Prosperity Theology Comes To The SBC

Welcome to the program ladies and gentlemen. My name is Justin Peters. I hope that this finds you and your family doing well today. I want to thank you so much for joining me for this podcast. Well prosperity theology is alive and well today and I am NOT referring to the word of faith movement.

Not referring to the New Apostolic Reformation or the charismatic movement in general. Not this time. Unfortunately today I am referring to the Southern Baptist Convention now softer versions of prosperity theology unfortunately percolate in pretty much all denominations out there Southern Baptist Convention being no exception, but today I'm going to bring to your attention a particularly acute and egregious and grievous example of prosperity theology within the SBC a denomination that is not at all known for at least theoretically preaching or practicing prosperity theology but it does exist to be sure in some of the uppity-ups the powers that be within the SBC.

Absolutely, and I'm going to bring your to your attention today an example at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Now, let me say up front. This is not to this is not to smear at all Southwestern.

I'm not talking about the faculty members at Southwestern rather I am referring to the former president of Southwestern Seminary and As we'll see as we get a little further into this video the trustees.

But the former president is a man named. Dr. Adam Greenway. Adam Greenway was elected as the ninth president of Southwestern Seminary in February of 2019 at the age of 41 which made him the youngest man ever to be elected as president of Southwestern Seminary and in full disclosure Adam and I know each other.

In fact, we were students together at Southwestern Seminary. Back in the day. We were we knew of each other. I graduated with my Master of Divinity from Southwestern in 2000. He earned his Master of Divinity in 2002.

So I was a couple years ahead of him, but we did know each other now. We were not friends I would say barely even acquaintances. We would speak to each other. Briefly, maybe if we passed each other in the hallway or something, but we didn't know each other well, just kind of a little light chit-chat once in a blue moon was really about it, but.

But he does know who I am. I know who he is. I have no idea how to get in touch with him. But at any rate Adam was not only the youngest man to be elected as president of Southwestern Seminary, but he also unfortunately holds the not so desired distinction of having the shortest tenure as president of Southwestern Seminary he was the ninth president and The tenth of course is Dr. David Dockery.

He holds that position now. Adam only Held his position for about three and a half years. Which is very very very short for a president of Southwestern Seminary. Most of the presidents there served at least for at least for 1010s on the short end to 20.

Maybe even 30 years. So a very very short tenure in fact, he resigned September 22nd of 2022 and I'll just read this to you what he said in a press release. It was widely reported at the time. He said quote these days are incredibly challenging in the life of our denomination said Greenway.

They are also challenging times for academic institutions particularly theological seminaries. In February of 2019 Carla his wife and I accepted the call to come back home to Southwestern Seminary. With an understanding of these challenges, but also with the strong desire to be part of the solution.

What we failed to appreciate was the enormity of the reputational Legal and financial realities that would welcome us to the dome. That's a reference to Southwestern Seminary because of the well-known dome there in the main building.

Only to be compounded by a global pandemic. Unlike anything we have ever experienced before we have done our best to serve Southern Baptists by helping position our seminary for the future. But much much work remains to be done nevertheless in the providence of God we sense a release from our duties.

Here, so this was September 22nd 2022 and then the next day Adam dr. Greenway made a statement. He announced that he was going to serve in a new position at the IMB the International Mission Board. Greenway spoke about this and he said quote.

We will continue to serve Southern Baptists as we have throughout the course of our lives and ministry. Greenway said we believe our next assignment is not a departure from but a continuation. Along the journey God has always had us walk.

We are thrilled that we are going to help prepare Southern Baptist missionaries for their work of addressing the world's greatest problem spiritual lostness with God's solution. Which is the gospel of Christ he added as we look forward to beginning a new chapter with Southern Baptist favorite entity The International Mission Board we ask for your prayers for us in this season of transition.

And we pledge our continued prayers and support for our beloved crown jewel referring to the IMB. Then just five days later five days later September 28th Adam made this statement. Carl and I are grateful for many for the many expressions of care and concern that have come our way since our transition from service at Swibbets Southwestern was first announced while we initially thought our path would take us to the IMB.

