Why Russell Moore Left the ERLC?, Resurrecting Q Anon, and Al Mohler's Platform

Conversations That Matter

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00:12

Welcome to Conversations That Matter Podcast. My name is John Harris. It is, in case you don't know this,

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Noahic Covenant Month. I know this because, I mean, maybe you have seen it too.

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If you walk around your community, if you go into stores and just you're out in public, you'll start seeing all these rainbow symbols.

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And we know what that means, right? That is the sign that God gave Noah that he wasn't gonna flood the earth again. And so it's just a great thing to see out there, all these rainbow flags, right?

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Celebrating God's covenant with Noah. And of course, I changed my profile picture on the

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Conversations That Matter Facebook page to, it has the rainbow flag. And a few of you have pointed out,

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I didn't realize this at the time, that I guess the flag for the Pride Month celebrations, et cetera, is six colors, whereas the actual rainbow is seven.

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And the one I posted, I guess, is six. It just, actually, what does it say? It says, remember,

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I think it says, remember the Noahic Covenant. But I realized, though, I'm not gonna take it down because that is cultural appropriation.

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We're taking that flag. I mean, look, who did they get it from? You gotta think about this. I mean, who did they get the rainbow symbol from in the first place?

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They didn't make that up. That wasn't from scratch. That wasn't an icon someone just came up with on,

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I don't know, some kind of a graphics design program. This was given to them.

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This was inspired because of what God's made. It's because of the rainbow. That's where they took it.

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So I don't mind taking their six -color rainbow and then appropriating it for what it should actually mean anyway, which is that the

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Lord has promised that he will not flood the earth again. There won't be a worldwide flood.

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Local floods, yes. Not a worldwide flood to kill every living thing except for someone in their family and to representatives of every kind.

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So anyway, I noticed, by the way, on that note, I haven't even gotten to what we're gonna talk about.

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Just for people who are wondering, we are gonna talk about Russell Moore, Al Mohler, and QAnon a little.

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Isn't that fun? Maybe we'll go to the website. We've never done that, find out what all this QAnon stuff is about. But anyway,

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I was walking into my local Walmart and I noticed for the first time, now maybe it was there last year,

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I didn't see it, but I noticed for the first time in this Bible Belt town that I live in, Lynchburg, Virginia, largest

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Christian universities here. I mean, it is a Christianized, it's the buckle of the

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Bible Belt. It's a very Christianized city. And they have now a little island in Walmart.

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As you walk in, and a third of it is rainbow flag and rainbow paraphernalia, and just shows you kind of how fast things are moving.

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Very fast. So I think it's okay to have a little bit of fun with it and to reclaim the symbol of the rainbow, what it actually means.

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I believe in authorial intent, and that symbol is not a sign of some kind of perversion or lifestyle that would be not in keeping with the designer's plan.

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It's actually represents the mercy of God, and that's why we like it as Christians.

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So anyway, we are gonna talk about Russell Moore. We are gonna talk about QAnon. We are gonna talk about Al Mohler's platform.

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We've got a few things lined up here, and it's all new stuff. So this was, most of this stuff came up yesterday.

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Yeah, June 2nd. And so we're gonna get into some of it. I think I'm gonna have to skip over some quotes because this was actually, this is a longer article, but long story short,

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Russell Moore, for those who don't know, left the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission for the

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Southern Baptist Convention. He was known as someone pushing the Southern Baptist Convention in a progressive direction, politically, at the very least, not to mention,

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I think, theologically as well, but he left. He's working for Christianity Today as a public theologian, whatever that means.

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And now he's on staff, I guess, or working with a church that, get this, apparently baptizes infants.

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And I, he, I don't even know what to say. Russell Moore is a Southern Baptist, and it didn't take long.

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Now he's going to a church that's not Southern Baptist, and they actually do baptize infants. So not saying that's necessarily heretical or a false teaching kind of thing.

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I disagree with it. But for someone who claims to be a Southern Baptist, it certainly is an interesting, and you just wonder what kind of, how hard, how tightly he grasped those convictions he said he had.

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But anyway, Russell Moore's left. And now, I think this is probably by design, but I don't know,

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Religion News Service, which is really progressive, like super left -wing, funded by left -wing entities, but it's a, which is why

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I think they're probably in cahoots somehow, I don't know, with, Moore probably wants this released. I don't have any evidence to say that, just so everyone knows.

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I'm just going based on track record and kind of knowing just a little bit about the way these kinds of things work.

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Could be that he doesn't have any idea that Religious News Service was gonna release this, but what they released was a letter that Russell Moore had sent to,

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I guess it was the trustees at the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission last year when he was under investigation from the

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Southern Baptist Convention, because they, essentially, they claimed that the executive committee, that churches were leaving, that there were, people weren't giving to the

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Cooperative Program because of Russell Moore and the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which I, by the way, I believe that 100%.

