SBC24 Proposed Resolutions

Conversations That Matter

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:01

We are live now on the Conversations That Matter podcast. I hope everyone can hear me out there in internet land.

00:08

We have a good podcast for you today if you are a Southern Baptist, because we're gonna talk about the proposed resolutions that are coming before the

00:16

Southern Baptist Convention this month that have been edited, I don't know to what extent, but by the

00:22

Resolutions Committee for the Southern Baptist Convention. So these are resolutions that were submitted to the

00:29

Resolutions Committee, which they then edit and vet, and then they submit back to the messenger body.

00:34

And resolutions are non -binding. Many people emphasize this when a resolution gets passed that they don't like, that this doesn't bind the churches, the churches are autonomous, they don't have to do anything that would signal their own agreement with these resolutions.

00:50

But they are good barometers to test where the Southern Baptist Convention is going.

00:56

And that is the largest still evangelical, well, Christian actually, denomination in the

01:01

United States. And so it's important to know where they're going. And every year we have a slew of resolutions, and I've often said this, that there's at least one, at least one, sometimes more than one, usually more than one, social justice type of resolution.

01:19

Generally there's at least one focused on racial issues or disparities.

01:24

And that's been the case for at least the last decade. So I'm gonna talk about the resolutions that are being proposed.

01:31

And I'll tell you what, I thought when I just briefly looked at the resolutions that there was not a, for the first time in a while, they didn't do a racial one.

01:40

And then I realized they actually kind of did, but not the way that I was expecting them to approach it necessarily.

01:46

And so we'll get to that. I haven't actually read all of them. I've read a number of them and skimmed through some of them, but we're gonna read them together.

01:54

And I'll give my thoughts. And we have some folks joining us, some Patreons, as well as some other friends, perhaps throughout the podcast who are gonna join us and give their thoughts and their comments and questions on this, whether through the comment section, if you're on Twitter or X, I should say now, or YouTube or Facebook, you can leave a comment.

02:16

Or if you are a Patreon, like I said, you can go to patreon .com. In fact, I will put the link in the info section for those who are

02:24

Patreons. If you wanna be part of the program, whether through video or audio, you can be if you follow the link that I'm about to put in the chat box here.

02:35

And that way you can be part of it and you can talk the way that I'm talking to everyone out there in internet land.

02:44

So there it is. It should be live now. You just follow that link. If you're a

02:49

Patreon and wanna be part of the show. All right, with all that said, I need to make one more announcement before we get into the resolutions.

02:56

And that is, I need to clarify something about the church search.

03:02

I mentioned this on the podcast two days ago and I did a truth script Tuesday podcast, but I did it in conjunction with streaming on the normal conversations that matter feed because I wanted everyone to be aware.

03:13

We have a church search tool, which means you can go to an area and use our tool and find out if there's any like -minded churches near you, which one of the big things we offer is explicitly anti -woke churches.

03:24

We're really looking for that. And I've had a number of people reach out and populate the map that we're still working on and we'll launch it once we get enough churches to populate it.

03:34

And just so you know, you can go to info or you can email info at true script .com with the church name, the address and the website.

03:41

And that's all we need. But there's been a little bit of confusion over how do

03:47

I know my church or the church that I wanna add fits in with what truth script is doing and their statement of faith.

03:53

And so, yeah, you can go to the statement of faith, go to truth script .com, scroll to the bottom about us. Statement of faith is right there.

03:58

It's 11 points. It's pretty simple. But I've gotten the impression that a few people have wanted to add their church and their church really hasn't explicitly taken an anti -woke stance.

04:12

Their church maybe even went woke, a little woke in 2020 or tried to be as neutral as possible.

04:18

And I'm trying to say this in the nicest way possible. That's probably not a church that's a good candidate for our map.

04:26

And the reason I say that is because, yes, there were churches that did compromise that later on thought, oh man, we shouldn't have compromised and they publicly repented of it.

04:39

The leadership did a 180 and said, we were wrong. Okay, that kind of church, you're a candidate.

04:44

You fit in with our statement of faith and our point about social justice. But if you are a member of a church that never took a stand, still hasn't really taken much of a stand, that really tries to make sure everyone can get along there, that maybe went woke and then privately said, that was a mistake, but never publicly said it.

05:06

You don't go to a church that has the kind of courage we're looking for necessarily. That's not a slam, it's just the reality.

05:11

That's what we're looking for. So if you were a church that never compromised on this stuff, you're definitely a candidate.

05:17

So I just wanted to make that a little more clear. That is what we're looking for. And you can, again, read the statement of faith and just say to yourself, does my church fit this?

05:26

Maybe talk to your leadership about it. That's probably a wise idea. Your leadership should know that they're going on a list like that.

05:33

And if they say, we don't wanna be on that list, then that's a good indication that your church doesn't qualify too. But again, this is just a tool.

05:39

It's not joining a denomination. It's just a tool to help you find a good church when you're traveling or moving to an area.

05:46

Or in fact, when we had the discerning Christian church finder app, which was a few years ago, it really actually motivated some people to move.

05:56

They found churches on it and they said, I'm gonna move because I wanna be around this church. So that is the potential for a tool like this.

06:02

Okay, with that said, we will take comments and questions in the chat box. Or if you're a patron member, you can go to that link and you can be part of the show.

06:12

I'm gonna go over a few resolutions before we even get to any of that stuff though, just to get the ball rolling here.

06:18

And like I said, my goal is to help Southern Baptists think through these resolutions. So this is pretty straightforward.

06:24

There's a document out there, Baptist Press published it, and I will actually put the link.

06:29

So if people want to find this, I'll put it in the chat box right now. You can go find this link and follow along if you're listening on audio.

06:38

But this is the PDF draft form, IndySBC24 Proposed Resolutions.

06:45

And the first one is on integrity in SBC leadership. And my goal is, this may sound like it's gonna be a longer podcast.

06:52

I hope not, but maybe, is to read pretty much everything. So you get, you know what you're getting into here.

06:58

So it says, whereas integrity in leadership is consequential to the furtherance of God's mission and the health of the flock of God, whether the authority is over the family, the church, the state, or private institutions.

07:09

And whereas scripture teaches that leaders must uphold the highest standards of integrity, live above reproach, serve others, walk in a manner worthy of imitation, set an example in godly speech and doctrine, remain faithful and fear

07:22

God, be trustworthy, hate a bribe, feed the sheep. And again, I'm not reading the references, but these are all backed up by scripture.

07:29

Model humility, be honest, love from a pure heart, and continually practice genuine repentance and sincere faith.

07:36

And whereas scripture also reminds leaders that they must pay careful attention to themselves because they will give an account to God who will expose the deeds done in darkness and judge more strictly those who lead.

07:49

Whereas God also pronounces woes and warnings to those whose leaders, leaders who fail to uphold the highest standard of integrity, destroy and scatter the sheep, set their heart on gain, neglect the hurting, rule with harshness, lead others to stumble and demonstrate false piety.

08:05

And whereas, I know this is a long, this is how, they're all like this though, by the way. And whereas Southern Baptists have been blessed with countless leaders who have walked in integrity, up heart in individual churches, local associations, state conventions, national entities, and other ministries to cooperate for the sake of the great commission.

08:23

And whereas we celebrate the legacy of faithful leaders who bolster the faith of others, model holiness that others strive to imitate and call others to salvation in Jesus, who is able to keep us from stumbling and present us blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy.

08:39

And whereas the legacy of faithful leadership in the SBC has been tarnished by public failure of leadership that have exposed private sin, indifference to abuse, financial impropriety, sexual scandals, deceptive practices, and abuse of power.

08:54

Now, therefore be it resolved. Now I'm gonna stop there for a moment. This is the format that these resolutions take in every case.

09:00

They have a whereas section, which has generally scripture and also precedence built into it.

09:07

And just true statements about assessing reality. Whereas this is the situation.

09:13

This is what scripture calls us to. This is what we've been doing traditionally. This is the condition. These are the conditions on the ground.

09:20

And then the resolved section is, this is how in reaction to that we are to live or what we are to do.

09:26

Again, non -binding, but this is a direction given to the church and to churches. So what we just read in the whereas section is that there is a problem that is being admitted here.

09:38

And it's a very vague problem. It's a problem that is in violation or many problems in violation of certain biblical principles, but there's no names specifically mentioned.

09:52

There's no actual situation specifically mentioned, which is okay. But this could have been written by someone who's on the

09:58

Me Too train. This could have been written by someone who is pro CRT. This could have been written by someone who has concerns about corruption in the

10:07

SBC or actually takes the opposite position on those two issues I just mentioned. This really could have been written by anyone because there's a list of villains.

10:17

There's a villains list for all these competing groups. So this is something that pretty much everyone can get behind.

10:22

So the question I have is, does this really do much? The closest I think we get to maybe showing what, like giving some definition to what they might be talking about is this last whereas, where it says the legacy of faithful leadership in the

10:39

SBC has been tarnished by public failure of leadership that have exposed private sin.

10:45

So what is that private sin, right? This could be Me Too stuff. This could be Russell Moore and I don't know, what he's said in private meetings at the

10:55

ERLC. I mean, it could be a number of things. We don't really know. Indifference to abuse. Of course, this goes right along with the

11:03

Me Too stuff. At least I'm not saying, I mean, obviously no one wants abuse. So it doesn't have to, but this is the language they would generally use.

11:11

Financial impropriety. This would seem to indicate those who are concerned like the

11:18

McCraney case about what Nam's doing with cooperative funds, that there might be some financial impropriety there, sexual scandals, deceptive practices, abuse of power.

11:30

I mean, that's really as close as we get. So really not much to sink your teeth into there.

11:37

But then we have the resolve section. And the resolve section says that the messengers of the SBC meeting this

11:42

June 11th through 12th coming up, affirm that and thank God for the righteous and godly leaders within the convention, acknowledging the faithful service of those, many in obscurity who are worthy of double honor.

11:54

And being further resolved that we call to repentance leaders who have engaged in public or private sin, abuse their power and misuse convention funds.

12:02

Now we're getting a little specific here. Committed crimes, engaged in deception, cover for the sins of others, resisted

12:09

God ordained authority or violated trust. And be it further resolved that we reject the notion that giftedness, charisma, or influence supersede character and qualification, knowing that the man looks on the outward appearance but the

12:21

Lord looks on the heart. And be it further resolved that we reaffirm our 2018 resolution on the holiness and integrity of ministry leaders, which states that leaders are to be examples by their faith in Christ and their lives of ongoing repentance of sin and should be held to high standards of doctrine, speech and conduct.

