SBC Primer #5 - The Blogs

I still remember my initiation into the world of Southern Baptist blogs very well. I can't remember the exact date, but I do remember, I was sitting at my desk when I worked in Augusta. During some down time, I was reading an article on ChristianityToday.com about whatever the latest controversy in SBC life was. It was specifically speaking of two people, bloggers, who'd become popular in Southern Baptist circles. They were the godfathers of SBC blogging, Wade Burelson, of Grace and Truth to You, and Marty Duren, of SBC Outpost, now of ie:Missional. I don't remember what the subject even was, but I was immediately drawn in, and have been reading those blogs ever since.

Since that first day, I've been introduced through their blogging to men like Tom Ascol and the Founders Blog, Timmy Brister at Provocations and Pantings, Ben Cole, Paul Littleton and the gang at the new SBC Outpost, Nathan Finn at The Fullness of Time, Micah Fries at Husband Daddy Pastor Learner, and Robin Foster, Tim Rogers and the rest of the crew at SBC Today. I've never met any of these men, and have only spoken briefly by e-mail to a couple of them, but I can tell you what most of them think about most of the issues facing both the SBC and Christianity in general. I can also tell you that they all seem to be men who love God and truly care about the future of the SBC in particular and Christendom in general. Trust me, they don't all agree on everything, and those disagreements can sometimes be quite sharp, but they really do a pretty good job of covering all that is good and not so good about SBC life. If you explore the SBC blogosphere right now, you'll discover arguments, ahem, discussions, on everything from Calvinism to tongue speaking to alcohol to proper baptism. All of the bloggers will have firmly held convictions, and will usually state those convictions pretty well.

While thought in Southern Baptist Life was once passed along at the speed of the Postal Service via monthly Baptist State newspapers and the Baptist Press, it now moves at the speed of the Internet (connections may vary depending on location). Southern Baptist blogging has become such a phenomenon that there's a web site devoted just to tracking the SBC blogs. I'm pleased to be one of the newest additions to that site, SBC Voices, which tracks more than 350 blogs daily.

Those blogs have had a pretty significant impact on SBC politics over the last several years. The bloggers have been given at least partial credit for the presidency of Frank Page. They talked up his candidacy quite a bit in the days leading up the convention two years ago. If that Resolution on Integrity in Church Membership that I've talked about passes at this year's convention, it will be thanks in large part, I believe, to a concerted effort through the blogs over the last few years to bring attention to the problem of the SBC's bloated rolls. I would also venture to say that more average lay people know and understand what goes on in SBC life a lot better because of the blogs.

This series has been mostly to help members of my Sunday School class learn a little bit more about how the SBC works as it is presently constituted, but I know over the last week or so, I've also picked up quite a few SBC bloggers, so let me end this post with a story and a word to them and for them.

I do an interview segment in my newscast every day. I usually don't know who it's going to be until right before I walk on the set. One day earlier this year, I picked up the sheet with my interviewees information on it, and the name immediately rang a bell. Just before the interview started, I looked at him and said, "Do you have a blog?" He was pretty surprised that I asked the question, but affirmed that he did indeed. He was one of the SBC bloggers that I'd read over the years, Matt Snowden, now Associate Pastor at First Baptist in Meridian. He blogs at Broken Steeple. We've gotten to know each other a little since then, so I think I can share what he told me with you. He said, "I thought those blogs were just for us insiders. I didn't think anyone else actually read them." He was really surprised that an SBC laymen, or for that matter, some non-Christian out there, might actually stumble upon something he wrote. I can honestly say I've never read anything Matt has written that he should be ashamed of; in fact, much he's written would be profitable to the world at large. But I can't say that for all of the SBC bloggers out there.

Here's the warning: whatever you say, whatever you write, can be seen by the entire world. I've been told anytime I have a microphone on, I should pretend that it's hot, and everything I say will be broadcast to the world. You should think the same thing with your blogs. They are not ways of doing personal correspondence between a small circle of friends. People are watching you, sometimes like me, very quietly, for a really long time, without saying a word. So be careful. My hope for this blog is that all I say will be Christ-honoring. I have a feeling that if I haven't already, I will eventually fall short of that. But the day I feel like I've gone too far, that what I'm writing will hinder the cause of Christ more than it helps it, will be the day I hang this blog thing up. I hope that's a promise that we can all make to ourselves.

SBC Primer #4 - The Factions

For those of you who don't know, I did not grow up in the Southern Baptist Church, or a baptist church at all, for that matter. I went to church for the first 18 years of my life at a tiny, Cumberland Presbyterian Church in my hometown of Sebastopol, Mississippi. My grandad was the pastor there for 38 years, and I got my spiritual foundation there. It wasn't until I graduated from college and had been working in Meridian for several years that I got back into church. When I did, I felt God leading me to a SBC church in Meridian, where I've been ever since, save the two years Crystal and I lived in Augusta, Georgia.