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Russell Moore claims that's wrong. There's no data to back that up. Whether there is or not, I just know, in the circles

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I even run in, I have heard this from so many people that their church is not giving to the Cooperative Program or they're specifically designating giving to specific missionaries because they don't want any of it going to the

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Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Now, I would argue, if it's going to the North American Mission Board, it's going to probably something that's even pushing worse things at a faster speed, but most churches don't know that.

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Most churches have known that Russell Moore and the ERLC are, they're the liberal ones, they're the progressive ones, they're the ones pushing critical race theory.

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Don't give to them, and that has been going on. I just know that from first -hand experience.

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But let's go through this a little bit and interpret it as best we can. This is the first sentence.

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The below, I guess it's the intro to this letter. The below letter, recently obtained by Religion News Service, was sent by early 2020, so it was

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February 2020 when it was released, to the trustees of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission by its then -president,

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Russell Moore. We publish it here without correction, changes or corrections, including Moore's misspelling of Rachel Denhollander's name.

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Now, this letter, I think what this is meant to do is to show

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Russell Moore left the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission because he was basically chased out by a bunch of racist, sexist bigots.

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That's, I think, what this is supposed to show, that it was so bad in the Southern Baptist Convention that Russell Moore had to leave because,

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I mean, his children and his wife were suffering trauma as a result of having to share, to be in this convention where their father worked for people who were such bigots.

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That's the narrative, just so you know. I don't have to read any more of it. That's what they're trying to communicate, and I'm 99 % sure of that.

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That's the whole purpose of the timing of it and everything. They waited till Russell Moore left, and this is right before the

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Southern Baptist Convention, and there's a lot of politics being played. So you tell me, what's the political, Religion News Service is very political.

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What is the political angle on this? Why release this? What is it supposed to achieve? And that would be the reason.

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That's the only reason I can even think of, reading this. I don't even know if I wanna read through all of this.

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It's long. I just took some representative paragraphs. We'll read a few of them.

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He talks about the Southern Baptist Executive Committee and how they wanted to take action, and he goes after Mike Stone, not by name.

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He says, it was motivated, the action taken against him, which was basically just investigating him to see if there's a connection.

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I mean, I think there's a little more to it than this, but to see if there's a connection between him and churches leaving. And it was motivated by Mike Stone, an individual, the current chairman of the

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Executive Committee, and we know it's Mike Stone because he had been in leadership of the Georgia Baptist Convention, and that's him. So the person not only drove the motion, but also said to it that he would be a member of the task force chairman, and one with the power to elect its membership, et cetera, et cetera.

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This whole time, Russell Moore is insinuating, actually accusing the Executive Committee and the Southern Baptist Convention of being involved in, not being above board, backroom deals, just being very secretive.

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And it's ironic to me because that's been the complaint of conservatives in the Southern Baptist Convention is they can't ever get anywhere because it's so secretive.

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And I will say this, I think Russell Moore's probably right about that. I remember when David Platt had left the

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North American Mission Board, he made statements like that of how horrible the politics was, how terrible the corruption was, and then he would never name any names, which doesn't help anyone.

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And Russell Moore doesn't name any names in this either. I mean, he gives you some descriptions that give you clues. Okay, that's

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Mike Stone he's talking about there, but it doesn't, a lot of the other things, he talks about all these racists and all these horrible people in the

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Southern Baptist Convention, doesn't name any names, just gives you little incidences here and there. And that's the problem.

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You can't complain about there being all these closed room, backroom deals, all these insinuations without being clear and attacking people and backstabbing people.

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And then this wasn't even meant to be released initially publicly, send this to all your trustees and your trustee board, and then you're not naming any names, you're not coming out.

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And that's, it's just, if there's something that's actually systemic, it's corruption,

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I'm figuring this out, it's corruption in the Southern Baptist Convention. There's just, it's like every entity has so much corruption in it.

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And I'm not familiar with every single one, but the ones I am familiar with, and it's just, and the people who are familiar, who

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I've had many conversations with, your jaw's on the floor after you hear some of the stories and things that go on.

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And I've bumped into it in my own personal experience at Southeastern a little bit. It's just very secretive, very hush -hush, very let's, you have our hatchet man and our cleanup man, and it works like a mob more than it does a

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Christian denomination. And Russell Moore had said in this piece that he doesn't want people, he didn't wanna name,

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I think he said something like he doesn't wanna name names or he doesn't wanna get into the details too much because if this came out publicly, there would be, non -Christians just would not understand it.

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It would give Christianity a bad name. And to some extent I agree, like, yeah, if you're talking about things that are below board and Christians are involved, that doesn't give

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Christianity a good name. But here's the thing, like at this point, I wonder to what extent, how many non -Christians are actually working in the

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Southern Baptist Convention, in entities? How many, I don't, I mean, you try to go through the proper process, quote unquote, you try to share your concerns, you get the ring around, you get wined and dined and nothing happens, or if you push it farther, you get blacklisted, you get your character completely annihilated.