12:38

That standard being the very character and example of Christ and be it further resolved that we urge leaders to cultivate a sincere dependence on Jesus, imitating him in servanthood, humility and obedience and to resist prioritizing results over character.

12:52

And be it further resolved that we implore leaders who are in disqualifying sin to examine themselves, call upon the

12:58

Lord in repentance and voluntarily remove themselves from their positions in order to pursue reconciliation, knowing that they might be permanently disqualified.

13:07

Now I wanna say two things about this, by the way. Real quick, these two last resolutions. First, prioritizing results over character.

13:14

This is interesting to me because this would strike at the heart of some of the DEI stuff that's been in the

13:21

Southern Baptist Convention for well over a decade now, not just on the convention level, but also down to the entities and the counting, how many people of what ethnicity are on boards and making this a priority, an important thing.

13:34

The priority should be character because that's the priority scripture places on leadership. So this would strike at the heart of that, but I don't know if people are self -aware.

13:45

I don't know. Maybe a lot of the more, the more woke you are, the more you think that that actually does reflect character how willing you are to diversify your boards.

13:55

The second one here that I just read that we implore leaders who are in disqualifying sin to examine themselves.

14:02

I think this is good. Obviously people should recuse themselves if they don't meet these standards, but at the same time, the

14:10

SBC seems to have a problem with actually firing people that don't meet these standards.

14:18

They're reluctant to get rid of them. They can meet two certain people, that's about it. And so,

14:23

I would just not want this to stand in for a more biblical process of confrontation and rooting out these people.

14:33

And I don't think it says that it's a stand -in, but I just, knowing how Southern Baptist politics works,

14:40

I think a lot of Southern Baptists would prefer that people just turn themselves in voluntarily and someone who's at the root corrupt isn't going to do that.

14:49

Anyways, two more. It says, resolve that we entreat Southern Baptist churches to call their leaders to be above reproach, subject those in unrepentant sin to church discipline and remove those who have disqualified themselves, understanding that accountability by the church is a grace from God.

15:04

And be it finally resolved that we call on all leaders to cultivate integrity as they pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, and gentleness, fight the good fight of faith, take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and knowing that the tested genuine of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire, may be found a result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

15:25

So, I would say this is a good resolution to vote for. I don't see anything jumping out that's a warning, red flag, it's just kind of, it appeals to everyone.

15:35

It's really not taking, it's not gonna do much in either direction. It's a general statement, everyone can pretty much get behind.

15:42

So, on that basis, I would probably give it a C. And C for me is just kind of sailing along, keeping the status quo, not really ruffling many feathers.

15:52

I'm gonna go through another resolution. And after that, I am gonna start taking some video comments and calls.

15:59

So, if you're waiting behind the scenes, just be prepared for that. I'll probably go to you first, Robert, after I go through this resolution, and then we'll go from there and take some more.

16:10

So, this one's on defending religious liberty. And I'll have a little bit more to say about this one. I don't know if I wanna read this whole thing because, well, it's two pages.

16:18

It's about the same length as the other one, but I wanna do a service for all of you. And I guess I'm, this is the audio book version of the resolution.

16:26

So, as you're driving, if you don't have time to read them, I will read the whole thing. So, it says, whereas the Lord Christ Jesus, or Jesus Christ rather, drew a clear distinction between his church and the government of this world, and reserved the judgment between believers and unbelievers for himself alone, the

16:42

Apostle Paul urged Timothy to pray for religious liberty and demonstrated that religious belief is subject to personal persuasion.

16:50

And the Apostle John revealed each one will be judged according to their works in Revelation 20, 12 through 13.

16:59

Now, it's interesting, I'm gonna stop there. I'm gonna stop a little more on this one. The Apostle Paul urged Timothy to pray for religious liberty.

17:05

Ah, I mean, to pray that we would live at peace and be unmolested by the king, yes.

17:14

But that's not an ideological commitment to religious liberty per se. It is specifically so Christians can live their lives in peace.

17:24

So, this is already language that, I'm not saying it's wrong to pray for religious liberty, but depending on what you mean by that, because that's even a whole question now with what that means.

17:36

But I think you can pray for that and mean the right thing by it. But to say that that's what the Apostle Paul was urging

17:42

Timothy, Timothy really would not have had a concept of what religious liberty is. He was concerned with the liberty of Christians to operate and to live a life unmolested by the governing authorities, to have peace.

17:57

So, not exactly accurate language. I would say that it's a presentist fallacy perhaps because you're taking language that means something in a modern context and imposing it on an ancient context that would not have known what that meant.

18:10

And it just wasn't something that world would have been familiar with. So, anyways, I do digress. That's maybe nitpicky, but worth mentioning.

18:18

Whereas Baptist in America, and by the way, I should say, I wouldn't vote against it just because of that. But maybe that's something to be strengthened or cut from the document on the floor.

18:30

Whereas Baptist in America have consistently championed constitutional protections against the establishment of state religion and for the free exercise of religion, believing the importance of religious liberty necessary made it the first freedom to be articulated in the

18:44

Bill of Rights. Now, two things to say here. First, this is true. Baptists have been on the forefront,

18:50

I guess you could say of that, or at least concerned with that. And they've passed resolutions to that effect.

18:56

If you read the Baptist Faith and Message, they have a whole section on religious liberty. And what they mean by it though, it really is freedom of conscience, if you read it.

19:04

I actually had a Twitter thread. It wasn't a long thread, but it was maybe two or three tweets in a thread,

19:11

I wanna say two weeks ago about this. And I showed how,

19:16

I think it was in the 1920s. I don't remember what year it was, 28 maybe. The Baptist Faith and Message first introduced this language.

19:25

But if you look at contemporary resolutions around that time, the Southern Baptists at the same exact time, they're saying, we want religious freedom.

19:33

We want really freedom of conscience, if you read it in context. They're also saying, and we think that we should have

19:40

Sabbath laws. We think that the government should actually oppose breaking the Sabbath through restrictions, through penalties.

19:49

And they said it more than once. And so this would actually violate what many modern

19:54

Southern Baptists think of as religious liberty. And it's important to, I think, separate those things, that traditionally this has meant freedom to worship

20:01

God according to the dictates of conscience. That's what it's meant. It hasn't meant that there should be no established

20:07

Christianity of any kind, because they clearly were for Sabbath laws. And if I had more time, it'd be interesting.

20:13

Maybe someone can look it up, if there was anything in SBC resolutions in the past on blasphemy and that kind of thing, because that was pretty baked into American culture, including

20:23

Baptist culture. That was just, that went without saying, of course, we should have standards when it comes to entertainment, that the

20:32

Hays Code wasn't restrictive. And if the government had gotten involved because the Hays Code failed, I don't think Southern Baptists would have thought that's a bad thing.

20:38

Public pornography has always been a bad thing, right? Blasphemy has always been a bad thing. So I know, at least on the

20:44

Sabbath issue, they were fine with the government in that sense, it's establishing

20:49

Christian standards for society while also claiming we're for religious liberty, because that meant freedom of conscience.

20:56

Whereas messengers to the meetings of the SBC from its inception in 1845 have adopted numerous resolutions advocating religious liberty and recognizing the true faith cannot be legislated, coerced or inherited, which by the way, every

21:09

Christian denomination should believe. Yeah, of course, the true faith, you can have traditions and cultural things, but the true faith only comes, faith comes by what?

21:17

By hearing and hearing by the word of God, you can't have that coerced or inherited. Whereas when adopting the

21:23

Baptist faith and message, I said 28, 1925, Southern Baptists saw a need to emphasize religious liberty by adding article, this is article 18,

21:33

I guess, or sorry, article, yeah, 18, on religious liberty. Subsequently, it was article 17 in the 1963 and 2000 editions, all right, so I guess they got rid of one.

21:45

I wish I knew which one that was, but thereby affirming the Lordship of Christ, the separation of church and state, and the free church in a free state is the

21:52

Christian ideal, that the state has no right to impose penalties for religious opinions of any kind.

21:58

And whereas through nature and conscience, others have come to recognize that our natural rights and responsibilities derive from our creator and open truth that the founders of the

22:07

American nation also explicitly recognized. And whereas Baptists have historically affirmed that nothing in the public square is truly neutral and have promoted active and holistic participation in society, which should reflect biblical values as outlined in article 15 of the

22:24

Baptist faith and message, the Christian and social order. And whereas our Christian witnesses better preserved by the separation of church and state, and scripture and history have shown the true revival comes through the spirit of God by means of fervent prayer, gospel evangelism, and biblical discipleship, now therefore be it resolved.

22:42

Now we'll stop there on the whereas. Another thing to mention that I think they get kind of wrong here. The founders were, they didn't want an established church.

22:50

That's true on the national or general level. That's not true on the state level.

22:56

They were fine with having established churches because there were many established churches on the state level during the time of the adoption of the constitution.

23:03

I don't know how many times I have to repeat this, but yes, it's our first freedom in the bill of rights, but what's the first word of the first amendment?

23:10

Congress. Congress is not supposed to be establishing these things. And this is the same Congress that during its first session elected to have a chaplain who was

23:21

Christian by the way, and has been Christian ever since of some form or variety.

23:27

That, you know, I don't remember all the other things, but I put a number of them in an article

23:33

I wrote for American Reformer on the Satan statue, that there were, you had the Northwest ordinance that encouraged biblical education essentially.

23:43

You had a number of things that signaled, we actually believe in some kind of a

23:49

Christian status quo, even on the general level, but they were okay with established churches on the state level.

23:55

So you gotta be careful with this thing. The founders believed, no, the founders ideas aren't limited to the first amendment and making the first amendment some kind of a universal principle that applies to everything.

24:11

It was for a specific task. So that's important, I think, to mention.

24:16

That's another inaccuracy I would say in this whereas section. So, you know, it's not a huge, huge thing, but yeah,

24:25

I mean, they get a few things wrong there. And then here's the resolution. So here's the word, the rubber meets the road.