We have not been able to find the Lord's peace. To move forward in that direction. We covet your prayers for ourselves and for our children as we seek the Lord's direction regarding his next vocational assignment for us.

So in just five days Things Changed dramatically. He was going to take a position at the International Mission Board and just a few days later Said mysteriously we no longer feel the Lord's peace about that well.

Your friends it had nothing to do with the Lord's peace. It had everything to do with gross financial Improprieties and Opulent lavish Spending of seminary money and if you are a Southern Baptist attending a Southern Baptist Church Who gives your money to your local church?

Lavish spending of your money. Because there was a report that came out this past week so in the fall of 2022 and after Adam Greenway resigned A task force was commissioned to review some of the expenditures that Adam Greenway undertook that he commissioned himself as president for the president's home and then his office, so If you're a president of Southwestern seminary you live in a house called Bacon Manor.

It's a house That's right there on campus within almost literally a stone's throw To the to the main building there so the president whoever he is he and his wife and family live in Bacon Manor and Then the president of course has an office.

He only has an office in Bacon Manor, but he also has the his main office there on campus in the main building there and so there was a lot of a lot of renovations and expenditures that people could obviously see what's going on during his Short tenure and so Southwestern put together a task force to review some of these expenditures after Greenway resigned and this report was was made known how interestingly Adam said on April 20th 2023 Adam said this I look forward to the seminary fulfilling its promise of transparency to Southern Baptist by releasing the full trustee investigative report Including all related findings without edit or redaction.

I trust that all Southern Baptists will then be able to judge for themselves the veracity of the summary narrative presented in the seminary's press release, so Adam was getting a lot of criticism people were raising a lot of questions about the the financial proprieties or lack thereof of his spending during his short tenure and Adam said that he is looking forward to the release and full transparency of this detailed report because People he believed were speaking ill of him and smearing him and then he says here on May 17th He says quote Greenway and his defenders have said privately if trustees are going to impugn his record as president.

They ought to give supporting evidence, but eight months later No details have been provided that was in this particular article in Baptist News and Adam kind of doubled down. He said to be fair. I said it publicly, but the point remains in other words don't impugn my character don't impugn my record if there is no evidence and he says basically Let's see it.

You know because I feel very confident that once these details are out then My name will be cleared and and nobody can impugn my character anymore. Well Those details have now been released as of this recording last week.

Southwestern Seminary did indeed release the findings of this task force that was commissioned back in the fall of 2022 and I'll put the link to this article down there below in the description so you can see it for yourself.

But let's run through this just a little bit and I'm going somewhere with this dear friends, and I want you to see this. Now notice at the top of the page. It says this is from the official release Southwestern Seminary the president shall have a direct charge of full supervision over and shall be responsible for all funds and properties of the seminary so This can't be laid at the feet of anyone else other than Dr. Adam Greenway, so in his short tenure there three and a half years Adam Greenway spent seminary money on Christmas decorations to the tune of almost $60 ,000 how do you spend?

$60 ,000 on Christmas decorations. How do you do that? Well somehow he did $25 ,000 for artwork. $11 ,000 for an espresso machine now. I have bought my wife a couple of espresso machines. We've been married for 13 years and so, you know, they don't last forever so I bought I bought a couple of them and they're they're they're kind of spendy but Nowhere near $11 ,000.

I mean that Not even close not. Not the ones I'm aware of and she likes her espresso machine. She was very satisfied with it didn't cost anywhere near that not even remotely anyway $180 ,000 on HVAC Heating and cooling $180 ,000.

How do you do that? And then the seminary employees? So if if you're familiar with Southwestern Seminary the the students there's a lot of the students there that work there on campus. Some of them have office jobs, you know in different Departments or whatever, but a lot of the students work on the grounds crew.

They work in the shop. They they're painters. They're plumbers. They're electricians. They work on the grounds their grounds crew. They work in the flowerbeds and all this kind of stuff and and these blue collar Jobs are called we refer to them as the blue shirts because that was their uniform.

