Messenger Study Committee Report
by Hollie Atkinson,
pastor FBC Marshall

The Messenger Seating Study Committee, mandated by 1995 Convention action, was appointed by the Executive Board Chairman, Dr. Bob Campbell. The committee reflected the diversity of the Baptist General Convention of Texas with regard to geography, race, gender, church size, and lay/clergy. There was, however, no diversity when it came to the authority of Scripture. Our committee was, to a person, committed to the authority of Scripture in their life and to attempting to embody the spirit of our Lord Jesus in their ministering to sinners.

The committee in alphabetical order is: Wayne Allen, Nancy Allison, John Anderson, Hollie Atkinson (Chair) Floyd Bradley, Jim Campbell, Dwight McKissic, Jeanie Miley, Levi Price, Jr., Mateo Rendon, Jr., Gary Singleton, Ebbie Smith, Mary Stedham, and Margarita Trevino.

The committee’s work was to study the desirability of amending the constitution to exclude messengers from churches that in some way affirmed a homosexual life style. It was the opinion of the committee that we ought not set a precedence of amending the constitution to reflect certain sins for which a person or church would not be in harmonious relationship with the BGCT. Our constitution allows for the refusal of seating for any number of grounds. In 1976, the Convention refused to seat messengers from a Dallas Baptist Association church because of the church’s disruptive charismatic practices.

At a time of pervasive moral relativism, particularly in the area of sexual practices where right and wrong have been reduced to matters of personal preference, emotional needs, biological drive or cultural choice, the Messenger Seating Study Committee felt that it needed to speak with a certain and clear voice, consistent with the testimony of Scripture and Christian tradition.

For Credential Committees down into the twenty-first century, this committee recommends the seating only of messengers from churches that affirm an ethic which reserves sexual union for the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman. Scripture is clear in its teaching that heterosexual marriage is the form of human sexual fulfillment planned by God in creation, and a life of disciplined abstinence for all who do not stand within such a relationship. Thus, homosexual, premarital, and extramarital forms of sexual union are contrary to divine purposes as revealed in Scripture.

While the report is unequivocal, it was the prayerful intent of the committee that Texas Baptists would not “write off” any group of Texans as being beyond our intent in Texas 2000. It was also the intent of the committee that no group of Texans would think that their sin had rendered them outside the reach of our Lord’s grace or the concern and interest of His people called Texas Baptists.

October 1996