24:30

Resolved that the messengers to the SBC meeting boldly affirm that God has endowed every human with religious liberty for God alone is the

24:37

Lord of the conscience. And so, yeah, it depends what you mean by that. Again, I think this needs to be clarified because if you mean by religious liberty that God has given every man a conscience and you cannot impose on, it's impossible really to impose on someone's conscience to make them believe something they choose not to believe.

24:57

You can't, you can try, your heart is to indoctrinate them or to influence them. You can't, like the conscience belongs to them though and to God.

25:05

So you can expose them to whatever you want to expose them to their thoughts belong to them. So that's what you mean, duh, right?

25:14

Like, but if what you mean by that is that, and I would say also, if you mean that should be respected, okay, sure.

25:22

But if what you mean by this, that there should be no

25:27

Christian establishment and by that explicitly Christian laws, like blasphemy laws or Sabbath laws are just outside the bounds because it's binding someone's conscience somehow, then unfortunately,

25:41

I think that would be bad. And that would flow into other things. Like, for example, can you limit pornography?

25:48

On what basis? I mean, they already said, well, we can have a Christian worldview implemented. Christian moral principles should be established in some kind, but how do you separate that?

25:58

Christian moral principles and then Christianity, right? This is the conundrum of a resolution like this.

26:06

And it doesn't do a good job clarifying it. And I think it probably just leaves the water just as money as it was before, if not making it more money.

26:13

It says, and that civil government being ordained of God, it is the duty of Christians to render loyal obedience, therefore into all things, not contrary to the revealed will of God.

26:23

And it be it for the resolve that we encourage and support robust Christian engagement in the public square including individual Christians who pursue elected or appointed office in order to influence government by living out their

26:33

Christian worldview while advocating Christian morals with respect for the conscience of all people.

26:38

And be it further resolve that reaffirm the 2023 resolution on Christ's sole lordship over every human conscience.

26:46

And its declaration that we decry any effort which seeks to supplant the sole lordship of Christ over conscience through confusing the separate covenants and responsibilities of the church and state.

26:55

And be it for the resolve that we oppose any effort to establish a state religion of any nation, including the

27:00

United States of America. Again, this is muddy too. What does it mean? We would oppose an established church like the

27:08

Anglican church as Americans. We traditionally have been against that on the general level.

27:15

But an establishment of Christianity as the default norm, no. So what is this saying, right?

27:22

Again, lots of questions. It raises more questions than it really answers or clarifies. We refute the idea that God has commanded any state to establish any religion or any denomination and we reject any government coercion of enforcement of religious belief, including blasphemy laws, there you go.

27:37

And so what does that mean even? What kind of blasphemy laws? Are we talking about the anti -Semitic laws that Congress was just in the process of passing and many state governments already passed that basically say, you cannot blaspheme this protected class of people, this protected class, this nation on the other side of the world, or else you could face penalties.

28:02

This will inform our hate law process. These are blasphemy laws, essentially.

28:08

We already have blasphemy laws. The question is, who is being blasphemed against? Are we going to honor the rights of God, which

28:14

I wish there was a resolution on that. John Calvin talked about this, that the rights of God ought to be honored before the rights of man.

28:20

That's actually what orders the rights of man. But the concern seems to be, the emphasis is the rights of man as far as the freedom of religious liberty is concerned.

28:32

And it seems like the SBC has this idea now that you are in an autonomous bubble, you and your conscience, and no one can force you to do anything religious.

28:41

But that's now extended to, so you can blaspheme all you want, right? You can look at pornography all you want,

28:47

I suppose. I mean, I'm just extending the logic here. You know, why not have public phallic symbols and things like this that are offensive?

28:55

Why not have that? I mean, maybe the defense would be, well, that's against the Christian worldview or something. Okay, but how do you separate the

29:01

Christian worldview from Christianity? I'm probably beating the dead horse, but that's my issue with this.

29:07

I wouldn't vote for this resolution. Resolve that we oppose efforts to establish state religion. Let's see, we refute the idea that God has commanded any state.

29:15

I already read this. Resolve that we oppose any effort to use the people and the churches of the SBC to establish Christianity as the state religion of the

29:22

US, and be it finally resolved that we object to any suggestion that our historic God, given distinctive or religious liberty, should be abandoned in favor of state -mandated religion.

29:29

And the last question I would ask is who's doing this, right? This is probably a reaction against, or an overreaction against what some people consider to be

29:36

Christian nationalism. I don't really see people advocating, though, for an established state church like the

29:44

Church of England, or like, maybe there's someone out there, but it's certainly not someone with any influence, or what the

29:50

Lutheran church used to be. So with that, I'm gonna start taking some calls, and then we will get to some of these other resolutions.

29:58

I'm gonna start with Robert, who's been waiting patiently. Hey, Robert, how you doing? Hello, John, I'm doing good.

30:04

How are you doing? Doing very well. Are you a Southern Baptist by chance? I am not part of the

30:12

SBC. We are Baptist, Calvinistic, dispensational, but we are not a part of the

30:18

SBC. Okay, so kind of MacArthur -ish church.

30:24

Yeah, just kind of like the church that I attend, so very cool. So what are your thoughts?

30:29

I was gonna say that, yeah, I think the second one seems to be certainly a anti -Christian nationalism resolution.

30:40

And it's because they have all the terms of the religious liberty and blasphemy laws being bad and et cetera.

30:51

One of the things that as you were reading it through, I thought is why would this resolution, why would the

30:59

SBC be interested or involved in what other nations do?

31:07

If there is religious liberty, it would seem like there shouldn't be, if another country wishes to establish a state church type of thing, why would that be a problem for the

31:21

SBC? That'd be one question I would wonder on this. Because they're unique to the

31:26

United States or I mean, they do have missionaries in other parts of the world, I guess. Yeah. But yeah, the

31:32

SBC is a, from what I've seen from the different conventions and stuff is a

31:40

US -based entity. So again, if something in Hungary goes on, are they going to oppose or blasphemy laws in Hungary or in Romania or someplace else?

31:59

That doesn't seem to be within the purview of the SBC. I see what you're saying. They've had missionaries in parts of the world, whether the

32:06

Muslim world or Catholic world, or maybe even certain Protestant places where there have been blasphemy laws of some kind or another.

32:14

And they never seem to be that concerned, at least as far as I know with that, but all of a sudden there's a reaction and they don't mention

32:22

Christian nationalism in the language, which I think is interesting, right? But it does seem like a lot of the buzzwords that are used to categorize

32:29

Christian nationalism, like the blending of ecclesiastical and civil magistrate power and an adoption of a state church, it's in there.

32:39

So I think you might be onto something and maybe this is just a reaction to that and or an overreaction to that.

32:46

And that's what they're getting at, that could be. Yeah, good perceptive point. So, yeah.

32:54

I don't know, did you get a chance? That's what I got from that. Cool, cool, yeah. I don't know if you had thoughts on some of the other resolutions.

33:02

I don't know if you read them, but we're getting to some good ones here. No, on that first one, that first one that you read, at one point

33:11

I felt like they must be talking about that it was wrong to give up the confidentiality, you know, attorney and client confidentiality in that it was people exposing sins of people.

33:30

But I'm not sure that that's what it is, but as you were reading through it, I thought that might be something going on there in that resolution.

33:38

But you're right too, it's so much of it is vague that it's hard to really pin down, you know, what is being actually attacked.

33:48

One of the things that I was thinking and I probably should have mentioned it is that when your enemy is in power, let's say your enemy has the high ground, they control all the positions in an organization.

34:01

You probably don't want to hand them a tool. Like even if it's a tool that you can use against them, right, and maybe

34:08

I should think about this more and flesh it out, I don't know, I'm still forming this idea in my head, but you probably don't want to give them the higher moral ground to weaponize something, even like this that's general against you, because that's how that first resolution, that's how it felt to me.

34:27

Like it was just so vague and it could really be applied to anyone in the

34:33

SBC, any side, but the side in power obviously is gonna be the one that wants to probably use it.

34:38

So I don't know, maybe from that standpoint, it's not the wisest, but it's just vague.

34:43

That's the main issue I have with it. But yeah, that's a good point. I didn't really think of that, that waiving of attorney client privilege and the

34:50

SBC executive committee and what they were accused of. And you're right, it could totally relate to that.

34:56

That's very possible. So, but hey, I appreciate the support, Robert, and thank you for weighing in and everything.

35:03

God bless. All right, well - Thank you for coming to me for a question. Yeah, my pleasure.

35:11

All right, well, with that, we have more resolutions to get to and more people waiting. The next one's on just war and the pursuit of peace.

35:19

I am probably not going to spend a lot of time on this, but since I noticed in the chat room, we actually have a soldier.

35:28

We have David Morrill, who's just signed in, and I'd like to go to him and to see if he's read it and see if he has any thoughts on this, because no, he doesn't want me to go to him.

35:38

Okay, all right. I'm not going to go to him then. I thought he'd be the perfect person. We're going to wait on that. And I'll just give you a summation then of what

35:45

I think of this resolution. Like I said, I want to read all of them. Let's see, how long is this one? This one's actually kind of a longer one than the other two.

35:54

I'd say this one is generally pretty good. So just skimming through, I'm going to skim this one a little bit more just because we're taking a little longer than I was expecting to get through these.

36:04

It talks about, Jesus assured us that wars and rumors of wars must take place so that war is just a reality, right?

36:12

So there's going to be wars. The government's instituted by God to bear the sword. So the government has a legitimate stake in waging war at times for the right reasons.

36:23

And the just war tradition then is something that they adopt here, or they say that they want to forward and support.

36:34

They say that we note as Baptists in the United States, that people in the

36:40

United States government and armed forces called for a just and righteous peace after the war. Traditionally, this was after World War II and called on all nations to seek an honorable solution that will bring a just and durable peace and recognize the dignity and values of human personality and the inalienable right of all men to be free during the

36:58

Vietnam War. So they're just pointing back to other things Southern Baptists has said at other times in our nation's history or country's history.

37:07

They go, they talk about Al -Qaeda and the war on terror, quote unquote, the war in Iraq. And so they're reaffirming what they've said at other points in time.

37:15

The messengers of the SBC affirm the historic Christian principles of just war tradition.

37:21

And here's what those are, that war must be fought for a just cause, number one, to defend, to vindicate, to restore public order, peace and justice when they have come under attack and be it further resolved that war must be fought by right authority, duly constituted sovereign government and be it further resolved that war must be fought with right intention and love for our enemies.

