What would Jesus do?Wrong Question for SBC!
By Mark Wingfield

ORLANDO, Fla. (ABP) —The key question is not, “What would Jesus do?” but “What does the Bible say?” Southern Baptists said resoundingly June 14.

After months of speculation about proposed changes to the Southern Baptist Convention’s “Baptist Faith and Message” statement, debate on the convention floor focused on the nuanced question of whether Baptists’ ultimate authority is Jesus or the Bible. Convention messengers overwhelmingly approved recommendations of a blue-ribbon study committee appointed by SBC President Paige Patterson, after soundly defeating three attempted amendments.

Leading Baptist moderates and conservatives alike agreed afterward that the debate provided a microcosm of partisan tensions that have torn the nation’s largest Protestant denomination apart over the last 20 years. Some viewed the 50-minute debate as the culmination of the battle for the Bible launched in 1979.

From a conservative perspective, Southern Baptists have cemented their conviction that the Bible is the written word of God. For moderates, the SBC has elevated the Bible to an object of worship, rather than an inspired document that points believers to Christ. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is what it all comes down to. The issue is whether the Bible is the word of God or merely a record of God’s word,” Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said from the platform at one point during the debate.

Mohler was a prominent member of the SBC study committee. He was opposing a motion from the floor by Anthony Sisemore of Floydada, Texas, who attempted to use language in the 1963 “Baptist Faith and Message” section on scripture instead of revisions proposed by the study committee. The 1963 version described the Bible as “the record of God’s revelation of himself to man,” while the new version says the Bible “is God’s revelation of himself to man.” Where the 1963 version identified Jesus as “the criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted,” the new version says, “All scripture is a testimony to Christ, who is himself the focus of divine revelation.”

“The Bible is not merely a record,” Mohler said, prompting a standing ovation from convention messengers. “It is the revelation of God. It is always a triumphant moment when this convention states clearly its belief that the Bible is the inerrant and infallible word of God. … Pray tell, what do we know of Jesus apart from Scriptures?” Sisemore and others, however, argued that the changes elevate the Bible above Jesus. “I believe the Bible is God’s word, and I strive to obey the standards it prescribes,” Sisemore said. “The Bible is a book we can trust. ... That being said, the Bible is still just a book. Christians are supposed to have a relationship with Jesus Christ, not a book.”

Sisemore described the rewording as “a major doctrinal change.” “For one must see that the Bible is a record of what Christ has done,” he said. “Christ is the revelation of God. He is not the focus of divine revelation. ... We must be careful not to elevate the written word above the one to whom it points.”

David Currie, executive director of Texas Baptists Committed, supported Sisemore’s argument. Currie said he became a Christian as a child because the Holy Spirit convicted him of his sin, even though he knew little of what the Bible said.

“In Galatians, Paul said, ‘I want you to know, brothers, this gospel I preach was not something I made up, ... rather I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ,’” Currie said. “I’m glad this committee was not around when Paul received his revelation from Jesus Christ.”

Currie’s comment drew a sharp retort from Richard Land, president of the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and a member of the SBC study committee. “The Apostle Paul was an apostle,” Land said. “The illumination we get from the Holy Spirit must be guided by scripture, because you and I are not apostles, sir.”

Messengers soundly rejected Sisemore’s amendment, just as they had to an earlier amendment proposed by Charles Wade, executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

Wade offers amendment

Wade suggested restoring two paragraphs from the preamble to the 1963 “Baptist Faith and Message.”

Before debate, the study committee introduced an additional two sentences to the statement’s preamble inserting the words “soul competency” and “priesthood of believers” but noting that these liberties should be tempered by “our accountability to each other under the word of God.”

Wade proposed going a step further by inserting sentences from the 1963 preamble. (see box with the amendments at top of next page)

Wade said his amendment was “crucial” to affirming the supremacy of Christ. “We are indeed people of the book, but we are also people who bow only before Jesus Christ our Savior.” The amendment also was needed to prevent the “Baptist Faith and Message” from being used as a creed, which Baptists have always opposed, Wade argued. The study committee’s proposed new preamble replaced the 1963 language with this statement:

“Baptist churches, associations and general bodies have adopted confessions of faith as a witness to the world and as instruments of doctrinal accountability.”

Members of the SBC study committee strongly urged messengers to reject Wade’s amendment. “All of us believe in the lordship of Jesus Christ,” Land explained. “But we believe the only Jesus Christ we can know is the Jesus Christ revealed in scripture.

“I fully believe that a demonic spirit could come and sit on the foot of my bed tonight and say, ‘Richard, I am Jesus. I want to tell you everybody is going to heaven and you don’t have to worry about it any more. But that would be wrong. ... Why? Because scripture stands in judgment of my experience, not my experience in judgment of scripture.”

Wade’s amendment was supported by Bruce Prescott, director of Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists. “There is a difference in the way we understand soul competency in the old ‘Baptist Faith and Message’ and the new version that is being proposed,” he said. “Soul competency as defined by E.Y. Mullins and Herschel Hobbs was soul competency under God. That means we are responsible to Jesus Christ. Soul competency as defined by this committee … is soul competency under the church. That means we are accountable to each other’s interpretations of the word of God.”

“We really need to leave us free to be accountable to Jesus Christ,” Prescott said. “He is the criterion by which the Bible is interpreted. He is the only infallible and inerrant interpreter of scripture.”

Messengers also rejected a third amendment, offered by Jim Goodroe of First Baptist Church of Sumter, S.C., to amend a statement that he said endorsed “closed communion.”

Difference Illustrated

In interviews afterward, both Wade and study committee members characterized the floor debate as illustrative of the differences between SBC moderates and conservatives. Wade said he agreed with Mohler’s statement that “this is what it all comes down to.”

The question, he said, is “Can you have a high view of the Bible but have a higher view of Jesus?” “It all comes down to this: The Bible, as high as we hold it as a source for doctrinal understanding, Jesus Christ is the criterion by which we interpret the Bible.”

If Jesus is not the guiding principle for biblical interpretation, Wade asked, “then who or what is?”

That question was put to four members of the study committee during a news conference minutes later. Mohler spoke for the committee to explain there were “dangers” in the language identifying Jesus as the criterion for biblical interpretation.

“We do believe in a christological hermeneutic” or framework for biblical interpretation, he said. However, “the danger is when Christ is set against scripture,” he added.

Making Jesus the criterion by which the Bible is interpreted allows anyone to assert anything and claim Jesus told them that was truth, he suggested.

Others opposed to the committee’s recommendations refuted that notion, claiming the words of Jesus in the New Testament, for example, take precedence when conflicting passages are found in the Old Testament.

The Bible is not a “flat” document, argued Wayne Ward, emeritus professor of theology at Southern Seminary during a speech on the convention floor. “You could follow Moses and stone adulterers,” he said. “It would clear out Congress and empty some pulpits,” but it would not be true to words of Jesus in the New Testament.

“The Bible is scripture, God’s written word, yes, but it does not say anywhere believe on the Bible and thou shalt be saved,” Ward said. “We have to decide whether we’re going to stop in the Old Testament with Moses or whether we’re going to go on and interpret Moses by Jesus.”

Chuck Kelley, president of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and a member of the SBC study committee, said in the news conference that this debate formed a “magnificent textbook illustration of why we had a denominational struggle.”

“If anyone had any doubt about whether a new stream of theology began entering our denomination in the ’60s,” listening to the floor debate about the relative merits of Jesus versus the Bible should have dispelled those doubts, he said. Mohler agreed: “There are two different visions of Baptist life and the Baptist faith.”

July 2000