They wore Blue kind of almost a baby blue Shirts with the Southwestern logo on them. So very much blue collar work there. And we called them the blue shirts. Well the blue shirts. And by the way, I had a job at Southwestern Seminary to I was a dispatcher for campus security.

Obviously, I couldn't work in the flowerbeds, but I could answer a phone and and do dispatch for security. So I did that but my shirt was gray. But anyway The blue shirts quote were often asked to do the same job multiple times to meet Greenway's demanding expectations.

So the morale amongst the blue shirts was very low because they would be called in by Adam Greenway to do the same job over and over and over. Because apparently their work didn't rise up didn't meet his level of expectation spent $10 ,000 For first-class airfare to Anaheim, California for the 2022 SBC annual meeting for Adam and his family.

I Believe he has one or two children and not a big family. So Adam his wife and one or two children, then I think someone else but $10 ,000 for first-class airfare from DFW to Anaheim, California now friends $10 ,000 for what a two-hour flight two and a half maybe.

Two two and a half hour flight maybe and you got to go first class to the tune of $10 ,000 When you could buy coach ticket for probably three or four hundred. Unbelievable. And friends I'm gonna say something that It may sound self-serving or like I'm patting myself on the back I promise you with a crystal-clear conscience before the Lord.

I don't mean it that way but I As an evangelist I fly all over the world and I fly the longest flights That there are in the world. I have flown to African countries Australia New Zealand India the Philippines Fiji some of the longest if not the longest flights that there are I've been on and.

And you know what? I fly coach and you know what I make it. I fly coach and I do so with cerebral palsy. It can be done. Yeah, first class is nice. Sure I mean you can lay all the way back and you know, like you're laying in a bed and sure you get you know Nicer meals and stuff like that, but it is Exponentially more and the reason I don't fly first class.

It is Exponentially more expensive to do so now if you want to fight fly first class on your own dime. If you have the funds to do that, hey and that that's fine great. But to use seminary money to do that for a two and a half hour flight tops two and a half hours really I mean long international flights.

They can be 10 12 hours long, maybe even 13 hours long. But you got to have first class to fly from Texas to California. Really and to use seminary money now when I say seminary money, please understand.

That is money that as a if you're a Southern Baptist and you attend a Southern Baptist Church. He's using your money to do this. Your money that you have given to your church that your church in turns gives to its state Baptist Convention which in turn gives it to the cooperative program.

Cooperative program money. All of that is distributed to the various Southern Baptist entities North American Mission Board International Mission Board and Lifeway. Well lifeway theoretically is its own standalone financially, but whatever and.

And then the six Southern Baptist seminary. So so your money that you give out of your pocket when you write a check to your church that filters down and Goes to at least part of it goes to the Southern Baptist seminaries one of which is Southwestern and Adam Greenway.

So he was using Cooperative program money that is ostensibly given to fund missions. Well, he's using it to buy first-class plane tickets from Texas to California it's just. It's unreal that it's beyond the pale and then $4 ,850 almost $5 ,000 for framing for framing his diplomas.

When I saw that my mouth dropped open I Didn't even know you could spend. No, almost $5 ,000 on a frame. Where do you what kind of frame shop? Sells frames for $5 ,000. I mean even if it's a custom frame job, which I'm sure it was.

But I didn't even know that was possible to spend that kind of money. He has spent in total. This report says 1 .5 million dollars. 1 .5 million dollars on renovations furnishings and related expenses.

To the president's home Pecan Manor where if you're a president of Southwestern seminary. That's where you and your family live and then you have your office. Speaking of his office. He spent half a million dollars $500 ,000 on his office.

I $500 ,000 on an office it is Unbelievable and and Think about this to the president as president you're living in Pecan Manor. You have no expenses. Adam Greenway doesn't own that home that he's living in.

Southwestern seminary owns it, but he lives there. That's his home for however long he's president. And yeah, if you're You want to make some changes here and there. I understand that kind of stuff but 1 .5 million dollars half a million dollars on your office.

He doesn't even pay the light bill. The seminary pays for all of the expenses. He pays no property taxes on it. He doesn't pay his light bill. He doesn't pay the water bill none of those he has no expenses and Still managed to spend in three and a half years 1 .5 million dollars.

