SBC 2021: What Went Wrong and Can it Be Recovered?

Conversations That Matter

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Welcome to the Conversations That Matter podcast. My name is John Harris. We are going to talk about the

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Southern Baptist Convention, hopefully for the third and final time. It's still going on. I put out two videos yesterday you can check out where I talk about the floor motions and the resolutions and provide a lot of commentary, show a lot of clips.

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We're gonna do some more of that today. First though, I'm gonna show you an interview between myself and Judd Saul.

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Judd Saul was in the convention hall and he took the temperature of the room. He's gonna give his analysis of what went wrong for conservatives.

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And my emotions are running high. This is right after the vote for Ed Litton came through.

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I mean, I think within an hour of that is when I talked to him. So he's just experienced this and I'm gonna probably provide some more commentary, but he's the kind of person that gives it to you straight, what he really thinks.

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And so you might not all agree with maybe his take on it, but I think it is an important take because I think a lot of people feel similar to the way he feels.

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So I'm gonna show you that. And then we are gonna talk about the abortion issue.

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I wanna show you a clip I did not show you yesterday and it's the applause line that interests me more than anything else.

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And then again, another situation where the applause line interests me quite a bit, and that is a nine mark session.

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I don't know if it was a breakfast or late night. I think it was probably this morning, a session where an individual asked

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Danny Akin about critical race theory. And I'll let you watch that and then look at the reaction from the audience.

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That's what's telling to me. And I'm not sure exactly how to make sense of everything that's happening.

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I don't know if anyone has the full picture, but God. But in my own estimation, I know

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I'd said it yesterday that those who are fans of reason and logic and principled argument in the

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Bible and arguing from scripture and that kind of thing, they would be very disappointed with this convention.

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There's a lot of fashion, popularity contests, optics, emotion, it's post -modernism.

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I mean, that's what we are witnessing. And there seems to be a very deep desire among many.

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It's not just the elite, it's many in that room, in both rooms that I'm about to show you. It seems like to me that they want to, they don't wanna be a threat to the establishment, the progressive, radical establishment.

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They don't wanna talk about issues that are actually attacking and confronting the church. They'd rather sidestep those.

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And then kind of in a softer way, much of the time, try to follow the lead of progressives in every other institution.

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That's what it seems like. Is this just pragmatism? I don't think it's just pragmatism at all. I think maybe for the older folks that might, hey, it's pragmatic, the kids want this, right?

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That's what they think. For the younger people, and I mean younger by, in general, these are rough kind of figures, but like 40 and younger, 35 and younger,

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I think for like millennials and Gen Z, I don't think it's pragmatism. I think there's a genuine belief in this social justice religion.

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There's a genuine syncretism going on, and it's not motivated by pragmatism. I think that's half true, but I don't think that's the full truth.

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I think there's something else going on. And I don't know about you, but it seems off.

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Doesn't it just, it seems off. You're trying to kind of, this is what I've been going through a little bit, is trying to wrestle in my mind, okay, what exactly is it?

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I know that I was at seminary at a Southern Baptist school. I know I saw the indoctrination. I knew this would be a problem five years from the point at which

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I first saw it in churches. That's been dead right, unfortunately. But even going back five years and seeing the reactions of people in class and seeing the way they thought and seeing sometimes how foolish it was, how ignorant oftentimes it was, and not everyone was like that.

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There were some smart people. A lot of them kept their mouths shut. But seeing even how professors who knew better would go along with things,

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I couldn't quite put my finger on all of it. Sure, I can come up with a lot of reasons in my mind for why that might be, pragmatism being one of them, false teachers being one of them, and just people who aren't converted sitting in the pews who sometimes they fail in other industries and sometimes unfortunately being a pastor or going into the ministry because Christians are so accepting seems like an option.

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And so they're not even true converts. I've gone through all these different explanations for this, and it's probably a combination of a whole bunch, but there's just something in the water.

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There's something in the air, something in the environment that is wrong. It feels off. And again,

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I know, logic reason, right? This is the working through things. I feel wrong. I sent something wrong.

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And then I'm applying my critical thinking faculties to try to figure out what that wrong thing is. And it is spiritual though.

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I know that guys. I just, I'm convinced of that 100%. There is a spiritual deception going on.

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And there's perhaps many different ways that it's coming in and manifesting itself, but there's something off.

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So I've said enough about that. So we'll talk about these reactions from the audience and this audience that just seems to be so out of touch with the world that they are living in and being able to apply a biblical ethic to it and see their place in it.

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And then we may take a trip down memory lane if we have time and talk about the path that got us here.

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And there's many different streams that converge and I can't follow all of them. So I'm gonna only focus on one of them if we have the time.

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We'll start in 1995 and we'll come forward. And I'll just talk about some of the resolutions that have taken place over the years where the

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Southern Baptist Convention seems to wanna just be anti -racist over and over and renew that pledge somehow. And it's like, there's never quite a forgiveness.

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It's always needs to be renewed. And this year was no exception to that. But there's an open letter

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I might wanna read for you from 1995, someone who I think had some foresight into some of this, who would now probably be completely condemned, even by some conservatives.

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But, and I'm not saying I even agree with everything that this open letter says, but I want you to at least listen to it.

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It is to our own peril if we ignore voices from the past. And that's why I think people should even read the

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Anti -Federalist Papers, not just the Federalist Papers, but I digress on that issue. So let's start with Judd Saul.

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Judd Saul, fresh from the convention floor where Ed Litton has just won. And here's what he had to say.

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Judd, thank you for joining us. I know that the votes tallies for the victory of Ed Litton for Southern Baptist Convention President have just come in and you have just left the convention.

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Wanna hear some of your insights. What happened? How did this happen? The wokest of the four candidates is now the president of the denomination.

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Well, this is what happened, John, is that the CBN and the

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Founders Network did not do what I had repeatedly asked them to do, is that they needed to separate themselves from the other candidates.

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You know, when Mike Stone goes on a show and says, oh, there's not a liberal candidate in the bunch.

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They're all good people. The woke was playing for blood and they were really pushing hard behind the scenes trying to do everything they could to win this election.

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On our side, they were trying to be genteel, trying to play a gentleman's politician's game where we know that the woke were playing dirty with this whole spontaneous sex abuse victim cornering

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Mike Stone in the middle of a hallway where there is no video recording of that that has actually been released, but it hits all the headlines.

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The woke knew what they were doing. The elites in the convention knew the game they were playing and they were playing for keeps.

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Our side, yeah, there was a lot of hype. There's a decent turnout from conservatives that showed up, but it wasn't enough because the people in the middle, the people you need to win elections, the people in the middle thought

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Ed Litton was anti -CRT. They think Ed Litton is not woke. In this series that we've been doing for five weeks, this is our last sermon.

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Thank you, Jesus, okay? So we've been talking about how to transfer a vibrant faith from your children to your children's children.

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So this morning, this last message we're doing together is going to be on four qualities of a transferable faith.

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Our resolutions on race led nobody to weep over four girls who were bombed and killed at 16th

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Avenue Baptist Church blocks away from here. It's led none that I know of that have wept over 3 ,446

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African Americans lynched since 1886. It's led none of us to really change anything except we resolve to say something.

