Saturday Special: The Liberal Drift of the Southern Baptist Convention (Part 1)

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Welcome to a Saturday special edition of When We Understand the Text, looking at current events and responding to them with a solid understanding of scripture.

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Visit our website at www .utt .com. Here once again is

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Pastor Gabe. The Liberal Drift of the Southern Baptist Convention, Part 1, a review of the

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SBC Annual Meeting in Anaheim. Pastor Gabe's blog for June 22, 2022.

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In 2 Timothy 4, 1 -2, the Apostle Paul wrote to his protege Timothy, I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom, preach the word, be ready in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, and exhort with great patience and teaching.

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In verses 3 -4, Paul went on to say, For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.

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The annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention was held in Anaheim, California last week.

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I was not able to attend, but we sent messengers from our church and I watched the live feed online. It was evident from what

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I saw and gleaned from witnesses who were there that the SBC continues to turn from sound doctrine, following the course of teachers who tickle their itching ears.

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Many have called this a liberal drift or progressivism. The SBC is a large vessel, considered the largest

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Protestant denomination in the world, made up of nearly 50 ,000 autonomous Baptist churches.

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Getting a ship this big turned around will take a lot of time, effort, and money.

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But the convention is not going to try and change direction if they cannot see that they are going the wrong way.

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What are the signs of this liberal drift? Can the Southern Baptist Convention change course?

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Or are they doomed to be shipwrecked? I'm going to offer my review of the annual meeting and the current state of the

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SBC by responding to seven questions asked by Dr. Nate Brooks, Professor of Christian Counseling at Reformed Theological Seminary in Charlotte, North Carolina.

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Dr. Brooks presented a thread of questions and answers on Twitter to positively frame the outcome of the

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Baptist meeting for his Presbyterian friends, though many Baptists loved his thread as well. I'm going to give contrasting answers.

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Brooks' Q &A was liked and shared by influential Southern Baptists, including former

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President J .D. Greer, Send Network President Vance Pittman, and SBC Recording Secretary Nathan Finn.

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In addition to Dwight McKissick, Daniel Darling, Grant Gaines, Josh King, Todd Benkert, Scott Coley, Jennifer Greenberg, and dozens of other professors, preachers, and parishioners.

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The questions were as follows. Number one, did the SBC go liberal?

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Number two, did the SBC elect a woke extremist as president?

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Number three, did the SBC endorse female pastors? Number four, did the

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SBC play abuse politics? Number five, did the SBC endorse

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LGBTQ plus lifestyles? Number six, did the SBC endorse abortion?

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And number seven, did the SBC annual meeting go well? Brooks said it did, and I will argue that it did not.

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I'll present each of Brooks' questions and the answers he gave, followed by my response. The details

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I'll be giving into the current state of the Southern Baptist Convention will be much lengthier, so I will need to break up this review into two parts.

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For part one, I'll be covering only the first three questions. Then next week, God willing, I'll present part two, responding to the next four questions.

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Let's begin with the first question. Question one, did the SBC go liberal?

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Dr. Brooks said no. Of course, the answer to this question is no. What church denomination would ever go liberal after a two -day meeting?

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Brooks' question comes across as disingenuous, as if he and everyone who agreed with his seven -question thread have never actually listened to the arguments made by conservatives.

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Brooks argued that the Southern Baptist Convention is not liberal. All six of our seminaries affirm inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, he said.

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All four of our presidential candidates affirm inspiration and inerrancy. Deity of Christ, Biblical miracles, bodily resurrection, and the virgin birth.

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Those claiming we have gone liberal have a very different definition of liberal than theological liberalism.

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The new liberalism speaks more to how Christians engage with the world than anything else.

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While there are people saying the Southern Baptist Convention is now liberal, I heard one say so just yesterday, that's not really the central argument made by most conservatives.

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The main concern is not that the SBC is liberal, but that it is becoming liberal.