Unbelievable of your money. Prosperity theology is indeed alive and well within the SPC and it was so Ironic when he was still president you would see him regularly and I have some screenshots here he would post pictures of Southwestern seminary seemed particularly fond of posting pictures of of the dome at night, you know I love the dome this kind of things and well, I bet he did he was living high off the hog.

At the dome no expenses. Unbelievable using your money if you're a Southern Baptist using your money. To fund lifestyles of the rich and famous and all the while. I mean how ironic. Let's go back to what he said.

When he resigned remember this when he said. What we failed to appreciate was the enormity of the reputational legal and financial realities that would welcome us to the dome. Failed to appreciate the enormity of the reputational legal and financial realities.

There is no one's reputation who is more damaged now than Adam Greenways and He's talking about the daunting financial realities that the seminary faced all the while he is Spending money like a drunken sailor.

It's unreal. Unreal and the whole time this was going on Southwestern seminaries enrollment was plummeting now to be fair. The decline in Southwestern seminaries enrollment didn't begin with Adam Greenway it began 18 17 18 or so years ago.

Right about the time actually well, maybe 20 years ago right about the time I graduated the enrollment started to drop, but it increased precipitously. Under Greenway's tenure and Southwestern seminary when I was a student there was the largest Southern Baptist theological in fact, I think it was called the largest theological seminary in the world.

Certainly the largest of the six Southern Baptist Seminaries or six of them and Southwestern was the largest now. I believe it is the fifth largest. I think it's next to the smallest because the enrollment has gone down that steeply and While that enrollment was going down Greenway was also firing faculty members according to a former Swivets philosophy professor.

Dr. Travis Dickinson. He said quote by my count within the first year of Greenway's presidency 40 faculty members were cut in Two rounds less than a year apart. His administration was still cutting as of this summer bringing the count up to 46 so Greenway was firing faculty members.

Because of budget constraints supposedly while he is doing 1 .5 million dollars worth of renovations and projects. Many of which had to meet his exacting standards. 1 .5 million dollars on luxury about $11 ,000 espresso machines $5 ,000 worth of framing for your personal diplomas while he is Firing faculty members Who have families that they are trying to feed and In doing all of this all of this opulent spending on something that he doesn't even own it.

I Mean, I don't. I wish I knew what a salary was. He had no expenses no expenses. No, he has a six-figure salary exactly what that six-figure salary is. I don't know but a six-figure salary and Spending this kind of money this kind of opulence $5 ,000 worth of frames for your personal diplomas $11 ,000 espresso machines and flying first-class.

You and your family Doing all of this spending this kind of money. All the while cutting faculty members Cutting their salaries and doing it spending this kind of money cooperate your money Mr. And mrs. Southern Baptist your money spending all the while these poor blue shirt students and when I say poor I mean literally poor these young men and some young women who are students at Southwestern and they are working many of them to sometimes even three jobs and Going to classes and writing papers.

Studying for exams doing all this Serving in churches working to some of them even three jobs just to make ends meet so they can pay their tuition. Pay their books pay their room and board. Put food on the table for their spouses and some seminary students for their children in Greenway.

Living it up. I just that is atrocious. Now you tell me what is the difference between that lifestyle and Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland now granted. Adam Greenway is not promising Poor people that God will make them wealthy if they give him his money or sick people.

God will heal you of cancer if you send in your money. He's not making those kind of promises that you find in the word faith in AR circles granted. But as far as a lifestyle There's no difference. Telling people to give to the Lord's work.

Benny Hinn says that give to the Lord's work. Absolutely appalling. Now I've kind of beat up on Adam Greenway. Rightly so but Here's the thing. People noticed you can't do 1 .5 million dollars worth of renovations To Pecan Manor and to your office without people noticing.

I Know the faculty member noticed. I mean they Everybody could see what was going on. The blue shirts could see everybody could see what he was doing. But the faculty members don't have any control over the president.

But the trustees do. The trustees do and I think there are 45 Members of the Board of Trustees of Southwestern Seminary. They knew what was going on. They had to see it. I know they did. There's no way they didn't.