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That is not repentance. Thank you, every one of you,

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I can count all of you, but just listen to this. But you say, preacher, I'm not a racist.

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Are you indifferent? Because there is a sin worse, the opposite of love is not hate, the opposite of love is indifference.

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And there is a sin of being indifferent about what our African American brothers and sisters are experiencing in this country, what they have, and there is an opportunity for us.

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Vindication, he says how they saw themselves. They also saw themselves with indignation.

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He said, not only what vindication, but what indignation. The Greek word here means anger that leads to action.

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The Corinthians finally dealt with this sinning man in a proper biblical way, but watch this. Their anger wasn't at him, it was at themselves for not taking sin seriously.

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How can we continue to be passive about sexual abuse in our churches? How can we look the other way, providing more comfort for abusers than for the abused?

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And I need to dive into one other thing, and that is this. Most recent flashpoint are attacks against two people that I frankly love,

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Beth Moore and David Platt. I know you're free to write whatever you want, but I thought under Christ, you may not be free to just say anything, that we are free to love one another, we are free to encourage one another, to help one another.

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You say, well, I'm here to correct everybody. God help you. We're being played by Satan for the cause of division that will strangle the gospel from taking this world for the glory of God.

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And I warn all of us in Galatians 5 .15, it says, if you bite and devour each other, watch out, or you two will be destroyed by each other.

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We are now reflecting the political culture of our nation more than the culture transformed by the love of Jesus Christ.

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And we need to check ourselves. We need to grieve over this, and we need to mourn over this and repent of this.

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So they were not informed on who he was. The people were not informed on who

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Ed Litton actually is and what he does. So the conservative candidates did nothing they could do to separate themselves from Al Mohler or Ed Litton.

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Now, you had referenced, I know you're probably frustrated right now. People who are listening to this tomorrow should keep that in mind.

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This is fresh right now. You referenced, I think you were maybe mixing up two quotes.

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You said Tom Askell had said, I think he said something on his show about the, that they're all good men.

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Well, Mike, there are four candidates that have announced that they're willing to let themselves be nominated for the presidency of SBC this year.

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And I don't know, I know Al Mohler, I don't know Ed Litton, and I just have corresponded a little bit with Randy Adams, but they all seem like really good guys.

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I mean, we're not talking about a bad guy in the mix. And then I think you mixed that with something

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Mike Stone had said in an interview with Baptist Press, which I talked to him about, and he said it was a mistake, but it was that there wasn't a liberal running and he kind of meant anyway.

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There's not a liberal running for SBC president. These are men that love the Lord, love his word, and I believe love the

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Southern Baptist Convention. So these kinds of statements you thought were confusing and more than that, there just wasn't an effort among a lot of the conservative candidates or conservative supporters of the two conservative candidates to make the argument that the other guys were bad.

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There should have been some negativity there. I think there should have been some negativity. If you're running for an election, you have to separate yourself from the other candidates.

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Why are you good? Why is your opponent not good? And there were people that I talked to that hated critical race theory.

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I was talking to different kinds of people all over the convention. You know, what do you think about critical race theory?

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They all hated it. They all don't like critical race theory. And it's like, well, then who are you voting for? And they'd be like, well,

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I can't decide between Ed Litton or Al Mohler. Well, they're not listening to conversations that matter or they're not looking at enemies within the church stuff.

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No, no, they're not. And the problem is, is I think people like founders and the

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CBN really had a, they lost this election for themselves in my honest opinion.

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Yeah. And, you know, but also the biggest travesty of the whole thing is this, is that the

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Southern Baptist Convention is in this position in the first place. Yeah.

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John, John, I watched Tom's brother submit a, try to get the committee to bring back a resolution to abolish abortion and the committee rejected it.

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I saw that. I didn't realize that was Tom Askell's brother. Yeah, Bill, Bill.

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Wow. So the Southern Baptist Convention can't even, the committee put forth a resolution to abolish abortion when overwhelmingly in the audience, they were calling for it, but the committee was like, nah, nah, we're gonna do our own thing.

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Well, I had said for, we're gonna air this tomorrow. So today is when

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I uploaded this, but I just made the observation that it seems like every time the Southern Baptists get together, they have to do something anti -racist in their minds every single time.

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But when the abortion issue comes up, it's like, well, we've already talked about that. So no need to further, you know, reinforce our position on it.

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So there's a huge double standard right there. It just shows you their prioritization is way off.

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Looks like you're, are you leaving me? No, I'm not leaving you. I'm just getting out of the car. Hold on a second. All right.

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I hope you have a good place to eat tonight. I know it's frustrating. Good steak. You know, that'll help you a little bit.

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Oh yeah, we're actually going to a steakhouse because we're tired of eating the downtown

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Nashville barbecue. You were saying you just don't think that some of the conservatives were aggressive enough.

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I understand that. I share some of that frustration. Just, I think we're all frustrated right now and everyone is thinking about what they could have done differently.

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I do have a lot of respect for Randy Adams and for Mike Stone. Mike Stone took a beating and, you know, he didn't get out of it.

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He kept going. Randy Adams, you know, also had a lot of negative press. He kept going.

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I guess the question is, you know, you had said that some of these people are conservative and they voted for the wokest of the candidates.

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Yes. That might put some hope in some people's minds. I saw that Rod Martin on Twitter just now has basically said that we need to stay in the convention and fight next time to try, you know, to reform it or something.

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I'm a little concerned about that because conservatives are going to be funding their own demise in a sense.

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And - Yeah, if you give to the cooperative program, you give to NAM. I mean, look, all the information that's come out from Will McCranny, issues that Randy Adams has brought up with the money corruption, every resolution and any time somebody came to the mic to address those issues was gone unheard.

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It was like tone deaf. Tone deaf silence, even from the people at the convention weren't concerned about the corrupt money flowing through the convention.

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So - Yeah, what can you do? I mean, he revealed shocking things and yet he didn't even get a thousand votes, which

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I just thought that's incredibly telling. And they worked,

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Randy worked real hard, worked real hard for very little to get the word out and to get what was going on.

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And for some reason, the message didn't resonate. It was just not resonating with people.

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Evidently, people would rather be nicer than Jesus and not worry about the money and the money corruption within the

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SBC. When Southern Baptist show up to the convention, you could tell the fight was ideological.

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They did not care about the numbers. It's like, honestly, it was like a Ron Paul type candidate situation.

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Randy Adams was Ron Paul. Inflation and the Fed - Ought to be fed, yeah.

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It resonates with 10 % of the people. The other 90 % don't care, sadly enough.

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But that's the reality. Randy Adams was the Ron Paul candidate in this situation. Well, I think everyone is probably hearing your opinion on whether they should stay or not in the convention, which it sounds like it's a no.

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Well, you can't, in good conscience as a Christian, fund this beast.

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John, I mean, we outed Dottie Lewis of NAMM. If you are putting your money into NAMM, you are funding woke church plants.

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Yeah, I know. If you're putting money into the cooperative program, you are funding a false gospel through these entities.