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The charge is liberal drift. On the evening of the first day of the annual meeting,

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Mark Dever's ministry Nine Marks hosted a panel that included Jonathan Lehman as the emcee,

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Danny Akin, Matt Chandler, Kevin Smith, and a couple others. Dr. Akin, who is the president of Southeastern Seminary, more properly framed the charge as liberal drift, but he dismissed the accusation as nonsense.

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He said, quote, I was in seminary in the early 80s where you could hardly find an inerrantist even at the most conservative of our seminaries.

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When I went to Southeastern in 1992 as a faculty member, the majority of the faculty just go down the line.

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No inerrancy, no exclusivity, pro -choice, all egalitarians, and may not even pray to God as father because that is patriarchal and oppressive to women.

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So when people begin to say like today, well, there is a drift toward liberalism.

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I'm sorry, but that's just nonsense. I've stared at liberalism in the face, and it's not what's happening in our seminaries today, unquote.

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Even though Dr. Akin acknowledged the accusation is liberal drift, he responded to it as if the accusation was full on theological liberalism.

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There's a difference between drifting liberal and being liberal. The drift is undeniable, but the reason

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Dr. Akin can't see it is because he's caught in it. Let's back up and consider briefly what theological liberalism is, and then

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I'm going to show you the liberal drift, even in what we saw on display at SBC 22. First, what is theological liberalism?

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According to Gary Dorian, as summarized by Kevin DeYoung, liberal theology can be identified by these seven characteristics.

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Liberalism believes and teaches, one, true religion is not based on external authority.

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Two, Christianity is a movement of social reconstruction. Three, Christianity must be credible and relevant.

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Four, truth can be known only through changing symbols and forms. Five, theological controversy is about language, not about truth.

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Six, the historical accuracies of biblical facts and events are not crucial, so long as we meet

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Jesus in the pages of scripture. Seven, the true religion is the way of Christ, not any particular doctrines of Christ.

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If you go back up and look at Brooks and Akin's characteristics of liberalism, the few examples they cited appear to fit only in categories one and seven, but there are more than two red flags.

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I would argue that the Southern Baptist Convention, including its entities, seminaries, and a large number of Southern Baptist churches, are drifting in the direction of all seven of these characteristics.

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I could write at length about this with multiple examples, but let me narrow it down to three. First, consider how the

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SBC has embraced a movement of social reconstruction. What better example than Southern Baptist relationship with the social justice movement?

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I highlighted this problem last year with a comment made by Dehati Lewis, who said, quote, the gospel is not good news without spiritual redemption and restoration, but the gospel is also not good news without emotional, economic, and social restoration as well, unquote.

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Lewis is not some fringe voice. He was one of the presidents of the

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North American Mission Board, NAM, and the emcee of NAM's roundtable discussion entitled

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Undivided, which was distributed to Southern Baptist churches. Second, consider how the

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SBC believes it must be credible and relevant. I've written much in the past about how many

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Southern Baptist churches have a long -running affair with pragmatism, the practice that if a method works, it's good.

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If doing a summer -long series called Back to the Movies attracts a bunch of people with sermons that are based on popular films, as long as you throw a few

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Bible verses in there, then it must be a good thing. That's liberal, and many

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Southern Baptist churches are doing it. By the way, that is a real sermon series going on right now, and it is a

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Southern Baptist church that is doing it. Third, consider how theological controversy in the

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SBC is about language, not about truth. We saw this on display at the annual meeting in Anaheim.

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Debate was stirred on the floor of the convention as to what a pastor is and whether a woman can be a pastor.

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The credentials committee recommended a year -long study into the definition of a pastor. The chairperson of the committee, who was a woman, said that pastor means different things to different people.

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This was a clear example of liberal drift. Yet, that very same evening,

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Danny Akin had the audacity to say that the accusation of liberal drift is nonsense.

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He believes that he's stared liberalism in the face and it's not what's happening in our seminaries today.

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It is happening in Akin's seminary, and it has come from his own mouth. Dr.

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Akin has advocated for what is called standpoint epistemology, meaning that where we live and who we are, including skin color, gender, and sexual orientation, influence how we interpret scripture.