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We're, you're not dealing with people that are acting in good faith as Christians, often.

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And that's why I don't think, you know, it's, oh, I gotta hold my tongue because there's things

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I wanna say right now that probably we're not quite ready for, the convention needs to happen first. But look, the convention's got stage four cancer.

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And if it doesn't recover, if this, this is the last straw in my, I'm just being real with you, I think this is the last time there'll be any effort.

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And it may already be too late, it really may be. But if there is any chance of recovering this, everyone's gonna have to go to Nashville and they're gonna have to vote for the most, and not just conservative politically, they're gonna have to vote for the person who's gonna root out the corruption.

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Corruption's the biggest problem in all of this. It's what's allowed the critical race stuff to even gain a foothold.

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And it's the corruption that keeps it in place because you're not allowed to go after someone who is being paid by one of the entities because they're protected by the guild.

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So I'm giving a lot of my own personal comments. I'm not reading a lot of this. Let me read for you some of it.

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Let's see, he talks about, let's see, churches having sexual abuse problems, and that J .D.

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Greer had mentioned someone who I guess was abused at one of the executive committee pastors' churches, and it was a personal vendetta that caused the

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Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission to be investigated. By the way, that investigation, it was, from what

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I understand, it was hardly an investigation. I don't even know, what did it even really result in?

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It was not an audit. It was not a forensic audit, which is what the executive committee would have the power to do, which is what they probably should have done and should be doing.

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You're gonna, whoever gets elected, whoever is in charge of the Southern Baptist Convention should be for that. They should have a plan and have it listed out.

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There's a lot of funny business going on with money and nepotism and these kinds of things.

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That's what needs to be investigated. There needs to be a, we need to see the accounts. That would be the first thing

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I'd say. This kind of an investigation that he's talking about was not a forensic audit. It was, like I said, it was more like, is there a tie between Russell Moore and churches leaving the convention?

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Is he pushing things too far in a progressive direction? Is that causing an adverse effect to the

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SBC? That's really more what it was about. And I just don't, I'm not saying it was, it's good to do that, but stage four cancer, again, you need stage four chemo for that.

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Anyway, let's keep going here. He basically, he pangs himself as the hero. He was the one that was taking to task sexual abusers and racists, and it was for those reasons that basically he was taken out, or he wasn't even taken out.

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He was just investigated. And it's so horrible, all these white nationalist nativist people that are in the

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SBC and all the quote unquote neo -Confederates and white supremacists and white national, I mean, these are words he's using, not me, all these horrible people.

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I mean, and I mean, of course, the Overton window keeps shifting on this. And I mean, the fact that even neo -Confederate is such a pejorative now, and now it basically means anyone who has respect for like Robert E.

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Lee or thinks the monument should stay around and not be ripped down by mobs, well, you're a neo -Confederate. So I mean, Russell Moore just showing how far he's being pushed.

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He does not specify what he's talking about. He doesn't name names here. And if that's the case, then what reason is there to even,

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I mean, that's what he thinks critical race theory is about, that all these people are just using critical race theory to go after that when really they're just white nationalists.

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That's the insinuation. He says he's only giving a tiny sample of, let me read for you this, tiny sample of what

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I experienced every single day. I am called a liberal, someone who believes in the inerrancy of Holy Scripture and the authority of the

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Holy Scripture, someone who has spent my life defending such concepts as the exclusivity of Christ for salvation.

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I am a liberal in this definition, not because I deny the inerrancy of Scripture, but because I affirm it. I believe in the inerrancy of all

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Scripture, including Luke 10, Ephesians two and three, Romans 12, and all of it. I believe that no sin, including sins of sexual morality or racial hatred can be forgiven apart from the blood of Christ.

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What he's saying is he actually takes the Bible so seriously that that's what he's being booted for and called a liberal for, which is absolutely ridiculous.

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Does he believe in any kind of standpoint theory? The answer is yes, he's written. And he doesn't say that specifically, but he applies it.

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Do we get better interpretations of the Bible because of the social location of those doing the interpreting?

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Do we, let's take caring well. Do we have, or is it better for us to get all this advice from people simply because they have a lived experience of going through some kind of trauma, or at least they say they do, than it is to go to the word of God and have a pastor who knows the word of God rightly apply a solution here.

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The caring well stuff is mainly it's abuse survivors. Now, yeah, there's some lawyers, there's some pastors who speak at these things like J .D.

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Greer, but it's, the emphasis is here's my story. Here's my story, here's my story.

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And I'm not saying you should never share the story. You should, but the purpose is supposed to be finding this, a way forward to stem this tide, to stem this abuse, to inform pastors about what they should be doing, that kind of a thing.

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And it's not lived experience that is, that's not the thing that's going to give you the tools necessary to combat this stuff.