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So how in good conscience could you stay with the Southern Baptist Convention, watching how they treated biblical resolutions, how they treated the resolutions on abortion, and then how they ended up handling the presidency?

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And I'm just gonna tell you, the thing that hurt me, not hurt me, oh, it hurts the wrong word.

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The thing that made me mad the most was watching the pro -social justice, the pro -gay, the effeminate pansy

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Southern Baptist wokies cheering and clapping and yelling because Ed Litton won the election.

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These are guys who I know that are not even in line with the scriptures, and their guy won, and they are happy and they're gloating about it.

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And it's a sad case for the Southern Baptist Convention, but it's also a sad case for Christianity in America.

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It is. It seems like, I think a lot of people would relate to this in my own life.

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You know, you had the presidential election, we just had a Virginia primary, and we had, of course, now the

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Southern Baptist thing, and every single one of them went almost as like worse as you possibly can imagine.

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They're just like worst case scenario situations almost. And a lot of people are discouraged right now.

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They don't know, I'm already getting the questions coming in. What do we do now? And I think for those who have regularly listened to me,

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I wasn't surprised completely by this. And I think there's an opportunity to just be an independent church.

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But do you have any, you were there, you saw the people who showed up, you know, you have an idea of what the

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Southern Baptist Convention is. What should people do right now?

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I know you don't think they should stay in, but if they shouldn't stay in, what do they do? Focus on your local church, put your money towards reaching the lost for Christ, put your money into good missions that actually spread the gospel and do what they're supposed to do.

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But don't give your money to a big corporate entity that's gonna blow it on $500 ,000 salaries for this guy, million dollar bailouts for this guy.

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Keep your money local, invest it into your community, invest it into your church, invest it into that missionary that's in your church that's being called by God to go reach the lost, put your money and efforts behind them.

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But you don't need the Southern Baptist Convention to teach you how to spread the gospel because they're not doing it.

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You can do a better job yourself and within your own church of reaching the lost and building disciples for Christ because that's what we're supposed to do as Christians.

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And that's it. The Southern Baptist Convention is just a convention run by a bunch of elites that take your money and spend it frivolously.

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You can invest your money yourself in your own community and your church and do what the

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Lord leads you to do, not what some Southern Baptist entity tells you to do. Good word on that.

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I know we had talked earlier about, even when you walked in, I know this is a little ambiguous, but was there even a sense of the, hey, the spirits at work here, they are having these worship music, they are having prayer.

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No, no, the Holy Spirit was not there. The Holy Spirit had no presence in that place at all.

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None. It was all superficial. There were people that were praying, really, really pushing for unity.

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And by the way, there was a call for unity like every hour and bringing up different people of different skin colors on a regular basis, calling for unity, calling for unity, calling for unity.

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I just wanna say that Southern Baptist, if you really wanted unity, why don't you address the problems? Yeah, it's a superficial unity.

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Superficially calling for unity and getting your token different colored person up on stage every five minutes calling for unity.

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There's nothing biblical about that. I know, it was sickening to me to watch this.

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It's actually very insulting in a way to, just JD Greer's sermon was insulting to me.

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The way he even views minorities. They need such a helping hand because they just can't make it on their own,

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I guess. He's gotta stack the deck and put them in these higher positions in the name of diversity. Anyway, I just wanna thank you.

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I know it's not been easy. You've put a lot, a lot of people don't know this, but you put a lot of even your own money into like the mini sort of montage.

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I don't know if I wanna call it a documentary, but the montage that got put out there about the Southern Baptist Convention. You're not even a

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Southern Baptist. I know you left just like I left. We were both members of Southern Baptist Churches a few years ago. And now you went to the convention and handed out material just to try to influence the outcome.

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So you are to be commended. And so is Mike Stone and Randy Adams and so many others who maybe we disagree with some of their strategies, but they're putting an effort in there.

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They stepped out, they stepped out beyond any, stepped out beyond their comfort zones and they reached out, they gave it a fight.

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They went and did it. They stood out, they tried. I mean, we can criticize strategy all we can, but they did step out in faith and they stood out to contend for what is right.

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And they need to be commended for that. And I do honor them for that. Emotions are running high right now, but just pray for them, give them strength.

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They took a beating. They not only took a beating in an election, but they took a beating personally with all the accusations and all the stuff that these woke morons threw at them.

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Just lift them up in your prayer, lift them up in prayer, lift them up and just ask for peace in their hearts and peace within their family.

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Yeah. Well, Judd, I appreciate it. I know you gotta go get your steak and you certainly deserve one right now after dealing with all that.

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You never have to go to a Southern Baptist convention again. How's that? Yeah, I'm done. I'm never going to one ever again.

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Well, if you wanna find out more about Judd's projects, you can go to enemieswithinthechurch .com and equippingthepersecuted .com,

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I believe as well, right? Dot org, equippingthepersecuted .org, yeah. Okay, all right. All right, enjoy your steak.

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We'll talk to you later. Thanks, brother. All right, bye now. Bye. Well, that is one take on what happened yesterday at the

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Southern Baptist convention. You can see Judd is pretty negative on the whole ordeal and I think it's fresh in his mind as he said this.

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I think there's an appreciation, I definitely have one for all the conservatives. That would include founders, that would include,

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I mean, I just put it on my Facebook congratulating last night or not even congratulating, but just thanking Randy Adams and Mike Stone for taking the hits they did, especially

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Mike Stone, I mean, the personal hits he took are just incredible. Deep appreciation for Conservative Baptist Network and all that they did.

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I think what, I think Judd, and he's, the thing that I think is important for people to hear in this is that he's not alone.

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There are, there is a segment of the conservative movement, if you wanna call it that, but people who really wanted to take back the

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Southern Baptist convention for orthodoxy, who really wanted to be more aggressive.

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And I'll tell you right now, in closed channels, there are already, there's some finger pointing, I'm sure, going on that that's normal with any election.

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And it doesn't mean that there's no appreciation for the people who did take stands and fight. We all would do things probably differently if we were,

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I mean, there's no two people that are alike. So if we were in similar positions, if you were running for Southern Baptist convention president, you might have done something differently as well.

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But Judd's analysis, I think that there's some possible merit to it, at least needs to be heard that maybe next time around, if there are still conservatives in the convention who wanna do something, maybe they do need to be more aggressive.

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One of the things though, that is concerning, if you are someone who wants to restore the Southern Baptist convention to orthodoxy and get it on the right track, how many conservative churches are gonna be leaving over this?

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And I'm gonna talk directly to that issue, but I think I'm gonna do that at the end of the podcast. Cause a lot of people are asking even me, what do we do now?

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I'm Southern Baptist, what do I do? And I can't answer that fully for everyone in every situation, but I'm gonna give you my own opinion and my best shot at it.

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And we are gonna talk about the biblical doctrine of separation a little bit. Now, I think what we need to do now though, is take the temperature of the room ourselves.

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Once again, I know we did that twice yesterday in the videos, but I wanna show you two more things that just show again, that there's a problem at a very deep level.