37:40

Now, this is an interesting one. I'm gonna stop there for a moment. And I just, that hit my ear wrong when I first read this, that war must be fought with the right intention and love for our enemies.

37:50

And because it's like, of course, we're supposed to love our enemies as Christians, pray for those who persecute us. We're talking about the function of a government though, here in waging war and it's love for your enemies.

38:03

I can see a way in which that might fit, but I would be curious. I've never heard this at any historic document, even in reading

38:10

Augustine's just war principles. I never came across this language. I can't remember coming across this language at least.

38:17

It just strikes me as odd. Truly intended to, it says, war must be fought for the right intention and love for our enemies, truly intended to achieve peace and justice for ourselves, our enemies and the world, that an otherwise just war may not be used as a pretext to fight for glory, profit, revenge or conquest and be it further resolved that war so far as possible must be waged only as a last resort.

38:42

And only if there is a reasonable chance for success. This is a little muddy. I mean, you do fight,

38:48

Israel fought wars for the glory of God. So there is a glory element that does factor into some wars here.

38:55

But anyway, let's keep reading here. The war must be fought with a proper discrimination between combatants and civilians.

39:02

Civilians may not deliberately be targeted for attack and war is not an excuse for murder or terrorism.

39:08

And be it further resolved that war must be fought with proper proportionality and the scale of death and destruction must be proportional to the scale of peace and justice at stake in the conflict.

39:17

And be it further resolved that military personnel should adhere to the principle of military necessity and are permitted to use the degree of force necessary to achieve military goals, no more and no less.

39:28

And be it further resolved that policymakers obligation is not discharged once the fighting stops, that wartime leaders must pursue order, justice and conciliation in the aftermath of war, war plans that take no heed of war's aftermath are fundamentally unjust and that an otherwise just war that fails to consolidate order, justice and conciliation in its wake is not fully just war.

39:49

Be it further resolved that the SBC reaffirms our stance on the freedom of conscience and conscientious objection.

39:56

So if you don't wanna fight in the military, that they uphold that. Be it further resolved that Christians everywhere should pray for our brothers and sisters serving in the armed forces in conflict zones, and then it goes on.

40:08

So not much more, I guess, to talk about here. I thought I remembered something about Ukraine being mentioned, but that must be a coming resolution that we're going to look at.

40:16

So I don't see a huge reason to vote against this. There's some odd language in my mind here, but I don't see like blaring, blaring red flags that we reaffirm the just war tradition.

40:28

So I'm gonna go to the next resolution, but before I do, oh, here's why I think

40:33

I was thinking this dovetails into the Ukraine stuff and the Israel stuff, but we'll bring on, we have

40:39

Ray Fava from the Evangelical Dark Web. We'll bring him on to join us in the discussion.

40:45

Not much, how are you doing? I'm doing all right. So I find this resolution ironic. I don't see just war theory in scripture.

40:53

The book of Joshua, the conquest of David and Solomon and stuff like that really don't follow the prescripts of just war theory.

41:01

I'm not a pacifist, just wanna say that. But yeah, this resolution reaffirms that the

41:06

Southern Baptist Convention says that the invasion of Iraq was justified, but the

41:12

Russian invasion of Ukraine is not justified, even though there's ethnic

41:18

Russians being attacked by the Ukrainian government and there's a clear self -defense mechanism and they actually went through diplomatic steps.

41:27

And then it talks about proportionality and then we're gonna pass that resolution on Israel. Yeah, let's get to that in a moment.

41:33

And I just wanna read that section because for some reason I skipped over it. And I think it's important that, because I thought

41:40

I was looking for Ukraine and I somehow my eyes didn't catch it. But it is in the section where it says, messengers to this convention condemned

41:47

Al Qaeda's attacks on the U .S. affirming America's right of self -defense. They argued that in 2003, they warned

41:54

Iraq was a warranted action based upon historic principles of just war and condemned Russian invasion of Ukraine affirming

42:01

Ukraine's right of self -defense. So yeah, it is in there. And I think you're right, but anyway, keep going and we can come back to that.

42:09

So you were talking about proportionality. Yeah, yeah. And then we're gonna talk about Israel. We're gonna have a resolution in support of Israel after talking about proportionality in warfare.

42:19

Oh yeah, yeah, right. Because Israel has leveled some areas in the Gaza Strip. Well, they turned it into Stalingrad.

42:27

Yeah, yeah. And it's not going well for them either. Yeah, yeah, the optics aren't great. Media's not talking about that.

42:34

Yeah, I have another problem with the next resolution too, but yeah, I think the

42:39

Ukraine thing is ironic because that's in the same resolution. And I think on the basis of just war theory,

42:45

Putin probably can actually make a case that we're defending people that are ethnically

42:50

Russian. And so we're operating by just war here. These have been traditionally part of Russia.

42:58

Culturally, even at times the borders have, you know, we've controlled these areas. So you could actually use the principles they're arguing to justify

43:06

Putin's actions and probably condemn the US invasion of Iraq.

43:12

It's just interesting that they use those two as the example. So I agree with you. Especially when it talks about the aftermath of the war section.

43:20

What happened to Iraq? Yeah, right, right. Yeah, it's a lot worse off now than it was.

43:27

So we touched it and you made it worse in some ways. So yeah, I would agree with you on that. So yeah, all right.

43:33

So I don't know, this is kind of a lame resolution. Don't vote for it. I changed my mind. But yeah, something that you said, and I don't want to take a long time to talk about it, but you know, just war theory,

43:43

I think, so I've thought this too, like did the Israelites when they were commanded to let's say go and eliminate certain

43:50

Canaanite groups, were they following just war theory? And the answer of course is no, they weren't.

43:56

And I think Augustine even addresses this, that these were special circumstances. And so just war theory is trying to find more principles that are universal for Christians in all time and places to apply that are not superseded by special circumstances.

44:17

Now maybe you could argue that that's not good or either, but I tend to think that there should be a moral, we should have a moral stance,

44:28

I think when it even comes to war, like we have to wage war in a way that is moral. And some people might not even agree with me.

44:35

My own dad, I don't think agrees with me on this, but I think that bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki probably wasn't a moral thing to do.

44:43

And I know I'm probably in the minority of some of the listeners of this podcast, but I don't think that actually followed just war theory.

44:52

But that's, yeah, there is a subjective element in this and we are operating based on principles and not based on very explicitly clear passages in the scripture that tell us how to wage a war.

45:04

So I don't know if you have any thoughts, but. Yeah, and I think just war theory is most useful when we're talking about Christian nations against Christian nations.

45:14

I don't think it really applies to say Christian nations and Muslim nations. So Reconquista and Crusades, cause it would condemn holy wars and stuff like that, so.

45:27

Yeah, yeah. I'm trying to remember my mind's a little fuzzy on it since it sounds like you've brushed up on it recently.

45:34

When Augustine talks about just war, isn't that the assumption he brings to it though? It is, he is talking about Christian nations in conflict.

45:43

It's not in the context of, I don't know if he's, we're not kind of, he's way before the

45:50

Muslim conquest and so forth. So he's not really addressing that directly. I'm not as brushed up on it as you thought.

45:58

All right, well, maybe in a future podcast we'll cover just war theory. There was a year ago or so, maybe it's more than that now, maybe two years ago, my mind's getting, the time just goes so fast.

46:09

I was supposed to do a podcast with Joel Webben and AD Robles on just war theory. And I did all this research and I came up with this document on it.

46:15

And then last minute, Joel was like, let's not do that topic. And I was like, what? So I actually do have a document on it.

46:21

Maybe we can go back and revisit that at some point. But anyway, I remember feeling - A few resolutions

46:27

I'll say on, but you know. Yeah, I mean, I was pretty positive about it.

46:32

Like war should be your last resort. War should be fought. You know, self -defense is a legitimate reason to fight.

46:38

You shouldn't just fight because you wanna invade your neighbor and take his stuff. Stuff like that. But anyway, let's go on to the next and I'll let

46:46

Ray stick with me as we do this. We have a resolution that is, I would say the application in some ways of what we just read.

46:55

And this is interesting to me. So I thought when I first read this, I didn't think like in racial terms, right?

47:04

I was thinking, wow, this is the first year in a while the SBC hasn't had one of these racial lament kind of resolutions, right?

47:11

Because last year, I think it was something on Native Americans. And usually it's been something on African -Americans or black people and how they've been mistreated.

47:20

And they were like another resolution on the SBC needs to lament and do better and so forth and so on.

47:26

And get rid of this symbol or this, or we need to somehow reaffirm that we're against slavery once again or something like that, right?

47:35

I think this is that resolution. I think this is the one that was filling that traditional template that they normally have.

47:45

So I'll start reading it. It says, the title is on justice and peace in the aftermath of the

47:50

October 7th attack on Israel. And it talks about the nation of Israel being attacked by Hamas.

47:57

And it's good, I think they say Hamas. They don't say Palestine, but they say Hamas, an organization designated by the U .S.

48:03

as a terrorist organization, which committed unspeakable atrocities such as murdering 1 ,200 people, the abduction of 253 people, rape, torture, other cruel and humane treatment of countless others, including women, children, and elderly, with nearly half of the hostages being foreign nationals or having multiple citizenships.

48:21

And whereas while no modern nation state is above reasonable critique, Hamas unequivocally bears responsibility for the atrocities committed and the devastating repercussions that have affected the

48:31

Jewish people. Palestinians living under the tyranny of this terrorist organization are brothers and sisters in the region and all neighboring people.

48:40

And whereas Hamas leadership openly declared that they will repeat such attacks until Israel ceases to exist. So I'll say this is good that they're at least separating.

48:47

They're trying to target Hamas. They say, whereas incidents of antisemitism have drastically increased both domestically and abroad since the terrorist attack on October 7th.

48:57

So here the net gets widened. We're not just talking about Hamas anymore. We're talking about a general category of antisemitism.

49:05

And whereas while theological perspectives on Israel and the church vary within the SBC, we are unified in calling current antisemitic attacks against Jewish people, especially heinous.

49:15

So this is interesting because they're coming up with a, there's an especially heinous category now for what's happening to Jewish people.

49:23

And this doesn't seem to be limited to Israel. This is, it seems like this is beyond that.

49:28

This is also beyond Hamas. And it says as Jewish people, they've often been targeted by their neighbors since God called them as his people in the days of Abraham.