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In a since -deleted video, Akin said of himself in the third person, quote, Danny Akin cannot help the fact that he comes to the

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Bible as a white male, married, who comes from the Deep South, who has rock -solid convictions and commitments about the supernatural worldview, about the inerrancy and infallibility of the

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Bible, and who is committed to Orthodox Christianity, unquote. He went on to say, quote,

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I suspect that I read the Bible differently than, say, a lesbian woman of a different ethnicity who lives up in the

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Northwest and is committed to a pantheistic worldview way of thinking, unquote. Because Dr.

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Akin views biblical interpretation this way, he hires and churns out professors who teach this way.

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Dr. Elizabeth Mburu, the first woman to earn a Ph .D. from Akin Seminary, has published a book entitled

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African Hermeneutics. Hermeneutics are the disciplines of biblical interpretation. She says that when interpreting the

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Bible, you must begin with an African worldview, then do a theological analysis, then you go to the biblical text, then do a literary analysis.

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Conrad Mbewe, chancellor of African Christian University in Lusaka, Zambia, said that Dr.

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Mburu has this completely backwards. Quote, the lady is confusing hermeneutics with application, he said.

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You do not begin with the place you will apply the text, but with the place where the text is written, unquote.

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Standpoint epistemology is not how to interpret the Bible. Being black or white, man or woman,

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North American or South American, Russian or Chinese, gay or natural, cannot help you understand the law, the prophets, the gospels, or what

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Paul wrote to Timothy. There is one way to interpret the Bible, and that is to understand what the original author wrote to his original audience, what is called a grammatical historical hermeneutic.

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We must seek to draw the original meaning out of the text, exegesis, not impose our personal experiences onto the text, eisegesis.

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Southeastern is not the only Southern Baptist seminary employing these woke hermeneutics. Jarvis Williams, New Testament professor at the

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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, wrote an article entitled, Intersection of Identity and Biblical Interpretation.

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Dr. Williams says that we must, quote, rigorously study the Bible with people from different races, ethnicities, social postures, and genders, unquote, as if a teacher's skin color has anything to do with a right interpretation of the text.

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For more, I recommend watching Dr. Tom Buck's message entitled, Woke Hermeneutics. You can find it on YouTube.

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This is liberal drift. Now, I call it drift and not full -on liberalism because Southern Baptist seminaries have not totally or confessionally adopted these liberal hermeneutics.

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There are still presidents and professors who would outright reject woke hermeneutics. Last year,

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I received an email from a listener who is a student at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He said that he attended the class of a professor who was woke, whose cultural views were heavily influenced by social justice and critical race theory.

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The student told me the professor's name, but because I did not personally witness this, I won't share who it was.

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It was a miserable class, he said. So, he switched to a class with Stephen Wellham, and that class was much more enjoyable.

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So, there are many who are still on the right course, but many others who are not.

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The Southern Baptist Convention has been in liberal drift for several years. Did anything happen at the annual meeting in Anaheim to help correct this trajectory?

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No. The SBC is drifting further and further into liberalism.

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Did the SBC elect a woke extremist as president?

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Dr. Brooks said, We elected a small -town pastor from Texas, Bart Barber, Brooks said.

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He ran on a platform of charity toward those we disagree with, supporting the sexual abuse task force, and that the

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SBC can be diverse yet unified. Brooks went on to say, even though I agreed more doctrinally with a different candidate, which

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I assumed to be the reformed Tom Askle, I voted for Bart Barber because winsome is as important as reformed."

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That is simply an astonishing statement. To be winsome is to be attractive or appealing in appearance or character.

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Merriam -Webster defines it, generally pleasing and engaging, often because of a childlike charm or innocence.

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The word comes from the same root word as win. If you've ever said of someone, he has a winning smile or a winning personality, that would be like calling someone winsome.

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What do you notice about this word? It's completely subjective. There is no biblical requirement to be winsome.

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What one person calls winsome, another might characterize as smug and arrogant. Being winsome can also be an act.

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Winsomeness says nothing about a person's beliefs, ethics, or leadership, just that they're good at being likable.