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There's a problem with the people that are making decisions, even on the floor.

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There's a follow the leader mentality. There's a let's not get concerned about issues that are actually confronting our churches mentality.

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There's just something going on. So check this out. We're gonna play the first one is for the convention and it's on the abortion issue.

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I would like to offer an amendment on the final resolved section.

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I would like to strike the words saying love, care for and minister to women who are victimized by the unjust abortion industry and replace with preach the gospel and urge repentance from all men and women guilty or complicit in the sin of abortion.

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Is there a second? Second, you wish to speak to your amendment. Yes, Mr.

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President. I think that the language, first of all,

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I should say, I'm grateful for the refutation of the Hyatt Amendment, which is extremely unjust and wicked.

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But I do think the final resolved language interferes with the gospel by softening sin and therefore eliminating the ability of the law to tutor the need for confession and repentance.

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Let me be clear, women who obtain abortions, although their situation may be tragic and horrible, they are by the law murderers and therefore should seek repentance and we should not be so arrogant to presume that their circumstance excuses their need for salvation from their sins.

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I share your passion for ending the moral scourge of abortion. And pardon me if I get emotional talking about this.

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I've spent a great portion of my life sitting in small rooms counseling women in a

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Christian pregnancy center in my hometown of Dothan, Alabama. It's called Wiregrass Hope Group.

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Before I entered into that task, I would have been very tempted to adopt language more in line with what you just proposed.

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And so I sympathize with the position that you hold. However, what the

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Lord has shown me sitting in those rooms across from broken women is that so many of them have been victimized by the sin of others, by generational sin, by parents who never took them to church and preached the gospel to them the way mine did to me.

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And yes, abortion is sin. And one of the things we impart to those women when we love them, care for them, and minister to them is the gospel of Jesus Christ, is the truth about the sin of abortion, and we do call them to repentance.

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But I am also telling you that when we take a punitive and hard -hearted position toward women who are at a crossroads that usually a whole lot of people's sin brought them to, we are not having the mind of Christ toward those women.

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What I want you to notice in that is not the issue that was brought up so much as the applause lines.

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So look at the faces of the people on the executive committee, see them nodding along, see them, the hearty agreement, the motivation.

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There is deep motivation for opposing this amendment. And whether you agree with this amendment or not, the deep motivation, it shows you

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Southern Baptist can fight for something, right? They can try to be united on something, right? They can, but what is it that they're fighting?

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They're fighting the notion that women who have abortions are in sin, that they're participating in murder and need the redemption and the gospel of Jesus.

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And the gentleman who offered this amendment, if you listen to what he said, he really didn't say much past that.

33:02

But look at the motive in fighting him. And I mean, he doesn't really get a whole lot of applause. You know, all 10 claps, you heard them.

33:10

And then just the incredible amount of support for knocking him down.

33:16

When in a sense, it seems almost like a misrepresentation, the analysis that the person on the resolutions committee gave to the issue.

33:25

She's grandstanding about how, you know, many people's sins lead to this. Well, that may be true, but you couldn't you say that about many different kinds of sins?

33:34

Well, imagine this for a moment, if you would. Imagine racism was the issue and not abortion, all right?

33:42

Or imagine abuse was the issue and not abortion. Let's take that one since that's the hot topic right now. Imagine someone said, look,

33:50

I really like some hypothetical amendment that we have about abuse. But I really think we should say that those who commit abuse, rapists, just those who molest children even, let's even bring it to that, right?

34:08

Something that we all consider extremely abhorrent and that the Lord God considers abhorrent.

34:15

I wanna just say that that is a sin and people need the gospel because they need to repent of that sin.

34:21

Let's say that was the amendment. And then someone from the resolutions committee got up and said, you don't understand that many of the people who abuse others have been abused themselves.

34:31

And there's all kinds of sin on other people's decisions that have caused them to come to the point at which they have such a messed up outlook on sexuality that they're willing to do something like this to a child.

34:46

What if that was the case? Could you see the Southern Baptist Convention resolutions committee nodding along?

34:54

Could you see the whole entire crowd standing and giving an ovation because someone knocked down someone who wanted to say that abuse is a sin?

35:03

No, you couldn't. You couldn't see that. And yet on the issue of murder somehow,

35:10

I just want you to ask the question, who is creating the ethic here for the

35:15

Southern Baptist Convention and for evangelicalism in general? Who is the one creating it? Is it the word of God that is creating this ethic?

35:22

Or is it something else? Is it something else? Where's the pressure coming from and why the motivation?

35:29

They would never do this on racism. They would never, quote unquote racism, whatever that means now to Southern Baptists.

35:36

They would never do that on abuse, but they will do it on murder.

35:43

I want you to note that. I think it's very significant. Now, I wanna show you something else that's also insignificant in my mind.

35:49

Look at the reaction in the audience at the end of this exchange. I'll talk about the exchange, but the reaction at the end is what

35:56

I want you to really notice here. Hi, last fall had a spoke almost unanimously on matters of critical race theory.

36:07

Several state conventions did that, and Danny, you were a seminary state that specifically sided with the state conventions where Browns were explicitly saying any affirmation of critical race theory, intersectionality, and critical theories is incompatible with the

36:24

Baptist faith message. When James Merritt stood up there and said, anybody who focuses on these things is in contrast to the

36:32

Great Commission and is running conflict with the Great Commission. Now, what am

36:38

I supposed to do when I go back to Ohio Baptist and go back to my church? Express these things that those that have been speaking on these matters can find them to be important doctrinal matters, such as the seminary presidents who say it's incompatible with the

36:52

Baptist faith message. How do I respond that at the SBC, they said, you are in conflict with the

36:59

Great Commission. Are you thinking we're gonna get a short answer on this? This is an important question.

37:05

Okay, but I gotta go back, and there's state conventions that all spoke on these things to say, hey, we reject it, and today we heard, if you talk about this, you are not running with us on the

37:14

Great Commission. And the seminary presidents encouraged many in this room by speaking clearly, and we heard, if you speak in specificity on this issue, that is what you said.

37:27

Well, general terms, and let me tell you, Danny Aikens' interpretation.

37:33

Okay, he rants, it's 10 .04, so this needs to be briefed. You can see on an afternoon talk as long as it took me.

37:39

I'll be quick, all right. We condemn critical race theory as an overarching worldview and ideology.

37:46

I believe all truth is God's truth, even critical race theory intersectionality and outcome voting model.

37:53

There's no friend of critical race theory acknowledges that sometimes it raises good questions, and sometimes it makes valid observations.

38:02

I can do that while at the same time saying there's an overarching framework, and this is what was said by Resolution 2.

38:10

It comes up short because it has a defective view of biblical authority, has a defective view of anthropology, has a defective view of sociology, has a defective view of eschatology, and so I can recognize that the overarching framework should be rejected outright, but I also realize that that's something everything they ever say, coming back to what

38:32

Kevin said earlier, is incorrect and wrong. Again, all truth is God's truth, wherever you find it, and so we're gonna always search out any and every discipline, and then finally, there's a difference between advocating something and educating about something.

