to five-point Calvinism. This seems to indicate that to teach at Southern Seminary, you need to believe in double predestination. Only the elect are saved; everyone else is lost; and it is already decided by God! Not everyone can choose to profess Christ and be saved.

And what about Southwestern and new president Ken Hemphill? He answers to the trustees who fired Russell Dilday. He publicly supports the fundamentalist takeover of the SBC. The pastors conference this Spring, held annually at Jerry Vine’s church in Florida, features a program this year of Adrian Rogers, Al Mohler, Paige Patterson, and Ken Hemphill.

Already, staff are leaving, or retiring. Bob Adams, a wonderful Ethics professor, who was teaching by presidential appointment after returning from the mission field, has not been rehired. Southwestern is becoming a fundamentalist seminary.

The effect of the takeover will be apparent when you call an “unaligned” pastor and he leads your church into fundamentalism.

That is why it is imperative that Texas Baptists support theological education efforts that balance the SBC seminaries in Texas and in other parts of our country. To not do so, will hand our state conventions to the fundamentalists.

April 1995