I say that to say this: I wasn't around for the Baptist battles of the last three decades. I've read a lot about them, but I know that I can never get a complete understanding of them because I wasn't there. Even if I'd been around as a child, I'd probably understand a little better, but alas, I was going to church with baby baptizers (that was just a little dig in case anyone in my still sprinklin' family is reading this - I love you guys).

Nevertheless, I think I might have a different perspective because I wasn't in the middle of everything growing up. I've watched what things have been like over the last couple of years very closely and very quietly, and I think I've discerned a little bit about what the lay of the SBC landscape looks like right now. So without further ado, for the few of you who know even less than I do about all of this, here's my take on what the different SBC factions look like.

Old School Fundamentalists - This is a small group, and getting smaller every year I think. These are the King James only, hymn and Southern gospel-only, frankly known much more for what they're for than what they're against, types. I would be very careful to label any particular person a Fundamentalist, because it has become such a pejorative term in most circles. Not all people who like the KJV or hymns or Southern Gospel are Fundamentalists. I think this group has always been a part of the convention, but I really do think it's getting ever smaller.


Traditionalists - This is where I think a good portion of the older part of the SBC is. They make up the people who've really been the backbone of the convention for the last three decades. They believe the Bible, they like things done formally and traditionally, they're probably heavily involved in the culture war, they're most likely Republicans, and they're serious about evangelism. They're probably very much revivalists, and they believe strongly in personal witnessing. They also likely believe strongly in a Baptist identity, holding very closely to a set of ideals about what the Baptist church is supposed to look like. I think a fair number of people in my church would fall into this category.


Contemporarians - These are people like Rick Warren, Ed Young, and Andy Stanley, who are trying some different things to try to reach people. It may be as simple as contemporary music; they also likely don't dress up quite as much for church. They've adjusted their methods for the society around them. They've also been criticized by many who say they've adjusted the message also. Hence, I think many of them have pulled out of active SBC life, and are going their own way. While they might still be a part of the convention, they are not as active on the political side of it. I also find a goodly number of people like this in my church.


Calvinists - This is a growing and controversial group in SBC life. I'm not sure I'd call myself a 5-pointer, but my soteriology has drifted pretty far in a reformed, Calvinist direction over the last few years, and I'm a big believer in God's sovereignty when it comes to everything, salvation included. The Calvinists are growing especially in the younger age groups, 40 and below, as they've been influenced by people like John Piper and Mark Driscoll and Al Mohler. They've been subject to some pretty harsh rhetoric at times, but frankly, I've seen many of them give it right back. But this movement is growing; I know several people who would call themselves reformed in my church, and some who I think are moving in that direction.

Charismatics - I hesitated even to put this category in, because I don't think there are really many dyed in the wool, classic charismatics in our convention. When you use that phrase, a certain kind of Christian tends to jump into your head; tongue speaking, prophecy giving, faith healing, and the sort. The issue of tongues has recently become a big one in SBC life, specifically the idea of private praying in tongues. I know there is a small, but significant portion of people in the convention who practice this, and that's probably who the charismatic group consists mostly of. I am not including in this group all of those who believe that spiritual gifts are still gifts for today. I think you'll find people like that in almost every group in SBC life, though some are more cautious about it than others. I think my church might have a Charismatic or four in it.

Emerging - This is another I hesitate to add, because I know that there is so much controversy surrounding the emerging church right now. The emerging have a lot in common with the Contemporarians, in that they're trying to to contemporize the church for the culture we're living in right now, but they're trying to do it for a more post-modern culture. That has it's problems because many post-modern folks don't really like absolute truth. I don't think people like that would feel comfortable in the SBC, and I don't think the Emerging church folks in the SBC are like that. But I know a couple of churches that I'd probably call emerging; they're meeting in homes or coffee houses, doing some different kinds of things to reach the culture. I would say the ones I know have their theology on pretty straight though.

Big Tent Baptists - These are the people who fall into any of the above categories, who are kind of tired of all of the fighting. They don't like what they see as a narrowing of the parameters of what it means to be a Southern Baptist. They think if you can affirm the SBC statement of faith, the Baptist Faith and Message, that ought to be enough. They see room in the convention for the fundies and the five pointers and the charismatics and the tie-died shirt wearers, as long as they affirm the authority and inerrancy of God's word, and interpret it in a way consistent with the BF&M.

This is not a perfect list of all the factions; I am sure there are more. Furthermore, there is a lot of cross-pollination between the different groups. Some Traditionalists are Calvinists, and some Calvinists are Charismatics, and some Charismatics are Contemporarians, and some Contemporarians are Big Tenters. I don't want to hem any one particular person into any one particular group unnecessarily. But as best I've seen over the last several years, this comes pretty close to covering all of the groups that are presently part of SBC life.