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It's gonna be understanding and rightly applying what the scripture has to say. It doesn't mean there's no wisdom that comes from lived experience, but you don't create these epistemic islands where it's like, well, this person's an expert on the topic and we should all listen to them because the only thing they really have is they lived through something that was traumatic.

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That's like what taking survivors of like the Parkland shooting and saying, well, they're just experts on gun control now.

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No, they're not. They survived the school shooting, but that doesn't make them experts on this issue. And that's the issue.

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And that's just one issue, but we could talk about, so the standpoint theory undermines revelation.

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You could talk about the ethics of social justice and what that does, how you make things that are into sins that aren't actually sins.

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You make things biblical or gospel issues that aren't attached to the gospel. Like it's in the soteriology.

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I mean, there's so many reasons people have called Russell Moore a progressive. He would go attend a gay wedding celebration or reception, but he wouldn't go to the wedding.

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I mean, this is the kind of moral thinking that he possessed and dispelled at the, or put out there at the

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ERLC. He says, here's the pattern. Find a way to investigate me in secret so that the Southern Baptist do not hear what goes on in those rooms.

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He's probably right about that in some ways. I mean, but there was stuff coming out. I mean, if he's talking about the executive committee stuff, there was enough public things coming out about that.

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There was someone like live tweeting it, I remember that. But this, there's a lot of secretive stuff that go on in different entities and the convention.

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And Russell Moore knows that because he's been a part of some of those things. But the strategy here is clear. One of these figures told me in the middle of 2017, we can't take, oh, here's it.

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He says, this is a quote from someone who's, I guess, on the executive committee. We know we can't take you down.

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All our wives and kids are with you. This is psychological warfare. To make you think twice before you do or say something.

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That's exactly what it is. So he's saying he's gotten intimidated. And yeah, all the women and children are with him.

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Because if that's true, it just shows you where he's at. It shows you, I mean, if you can't get the men to get behind you, if it's just the women and children, is it emotional manipulation that he's using?

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Is that what's going on? Because why can't you get the men to be behind you on these things? Is it because they're a bunch of bigots?

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Because that's the insinuation that I'm, that's the only conclusion you can draw after reading this. Through all of this, brothers and sisters,

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I have tried to smile and pretend that everything is all right with me personally and with the denomination. That's because, for one thing, I don't want lost people to know about this stuff.

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I talked about that earlier. He doesn't want them to be afraid to associate with Jesus. I mean, this is associated with Jesus.

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Look, Jesus is gonna save people and there's corrupt people. And Paul talks about this publicly in scripture.

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The sooner they realize that there's people who come in unaware, people who are false teachers, the better.

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There's gonna be corruption, but the true Christian's gonna stand out. We don't cover for those people.

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We don't, you know, well, let's cover the, you know, make sure their sins aren't known. That'll do more damage. And that's unfortunately the attitude that prevails and that's what's going on.

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Let's see here. Some people will say, let's see, do you want to resign? They are telling the truth.

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Basically, he's hinting that he does wanna resign. It's toxic, there's abusive leadership.

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Let's see. Okay, here's, this is interesting. This is like the drama queen stuff.

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He reads this quote by Whitaker Chambers and it says, it's talking, he referred to a woman talking about her father who also had left

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Stalinism and explained why, very simply, one night in Moscow, he heard screams. That's all, simply one night he heard screams.

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I have heard many screams, Russell Moore says. And I'm now realizing that some of those screams were my own and those of my family.

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My children asked my wife the other day if their dad has a, so here's the thing. His children and his wife are screaming.

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You know how they're screaming the same way that people suffering under Stalin were screaming in Moscow? That's the comparison he makes.

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This is drama queen stuff, guys. I'm sorry. That's an offensive comparison.

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You can say that I'm troubled, we're hurt, or something like that. But to compare what you're going through to people screaming in Moscow under Soviet control is just amazing to me.

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I don't even know if I wanna read any of this. He's, psychological and institutional terrorism against him, his wife, and his children.

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I mean, look, really, they're psychological and institutional terrorism? You're gonna compare it to terrorism?

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This is an example of a guy, Russell Moore, who is so out of touch with masculinity and with a hard life.

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I'm just telling you what jumps out at me after reading this. This is someone who is so not used to any kind of conflict or adversity that he thinks it's terrorism and the screams of people in Moscow under Stalin that compare to his situation in being called a liberal at the

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ERLC and being called progressive and being put under an investigation just to see if his leadership's having an adverse effect in the denomination.

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Please, I mean, that is, please. This is incredible to me.

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This proves this is not a man you want running your ethics and religious liberty. You need someone with a little bit of a skin here who's able to, and look,

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I guess the reason maybe I don't have as much compassion to is because of, look,

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I've gotten death threats. I've gotten, I get horrible, treated horribly sometimes by the way people talk about me online, misrepresent me, say all kinds of terrible things, but like who cares?