38:48

We do not advocate critical race theory, Southeastern Seminary, and I know it's not advocating any of the other seminaries either.

38:57

At the same time, I would never play the ostrich head in the sand and ignore it and not equip my students or go around and be pastors and ministers to not be able to lead and instruct their people well in this current climate in which they find themselves.

39:15

And if you're new to hearing this conversation from William's Church, it's a perfect summary of what you hear a hundred times, that kind of question and that kind of answer.

39:24

And I think that brother is not satisfied with that answer, and I think that answer satisfies that brother, and you guys can talk about that, that's all right?

39:33

Because a lot of people are not satisfied with that, and a lot of people are satisfied with that, and you guys get to talk to each other afterwards.

39:39

Yes, sir. Hi there. My question is not about critical race theory. Yes. So here's the situation.

39:51

You have a young man, pastor it sounds like, come to the mic and say, look, my church needs an explanation.

39:57

He's probably got people in his church who are wondering why are we in the SBC? Why are we giving money to this organization when they don't believe what we believe?

40:04

And he's probably said, like a lot of pastors, well, look, they've made statements against critical race theory. And one of the things

40:09

I've said pretty much from the beginning is you gotta look at the statement. Isn't it an inadequate critique of critical race theory?

40:17

Are they saying, well, we condemn it as a worldview, but then smuggling in the analytical tools or taking parts of it, what is it about critical race theory they actually object to?

40:26

They don't object to the actual features of critical race theory, the ethical features or the metaphysical features, really.

40:34

Racism is normative. You need minority lenses and insights in order to understand justice and injustice and the world around you.

40:43

You need to have a revisionist history. Now it's called memory studies. There's very firm designations and lines separating the oppressors and the oppressed in a very

40:56

Marxist simplified way. Social relationships are actually power relationships.

41:05

These aren't the things that they'll condemn. They'll condemn, well, the foundation of it, that there's atheistic assumptions behind this, wrong anthropology, wrong view of, they don't believe in God, they don't have redemption, et cetera.

41:19

So as a worldview, they'll condemn it, but they won't actually condemn the ethical or many of the metaphysical assumptions of critical race theory.

41:27

That's the issue. So it gets them to the almost the same place that it does someone in the secular world. Critical race theory is a tool for deconstruction.

41:35

So they're deconstructing, people who aren't Christians are deconstructing their institutions, same thing.

41:42

It's the same thing that happened with liberation theology and Marxism. Oh, we're not for Marxism because we don't believe in atheism, but let's take the class consciousness and many of the other tools that Marxism gives us.

41:55

That's what's going on. And that's been the issue. And it's fooled so many people because so many people don't actually understand what

42:01

Marxism is, what critical race theory is. And you don't need to be an expert, just read like one book on it, read Delgado's critical race theory.

42:07

They don't understand what it is and they haven't integrated their understanding with their understanding of what biblical truth and what a biblical understanding would be.

42:15

So they haven't, and that's not a criticism necessarily, it could be depending on who you are, but it's more of just,

42:22

I'm just observing, this is the reality. So there's been a lot of confusion. They can't separate the two things. Danny Akin just did the

42:29

Hegelian dialectic again. They keep replaying resolution nine over and over and over.

42:35

We take the insights, we reject the worldview. You can't do it. I made the case so many times, you cannot do it.

42:43

It's one thing to take things from natural revelation, laws of logic, laws of science and math, things that are just fundamental to reality and say, yeah, we can take the

42:53

Pythagorean theorem. It's another thing to take the ideas, the myths, the assumptions in the heads of sociologists and then take that and say, we can take the tools from that.

43:08

If you take the tools from that, which are tools of deconstruction, you take the world, the worldview comes with it.

43:14

The tools are based on the worldview. So that's the problem with it. And I think some people are starting to see that, but listen to the applause line.

43:23

When someone comes up and says, my question's not about critical race theory, everyone applauds. Why is that?

43:29

Why do they applaud? Because they're sick of the conversation, because they don't think it's important. That's the scary thing.

43:36

You have applause line and a big strong applause at the Southern Baptist Convention for someone who wants to basically misunderstand the amendment being brought up about abortion and then claim it's, so many people have different, have contributed sin to the choice to kill a baby that we don't wanna put this language in our resolution,

44:01

I guess it was, and applause line for that. But then you also have a big applause line in the nine marks room for someone who wants to shift the conversation away from critical race theory.

44:11

Why is this? Critical race theory, abortion, I mean, these are two huge things confronting the church today.

44:19

Why in the world is it, we just want to sidestep these things? That's the thing, there's no fighting spirit.

44:25

And that's the thing I want you to see. Whatever fighting spirit there is, is turned on Orthodox Christians.

44:32

It's turned on the people who are concerned about these threats. That's the issue. And that is something

44:37

I don't know if the Southern Baptist Convention can quite escape from. And it is concerning to say the very least.

44:44

Now let's talk about some media reactions to this. So here's what the

44:52

Associated Press said. Southern Baptist elect a new president, Ed Litton, who is seen as a bridge builder.

44:57

Really? Because we don't see him that way. Half the convention probably doesn't see him that way. Almost, I should say.

45:05

Southern Baptist, Ed Litton, elects Ed Litton as their president, a defeat for the hard right, Washington Post.

45:11

Yeah, it doesn't matter how moderate you try to come off, you're the hard right guys. Learn the lesson. Trump learned the lesson, learn the lesson.

45:19

Southern Baptist Convention dodges critical race theory fight, elects moderate Ed Litton. Really? Ed Litton's a moderate according to, who is this?

45:27

I don't know if I put what publication this was. Probably, I think this is a Newsweek. He's a moderate according to Newsweek.

45:32

Southern Baptist narrowly head off ultra -conservative takeover, New York Times.

45:40

So yeah, it's a boogeyman. The ultra -conservative is the hard right. I'm telling you guys,

45:45

Conservative Baptist Network, they're not ultra -conservatives. I'm just telling you straight up, they are not the hard right, whatever that means.

45:53

I would say, I mean, five years ago, they would have been the moderates. They're people that tend to love their country and tend to be against critical race theory and want there to be, reject,

46:09

I guess, I don't know if everyone can articulate it this way, but they reject standpoint epistemology. They believe in the authority and sufficiency of scripture.

46:16

I mean, that's pretty much Conservative Baptist Network. That's hard right. That's ultra -conservative next to the moderate

46:22

Ed Litton. Well, let me show you something from the moderate Ed Litton. Here's his church, what we believe on God.

46:27

This was changed this morning. After he was elected president, someone called him out on Twitter for this and his church changed the language.

46:35

But here's what it was up until what? 10 a .m., 11 a .m. this morning. God is the creator and ruler of the universe.

46:42

He has eternally existed in three persons, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These three are co -equal parts of one

46:51

God. Really, because that's heresy. That's called partialism. Athanasius actually basically debunked this at,

47:02

I guess it would have been the Council of Nicaea. But this is something that is so fundamental to Orthodox belief in theology.

