A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I regularly blogged about matters relating to the Southern Baptist Convention. After a couple of years of such writing, I retired from it and began to blog about other matters. I’m writing this particular post as a couple of friends, for whom I have great respect, have asked me to weigh in with a few thoughts on the proposed Great Commission Resurgence (GCR) in the Southern Baptist Convention. I’m not returning to the fray.
Though some, perhaps many, will take my writing as negative, it is only how things are viewed from my seat. I hope against hope for nothing but success for all those who are involved in this attempt and would be happy to be proven wrong.
Beginning at least as early as Dr. Jimmy Draper’s Younger Leader Initiative in the SBC, calls for major institutional, structural and Cooperative Program reform have been a part of conversation from the fringes to the center of SBC life and leadership. The Younger Leader discussion board that went online just before Thanksgiving of 2004 (now defunct) was flooded with concerns about the wastefulness of the current denominational structure and suggestions on how to address those issues. Those younger leaders ultimately divided into at least three branches: those who continued their path out of the convention, those who tried a concerted effort (ie, political) to effect change (I was here) and those who more or less eschewed the politics to focus on bringing change via their local churches. This is a simplification, I’m aware, but I think it holds up well enough for this post.
After two years of blogging multiple times a week and gaining insight into the mechanics, politics and personalities of the SBC, I came to the conclusion that attempt at denominational reform were hopeless and efforts to bring it about were futile, bordering on bad time management. (One can read those posts here, here, here and here. Independent of my own writing, Michael Spencer came to very similar conclusions regarding the collapse of evangelicalism Part 1 and Part 2.)
Recently Dr. Danny Akin of Southeastern Seminary issued a call for denominational reform under the name Great Commission Resurgence which term has been credited with coinage by Dr. Thom Rainer, president of Lifeway Christian Resources. This original 13 point message was distilled into ten points and promoted by current SBC president, Dr. Johnny Hunt, who, as I understand it, intends to make it a focus of the 2009 Convention in Louisville. As of this writing, the document boasts 3,346 signatures, which is less than the annual attendance of the SBC and .0002% of the claimed 16M SBC membership, but, to be fair, substantially more than movements of the recent past have garnered (ie, The Memphis Declaration and the Joshua Convergence).
Responses to the GCR document have been, shall we say, wildly varied. Shortly after Danny Akin’s message, Baptist Press published a subtle rebuttel from the normally far afield Dr. Malcolm Yarnell who did not disappoint. Dr. Hunt has taken flack for proposing such a thing as the GCR, accusations about base motives are swimming just under the surface. A document attempting to call the SBC back to a focus on the Great Commission has not been signed by 75% of the Executive Directors of state conventions/fellowships, who, ostensibly, are for the Great Commission, and there is suspicion within the ranks over who would be the president of a potentially combined IMB/NAMB mission agency. With the less than stellar performance of late at NAMB and the perennial candidacy of the SBTC’s Jim Richards, I do not know that much trust would be engendered by a search team, assurances of “God’s will being done” notwithstanding.
My thoughts are few and, sadly, are little changed from the thoughts that led to me abandon any hope of a true change in the SBC from a vestige of a nostalgic past to a rebirth as a missional powerhouse. Nevertheless, here are a few for what they are worth.
1. The SBC has ADHD. EKG, GPS, GCR. The SBC sounds like alphabet soup or the federal government. There is scarcely enough time to promote one program or idea before it makes way for the next one, none of which catch hold. There are programs that emanate from different offices and different entities (The Net and F.A.I.T.H. for example) giving the impression that some entities are actually in competition with each other. This is not even to get into different promotions within given states that alternately duplicate or ignore national movements (Promise Keepers becomes Legacy Builders in the GBC).
2. There is too much turfism. The local association, the state convention and the national convention are often at odds with each other over who is to do what, when and where. State evangelism offices and directors are at odds with NAMB. The entities are concerned about money and who’s getting it. For years at least one of the seminary presidents has been pushing hard for a “seminary offering” to be observed in the convention’s churches, but has been rebuffed. The states balk at the idea of sending a greater percentage of funds to X-Comm, though the IMB is now unable to send M’s who are currently trained and ready. Much of this is related to denominational protectionism or fiefdoms that must be protected at all costs, even kingdom costs.
3. The SBC’s greatest strength, autonomy, has become its greatest weakness. Since each level makes it’s own decisions independently of the other levels (though each claims to be the servant of the churches), there is not enough cooperation and often redundancy. When Dr. Akin mentioned “bloated bureaucracy” he was met with cries of “foul” from other areas. No one thinks that their own area is bloated only that others are. For that reason, as some have noted, passing a resolution on this document means little since the states and not obligated to do anything as a result (Others have noted that restructuring will not bring revival). Even if a study committee returns and makes recommendations for streamlining, each individual state would have to act independently and would be loath to do so for fear of another state keeping or receiving more CP money.