49:36

And whereas true peace will not be achieved until the return of Christ. Can we do a hold up on that one? What's that? So that resolution, scroll up a little bit, is like, yeah, there's a lot of differing theological perspectives, but they're his chosen people.

49:51

Yeah, it says since God called them. So you mean you think that's chosen people language?

49:57

I think they're just saying there's an element of continuity between the Jewish people of the

50:03

Old Testament and modern Jewish people. I think that's, that's what I read that as saying.

50:08

I don't think, I think you're, you could be an amillennial or post -millennial or whatever. You could probably read that.

50:13

I think Doug Wilson would agree with it probably to pick a post -mill example. We all kind of know that one. So he's not a

50:20

Southern Baptist. I'm just picking him out as a post -mill guy. It says after that, in the resolve section, that the messengers of the

50:27

SBC meeting in Indianapolis condemn Hamas' attacks, commit to standing with the

50:34

Jewish people and those suffering in the region and oppose all forms of antisemitism and be it further resolved that we deny assertions of moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas.

50:44

And I think I need to stop here and say a few things and I'll let Ray say some things if he's got thoughts, but there's, the first thing that I find somewhat offensive and I think that is the word,

50:54

I am offended by this resolution is because of what's happening in Nigeria. In Nigeria for the last few years, there have been thousands and thousands of Christians killed in terrorist attacks by Muslim terrorists who really are no different than Hamas in their outlook.

51:16

And they are Christians. They are literally our brothers and sisters in Christ. And because they're in Nigeria and the news organizations don't focus on them as much, you have the

51:26

Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant domination with the ability to now put them in focus, to show, hey, we have actual brothers and sisters.

51:35

I mean, aren't our obligations first to the household of faith? They don't do that.

51:40

There's no resolution on this. There's not even a mention of this, not even in their just war resolution.

51:46

There's nothing about this. They're just kind of left hung out to dry. That's what really bothers me about this.

51:52

But all of a sudden, Jewish people get this special place, this special category for them that they're especially, what does it say?

52:01

It's especially heinous when anti -Semitic acts are done and so forth.

52:07

Yeah, of course that is heinous, depending on what you even mean by it, because I don't know what anti -Semitism means in every context.

52:14

They're giving it a blank kind of general definition here, or they're not defining it. That could mean, according to some laws in our own country now, just criticism of Israel is anti -Semitism.

52:24

So I don't know, but okay, let's just grant that that's heinous. What about our

52:29

Christian brothers and sisters who are being persecuted every day in quantities that are greater and in just worse ways for a longer period of time?

52:40

I just don't appreciate that that's our focus. And so that's, I think, something that just stands out to me when

52:47

I read this, there is this special category that they're making. And if you wanna talk about it, fine, but don't leave out our

52:53

Christian brothers and sisters. Ray, what do you think? Well, I can honestly say that I don't think the average

53:00

American cares what goes on on college campuses. This isn't really something that impacts us.

53:07

And I'm actually surprised, if we wanna talk about the resolution, I knew they would have a resolution on this.

53:14

I thought that was gonna come. I thought there'd be a women's sports resolution.

53:20

I'm surprised they didn't talk about that. But they wanted to talk about and basically condemn anti -Zionism.

53:27

And I think anti -Semitism's a woke buzzword and kind of always has been.

53:33

So I think this would be, it would fit that social justice resolution that you were talking about. And it does create a special category for Jews that it probably would not for Muslims.

53:44

Or Christians. Yeah, even Christians. So we've always kind of wondered when was the

53:52

Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission gonna care about Christian religious liberty in the United States? I guess this resolution is gonna give them more fuel to take action that opposes the interests of Christians.

54:08

Yeah, none of these resolutions actually, I don't think would bother the Biden administration.

54:14

Right? None of these are really threats to the prevailing social order that we find ourselves targeted by.

54:21

Which is another interesting thing. You'd think the SBC's job would be to focus on that first, primarily.

54:28

And would it be wrong to include in that resolution a call for peace? Yeah, right.

54:34

Right. They're definitely taking a side on this. Which again, if you're gonna do it, at least talk about Nigeria.

54:42

At least say some things that also are moral challenges to our people in the

54:49

United States right now from the Biden administration. And they do talk about abortion stuff. So I wanna give them that.

54:55

But even in the way they talk about it, I'm not so sure. I don't know. I don't know how helpful it is. But that's the one area they do get into.

55:01

And there's two resolutions that have to do with that, which we'll get to momentarily. But there's nothing in this stuff, at least, that would threaten, not that that has the barometer, but I don't know.

55:12

You just expect there to be some stuff that would put the Biden administration on notice.

55:18

So let's just finish this. It says, resolve that we commit to supporting biblical solutions to the conflict, advocating for the principles of justice, mercy, and humility.

55:26

Let's see here. Are we opposed? Share screen. Oh, did I not do any share screen? Hold on. There you go.

55:33

Let me zoom in too so people can see a little better here. Can you read that better?

55:40

I think so. We commit to supporting biblical solutions. It says that we oppose those calling for the nation of Israel to lay down its arms, repudiating any calls for a ceasefire that do not result in an immediate release of all hostages.

55:54

We resolved to call for international community to redouble efforts to support the nation of Israel toward a just and lasting peace.

56:00

So they do call for peace. Addressing underlying issues such as terrorism, human rights violations, and regional instability, consistent with biblical calls to defend the oppressed and promote justice, especially among non -combatants and civilians.

56:13

So Ray, actually that last one, you know, it's not very clear, but that could be the inroad for the pro -Palestinian people to be like, hey, like we're in this region too, and you know, you're oppressing us.

56:27

And I mean, it's not explicitly saying that, but I suppose that they might find that favorable language.

56:34

It says that we recognize the dignity and personhood of all people living in the Middle East and affirm God's love and offer of salvation through Jesus Christ, honoring the difficult ministry of Jewish and Palestinian believers who labor for the gospel as we pray for their protection and ministry and be finally resolved that we encourage

56:49

Southern Baptists to pray diligently for a peaceful resolution of the war and all affected by warfare. And it goes on.

56:55

So that's pretty much, that's the resolution. So do you vote for the resolution or not? No, I'm just -

57:02

You're not gonna do it? I'm not interested. I'm not an NPC. So - You're not a Southern Baptist either, are you?

57:08

I grew up Southern Baptist and I'm gonna be live streaming the Southern Baptist Convention.

57:13

So there's a shameless plug, but you know, it's my background. So it does mean stuff to me.

57:20

So. Yeah, well, just plug your website so people can go there and then we'll bring on a

57:25

Southern Baptist to talk about some of these other resolutions. Evangelicaldarkweb .org,

57:30

Christian News, in your inbox each and every day we have a newsletter, but Evangelical Dark Web, the

57:36

YouTube channel, we'll be live streaming the Southern Baptist Convention next week. All the sessions all day long, pop in and out when you like, but we'll be the place to watch it.

57:50

All right. So you heard it here first, Evangelical Dark Web. Thanks, Ray. I appreciate it. All right.

57:57

I'm gonna bring David Morrill on from Pertestia. Hey, David, how you doing? Hey, John, good to see you. You're a

58:02

Southern Baptist, right? Yeah, I'll actually, I'll be at the meeting. Yeah, so we have our first Southern Baptist guest who can weigh in on some of these things.

58:11

You have any thoughts on what you've heard so far? Well, I missed the one I, you know, the religious liberty one probably was the most interesting one to me so far, but the abortion ones, they're interesting because where they have two this time, they're kind of related to that, if I'm reading this correctly.

58:26

Yeah, we're gonna talk about that in a moment. I see Tim Miller said that religious liberty amendment is obviously a blatant anti -Christian nationalism amendment.

58:34

Is that clear to everyone? It wasn't automatically clear to me, but now I kind of see it that way because it was the reason for them bringing it up.

58:42

Yeah, well, it seemed like a, yeah, it seemed like kind of a, in Southern Baptists, you know, the way that Southern Baptists tend to do this is it tends to be a little passive aggressive.

58:51

We don't wanna say it exactly what we wanna talk about here, but we'll just hint at it. So be, you know, wink, wink, people will know.

58:57

That's what it seemed like to me. And this is coming from, I mean, you know, from our conversations, I'm a strong supporter of religious liberty, but in its place, right?

59:06

So if we say religious liberty is a handcuffing of the magistrate, that's how

59:11

I tend to look at it, not civil liberty or not religious liberty, meaning believe anything, practice anything you want and it's okay.

59:18

Now, you know, it's more a keep the government out of it kind of a thing for me. But I mean, I've written on it before.

59:24

Yeah. I mean, we can talk about the abortion ones for sure if you wanna, I don't wanna interrupt the flow too much.

59:30

Yeah, well, no, we'll get into that. I just think it's just odd that they were so vague on so many of these resolutions.

59:36

That's what I've said at the end. I'm like, I don't really know what they're saying exactly. Like you could bring your own assumptions to this and like it.

59:44

So that doesn't really mean it's a good resolution, right? A good resolution. Yeah, it tends to say more about the resolutions committee than it does about, you know,

59:52

Southern Baptist pew sitters. Yeah, a good resolution should be clear and should actually do something.

59:58

And most of these don't. And there's sort of a, it's like the gospel coalition was assigned to write these to make them, to put the right buzzwords in there and to make you feel good, but not to actually effectively do much.

01:00:11

All right, well, let's talk about some of these other ones cause we're getting to some important ones. And I know,

01:00:16

David, you're very active in the pro -life. Movement, or I don't even know if you want to say that way.

01:00:24

Anti -abortion movement. Some people don't like it. Yeah, protesting is pretty strongly, we're very vocal on the side of abortion abolition versus the pro -life movement.

01:00:35

And that distinction should be made. I found it funny that in the first abortion resolution or what was it talking about?

01:00:45

Dignity of the human embryo, something like that, right? Going on, I'm trying to get to the list here. Well, I'll pull it up.

01:00:52

The pro -life ethic, yep, in a post -Rose society. And I find it really funny reading through this and all of their statements of the way things are, all of their whereas statements, they go back to a 2015,

01:01:09

I think it was, 2015 resolution that was referring to abortion. I'm just going to try to find it here.

01:01:15

It should be. Well, I'll start reading it. Well, if you want to start reading through it, we'll find it, I'm sure. It says, regardless of the stage of development or location, all human beings are created in the image of God.