Now, it's very easy to say that the Fundamentalists want to kick everyone else out of the convention, and the Traditionalists are stuck in the past, and the Contemporarians are compromising the Word of God, and the Calvinists are going to hurt the cause of missions, and the Charismatics are going to cause chaos, and the Emerging folks just want to be able to drink beer and cuss, and the Big-tenters are going to cause us to drift toward liberalism. I've heard all of those arguments made in the past. I frankly don't buy them. I think there is a place for everyone inside the convention, and keeping each of the groups around kind of balances one another out. I personally can find agreement with most of the groups over some of their big issues, though I probably have most in common with the Calvinists and the Contemporarians (both sides might tell you that's impossible, but oh well.)

The point is, with all of these factions, it's easy to see why there is generally a fair amount of infighting and disagreement. I'm not sure that's a bad thing, you know, iron sharpening iron and everything. These disagreements have been around for years, but I think during the convention they'll mainly just kind of boil beneath the surface. But it's certainly more public than it used to be; with the Internet age we now live in, arguments seem to be louder now. That will be the subject of my final post on the SBC.

SBC Primer #3 - The Presidential Candidates

This year's Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Indianapolis should be one of the most intriguing in years for one major reason: the shear number of candidates running for the office of president. It's been almost thirty years since the SBC had so many candidates, dating back to the very beginning of the SBC's so-called Conservative Resurgence in 1979, when conservatives began to regain control of the denomination.

For the most part over the last thirty years, the conservative power structure has nominated one person, and that person has pretty much been coronated the President. There have been a few competitive races, but most of the time, the person the conservatives wanted became president. It gave us presidents of such renown as Charles Stanley, Adrian Rodgers, and Jerry Vines. In many ways the Conservative Resurgence produced a slew of well-know, conservative, godly, Biblically based men as President.

But two years ago, something different happened. There were three candidates for the position, all conservative, Godly men, and two of them came from the old guard. The third, Frank Page, won the election on the first ballot. Dr. Page has served honorably and ably as president for the past two years now. (I have a slight connection to him. I was a member of Warren Baptist Church in Augusta, Georgia, the church he pastored before he took over First Baptist Church in Taylors, South Carolina. We weren't there at the same time, but we are both former members of Warren. So there.) I like Frank Page a lot. I think he's been a breath of fresh air, not quite as strident sounding as some of the former presidents, though his beliefs are equally as conservative.

The SBC president typically serves two one-year terms before moving on, so this will be Dr. Page's last term in office. That sets up what is likely to be one of the wildest presidential elections in some time. So, I will try now to break down said election, in as simple a way as I know how.

Here are the candidates and a little bit about them, in alphabetical order.

Frank Cox - pastor of North Metro First Baptist Church in Lawrenceville, Georgia. In a normal year, it's likely that Dr. Cox would have been nominated, and that would be it. He has strong conservative credentials, pastors a large church in the heart of SBC territory, and has the backing of some well known people. He will be nominated by a man who is no stranger to my church, the well-known evangelist Junior Hill. For that reason alone, it's likely that he will have some strong support among people in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. He has his own campaign web site, FrankCox.org.

Wiley Drake - the pastor of First Southern Baptist Church of Beuna Park, California, and easily the most colorful of the candidates. I understand from reading about him that this guy has a heart of gold, and has quietly done a ton of work to help the poor and underprivileged in his community. But he's going to be best know for being the guy who for sponsored the ill-fated SBC boycott of Disney World, and a couple of years ago presented an unsuccessful resolution calling for parents to pull their kids out of public schools. He currently serves as second vice-president of the SBC, a largely ceremonial position.

Johnny Hunt - pastor of First Baptist Church in Woodstock, Georgia. Again, in any other year, Hunt would have been a guy running with very little opposition. He's a well-known pastor of a mega-church in the middle of SBC territory. He actually toyed with the idea of running two years ago, but backed out at the last minute. Hunt has been active in trying to develop young leaders, through his Barnabas-Timothy conferences, and has planted 78 other churches, including a couple of them in Las Vegas.

Les Puryear - pastor of Lewisville Baptist Church in Lewisville, North Carolina. In any other year, a pastor like Puryear wouldn't even consider running, much less be considered a real contender. Puryear has been pastor at Lewisville, a church of about 200, for about three years. Usually, a small church pastor wouldn't even consider running, but he's gained notoriety for his Small Church Leadership Conference earlier this year, and for hosting one of the more popular SBC blogs, "Joining God in His Work".