4. There is not enough trust. Everything that I learned in two years keeps me believing that there is ample reason for this, but this is a terrible situation. Adult men and women all of whom are assumed to be maturing Christians, but cannot trust that there are no agendas other than a kingdom agenda. There is not even trust on the upper levels of leadership; how is there going to be trust down the line? Anyone who has read Patrick Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a Team knows that trust is foundational to effectiveness.
5. There are too many viable options for education, fellowship and mission. Southern Baptists no longer need an SBC education. The proliferation of online education has made it possible to have more (and sometimes cheaper) alternatives. Not being forced to move in order to attend seminary may be a bane to the schools, but it is a blessing to the students. Not only that, but currently I’m in a degree program that is not offered by SBC seminaries and is a less expensive option even counting CP subsidies.
Networks such as Acts 29 and Glocal with discussions like ChurchAsMissionary have made it possible to have meaningful partnerships outside rigid SBC structures and, in many cases, individual churches provide more church plant money than all levels of the denomination combined. Fellowship is as readily attained in online communities and impromptu phone calls than at the Monday Morning Pastors Conference at Shoney’s.
6. God does not need the SBC. At least one SBCer, Jedediah Coppenger, has written a lament about the drop in Cooperative Program funds relating to international missions asking if the Great Commission is filing for bankruptcy. While I appreciate the concern, I cannot join the chorus of despair because I do not think that God is dependent on the SBC. Was there no fulfillment of the Great Commission before the founding of the Southern Baptist Convention? If not, how did the gospel get to our ancestors? Was the modern missions movement founded in Nashville? Did Adonirum Judson go through the International Learning Center?
A few years ago I sat in a room with 20 or so other men and ladies and we discussed the future of the SBC. My primary contribution to the conversation was this: “If we are not prepared to admit that God may be envisioning a future without the SBC, then we are not prepared to envision a future with it.” That is, the SBC must be willing to at least seriously and thoughtfully consider that God is done with the SBC before serious thought can be given to a potential future. Otherwise we think and act from a position of triumphalism–that God needs us to fulfill His plans, when, in fact, He does not.
7. There is more concern about job security than about soul salvation. Every time someone mentions b’cracy, downsizing, and streamlining, someone usually brings up the fact that people will lose their jobs. So? And? I see a commission in the Word to take the gospel to all the world, but see nothing about denominational job creation. This particular concern should never enter the discussion. It simply is not relevant to the mission. Glorifying God by getting the gospel to those who have not heard is the mission; everything about the SBC should flow from and into that.
8. There is no compelling vision. Still.
9. We do not need a Great Denominational Resurgence. In case you spend all of your time inside the SBC beltway, the GCR has already been pegged as such by some outside your circles and a few in them. I just don’t know anyone who is crying themselves to sleep at night because of the SBC. Over the condition of our world? Yes. Over the lost? Yes. Over the denomination? No. Pastors are leading churches to be involved in the Great Commission. I know scads of them who have adopted unreached people groups, have partnered with M’s and nationals, have sent countless teams and planted churches all without denominational assistance. Why spend so much time and energy trying to change the saddle on a dying horse? Pastors and churches should recognize the efficiency and effectiveness of channels that exist outside the bureaucratic structures of denominations and exploit them to the fullest.
10. Any study team will likely have the wrong people on it. The order of thinking that could get the SBC out of this mess will of necessity be a different order of thinking than got the SBC into this mess and that “different order” kind of thinking will have to come from different people none of whom will be asked to serve. Why? Because they are on the fringe. The fringe is where creativity happens. Revolutionary thinking scares the status-quo which is why it gets pushed out to the fringe.
One SWBTS professor wrote that the SBC is led from the center. This might be true when there is consensus, but is decidedly not true about leading a revolution. Revolutions always begin at the fringe because the center is inhabited by the status quo. Imagine a study group filled with fringe dwellers who bring back a bunch of wild ideas about streamlining, combining, restructuring…stuff that will actually work. Then it gets beat half to death by a bunch of turf protectors, before being subjected to everyone in the blogosphere, then it finally limps into the annual meeting only to be suffer 20 lashes and then pass the votes of not one but two consecutive June meetings.
And while all that energy has been expended trying to change a denomination, the fringe dwellers are out changing the world.
I remember being in the 9th grade, sitting the back of Mrs. Howard’s math class at Riverdale Junior High School. I was a teacher’s aide and spent almost as much time doing nothing as doing something. My desk, as it was, sat beside a bookcase that had just one or two books on it (it being a math class, after all) one of which had a black cover with the title in bewitched looking red letters. I did not know at the time those two words had come from a Beatles song: Helter Skelter.