01:01:23

This reality is the foundation of God's call upon Christians to love one another as ourselves, especially the most vulnerable.

01:01:30

The BFM states that God has ordained the family as a foundational institute of society, institution, children from the moment of conception are blessings and heritage from the

01:01:39

Lord. And whereas we joyfully celebrate and thank God for the 2022 Supreme Court decision in Dobbs that overturned

01:01:46

Roe v. Wade. And whereas nothing is value neutral and pro -choice policies and court decisions have reinforced the idea for almost 50 years that abortion was morally good and promoted a particular vision of the good life centered on moral autonomy with phrases like my body, my choice.

01:02:01

And whereas many states have rightfully restricted access to abortion and abortion pills, while others have lamentably expanded access resulting in an even greater number of abortions.

01:02:11

And whereas chemical abortions now account for over 60 % of all abortions in the US and not only take a precious pre -born life, but also lead to medical complications for one in five women.

01:02:22

Whereas in 2022, messengers to the SBC encouraged the development of policies that eradicate any perceived need for abortion.

01:02:30

And whereas 73, there's a lot of whereases in this, 73 % of women who choose to have an abortion cite economic insecurity as the primary driver of their decision.

01:02:39

And the SBC and other pro -life Christians have sought to serve vulnerable women and children despite character attacks in the media and culture amid mounting opposition from deadly and dehumanizing abortion industry.

01:02:52

Messengers to the 2015 annual SBC, this is what you were talking about, David, resolved to show grace and mercy on those individuals who grieve with repentance over past abortions.

01:03:04

And whereas apostle Paul reminds us in Ephesians that our battle is not against flesh and blood, now therefore be it resolved.

01:03:10

So those are the whereases. What did you wanna say about that in the 2015 statement? Well, it was notable to me when

01:03:16

I read through this that they skipped over the 2021 resolution. There was a 2021 resolution.

01:03:22

Some of you might remember when James Merritt was chairing the resolutions committee in 2021 and they brought what apparently the messengers thought was too much of like a soft resolution on abortion.

01:03:36

And the messengers instead from the floor brought a much more strongly worded resolution that talked more specifically about the equal rights of the unborn.

01:03:48

Equal protection would basically force us in a good way.

01:03:55

I mean, I think in a just way to not let certain people involved in what we consider murder to be let off the hook.

01:04:04

And I mean, this 2024 resolution, they can't seem to let this go. It's always like, well, the woman involved is always a second victim here.

01:04:12

Like every single time they bring one of these up, it's the same thing. Or, well, we wanna be understanding to women, 73 % of them say that they got an abortion because they can't afford the kid or you're going through economic hardships or something as if somehow that makes murder okay.

01:04:30

You can't have one without the other. Is it murder or isn't it? You know, I noticed that, you know.

01:04:36

Yeah, it's a curious thing that we wouldn't apply that logic to any other type of murder. We wouldn't say, you know, hey, the communists who killed these rich people,

01:04:46

I mean, they were exploited by them first. So, you know, it doesn't make sense. Like they wouldn't actually ever use that logic that they do here.

01:04:53

Yeah, very weird. And that's a good call. I didn't notice that, but you're 100 % right. That was a battle on the floor.

01:04:58

And as I remember, they even, the resolutions committee changed the language to kind of take the teeth out of that resolution.

01:05:05

Right, and we ended up passing the better one. We did pass the better one, but I asked Merritt that year because I had a press pass and everything that year.

01:05:15

I asked him, do you see that as a repudiation to the credentials committee from the messengers?

01:05:20

Are the messengers telling you guys this wasn't good enough? This wasn't just enough.

01:05:25

This wasn't biblical enough because I certainly thought that's what it was. And of course he batted that away.

01:05:31

No, it's not a rebuke and it's fine and we're fine, you know, but I think it was. I think it was the messengers, similar to the law amendment, the messengers are putting the platform in its place.

01:05:41

Right, so here's the resolved on this particular amendment.

01:05:46

It says resolved that the SBC messengers redouble our commitment to upholding, protecting, and cherishing the lives of the pre -born.

01:05:52

We celebrate the invaluable work of Christians who are working on the cause of pro -life in all these different capacities, that we remain steadfast in our work toward robust legislation or regulation with the ultimate goal of abolishing all abortions, including the dangerous life ending chemical abortions, that we champion conscience protections for medical professionals.

01:06:14

We affirm legislative policies that assist abortion vulnerable women and promote family flourishing by making adoption more affordable and accessible, eliminating marriage penalties, bolstering the important work of pregnancy resource centers and providing a baseline of security for new families to bond with their children.

01:06:31

Talks about supporting collaborative partnerships between civil society and government that bolster social support.

01:06:38

Talks about sharing the gospel and ministering to men and women who have suffered at the hands of the abortion industry and to actively engage in ministries of healing and restoration and desiring to see a culture of life that embraces and celebrates the formation of families.

01:06:53

So I don't really know if there are any things jumping out at me that is negative. I mean, these all seem like good resolved.

01:06:59

No, it's near the bottom of the second to last page.

01:07:05

We affirm legislative policies that assist abortion vulnerable women. This is a little bit of redistribution of wealth that I'm seeing here to promote family flourishing.

01:07:16

Basically, they're reiterating, well, women get abortions because they're poor and they can't afford it. So we would therefore support any government action to not make them poor and therefore they won't abort their kids.

01:07:29

Are you talking about affordability in maternal health care? Okay, the third to last, yeah. Well, and they don't even say, they add that in.

01:07:38

But if you take the first sentence, we affirm legislative policies that assist abortion vulnerable women and promote family flourishing by making adoption more affordable, accessible.

01:07:47

Okay, we're okay with that. But what are the limits on the legislative policies to assist abortion vulnerable women?

01:07:54

Because that's a separate statement. So we're assisting abortion vulnerable women and we're making adoption more affordable.

01:08:02

Obviously, abortion vulnerable women are not the same people as those who would seek to adopt, I'm presuming.

01:08:08

So it's like, they're still sneaking in this. They're sort of still poisoning the well a little bit with women get abortions because of things that we can solve by giving them more money, which that's been the

01:08:19

SBC, the ERLC's position on this for a long time. That we can take government action to make poor women less likely to abort their children.

01:08:32

Yeah, and they already have, there's already social programs for this purpose. So if it doesn't do anything already, then adding more money to it's not gonna do much.

01:08:42

And how many women have we seen that have basically said and almost celebrated the idea,

01:08:49

I have access to abortion so that I can live the life I wanna live. It's not because they're poor, it's because they don't want the kid and they don't want to take responsibility for their sexual behavior.

01:08:59

Well, so I think what you're saying maybe would lead to, there should be a whereas, I don't know if you wanna see a majority, but a number of women are, their consciences are seared and they're having abortions, not because of economic factors.

01:09:15

And the government should punish them or should. A reiteration of the equal protection that the convention resolved just a few years ago.

01:09:25

It was only three years ago that the messengers of the convention resolved to look at this issue through the lens of equal protection for the unborn rather than sort of a, more of like a soft social policy version.

01:09:38

It seems to me like what's not said is the big issue for me, like they're not saying we should punish with the full extent of the law abortion doctors and people who would seek abortions.

01:09:50

So that's what's missing from this. It's the government has a role, but the only thing the government's not commissioned to do is to actually do its job.

01:09:58

Right, yeah. So it's like, you're gonna be, I think you're right, probably welfare. Don't bear the sword, buy them off instead with other people's money, of course.

01:10:08

Yeah, but when it came to what, two resolutions ago with just war theory and all, the government definitely bears the sword there.

01:10:13

Yeah, they were fine. No sword here, where'd the sword go? It's a little inconsistent. Government sheaves it, and then decides to put money into social programs.

01:10:22

Yeah, I think the language of affordability in maternal healthcare is definitely a weasel term there because obviously, like we would both,

01:10:29

I think say, yeah, we'd like, there should be like affordability in healthcare. So let's repeal Obamacare, right?

01:10:34

Like we would say roll back some of these regulations, but they're not thinking that probably,

01:10:40

I would imagine. So yeah, I would agree with you there. So yeah,

01:10:46

I don't know. Do you vote for this or not? I think if you added another whereas and maybe another resolved,

01:10:52

I could vote for it if you just add in the government doing its job. Right. Yeah, potentially,

01:10:57

I mean, depending on how much time there is, potentially it could be amended. I mean, there is time for that in the business meeting.

01:11:04

There's time to say who wants to speak on this resolution and you can offer an amendment and say, hey,

01:11:09

I wanna move to amend the resolution, whichever resolution this is, to add the following language and say, so maybe somebody will step up to the mic and do that.

01:11:19

Maybe me or like Dusty Devers or someone. Yeah. Maybe I'll be able to fix this. Let's go to the next one.

01:11:26

This is on the ethical realities of reproductive technologies and the dignity of the human embryo. And I'll keep David on here to comment on this since you'll be at the

01:11:33

SBC commenting on it there. This flows right, this goes right from this one we just read, it follows it in sequence.

01:11:42

It says, whereas every human life is made in God's image and should be respected from the moment of fertilization, human beings possess an inherent right to life and the opportunity to reach their fully developed maturity and governments are ordained by God to safeguard human dignity and promote human flourishing at all stages.

01:11:58

And whereas biblical creation portrays the embodied union of husband and wife as a singular normative expression of procreation, infertility affects many married couples who have good and godly desires to bring children into the world and couples who experience the searing pain of infertility can turn to God, look to scripture for examples of this, they can pray and lament.

01:12:17

All children are a gift from the Lord regardless of the circumstances of their conception. Though all children are fully, should be fully respected and protected, not all technological means of assisting child reproduction are equally

01:12:30

God honoring or morally justified. And Southern Baptists have historically affirmed every human life is valuable and opposed technology that disregards this.

01:12:40

IVF process routinely creates more embryos than can reasonably be implanted, thus resulting in the continued freezing, stockpiling and ultimate destruction of human embryos, some of which may also be subjected to medical experimentation.

01:12:55

IVF also often engages in the destruction of embryonic human life, increasingly engages in dehumanizing methods for determining suitability for life and genetic sorting.