47:10

They get the Trinity wrong. His own church gets the Trinity wrong. Elected president of the

47:16

Southern Baptist Convention. His wife preaching with him, elected president of the

47:22

Southern Baptist Convention. Understands that critical race theory is not charity.

47:28

Still calls critical race theory a boogeyman. This is out there. Wants people to repent.

47:36

Or, I mean, it's never enough. You always gotta feel more sorry. You gotta do something to get rid of this guilt.

47:41

White people, I guess, are just guilty. Southern Baptists are just guilty. I mean, I could go on and on. You saw the little montage earlier.

47:47

Ed Litton is not a moderate, whether that's politically or that's on orthodoxy.

47:55

And I would say this is a big deal. But will there be questions about it? Will there be actual holding him to account?

48:03

No. This is what we're gonna get. Let me show you. Al Mohler, the Southern Baptist Convention has a new president,

48:08

Ed Litton, who now fully deserves our prayer and encouragement. If I can help, I'm a phone call away. That's great.

48:17

We have, let's see here, what else? Pastor Mike Stone, thank you to all those who supported me in this effort.

48:24

Our prayers and congratulations are to Ed Litton. And I think this is just being a gentleman. You have, let's see.

48:34

Rod Martin, tough beat, but it's the work of a single year. We fought the entire denominational machine plus all their mainstream media friends.

48:42

We didn't win, but this result shows we can. Someone responded, I am just being honest.

48:47

I don't wanna fight the machine anymore. We have already have to do that everywhere else. I want to be free of the machine.

48:54

And Rod Martin says, I don't want to give them 30 billion in awards assets just because they had more staying power.

48:59

I don't want to have to explain that stewardship decision someday. This is the debate that's gonna be happening, guys.

49:07

You have Rod Martin, who's a great guy from what I understand, and I talk to him here and there,

49:13

I thought he did an excellent interview with me on the election. I think a really nice guy, really positive guy.

49:21

Yet he's in Conservative Baptist Network, and this is what, he wants people to stay in.

49:28

He wants to keep fighting. This is the question you're all gonna have to ask. I'm just gonna tell you the reality of the situation.

49:34

A lot of conservatives are not gonna keep fighting. They're gonna leave. And I think that it's conservatives leaving over the last few years that probably could have even made a difference in this one election.

49:44

But if you think that this election would have made a huge difference, that's also a dividing line. There's a lot of conservatives who don't think it would have.

49:50

That's why they're leaving. So you have, the split is already happening, but there are people who think they can still win it.

50:00

And Rod Martin's one of them. And look, I like the positivity, I do. But is this realistic?

50:06

That's the question that you need to ask yourself when you got a guy who can't even, his church website can't even define the

50:12

Trinity, and all the other junk that we've talked about. He's the one now, the president of the convention.

50:19

And you've seen the reactions I just showed you. You've seen hopefully the other two videos I put out there. Is it worth it?

50:24

Because you're gonna keep funding this kind of stuff if you stay in. That's the issue. Can you stay in and keep funding this stuff?

50:33

Now, is there a way maybe you can allocate your money to certain mission? I mean, you can look into that, I guess. But I don't trust the people handling the money that you send in.

50:42

Just saying. Let's read a few more reactions. Josh Bites, and I think he gets this right. He's the one that is the head of G3.

50:50

Today was another historic day in the history of the Southern Baptist Convention. Danny Akin and others promoted Ed Litton as president after Mueller lost.

50:56

In order to oppose Mike Stone, they supported a man who recently co -preached a sermon with his wife. Many will exit the

51:01

SBC, and he's 100 % right. Gabriel Hughes, Ed Litton with, I think he's the one that does when we understand the text videos.

51:09

Ed Litton was 6 ,834 votes. Mike Stone was 6 ,278 votes. The ship continues taking on water.

51:16

He's 100 % right. Randy Adams, we gave it our best shot all the way from the

51:22

Northwest. Thank you, everybody. I do believe our message of transparency, accountability, participation, partnership have made a lasting impact in the

51:29

Southern Baptist Convention. He hasn't, at least as far as I know, congratulated

51:34

Ed Litton. Michael O 'Fallon, Sovereign Nations. Can anyone imagine

51:40

Luther congratulating the new Pope? No, thanks. I'm not into playing the reindeer games. I am much more interested in promoting truth than sowing confusion.

51:49

And I think a lot of people feel the way that Michael O 'Fallon feels, and the way Rhett Coppel feels here, who responded to Rod Martin.

51:57

And they agree with the analysis of Josh Bice and Gabriel Hughes. I think that's where a lot of people are at today who are more conservative.

52:05

Why deal with this? And they would think of it as a Luther versus the

52:11

Pope. I mean, this is like the, I mean, you're adding to the gospel. I showed you in the video yesterday, J .D.

52:16

Greer's confusion on the gospel. You have misplaced priorities, radical subjectivity, creeping into the denomination.

52:27

How does this resemble Christianity anymore? It's something different. It's quickly morphing into that.

52:34

And what, you need a Luther figure. You need someone who's really strong, really, the

52:41

Paige Patterson types and Adrian Rogers types, I'm saying that personality is what you would need.

52:48

And I'm looking around, I don't know where that is. I don't know who that is. So not to be overly dismal,

52:56

I've tried to prepare everyone who's been listening to me for this, just because I assumed it would probably go this way, possibly.

53:02

I know I predicted that I knew a conservative would get to the second round, but whether they could win that second round, I was very suspicious.

53:09

And even if they did, I didn't know how much of a dent it would do. You need, you know, it's stage four cancer.

53:15

You gotta take drastic action. Let's take a trip down memory lane, shall we? And then we'll talk about the doctrine of separation.

53:22

This is just one little slice of the pie here on what's afflicting the SBC. 1989, there was a statement against racism and bigotry.

53:28

1995, a statement on racial reconciliation was adopted in which the convention apologized to all African -Americans for condoning and or perpetuating individual and systemic racism and committed themselves to eradicate racism in all its forms from the

53:41

Southern Baptist life and ministry. 1996, there was a statement on arson in African -American churches, which focused on racial reconciliation.

53:49

2007, they denounced racism in a resolution on the Dred Scott case. 2015, there was a statement on racial reconciliation.

53:56

2016, there was a statement against the Confederate battle flag. 2017, another statement against racism, including slavery, was adopted.

54:04

There was a resolution sponsored by Danny Akin in last year's convention that was essentially another apology.

54:10

It was not adopted. What was adopted was a statement against the curse of Ham, including using it as a justification for slavery and yet another statement that condemned, among other things, racism.

54:20

Multiple statement, 2017. 2019, the convention adopted a statement supporting the use of critical race theory and intersectionality as analytical tools.

54:29

2021, another statement condemning racism was adopted, which rejected theories and worldviews in conflict with Christian teaching, but not analytical tools.

54:37

Add to this the various statements written, sponsored, or supported by Southern Baptist entities, and one begins to swim in a sea of anti -racist statements that just about all seem to carry a weight of guilt in some way.

54:50

That's what's going on, guys. It's been going on for years, and I think many didn't understand. I remember

54:55

I was talking to someone about the resolution on the Confederate battle flag, and they were saying they didn't understand at the time.