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Now, I'm not saying anything here about Bart Barber's character. He strikes me as being a nice guy, an aw shucks, polite southern fellow.

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My contention is with Brooks saying that being winsome is every bit as important as being reformed.

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While winsome is something subjective, reformed is something objective.

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If Dr. Brooks has any deep convictions about being reformed, and I assume that he does given that he is a professor at Reform Theological Seminary, then he knows that being reformed is synonymous with being biblical.

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To be reformed is to confess to a specific statement of faith summarizing biblical beliefs.

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In Tom Askell's case, his doctrine is aligned with the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith, 1689, and other connected

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Baptist confessions. Now, if by winsome, Brooks meant something like 2

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Timothy 2 .24, that the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, then he should have said that.

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But he did not ground winsome in anything objective. It was based on how someone feels about a person, not on what the

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Bible says. Sadly, Brooks' behavior here was rather unbiblical.

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He went on to say of Dr. Askell, quote, the reformed candidate has declared our convention to be slipping into apostasy, vilified those supporting abuse survivors, and sought close association with those who protected abuse survivors, unquote.

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This was a character attack. He did not explain himself further or back up his accusations with anything substantive.

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He slandered Dr. Askell. And so did anyone who gleefully shared

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Brooks' thread in happy agreement. How was that winsome? It struck me as mean for no reason.

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Talk about being sore winners. The hypocrisy here is baffling. Brooks called himself winsomely reformed, but this accusation was not winsome.

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He praised Bart Barber for running on a platform of charity toward those we disagree with, but he did not show charity towards someone he disagreed with.

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He said Askell vilified those supporting abuse survivors, but that accusation is itself vilifying.

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And Greer, Pittman and Finn applauded this behavior. Shame on them. How are you going to praise

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Barber for being charitable and not be charitable yourselves? Dr.

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Askell publicly reached out to Brooks asking to show me where I have vilified those who support abuse survivors.

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As of the publication of this article, Dr. Brooks has not replied. Like Brooks' first question, his second was also disingenuous.

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Who called Bart Barber a woke extremist? While Barber might be a nice guy and not extreme, he's still a company man who has loves the direction the

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Southern Baptist Convention is going. He's a smiler, not a fighter. The SBC, its entities and its seminaries will continue to drift into liberalism under Barber's leadership.

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Will he do what is necessary or what Southern Baptists want him to do? Did the

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SBC endorse female pastors? Dr. Brooks' answer was yes and no.

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So his answer is basically yes. He went on to say that SBC polity or our governing structures are a mess.

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For instance, some churches have women who are titled pastor of music, he said. However, they are not elders.

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Indeed, those churches may have only one elder, the lead pastor. So what do you do?

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We're figuring that out. The issue is one of imprecise terminology, not of liberalism.

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And I say that as a thoroughgoing complementarian, unquote. So Dr.

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Brooks can be that charitable toward these churches with women pastors with whom he does not doctrinally agree, but he could not be charitable toward Tom Askle with whom he does doctrinally agree.

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But I digress. Brooks' response to this question was woefully naive at best.

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The growing issue with an increasing number of women pastors in Southern Baptist churches is not about terminology.

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The issue is about function. For several years now, progressives have been positioning women in roles of teaching authority over men, which is prohibited in 1

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Timothy 2, 11 to 12. There, the Holy Spirit of God has said, a woman must learn in quietness, in all submission.

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But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet.

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The outgoing Southern Baptist president, Ed Litton, has had his wife preach sermons to the gathered body of believers on Sunday morning.

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I wrote about this ahead of last year's annual meeting. He got elected anyway because of liberal drift.

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Days after being elected president, Litton was exposed as being a plagiarist and a lying fraud.

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Not only had he plagiarized sermons, but so had his wife preached plagiarized sermons.

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I demonstrated that in last year's article. Two years ago, ahead of what was going to be the annual meeting in Orlando, canceled because of COVID panic, the keynote speaker of the pastors conference was a man who was not

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Southern Baptist, who pastored a church with women pastors who preached to the body on Sunday morning.