01:13:05

It talks about the estimate suggests between one and 1 .5 million human beings are stored in these freezers in the

01:13:12

United States. And then it gets to the resolve section there. The only thing I guess jumping out at me that I don't care for is the, they do add in that language of human flourishing at all stages, which again, that's so often used to expand pro -life causes to more than just whether or not you're murdering someone to eating cheeseburgers and like that kind of thing.

01:13:39

And this isn't a quality of life issue. This is again, an issue of murder. So I don't think that should be in there.

01:13:46

I think that muddies the waters, but otherwise I think, I mean, they're right on that often IVF procedures do include making more embryos than are going to be implanted.

01:13:55

And that is a big problem. It's certainly not consistent with our understanding or belief that life begins at conception because an embryo is post -conception.

01:14:07

Right. So if abortion pills are immoral because they destroy a unique and new human life, so is

01:14:16

IVF the way that it's typically done. Right. And that should probably be, whereas, you know, there are situations where the typical process is not followed.

01:14:30

And there are couples who do not freeze more than they use and that kind of thing. They kind of leave room for that, but they don't explicitly say it.

01:14:37

Oh, and they don't resolve that IVF is, you know, always an evil thing or something necessarily.

01:14:44

They just do that. It's again, it's kind of a softer way to sort of reaffirm, hey, this is where, like I don't have a big problem with this one.

01:14:51

There's a few language things like you did with either with the human flourishing or where they said at the beginning that biblical creation order portrays the embodied union.

01:15:02

It's like, no, it also commands it. Actually, it's not just a story. It's not just, hey, here's an example.

01:15:07

It's like, no, this is God's commanded order for procreation. This is what he designed.

01:15:13

Right. So they could probably firm up the language a little bit, but as it sits, I'd probably vote for it as it sits.

01:15:21

Yeah, I think it's a pretty good, I'm looking at the resolves here. It talks about that Southern Baptist should reaffirm the value of the right to life, which is pretty basic, including embryonic stage and to only use reproductive technologies consistent with that affirmation.

01:15:38

So they're not saying you can't use reproductive technologies but they need to be within these boundaries. It says we affirm all children, no matter the circumstances are a gift from God that we should love all neighbors in accordance with their

01:15:50

God -giving dignity as image bearers and advocate for the government to restrain actions and is consistent with this, which includes frozen embryonic human beings.

01:16:00

And that we encourage Southern Baptist to continue to promote adoption as one way to alleviate this problem.

01:16:06

And I do know couples who have adopted frozen embryos and I'm generally in favor of that. I think that this is a solution, but the hard part is that if you have 1 .5

01:16:17

million, like, I mean, we've created such a problem.

01:16:23

That's very hard to know what to do when the problem is that great. Be it further resolved that we grieve alongside couples who have been diagnosed with infertility, affirm their godly desire for children and encourage them to consider the ethical implications of assisted reproductive technologies as they look to God.

01:16:38

And we commit to pray to God on behalf of that. So I actually like all of this.

01:16:44

I don't see any problem with, any major problem. I think I agree with you, David. Yeah, like, you know, a couple of little tweaks amended could potentially make it a little bit better, but if it went to a vote as it is now,

01:16:58

I'd vote for it. Yeah, this is my favorite resolution so far. And it's actually relevant to the issues of our day and it's biblically, it's good.

01:17:08

Well, are there any, I don't know if you've read all of them, David. Are there any other resolutions before I let you go that you had some thoughts on?

01:17:15

We haven't quite finished, but the rest of them, I think, I don't know if they're as very controversial. We do have one on NDAs.

01:17:23

That one's, you know, given some of the Southern Baptist history with this, that one's kind of interesting.

01:17:29

That's relevant. But the other stuff is, I think, pretty basic. Great commission, appreciation for Indianapolis, parental rights.

01:17:40

I mean, that one might is somewhat relevant, I suppose, but. Well, especially in terms of the transing of kids and stuff, that one becomes a little bit more relevant.

01:17:50

You know, as the government tries to interfere or public school system tries to interfere with parental decisions, you know, legally speaking, parents basically own their kids and that's the right thing to do.

01:18:02

I mean, you know, our kids obey us, you know, they're supposed to obey us, meaning like they are under our sovereign authority.

01:18:09

Right, right. Yeah, and it's, you know, barring, I guess, a extreme situation where the parent is actively trying to destroy their kids, there's really no room for the community to involve themselves.

01:18:25

And so maybe finding those lines is important, but we'll read that resolution next. I'm gonna take comments too.

01:18:31

Leave your comments in the chat box. David, what do you wanna plug before I let you go? Oh, just what, yeah, we'll be there.

01:18:37

So, I mean, I know you and I have touched base before while I've been at the meeting and, you know, kind of filling in on what's going on, but now that they're streaming the whole thing, you know, online, there's part of me that's like, you know, except for going to vote or going to, you know, say hi to people or things.

01:18:51

The journalistic aspect could be done, you know, streaming like Ray's gonna do. Although, I don't know, because when you've been there and we've talked in the past, which maybe we'll do that again, that would be good if we get you to weigh in.

01:19:03

You've told me things that weren't, that didn't come through the live stream. Yeah, there are things you can pick up on in terms of the sort of the feel of the room.

01:19:11

Right. Everybody's talking about the law amendment, so that'll be very interesting to see sort of how that goes. And obviously there's going to be debate on the floor prior to that vote.

01:19:21

And I expect some shenanigans, so. Yeah, and that'll be the big thing because we're voting to basically reaffirm it, right?

01:19:31

So they can't go change it at this point. It's already been voted on as written one, you know, last year.

01:19:37

Now this year it has to be voted on again. Nobody can jump in and amend it because obviously then it's, then you're voting on something different than what people affirmed last year.

01:19:45

Right. I mean, there might be some, you know, procedural or bureaucratic technicality kind of, you know, tricks and things like that that go on.

01:19:54

It'll also be interesting to see what happens with the big supporters of abuse, you know, abuse reform and all of that, because I would argue they very much have a egg on their face at this point.

01:20:06

That whole thing has just crumbled and fallen apart. I think in the eyes of messengers that are paying attention.

01:20:12

So we'll see. Yeah. I know you were telling me last year about like what was going on at certain mics that you didn't see in the live stream and how they would choose certain mics over others.

01:20:23

And that's what I expect to happen again. So, all right, well, thanks for going. So we don't have to, and going through that may be a headache, but go to protestia, was it .com?

01:20:35

Yeah, it's protestia .com, you know where to find us. You can check out David Morrell's stuff there. God bless David. Thanks, John.

01:20:41

Appreciate it. All right, so I'm gonna finish these resolutions and take your comments, and we're gonna go a little faster.

01:20:48

There's only, I think, three more. First is on the God -given rights and responsibilities of parents, which talks about God established the family, what that is.

01:20:57

It's a unique bond in society. God possesses sovereign. Oh, by the way, I should mention this, that it's the most fundamental institution of society that existed prior to the state and the relationship between parent and child, whether biological or legal, is a unique bond in society.

01:21:12

So I don't know if there's some subtle kinism going on there. I'm just kidding. But it goes on.

01:21:18

It says, whereas God possesses sovereign authority overall and is entrusted to parents certain rights and responsibilities as their primary stewards of their children, teaching them spiritual and moral values to lead them through consistent lifestyle examples and loving discipline to make choices based on the

01:21:32

Bible. God has ordained the state to promote good and restrain evil, cultivating the conditions necessary for the flourishing of families.

01:21:39

It talks about the United States in Pierce versus Society of Sisters, 1925, stated that parents have the right to direct the upbringing and education of children under their control.

01:21:51

Parental rights are not absolute, and the state has a compelling interest to intervene in certain situations where children are being abused, neglected, endangered.

01:21:58

And whereas it becomes increasingly common for some in the medical educational business and legal sectors to encroach upon and attempt to supersede these

01:22:05

God -given rights and responsibilities of people in the name of autonomy and expressive individualism. Now, therefore be it resolved.

01:22:11

Now, let me say one thing about this. A lot of what we're going over here and a lot of the current debate over trans surgeries and all that, it really hinges on this.

01:22:20

What constitutes parental neglect, abuse, and endangerment? Is it abusive for a parent to restrict their child from pursuing a transgender surgery or identifying themselves as trans?

01:22:35

Is it abusive for a parent to say, no, you can't have a homosexual relationship under this roof?

01:22:41

Is it abusive for a parent to say, no, we are not calling you by your pronouns that you prefer?

01:22:48

Is it abusive for a parent to call them by the names the parent gave them at birth? These are all the questions that are up for grabs right now.

01:22:58

And I think the only answer to this is you have to let your definition of what constitutes abuse be informed by the created order, by what

01:23:08

God has established. And we find that in scripture. We also find that in his natural revelation. And I think that that is what is being discarded in our country today.

01:23:22

And why now we have different understandings of what it means to be abused, neglected, and endangered.

01:23:27

And there needs to be language about that, that this should be informed by the created order and that specifically parental authority exercise in the defense of that order for the protection of children is justified.

01:23:44

So adding that language, I think is required. This resolution needs that, but it says resolved that the parents are the primary stewards and the decision makers for their children, not doctors, teachers, the state.

01:23:58

Being further resolved that we honor God's good design for the family and the flourishing of children and seek to embrace and celebrate the formation of families.

01:24:06

That's good language, but it's too vague. You know, what is God's good design? Let's spell it out a little bit more.

01:24:13

And what if a parent pursues a transgender surgery for their child? Should transgender surgeries for minors be illegal?

01:24:18

I think they should. Is that encroaching on the parent's rights? Someone could say that. By the way, based on parental rights.

01:24:25

So this has to be informed by God's standards or else it's not gonna make much sense.

01:24:32

Resolved that we call upon parents to exercise their rights and responsibilities to make decisions regarding the upbringing of their children under the authority of God, recognizing that they will be responsible for their choices.

01:24:41

We encourage the state to partner with rather than act contrary to the family union. So their legislation should uphold parental rights.

01:24:50

Parents should have decisions. Let's see. Including the child's moral and spiritual formation.

01:24:59

Yeah, I mean, yeah, I get it. I get it. I just think the language that I've been talking about should be added.

01:25:05

We call upon churches, pastors, and all SBC people to advocate for policies and practice that support and strengthen the family.

01:25:12

So overall a good resolution. It just needed like a number of these resolutions. We need to amend it and add some clarification.