Now they may not have known The full extent they may not have known down to the dollar amount, but everybody could see they could see The opulence that Greenway was enjoying and there's no way they didn't so all that to say is Not only is Adam Greenway culpable The Board of Trustees is culpable too because they could have put a stop to it and they didn't.

So I you know, this is going on at Southwestern. I Hear supposedly they're making changes my goodness. They ought to but How much of this is going on at the other? Southern Baptist seminaries. I don't know.

I know the presidents get paid well, and I'm not against being paid. Well for honest hard work, but this kind of stuff folks. That's beyond the pale. It is it is utter hypocrisy hypocrisy for the Southern Baptist to teach against the Prosperity gospel health and wealth theology.

When this kind of stuff is going on in their own camp so Annual meeting is this week. And boy, there are a ton of issues in the SPC a ton. It's not just women preachers. That's a massive issue too because there reports now are now well over a thousand Churches in the SPC have female pastors serving as pastoral and pastoral roles.

That's an issue. You've got churches that are blatantly heretical and in both in both their Orthodoxy and their orthoprag and what they teach and what they practice you've got churches like Church of the Glades that is a Goat farm you've got First Baptist, Orlando.

That is baptizing homosexuals even allowing homosexuals to baptize people in their own baptistry. You've got that going you've got Almost wholesale capitulation on SSA. You've got all kinds of stuff going on.

It's a mess it is a mess and you've not to mention the plagiarism scandal of Ed Litton and Ed Litton being hosted by at least five of the six Southern Baptist seminaries not the least of which Southwestern Seminary, Adam Greenway inviting a plagiarist a serial plagiarist to come in and preach at Chapel at the seminaries and Adam Greenway hosting Ed Litton and giving him an interview in and in letting Ed Litton lie bald-faced lie to all of those seminary students and before God himself lie about his plagiarism and Documented irrefutable plagiarism, but he says it wasn't plagiarism.

Well, of course it was plagiarism unbelievable if if any of those seminary students any of those blue shirts or any other seminary student had done a fraction of 1 of the kind of plagiarism just that we know about from Ed Litton the former president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Those seminary students would have been kicked out on their ears and rightly so and yet Ed Litton President of the SPC is invited with warm welcome open arms From it. I would say at least four and I think five of the six in there I think there was one seminary at least one seminary that did not invite him to come in and preach at Chapel, but Most of them did Southwestern did and Adam Greenway Just gave him a platform and let him lie Bald-faced lie in front of the students and before God Just on it the hypocrisy.

The it's just stunning and for so many I hate to say this but for so many in the SPC Not all not all there are some good SPC pastors and there are there are some good Good SPC pastors. Some of them are friends of mine, and I love these men.

But for so many in the SPC their loyalty is Not first and foremost to Christ their loyalty sadly. And I don't see how you come up with any other Conclusion than this, but their first loyalty is to the SPC.

It's to the machine. And they invited this plagiarist of serial plagiarism liar to come and preach preach in their chapel services in front of their students. Unbelievable. I was speaking with a former professor at Southwestern seminary Just last night as of this recording and I told him I won't give you his name.

But I told him we were talking about this and I said, you know, I have I actually believe that one day I will stand before God. I will stand before a risen Christ with eyes of flaming fire and feet of burnished bronze and I will have to give an account for what I have done with the Time and the resources that Christ has entrusted to me.

I'll have to give an account. I don't fear God. I don't fear fear God's wrath. Eschatologically because that's been taken care of in the atonement. So I don't fear the wrath of God. But I do fear that day when I will stand before him and have to give an account.

I'm not going to give an account to a board or to a denomination to a committee I'm gonna give an account to Christ and we all say we believe that we say we do. But my goodness, I wonder how many of us actually believe it.

So, all right, dear ones. Maybe not the most cheery video, but I think it was important to to deal with this and so you can know especially if you're Southern Baptist, you know, what's going on and Do with it as you will.

Let your conscience be your guide. Okay. Thank you very much dear ones until our next time together. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ the love of God and the fellowship of his Holy Spirit be with you all.