Bill Wagner - former SBC international missionary and current president of Olivet University International in San Francisco. Wagner is also the unpaid pastor of tiny Snyder Lane Baptist in Rohnert Park, California. Wagner was, I believe, the first candidate to announce, and the first ever to have his own campaign web site, WilliamWagner.org. Wagner has also proposed a 10-point "Contract with Southern Baptists," with what his plans will be if he is elected.

Avery Willis - Executive Director of the Inernational Orality Network, and also a former SBC international missionary. Willis is probably best know for a creating the Master Life discipleship materials while he was a missionary in Indonesia. Lifeway has translated that program into more than 50 languages, including English, and it has been used by many people over the years to learn and grow in Christ. Not being a long-time Southern Baptist, I had never heard of it, but apparently it was very popular and effective.

As far as which way this one is going to go, I have to say I have no idea. Hunt and Cox will have a lot of support among the traditional, old guard SBC'ers. I'm sure both would be fine presidents. If I was at the convention, I would probably lean toward Puryear, because I've read his blog and can appreciate the work he's doing. But I'm not sure who I'd vote for. The guy I liked the most, Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, dropped out of the race after being diagnosed with cancer earlier this year.

I have linked to each of the candidates Baptist Press articles announcing their candidacy, if you want to read more. This year is certainly going to be interesting.

Coming up next: the different factions that make up SBC politics right now.

SBC Primer #2 - How it works

I've never been to an actual SBC annual meeting, so I can't really say with any certainty exactly how it works. Most of us know only what we see on TV: lots of people gathered in some large auditorium, singing, listening to speeches, debating resolutions, and so forth. It frankly looks a little like a Party Presidential Convention, sometimes complete even with addresses from politicians. President Bush has addressed the convention via videotape a couple of times, and a couple of years ago, Condoleeza Rice addressed in person.

As best I can tell though, the action on the floor is only the culmination of much behind the scenes work and back room wheeling and dealing. The SBC is a political animal, Christian or otherwise, and politics is a big part of what the annual convention is all about. The conservatives in the convention were known for years for having pre-convention meetings in hotel rooms to decide how they were going to nominate a presidential candidate, and last year some well known bloggers got together to get the now-infamous Garner Motion passed. For more on that, you can click on this link.

On the floor, there will be several things going on. Here's a partial list:

1) Presidential Election - I'll have more on that in a day or two.

2) Resolutions Debates and Votes - I blogged last week about one of those resolutions, the Resolution on Integrity in Church Membership.

3) Reports from Southern Baptist Entities - The presidents of all of the SBC's seminaries will tell us what is happening there, as well as the heads of SBC entities like the North American Missions Board, the International Mission Board, and Lifeway.

There will also be lots of preaching and praise and worship of the Lord. It should be an interesting couple of days. You can follow it all live on the SBC's web site - http://www.sbc.net/.

Coming up next - a look at the candidates for SBC president this year.

Southern Baptist Convention Primer #1

The Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting is set to start in about two weeks. It will be held June 10-11, in Indianapolis, Indiana. I'm admittedly still a neophyte when it comes to Southern Baptist politics, but for those of you who are even newer to it than I am, I'm going to try over the next several days to do a quick overview of the state of the SBC right now.

This year's meeting will likely be one of the most interesting ones we've seen in many years. First of all, it comes not many weeks after a report by Lifeway found that the convention is actually declining in membership for the first time in years. I'm sure there will be much talk of that during the meeting. Secondly, there are six, count them, six, men running for the office of President. That might not have ever happened. I think it's a sign of a lot of new ideas out there, and a bit of splintering into several different factions within the convention. That splintering may or may not be a bad thing.

If the SBC is going to survive and thrive for years to come, I think this year may be one of the crucial years, not just for the annual meeting, but for all Southern Baptists, that we decide what we are going to do to properly reach the world. I don't know what the SBC's future is. I personally don't like everything that goes on within the convention's leadership, or within many of the individual churches in the convention. But I know there are a certain few things I can expect when I go into a church that affiliates with the SBC. I know it will more than likely be conservative, believing the Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God. I know what it's basic theology will be, though I also know that there is a fair amount of variation across the spectrum. I also know that at least some of the money I give in the form of my tithes and offerings will go to help pay for missions, both nationally and internationally. So for those reasons alone, I like the idea of the SBC, though in it's practice I sometimes find myself frustrated.

Over the next few days, I'm going to discuss some of the specifics of the convention: 1) how it works, at its very basic form, 2) the presidential election and the particular candidates, 3) the different factions that seem to be making up the convention right now, and 4) how blogs have lately formed the debate in the convention.

I've admittedly become fairly intrigued by SBC politics lately, though I also know that my knowledge of it is still limited. Whatever I write will only be good for the uninitiated. If you know much about the SBC, it probably won't be of much help to you. But if you, like me, are new to the inner workings of the convention, it might be of some help. We'll just have to see.