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I mean, do I defend my reputation at times? Yeah, there's been times I've gone out and I've defended my reputation.

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Most of the time I don't. Most of the time it's just let it fall off your back and it's, I would never compare it to what happened in Moscow under Stalin.

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I'd never compare it to terrorism. I would just say there's some really mean people out there and thank God that I can still make a living and go out and breathe fresh air and have a car to drive and all these blessings.

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And my life doesn't even start to compare to people living under that form of communism, at least not yet.

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So this is just, this is incredible drama queen stuff to me. Now, I'm not gonna play this for you.

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I thought about it, but it's just a waste of time to play it. I'll just tell you yesterday, I believe it was, Russell Moore was on CNN talking about, and here's the headline, conspiracy call out, top evangelical pastor warns

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QAnon is infecting churches. That's right, that QAnon. And I'm gonna actually, let's see if we can do this right now.

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Let's go to QAnon, QAnon. Let's see if we can even find it here.

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It's actually kind of hard. You can't just type it in. All right, QPosts.

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All right, so I think I found it. I'm just gonna pull this up for you guys, see if I'm able to do this.

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Yes, I am able to do it. All right, so here's Q, and this is the last post.

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It's from December 8th, 2020. This is what I wanna show you. And it's a YouTube video, and I think it's just, let's see, what is it?

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Video's not even available. Okay, yeah, a video that's not even available.

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And what was the post before that? Also, let's see, that's November 13th. It says Durham Q. What's Durham even doing?

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Is he even investigating anything now? Did he step down? I don't even remember now. This is really old stuff, guys. Super old,

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December 8th. And yet Q is back in the headlines.

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And so this is what, let's see here. How do I? Boom, all right.

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So Q is back in the headlines. And here we have Russell Moore talking to CNN about Q.

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And I watched it. It's like five minutes long, if that. And basically what he says is this is a big problem for churches, this

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Q stuff. I mean, it's just getting into all these evangelical churches. And it's the children that are saying their parents are into it.

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It's like the parents, the older people are just there. It's causing so many problems.

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It's a false messiah. It's false religion. I mean, he just really goes after it.

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And this anchor from CNN is asking, well, what do we do? And he's like, well, you know, it's just really hard.

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But here's these courageous pastors. Here's what they're doing. They're confronting this. So this is, like I said, the last

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Q post, which I had never even been to the Q website, I think until like last,

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I think maybe November or it was December, maybe. I went to it just to see what's this whole thing about.

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I keep hearing about it. And I was like, this is it.

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Really, this is it? This is what they're talking about? Well, the thing, it dies out. And then the media just keeps resurrecting it.

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I think this is part of the plan. I think this is part of the strategy. Now, look, I do believe there are people who definitely have gone way too far in reading in just things that don't, trying to take

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Q posts or things from years ago, and then trying to make that mean something for today.

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And there's so many assumptions you bring to that. It's sort of a form of, kind of like standpoint epistemology is a

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Gnosticism where you say, well, your social location will help you. That determines what the truth is.

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And you have the secret knowledge kind of that's specific to your social location. And so that's why you need minority voices.

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Well, the Q stuff's kind of like that. The people who get deep into that, they kind of start, it seems like what they do is they think that the ability to read a code of some kind, a secret code or see symbols, or just through the power of suggestion, draw parallels between things, give certain people these gifts.

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Like they're just gifted people. And so they're the ones to follow because they're just interpreting all these codes.

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I think there's a problem with that. I think that's bad. That should be, you should go after that the way that you go after standpoint theory, where it pops up.

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But where is it popping up? That's my question is where, is this really prevalent? Is this really the thing that's going on right now?

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I mean, it seems like it kind of died out. I don't hear anyone talking about it, but all of a sudden the media breathes new life into it.

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And we're also more is there to help them breathe new life into it. I would say as a side note today, it's trending that Donald Trump is apparently saying that he's gonna be reinstated to the presidency by August.

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Now here's the thing, this is the source for it. This New York Times reporter, Maggie Haberman. I haven't seen anything from Trump.

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I haven't seen any primary source yet. The stories are all based on a New York Times reporter saying this.

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I think that's kind of nuts. The law doesn't allow for that. I mean, we are a post -constitutional country at this point.

29:18

We're playing Calvin ball with the, I mean, there is like, I don't know, there aren't rules really anymore that people are following.

29:25

It's the constitution is being ripped to shreds. But the thing is the people in power are the

29:30

Democrats. And even if you'd get the Supreme Court to do something absolutely crazy, which they would never do, they didn't actually step in for the election.

29:37

What makes you think they're gonna step in all of a sudden in August and say, yeah, you know, the election was all rigged, et cetera.

29:44

Like it's, no, like this is kind of nuts to think this scenario is going to play out. But it's, but bigger than that, it's just a distraction.