55:00

They thought, well, this is just a well -meaning measure, and they didn't understand the Trojan horse that was sneaking in the door with things like that.

55:07

Why not have a resolution against the American battle? American battle, the American flag, right? I mean, that's the flag that flew over just about every slave ship that came to the

55:16

United States. I mean, that's the one that flew over the armies that went out West, and after they were done, many of them, many of the generals burning up the

55:27

South, they went out and they did the same thing to indigenous peoples. I mean, is that a problem?

55:33

Are we gonna start saying that, well, the colonialism of the Spanish -American War, we really gotta take that American flag down because it's racially insensitive or something.

55:43

I mean, this is what the Klan used when they marched in the 1920s, the second Klan, the

55:48

Progressive Klan in Washington, DC. You can go and Google, or maybe not

55:54

Google anymore, DuckDuckGo, pictures of the Klan and the American flag. So does that mean you take down the

55:59

American flag? And this is the thing I was trying to, and I think this person gets it now. They understand, they've seen, hindsight's 20 -20, they've seen where this has gone, and they realize, wait a minute, the play that they made on the flag is the same play they're making with everything.

56:14

They're attaching everything to racism in like two steps or less, somehow. Why not have a resolution against the

56:20

Constitution of the United States, or the Declaration of Independence, or something like that? I mean, look, slave owners, significant part of the, significant portion of the people who adopted it.

56:31

Look what, look at the Three -Fifths Compromise, look at, I'm telling you, it's going that direction.

56:39

You're not, I don't know, for how much longer are you gonna have at the Southern Baptist Convention a whole thing on the military and religious liberty?

56:45

I think that they're throwing a bone to some people, but how long is that gonna be there? Let's be honest.

56:52

Let me read for you something. This is a letter, if I can find it now.

56:57

I had it, let's see here, yes. This is a letter, it's a little lengthy, not horrible, but I wanna read it for you, and you may not agree with a lot of the language in this, just, and I'm not saying

57:08

I agree with all the language in this. It's perceptive, though. This is someone from 1995 who saw what would happen in the

57:16

Southern Baptist Convention. So I'm not necessarily saying I agree with everything that's written here, the way it's worded, really, the way it's worded is a big part of that, but this is someone who predicts exactly what is happening.

57:30

Let me read it for you. This is about the 1995 resolution that the Southern Baptist Convention passed on racial reconciliation, and in an effort to defend the good name of Southern Baptists of the 19th century, the following letter was submitted to a

57:47

Louisiana Daily Paper in 1995. The letter was rejected for publication no less than three times.

57:54

It was also rejected by the official newspaper of the Louisiana Baptist Convention. That's Louisiana for some of you.

58:02

An innocent man in the Greek play, Antigone, I think it's Antigone, I've never read the play, is given a death sentence and laments.

58:11

It is a grievous thing when the right judge judges wrong. The recent slanderous attack upon the good name in honor of deceased

58:18

Southern Christians by the Southern Baptist Convention, with their apology for the sins of slavery and racism, brought forth a similar sense of agony in many

58:25

Christians. One stands astonished by the hypocrisy of modern Baptist churchmen who dare condemn

58:32

Christians of the 19th century, yet no century has produced more death and destruction than the 20th century.

58:40

Neither has this nation seen a people with less civility or respect for law and moral standards than this 20th century.

58:48

Never has illegitimacy, murder, rape, and divorce been as high as it is today in the 20th century.

58:54

Compared to our ancestors of the last century, we of the 20th century live in a virtual Sodom and Gomorrah.

59:00

How much more so is that true now? Yet Southern Baptists can find nothing better to do than to desecrate the graves of our sainted dead.

59:08

Honor thy father and mother. I will honor my Christian father who is interred alongside his father and grandfather, a

59:14

Confederate soldier. I will not stand silent as the sycophants of liberal political correctness desecrate the graves of my people.

59:22

If slavery is such a diabolical sin, it should be easy to find a clear -cut, thus saith the

59:28

Lord, repudiation of slavery. I defy the minions of political correctness to come forward and reveal such a text.

59:34

While they rush to and fro, I direct the reader's attention to Leviticus 25, 44 -46. In Leviticus, the

59:41

Lord gives to Israel his law on slavery. God's law on slavery not only made provision for the

59:47

Hebrew slave who was subject to the law of Jubilee, but also the stranger or non -Hebrew slave, which would be the property of the

59:54

Hebrew forever. The listing of slaves along with other property is seen in the Ten Commandments.

59:59

A search of the New Testament will not find one verse that unequivocally condemns slavery as a sin.

01:00:06

Neither during the life of Christ, the cruel pagan Roman system of slavery brought people from all over the world under its control.

01:00:14

Yet during his ministry, Jesus Christ never condemned slaveholders nor the system of slavery.

01:00:20

Christ nor his apostles saw fit to condemn slavery as sinful. In the New Testament, we read

01:00:25

Paul's Epistle of Philemon, where the apostle returns a runaway slave to his master with the request that the slave be received back with love.

01:00:33

If ever there was needed a time for the Holy Spirit to move Paul to condemn slavery, here was that opportunity.

01:00:39

Yet nowhere is the slave master nor the institution of slavery condemned as sinful. The biblical argument for slavery given here is neither

01:00:46

Baptist nor Southern. The New England Puritan cleric Cotton Mather, among other

01:00:51

Yankees, used biblical arguments to defend the New England system of slavery and the slave trade.

01:00:58

Today, due to liberal education of our people, most of all Southerners know little about the history of slavery under the

01:01:04

Puritans of Massachusetts. What will be the response, and here's the big point

01:01:09

I wanted to read for you. What will be the response of our churchmen when they are met with a demand for an apology for all the years of patriarchy, i .e.

01:01:19

male dominance in church and family, or an apology for the homophobic attitude of the church?

01:01:24

If current events offers us any guide, get ready for a full -scale apology to the feminists and the sodomites.

01:01:31

When one starts down the path of rewriting Holy Scripture, all types of apostasy are possible.

01:01:38

The Sunday after the local paper carried a slanderous attack upon my Southern ancestors by several local

01:01:43

Baptist ministers, I had the pleasure of worshiping in a church where Southern pride and respect for our people are commonplace.

01:01:49

The most often seen flag in the church is the Confederate flag. Twice each year, the church is the focal point for Southern heritage celebrations, and the pastor is a resolute proponent of Southern independence.

01:02:00

That Sunday, and each Sunday thereafter, I look at the congregation and see more racial and cultural diversity in that church than is found in the average

01:02:09

Baptist church. These Christians have no trouble worshiping with people of various races or different cultural background, yet these display love and respect for their

01:02:18

Southern heritage, and would never defile the honor of their Southern ancestors. I trust that one day

01:02:23

Southern Baptists will learn how to love in this manner. And for those wanting to know what book this comes from, it's from a book called

01:02:33

Myths of American Slavery by Walter D. Kennedy. Would I have written that letter the way he did? I don't think so.

01:02:39

But he was also writing in 1995, and it was a little bit different, and some of the, he didn't have to take for granted some of the misunderstandings that exist today.