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The president of the pastors conference, David Hughes, was going to have an ordained woman pastor come and recite poetry to the pastors at a pastors conference.

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I kid you not. Another preacher for that conference, David Hughes, is a co -pastor with his wife at a

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Southern Baptist church. In fact, the three largest Southern Baptist churches all have women pastors who preach and teach in the function of an overseeing elder.

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Saddleback Church, Andy and Stacey Wood, Fellowship Church, Ed and Lisa Young, and Elevation Church, Stephen and Holly Furtick.

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NAM has been planting churches with women pastors and partnering with churches with women pastors.

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This is an ongoing and growing problem among Southern Baptists. At last year's annual meeting in Nashville, the credentials committee was asked by the messengers to investigate

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Saddleback Church for ordaining women pastors. Saddleback was the target because that story was fresh in the news, but there are many very large

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Southern Baptist churches who have been doing this for a long time. These are not women who oversee child care and are mistakenly given the title children's pastor.

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These are women with teaching authority over the men in the church. When the credentials committee stood before the messengers at Anaheim and gave their report, here is what chairperson

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Linda Cooper said. Under SBC bylaw 8, the credentials committee is tasked with considering the relationship between a church and the

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Southern Baptist convention. Our scope is limited to considering the question of whether a church is currently in friendly cooperation with the convention as described in SBC constitution article 3.

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Our assignment is to form an opinion as to whether a church has a faith and practice that closely identifies with the convention statement of faith.

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To form that opinion, our committee relies on previous actions of the convention, the

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Baptist faith and message, adopted resolutions, and the convention's governing documents.

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It is important for you to know that although we can inquire of a church, we may not investigate or use any process that would attempt to exercise authority over a church.

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To do so would be in direct violation of article 4 of the SBC constitution.

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We are a recommending body only. We have no decision -making power.

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That power lies with you, the messengers of the convention, or with the executive committee acting at interim between annual meeting sessions.

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Only the convention or the executive committee has the authority to declare that it will no longer recognize a church as a cooperating church with the convention.

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Regarding Saddleback's ordination of women pastors, Cooper said that the committee interviewed

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Senior Pastor Rick Warren. During the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting in Nashville, Tennessee, a motion concerning the relationship of Saddleback Church, located in Anaheim, California, was referred to our committee for consideration.

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For your reference, our report and recommendation can be found on page 3 of the

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Tuesday Bulletin as follows. Based on the information available to us currently, including direct communication with Pastor Rick Warren, who was so gracious in answering our questions regarding faith and practice, we have concluded that we are not yet prepared to make a recommendation regarding Saddleback Church, recognizing that there are differing opinions regarding the intent of the office of pastor as stated in the

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Baptist Faith and Message 2000. Therefore, we are coming today asking for a study committee to provide clarity regarding this matter.

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We feel it is very important for you to know that it is the unanimous opinion of the

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Credentials Committee that the majority of Southern Baptists hold to the belief that the function of lead pastor, elder, bishop, overseer is limited to men as qualified by scripture and that this was the intended definition of office of pastor as stated in Article 6 of the

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Baptist Faith and Message 2000. However, the Credentials Committee has found little information evidencing the

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Convention's belief regarding the use of the title of pastor for staff positions with differing responsibilities and authority than that of lead pastor.

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For this reason, the Credentials Committee moves that the following recommendation be adopted.

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The Credentials Committee recommends that the Southern Baptist Convention, during its June 14, 15, 2022 annual meeting in Anaheim, California, form a study committee, the members of which shall be appointed by the

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President to report to the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting June 13 and 14, 2023 in New Orleans, Louisiana, a recommendation to provide clarity regarding the office of pastor as stated in the

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Baptist Faith and Message Article 6, the church, given the many different offices within Baptist churches which include pastor in the title, though often with very different responsibilities and authority.

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Mr. President, that concludes our report and our recommendation to this great convention.

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Notice the qualifier that was used there, lead pastor, not just the office of pastor, but the office of lead pastor.