29:53

It's just, I think this is a trap. It is a way to try to breathe new life into Q because they're blaming

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Q for it. And then to try to make conservatives or people who are

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Trump supporters look really stupid. That's what I think is going on here. And again, Russell Moore kind of there for it.

30:13

And by the way, unrelated note, kind of related, but unrelated. The Arizona audit, we got to talk about that sometime because there's some really interesting things coming out that prove what we were talking about and what we thought the end of last year.

30:26

But let's keep going here. We're gonna talk about, yeah, Trevin Wax.

30:32

All right, so we're leaving Russell Moore. Russell Moore is working for Christianity Today. He's got his own gig. And he,

30:39

I wonder sometimes if he could do more damage outside the SBC than inside. I think he may,

30:45

I'm not sure. But this is, he is still doing damage. His ghost hovers over the convention that is about to pop up and happen.

30:56

And speaking of that convention, Trevin Wax, what are Southern Baptists really fighting about in the gospel coalition?

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He says there's three things. And the way he frames these things, this is,

31:07

I sense the Hegelian dialectic at play, which by the way, Sovereign Nations put out a great video Michael O 'Fallon did on the

31:14

Hegelian dialectic. They also did a great video on the history of the early years,

31:20

I think he called it, of the social justice movement, fighting it in evangelicalism. Really good stuff, by the way, really good commentary.

31:27

No one's paying me or asking me to plug it, but go to the Sovereign Nations podcast or their, The Causes of Things is the name of it, their

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YouTube channel and check those two out. But Hegelian dialectic, big question,

31:40

Trevin Wax says. Number one, do Southern Baptist churches unite primarily around doctrinal consensus or missional cooperation?

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And he basically concludes, well, it's both. It's this, it's that, it's, well, here's the thing.

31:54

Why even ask that question? That's not a controversy. That's not even, do you hear anyone talking about this?

32:02

No, this is a way to try to categorize issues that are going on and saying, well, one person's emphasizing this, one person's emphasizing that.

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They're both just emphasizing two different things and we need to kind of come together and compromise. How about no compromise?

32:17

They should unite around doctrinal consensus and missional cooperation, how about that? How about that's the whole purpose of the organization?

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And there is no compromise between emphasis. There's no, you don't take away from doctrine if you emphasize missions.

32:30

You don't take away from missions if you emphasize doctrine, you have both of them. How about that? But the way that it's framed here, it just makes it sound like, well, you got to kind of like 50 % this, 50 % that.

32:40

No, it's 100 % both. Here's another one, big question too. Should we engage secular sources of knowledge with a fundamentalist or an evangelical posture?

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And what's behind this is, well, the fundamental, it's the analytical tool stuff. The fundamentalists don't want any critical race theory.

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The evangelicals think there's some useful ideas from the analytical tool, so which one? And y 'all, they both got a point.

32:59

We need kind of both. No, we don't. How about we ditch the terms fundamentalist and evangelical from this equation and we just use biblical language?

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Should there be truth or error? Should there be, or theological language, orthodox theology or not orthodox theology?

33:18

And then have your debate as to whether the critical race theory and its analytical tools fit that. But again, this is trying to create categories by which to think about these things before the convention so that you go in there and you think, well, you know, we need both of these people.

33:34

How about 50 % evangelicals, 50 % fundamentalists? Let's just come together. And it's okay if the evangelicals kind of want to do their thing and the fundamentals kind of want to do their thing and we need to kind of work together.

33:44

No, actually, if it's truly in error to use the analytical tools of critical race theory, which we've demonstrated, then the answer is no.

33:53

And it's not like an evangelical emphasis. By the way, if it's neo -evangelicalism that he's talking about,

33:59

I've talked about this before, but it's been largely a failure as far as the goal that neo, I'm talking about Carl Henry, Harold Ockinga, and Fuller Theological.

34:10

I mean, it liberalized, it went progressive in like 10 years, Fuller Theological. And now you could literally write the book,

34:18

The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Evangelicalism and talk about, and use the same categories that were used for the uneasy conscience of modern fundamentalism in 1947.

34:28

Largely, it's been a failed project, but I digress. Big question three, how politically aligned must

34:34

Southern Baptists be in order to cooperate together? Now, this one, I think sidesteps an actual issue here.

34:42

It's not about politics as much as it is about the issues that have come to the forefront recently in politics because some of them are actually theological issues.

34:53

And they're primary ethical issues. I mean, abortion is one of them. That was one of the big issues. How can you vote for a guy who's pro abortion, right?

35:01

And that is a big issue. And so it's not a political issue as much as it is a moral issue that Southern Baptists, I mean, if he phrased it that way, can we disagree over supporting a candidate who's for abortion?

35:16

That would be the way to frame it, not how politically aligned must Southern Baptists be in order to cooperate. The way he's framing all of these things is just not, it is moving, it's shifting everything kind of left.

