What happened to the SBC? by Bob Mulkey senior pastor, First Baptist Church, DeLand, FL

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I recently read "The Way We Were" by Fisher Humphreys, Professor of Theology at Beeson Divinity School, Samford University. Dr. Humphries' book has helped me to see more clearly what has happened to the Southern Baptist Convention. Why do we at First Baptist Church of DeLand give our members the opportunity to give money to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship as an alternative to the Southern Baptist Convention? Because, as Dr. Humphries writes, there are four progressive beliefs which are no longer welcome in the Convention: the ordination of women to serve as pastors, the critical study of the Bible, higher education as exploration rather than as indoctrination, and ecumenism. He says, "The new leaders of the Convention have rejected them so vigorously that it is now clear to everyone that these progressive beliefs have no future in the Southern Baptist Convention."

What do these "progressive beliefs" have to do with our church? First Baptist has ordained women to serve as deacons since 1972. As far as I know, we have never ordained a woman to serve as a pastor. However, we believe that God does not give spiritual gifts based on gender. If a woman has the gift of teaching and the gift of leadership and hears God calling her to serve as a pastor, we would not tell her she has misunderstood, because God doesn't do that. We understand that the words in 1 Timothy 2: 11, "I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man," were perhaps expressing God's will for the first century, when a woman's exercise of public leadership of any kind would have been considered a scandal. But women in our time exercise leadership in government, business, education and in many other realms. Now it is a scandal to exclude women from leadership roles and will hurt the cause of the gospel to do so in the church.
That brings me to the second progressive belief, the critical study of the Bible. The word "critical" does not mean that anyone is to criticize the Bible. It means that we are to put our critical faculties into play when we read the Bible and ask what it meant when it was written and how that meaning is to be applied two thousand or more years later. We want to study the Bible in our church using the best scholarship and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

A third progressive belief that is now not welcome in the Convention is that the best higher education is exploration not indoctrination. We believe that we have a heritage to pass on to our children and grandchildren. At the same time we believe that all learners should be encouraged to explore belong their tradition. The danger of indoctrination is that it will prevent students from studying alternative views so that they can freely decide for themselves which view is truthful.

The fourth progressive belief is that Baptists should participate in ecumenism. Southern Baptist leaders have dropped out of dialogue with Roman Catholic leaders. One of the former presidents of the Convention has recently made ecumenical relations with Muslims difficult for Southern Baptist leaders by stating publicly that "Muhammad was a demon possessed pedophile." Other Convention leaders have defended his statement because they have no interest in dialogue with Muslims. The difference between Cooperative Baptist Fellowship people and Convention leaders is that we are willing to cooperate with mainline denominations like Methodists and Presbyterians and seek to learn how to serve Christ along with them. Our Coordinator, Daniel Vestal, has opened up conversations with national Muslim leaders since 9/11.