01:02:49

And he also could use terms that today will get you in trouble to use. But the general sentiment that he is giving in that, his point, is well -received by me.

01:03:01

Because his whole point is that you stepped outside the boundaries of what scripture says is sinful in that resolution, and now we've opened

01:03:09

Pandora's box. It's been open since at least 1995. And Pandora's box is opening wider and wider and wider, and now you see in SBC 2021,

01:03:20

I mean, who really cares that someone has a statement that has heresy about the

01:03:25

Trinity in their church constitution? I mean, who really cares that someone doesn't even believe in the objectivity of revelation coming from God?

01:03:33

I mean, that doesn't really matter. Who really cares whether someone develops or agrees with the view of Marxist class consciousness that has been smuggled into, or full -scale adopted,

01:03:45

I should say, into critical race theory, and applies that to Christian organizations? Who cares if someone adds works to the gospel?

01:03:53

Who cares if we don't believe in the standards for proof as set forth in scripture for making sure that we are accurate when we look at cases of abuse?

01:04:05

And a list can go on and on. Who cares about what the Bible says about homosexuality when it comes to this innate orientation?

01:04:13

We know better. We can bring in psychological categories. This is just, it's exactly what this gentleman said in 1995.

01:04:26

Now, I'm not, I don't know if that church he described, even, I have a suspicion that's probably, just based on what

01:04:35

I know about the person, the author who wrote that book, I think it's probably Steve Wilkins' church in Monroe, Louisiana.

01:04:42

I'm guessing, which I think is Presbyterian. I could be wrong about that. Steve Wilkins had done some things for American Vision.

01:04:48

He had done the great Civil War debate, and I think the author's from Monroe. I think Steve Wilkins is from Monroe. I don't know, though, that for a fact.

01:04:56

But who knows if that church, I'm assuming it's still around, but if that description even still describes that church,

01:05:03

I don't know, and that's not really the point. The point isn't to, the point is the orthodoxy that has been, with oftentimes good intentions by people who are ignorant, the orthodoxy that has been kicked to the curb is now, it's coming back to haunt us, that kicking it to the curb, because orthodoxy is now not in style, and it is being chipped away at ever so much, ever more so every year.

01:05:36

And this is why I put out the video I did, what is wrong, I think I titled it, what's wrong with American slavery or something like that, or the reason

01:05:43

American slavery was wrong. And I think it's so important that if you're gonna have a discussion on this issue or any issue of ethics, you understand what the

01:05:51

Bible teaches on that issue. And I can point to very clear things. Slaves not being able to read, and this is, again, a critique of the government, but in many states, because they were afraid of slave insurrections, they'd read abolitionist literature calling for that, they weren't, laws were passed that you can't teach them to read, that's wrong.

01:06:08

They have to be able to read Holy Scripture. You're keeping them back from their own spiritual development.

01:06:14

And I have no problem saying that, standing on Holy Scripture. The slave trade was based on primarily, and we don't know the full picture, but these situations in Africa where people were stealing other people, or some of it was a result of tribal warfare.

01:06:31

It's hard to piece all that together because there aren't written records on all of it. But at the root of it, you have some sort of a man capture element in the trade itself, well, that's wrong.

01:06:42

The racial animosity that developed where among many who did try to justify it based on some kind of a racial inferiority, well, that's against Scripture and that's wrong.

01:06:53

I can point to many different things that are wrong. I knew there are slaves who were able to take their masters to court for abuse, but there are places where the abuse was more common because they're out in the country and you don't have the recourses.

01:07:07

So I can point to these things. I can say, look, these are problems. This was a labor. If you look at the whole system from a bird's eye view, there's sin in this.

01:07:15

I think even Robert Louis Dabney said the slave trade was an iniquitous traffic. Robert E.

01:07:21

Lee, I'm using Southerners here, said that there's hardly a man in this enlightened age who will not consider slavery.

01:07:29

I think, I don't know if he used the word sin, but a great evil, I think. And usually the way they used that was there was evils attached to it.

01:07:38

And you can do that while standing on Holy Scripture. And you can even say there was, like all people have problems in their history.

01:07:46

There's problems in our history, but what you can't do is start going past what the Scripture says and start calling things sin that Scripture doesn't specifically say are sin.

01:07:54

And that's something that I thought was helpful to bring to you because we are now replaying this in so many other areas.

01:08:02

The motivation those people had in the convention hall for supporting the resolutions committee when they condemned the man who wanted to say, hey, look, abortion's a sin.

01:08:15

For the person, the mother who chooses to do this, it's a sin that she does that. Yeah, that's what the

01:08:21

Bible says. It's pretty clear cut. But the people in the audience, and look, if you wanna say this isn't politically strategic, say it.

01:08:30

But what they ended up doing was saying, well, because there's a whole bunch of other sins involved, you know, we can't really do this.

01:08:36

And then they cheered, they cheered. It's better to stay with the clarity of Scripture on all matters of ethical concern.

01:08:46

And because that's not happening, I don't know what to tell you about the Southern Baptist Convention, whether you should stay or go.

01:08:52

I'm gonna tell you my thought is 2 Corinthians 6, 14 through 18 says this, do not be mismatched with unbelievers for what do righteousness and lawlessness share together?

01:09:01

Or what does light have in common with darkness? Or what harmony does Christ have with Bilal? Or what does a believer share with an unbeliever?

01:09:09

Or what agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. Just as God said, I will dwell among them and walk among them.

01:09:16

And I will be their God and they shall be my people. Therefore come out from the midst and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean and I will welcome you.

01:09:23

And I will be a father to you and you shall be my sons and daughters to me, says the Lord God Almighty.

01:09:29

This is to everyone who is in Christ. I don't care what color you are. You're my sister or brother in Christ, if you're in Christ.

01:09:36

I don't care what gender you are. You're my sister or brother in Christ, if you're in Christ. This is the separation that I think is probably already happening.

01:09:47

And unfortunately, I think it probably needs to happen. And that's just my opinion on it. Is the

01:09:52

Southern Baptist Convention a Christian organization any longer, or is it something else? And I mean,

01:09:58

Orthodox Christianity. Do they value what the scripture teaches or do they value the opinions of men more?

01:10:05

Only you can answer that question. But I'm hoping that I've given you some tools and some thoughts.

01:10:11

And you may not agree with all of them, but at least some things to think about. So God bless you all.

01:10:17

I hope that was helpful. And we'll have more content coming soon,

01:10:23

I'm sure. And you can look forward to some of that. I wanna mention last but not least, discerningchristians .com,

01:10:30

discerningchristians .com. This is why we built the website. You can go there, you can sign up, you can enter your church or organization's information there.

01:10:41

Go check out the podcast I did with Craig on it, our designer for that.

01:10:46

And you can go on a map and you can look at what churches are in my area that are against social justice and Darwinian evolution and are probably complementarian.

01:10:56

And it's just a tool, just a place to start. The churches on the list might not work out for you, but we need something.

01:11:04

So that's why it's out there. God bless you all. And until next time, have a good afternoon and evening.