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It is trying to take 50 % here, 50 % here and move it because the

35:33

Southern Baptist Convention was, if you go back even 10 years ago, they would have been pretty stalwart on these issues in the conservative direction.

35:41

Now, if you move it, then it's no longer that. You untether yourself and eventually anything goes.

35:48

All right, here's Al Mohler. The way forward for the Southern Baptist Convention, a very personal word from Al Mohler, very personal.

35:54

It's just, you have to say that too, I guess. It's funny how they phrase it, a very personal word.

36:01

It's not just a word from Al Mohler, it's very personal. So he's letting you in on things that he doesn't just share with anyone.

36:10

This is personal stuff, except when you read it, you're like, this is very personal, really?

36:17

I think what they mean is that it just means so much to him, but it's so vague. Again, it's Al Mohler, it's the way he writes.

36:23

It's a lot of word salad stuff. Here's what he says. The crucial factor in my decision was the case that many people made to me about why

36:29

I should allow my nomination at that time. I said, yeah, so he's talking about his nomination to be SBC president in hope that I could offer state.

36:36

So here's what he says. He offers statesmanship, a steady hand, denominational experience, theological conviction and a calm spirit to all

36:46

Southern Baptists. People who know Al Mohler personally, I wonder if they can attest to the calm spirit claim.

36:53

I love Southern Baptists. He's saying how he loves to see them work together. He loves their bedrock beliefs, their doctrine, polity, mission.

37:03

So this is what he's offering. This is his own assessment of his character.

37:09

So, I mean, it is very personal, I guess. He's talking about himself, personal. So here are his 10, the 10 elements of Mohler's platform.

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First, I will call Southern Baptists back to our bedrock convictions. Here's my question. Why couldn't you do it at Southern Seminary?

37:24

Why was it so hard there? Why did you fire the person who was trying to do that, Russell Fuller? And Jim Warwick for that matter.

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But why couldn't you do that in the area in which you have control right now?

37:37

Second, I will use the convening influence of the SBC president to call Southern Baptists to talk to each other about the issues of strain and stress, okay?

37:48

You could do that now, though. That's the thing. He has enough influence now. He could do that. He doesn't even really need the influence of the

37:55

SBC president. He's already tried to do that. And for the most part, it hasn't worked. Think back to the last fall and they're sort of anti -CRT, really not anti -CRT.

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Their replay of Resolution 9, which gets replayed over and over. Third, I will encourage

38:10

Southern Baptists to avoid gathering in separate corners, as if we are waiting for a fight in the ring. You could,

38:16

I mean, it's worked so far at Southern. Hasn't it? No, it hasn't. Fourth, I will seek to represent

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Southern Baptists before the watching world with fidelity and respect. I wonder if that fidelity and respect mirrors what

38:29

Russell Moore's been doing and what Al Mohler to some extent has been doing, showing up in the Houston Chronicle and CNN to go against Roy Moore, to go against C .J.

38:39

Mahaney, to go against the quote unquote sexual abuse that's happened over years in the

38:44

Southern Baptist Convention. I'm wondering if that's what he's talking about, because that's what he's been doing.

38:50

And that's when you hear from Al Mohler in the public arena like that, that's usually what he's talking about. It's that kind of stuff.

38:58

So, I mean, if that's what you want, I guess you will get that and there will be fidelity and respect, but by whose standard is what

39:05

I'm asking? Is it by the standard of the Houston Chronicle? Fifth, I will seek to make SBC leaders more accessible to all

39:11

Southern Baptists, starting with the messengers to the annual convention. He is one of the least accessible people for those who actually attend the school and have actual concerns.

39:27

And this is, I think, the point of Russell Fuller and Tom Rush, who actually do talk to him or have talked to him. Even if you get ahold of him, what actually changes?

39:37

Even if there's lip service, what actually happens? Accessibility, I just, it's hard to buy this.

39:46

It's just really hard. I remember, oh, I'm not gonna share it, nevermind. I was just thinking back to a story of calling

39:54

Southern Seminary, maybe I will. I remember calling Southern Seminary to ask them, hey, is

39:59

Curtis Wood still a professor there? And it was pretty quick. I mean, the lady on the phone, she said, oh yeah, he's not a professor here anymore.

40:07

Just giving all this information. And I think it was within like 10 minutes, other people were calling to verify and they were not taking any of the calls, not answering any of the questions.

40:16

I mean, that's the kind of accessibility you want there. Sixth, I will seek to draw the work of Southern Baptists at every level into closer conversation and cooperation.

40:29

It's so, it's general, I mean, how's it going so far?

40:34

Again, seventh, I will hope to lead Southern Baptists to avoid, this is the funniest one to me. I will hope to lead

40:40

Southern Baptists to avoid embarrassment. Listen, you will never avoid embarrassment, ever. If you're gonna live godly in Christ Jesus, if you're gonna do the right thing, if you're gonna say the right things, you will be, the world will try to embarrass you.