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We just heard from a woman on the platform at the SBC annual meeting in Anaheim that a woman can be a pastor of a church, so long as she is not the lead pastor.

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She can teach men and women and preach to the corporate body of believers, so long as she is not the lead pastor.

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And that is what the authors of the BFM 2000 meant when they wrote the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by scripture.

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They meant lead pastor. Moments later from the floor of the convention,

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Dr. Albert Moeller, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said that is not what the authors meant when they wrote that in the

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BFM 2000. Dr. Moeller would know because he was on the committee that drafted the

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BFM 2000. Dr. Moeller said, I served on the committee that brought the

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Baptist faith and message in 2000 that was overwhelmingly adopted by this convention.

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My concern is as a churchman, a theologian, and someone who loves this convention, as I know everyone in this room does, if we eventually have to form a study committee over every word in our confession of faith, then we're doomed and we're no longer a confessional people.

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Dr. Moeller went on to say, the words mean what Southern Baptist said in the year 2000.

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At that time, the word pastor was used by the committee and adopted by the convention because we were told that is the most easily understood word among Southern Baptists for pastoral teaching leadership.

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I have to hope we still have that much clarity and that churches that use the word pastor mean it.

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Chairperson Linda Cooper responded to Dr. Moeller. Dr. Moeller, I understand totally.

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To me, I know what pastor means, but in some of our Southern Baptist churches, pastor is a spiritual gift that is given to many people.

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It needs to be said here that is wrong. The Holy Spirit is not going to gift a woman for a role that the spirit also prohibits a woman from doing.

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Adam Greenway, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, later presented an amendment that would essentially welcome churches with women pastors, regardless of what is said in the

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Baptist Faith and Message 2000. Jimmy Scroggins, a pastor in Florida and board member of Lifeway said, quote,

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I'm happy to partner with leaders and churches that see some things differently than I do.

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I might not ever join their church, but I'm in favor of a more generous reading of the

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Baptist Faith and Message and a bigger Baptist tent for purposes of fellowship and partnership, unquote.

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The next day, Rick Warren was given the opportunity to address the convention. More on his bloviating speech at another time, but my wife and I reviewed it in a recent

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Q &A. He said that there was a difference between the gift of pastoring as opposite from the office of pastoring.

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The gift of pastoring is opposite of the office of pastoring. What does that even mean? So if a person is functioning as a pastor, they're opposed to what the office entails.

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That's ridiculous. As Dr. Moeller has said, the office is the function and the function is the office.

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There is no difference between the two. Scripture says only men are to be overseers in the church and women are not to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet, period.

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Given what we saw at SBC 22, I do not understand how Dr. Brooks could accept that and still call himself a thoroughgoing complementarian.

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Did the SBC endorse female pastors? Brooks' first answer was the correct one.

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Yes, they did. Since the conservative resurgence, has there ever been an annual meeting where accepting women in the function of pastor was expressed from the platform or from the floor of the convention as it was expressed at Anaheim?

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Many Southern Baptist churches have been appointing women as pastors for a while. They now have the convention support.

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More and more biblically disobedient churches with women pastors will be welcome at future annual meetings to cast their votes on Southern Baptist life, polity, money, positions of authority, and teaching.

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Do you still think there is no liberal drift? Conclusion. This concludes part one of my review of Dr.

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Brooks' Q &A. God willing, I will post part two next week covering his next four questions.

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We will consider how the SBC has played abuse politics. Has the

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SBC endorsed LGBTQ plus lifestyles in any way? And what were some of the things talked about at the convention regarding abortion?

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Will Southern Baptists see the problems in enough time to change course and right the ship?

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Or have many already suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith?

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1 Timothy 1 .19. Whether you're Southern Baptist or not, it is as important as it has always been to preach the word, reprove, rebuke, and exhort with great patience and teaching.

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Verse five says, be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

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My thanks to Tom Buck, Denny Burke, Ryan Graber, Woke Preacher TV, and Founders Ministries, whose chronicling of events contributed to elements of this article.