40:53

And by their standard, it will be embarrassing. You just have to get used to it. You have to say that you don't care about what they think.

41:00

If you try to avoid that embarrassment, you will compromise. Eighth, I will do my best to convince Southern Baptists to talk to each other rather than to tweet at each other.

41:09

He said that kind of at the Shepherds Conference, right? When Phil Johnson was actually talking to him and he says, I'm not gonna get into a

41:16

Twitter war with 140 characters or less. And it's like, well, yeah, but you're sitting right here with someone.

41:22

You can talk to them. He again said that he wants to have a conversation about social justice, never did.

41:29

So yeah, this is, I just can't, I can't take it seriously. Ninth, I will tell Southern Baptists the truth.

41:38

Okay, let's hear the truth about why Russell Fuller was fired. Let's hear the truth about what you really think about Russell Moore and his job he did at the

41:46

Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Let's really hear the truth about why you did not sign the Dallas Statement, what you really think about that.

41:56

The truth, I mean, I don't know. The list just goes on and on and on in my head. Like, this is the problem is that, you know, the truth about why you tweeted what you did about the

42:05

ByWhatStandard trailer when apparently you had already seen it weeks before. This is the kind of stuff,

42:12

I just can't take it seriously. 10th, and finally, I will commit to leading the Southern Baptist Convention with joy.

42:22

Leading it with joy would be good, but it's, again, are you leading

42:28

Southern Seminary with joy? I don't wanna, I have thoughts that I could share, and I just,

42:36

I'm not, I'm not gonna share them. I'll just let everyone else assess whether or not they think

42:41

Al Mohler has, it demonstrates a lot of joy in the position he's at now at Southern Seminary. So, obviously, if you're coming at this, and you've never heard me talk about Al Mohler before, you may think that what

42:51

I'm saying sounds perhaps too dismissive, maybe disrespectful in your mind.

42:58

The thing is that we have been talking about Al Mohler for years. You go watch the video, What Happened to Al Mohler, and I give you my paradigm for trying to understand the facts that are publicly available.

43:09

I was someone, I mean, I remember, I didn't even really wanna go to the Shepherds Conference years ago unless Al Mohler was there.

43:15

This is, I mean, that's how big of a fan I was of Al Mohler, like 12 years ago, 10 years ago.

43:21

And that has, it's been hard to see that, the changes and the compromise I've seen.

43:27

It's sad, more than anything else, it's sad. And I don't mean to irreverently mock, but what

43:33

I do think, I do think some of these things he says are so sad and so pathetic, given the track record over the last few years, that it's just, it's not, you can't take it seriously.

43:47

And that's really all I'm conveying. I just can't take this seriously, what he's saying. There has to be some kind of a, the truth needs to be told now before you can tell it.

43:58

I mean, the principle here is that being faithful in the little things makes you qualify to be faithful in the bigger things.

44:06

That's the principle here. And no one's 100 % perfectly faithful except Jesus Christ, but there should be a level of faithfulness.

44:14

There should be a being characterized by it from a human standpoint that someone has before they're faithful in bigger things.

44:20

And Al Mohler just hasn't demonstrated that. And his words are one thing, but his actions speak a lot louder.

44:27

And so I just, I feel sad. I wish what he would do, honestly, and this is true, this is very personal and sincere.

44:35

I just really think that you don't, he doesn't have to use certain words, like very personal or with joy, or he doesn't have to use these words to try to overcompensate for the way that people actually believe him to be, without joy, perhaps, or angry, or not very personal and detached.

44:57

What he could do is just come forward and tell the truth and apologize and retract things that he regrets, but that won't happen.

45:04

And that's the problem, is it just, it won't happen. He won't, I mean, it's like with Matt Hall, like just come out and say, look,

45:11

I'm sorry I said what I said. I'm sorry I claimed that I'm a racist because I benefit from a system that allocates privilege.

45:18

Like just come out and say that, admit that you were wrong, but it won't happen. And Al Mohler doesn't seem to want to admit any kind of wrongdoing, or even address situations like the

45:32

Fuller situation. And that's the problem. It's hard to take someone seriously who says they're gonna be for accountability and transparency when they haven't been that way at what they're in charge of now.

45:45

So that's my two cents on that. And I would hope that Al Mohler, I mean, look, he could repent and people would receive him and trust could then be built again.

45:53

It would take time, but it wouldn't be in time for the convention, but you could start that process.

45:59

But with this kind of stuff, it's just not gonna happen. It just comes across as fake. It doesn't come across as very personal.

46:04

It doesn't come across as joyful. So let's see, what else?

46:10

Anything else? I don't think, that's it for now. We're gonna end it there. I hope this was helpful to all of you in the

46:15

Southern Baptist Convention, especially. I got some more stuff coming up later this week, so look forward to that, and God bless you all.