01:25:19

On the danger of NDAs and non -disparagement agreements. Now, for those who don't know, from my perspective, this is an issue that it's specifically related to firing professors, people who work for other

01:25:38

SBC entities, most especially the North American Mission Board, and then tying their benefits to whether or not they bad mouth the institution.

01:25:48

So if they say anything that could be considered negative against the institution, it's tied to their benefits, they don't get their benefits.

01:25:55

That's how I've seen this used and weaponized. And I kind of am positive about a resolution on this subject because of that.

01:26:03

And I most often seen this work to oppose the good guys in the

01:26:08

SBC. Now, this has also been, I mean, there's also people on the left who have violated their

01:26:14

NDAs. So it's not unique to the people on the more traditional conservative

01:26:20

Orthodox side, but that's where I've most often seen this abused. So it says scripture teaches we should walk in the light and that everything reveals itself in the light, that the

01:26:33

Baptist faith and message says every person possesses full dignity. Every Christian should be careful to act with love.

01:26:40

NDAs or confidential agreements and non -disparagement agreements as a common practice in both secular and Christian organizations.

01:26:46

And there's appropriate uses for these agreements, including not limited to the protection of proprietary technology and information, personally identifying information donor records and confidential information learned in private counseling sessions.

01:26:58

NDAs and non -disparagement agreements can be abused and weaponized, resulting in silencing victims. Misuse of these agreements can foster an environment whereas abuse, misconduct, and other forms of harmful behavior are shielded.

01:27:12

Recent public examples of Christian organizations utilizing NDAs and non -disparagement agreements in instances involving, there it is, sexual abuse, have highlighted the danger posed by the misuse of such agreements and the harm done to those who are silenced under the threat of legal action.

01:27:25

And whereas, well, is that Trump? Is that talking about President Trump? Probably not because it's

01:27:30

Christian organizations they're talking about, but I guess this is from the Me Too side again. Christians are called to speak the truth in love, speak what is right.

01:27:39

And the incentives typically associated with the abuse of these agreements, financial and otherwise, can pressure victims into unjust silence.

01:27:46

Legislatures and judiciaries have begun to acknowledge the misuse of NDAs and rulings preventing them from being enforced in certain instances.

01:27:56

The SBC condemns non -disclosure and non -disparagement agreements that oppress or harm individuals, promote unnecessary secrecy or deter accountability.

01:28:04

I think this is actually great. We call for the appropriate use of such agreements and we affirm the inherent dignity and worth of every individual.

01:28:11

We call on organizations to revoke any NDAs or non -disparagement agreements, which prevents victims of abuse from speaking the truth of their experience, ensuring the redemptive ways in which

01:28:20

God can restore and heal. We urge all Christian organizations to diligently and prayerfully review their practices in light of scripture.

01:28:27

Actually, I think this is a great resolution. We call to repentance anyone who has knowingly used

01:28:32

NDAs to silence victims or whistleblowers. Russell Fuller, resolve that we affirm those state legislatures and judiciaries which have limited or curtailed the use of NDAs and we commit to fostering a culture of openness.

01:28:49

I think this is actually a great resolution. I would vote for it as is. I don't see any major, I don't see any problems with it, to be honest.

01:28:56

And then we have one on evangelism and the Great Commission. And it says, it just reaffirms commitment to evangelization.

01:29:05

And I'm just skimming through it right now that the

01:29:10

SBC prioritizes spiritual awakening, evangelism and discipleship. The IMB is committing to develop and maintain a strategy for gospel proclamation and planning churches.

01:29:21

One of the things is, I guess I can't help, maybe it's a little cynical, but NAM and the

01:29:26

IMB both have some problems. And this does try to recenter their focus or at least establish that their focus is, that the

01:29:36

IMB's focus is really developing and maintaining these gospel proclamation strategies. I do think there needs to be some acknowledgement that they've gone off the rails in some areas, but anyway, that might not be for this resolution.

01:29:51

Christ gives evangelists, some as evangelists to equip the body, share the gospel, and that the

01:29:57

SBC should commit to make efforts to witness, to share the gospel. We celebrate those support and work of the

01:30:03

North American Mission Board, the IMB, which empower and assist churches in the work of evangelism, church planning and missions.

01:30:10

Yeah, I just can't, I guess it bothers me just because North American Mission Board, you know, these are organizations, first of all, that do use these

01:30:18

NDAs to silence opposition, because I've talked to people in both of them that can't go public because of NDAs.

01:30:26

And especially the North American Mission Board, they've been invested in planting, I would say very woke churches in the last few years.

01:30:34

And it's just, there's too many stories I've heard about like who gets the money from NAM and where the money goes and the corruption that exists in NAM.

01:30:43

And, you know, that should be addressed. It really should. The purpose of NAM might be this, but again, the purpose of a system is what it does.

01:30:51

And NAM is doing some bad things too. Resolve that we call churches to evangelistic cooperation through all means possible, including mission trips, vacation

01:30:59

Bible school and other stuff. We urge Southern Baptists to pray for those around the world. We call Southern Baptists to evangelize and reach peoples.

01:31:06

We charge Southern Baptists to call out, to call out to the called, praying for supporting and sending those in the spirit.

01:31:15

Let's see here. We pray for boldness and discernment to seize evangelistic opportunities. And then an appreciation for Indianapolis, which is just thanking them for their hospitality.

01:31:25

And that's pretty much it. These are the proposed resolutions for the Southern Baptist Convention. So I hope that is helpful to some of you out there who are considering, if you're a

01:31:36

Southern Baptist, what to vote for, what not to vote for, what to amend, what not to amend. Maybe this gives you some ideas of how you can operate when you attend the annual meeting, which is coming up very soon.

01:31:46

Let me get to some of the comments and questions. I'm gonna look specifically for questions that have come up.

01:31:59

Let's see here. We have Christian Mama. What's evil about loving your enemies like Jesus said?

01:32:05

Do you follow Jesus or your ideas of self -defense, which are found nowhere in the New Testament? I feel like this is responding to someone else and I'm jumping in the middle of it and not sure.

01:32:16

Yeah, I mean, I do follow, I try to follow Jesus in my ideas of self -defense. But I don't think

01:32:23

Jesus specifically gave us, this is part of the challenge with just war theory. Many of the directives

01:32:30

Jesus gave, for instance, the Sermon on the Mount, they weren't meant to inform militaries on how to proceed with battle.

01:32:37

They were for interpersonal relationships. Turning the other cheek is not a principle for the battlefield. It's a principle for personal relationships.

01:32:45

And we have other areas of scripture that do give more definition on battlefield principles.

01:32:52

I think the Order Amoris that Augustine also systematized is meaning the order of loves is a really good theological doctrine,

01:33:04

I suppose you could say, of proximity being attached to obligation. But you're basically finding different passages and from consequence, from arguing from the principles of scripture, you're deriving principles.

01:33:23

You're looking at specific instances, cases and principles, and you're then showing, okay, here's what the principle is.

01:33:31

Here's how we should operate. It's the same thing with just war theory. It's looking at the ways wars were fought in the

01:33:37

Old Testament, in examining all the cases, it's looking at general commands

01:33:43

God has given, and then trying to come up with, okay, here are the circumstances in which war is justified.

01:33:49

Here are the circumstances in which war is not justified. And everyone's going to have a morally informed opinion of this.

01:33:59

What is a justified war and what's not? So that is what just war theory attempts to do. And so, yeah,

01:34:05

I mean, Jesus does play a part in this, obviously, but it's not just the red letter. It's all of scripture.

01:34:12

And his authority, of course, being important, his moral authority to this. Tim Miller says that religious liberty amendment is obviously a blatant anti -Sean amendment.

01:34:22

I think I already read that, and I agree. Augustine invented just war theory. It's not in the Bible, Old and New Testament. I think

01:34:28

I just addressed that. Yeah, he did. I don't know if invented is the right word. He would probably say that he distilled.

01:34:35

So it's something that existed, but it's not something that was blatant. John, please ban

01:34:41

Christian mama. Okay, I also tagged you on Twitter. She has a history of trolling to derail conversations.

01:34:48

I haven't followed the conversation close enough to know. She has had a lot of comments in here.

01:34:59

So, yeah, I'm not going to do that now because we're wrapping up, but that's maybe in future conversations, if we have people that are in the chat that are derailing stuff, then we will do that.

01:35:11

I don't really have any other major questions here or comments. I'm looking, I'm skimming for them.

01:35:17

Kat says, it seems there is much muddiness, need clearer water. I think that's exactly right. Half these resolutions at least are just vague and they need some definition.

01:35:27

And I think that's what you do when you wanna play it safe, when you're afraid of taking sides. That's actually, in my mind, that is a symptom of problems in the

01:35:35

Southern Baptist Convention, when you have to go vague. That's what you do when you have warring sections and you have to try to come up with something they can rally around, but you can't come up with anything specific because they'll war.

01:35:46

So you come up with something super vague that they can both get behind, but it doesn't really do anything, it's meaningless. That's a symptom of bad health in the

01:35:53

SBC when the clarity of the resolutions goes down, which is exactly what

01:35:58

I'm seeing. So the SBC is, I think, in a bit of a tailspin right now. Even if the law amendment passes,

01:36:03

I think there's still a lot of problems in the SBC. They have a fight on their hands and it seems to be getting worse in some ways.

01:36:10

And I think that's just one evidence of it. Okay, I think that's about it.

01:36:17

Well, I appreciate everyone who participated. I guess we have, okay, one more question and then we'll go.

01:36:23

I have a question. Is there any means to punish the evildoers at the top of the SBC without going through official internal channels or filing civil lawsuits?

01:36:31

No, not that I'm aware of. They're in charge. We've had, I told someone recently that they should write this article, the five presidencies of J .D.

01:36:43

Greer, even though J .D. Greer, it's like saying that Obama's still controlling things even though he's not the president.

01:36:48

I think that's true of J .D. Greer and the Southern Baptist Convention. It's like we've had J .D. Greer over and over and over since he was first elected in, what was that, 2018?

01:36:57

And I think that at this point, the convention is just stacked with people who are loyal to a more progressive wing of the convention.

01:37:05

And before J .D. Greer, I guess it was, I mean, people have said Al Mohler's guys kind of got into all these positions of authority, and that's probably true.

01:37:13

You have a subtle shift that's taken place over time. And you'd have to win the presidency and you'd have to not just win the presidency this year, you'd have to win it this year, next year, the year after that.

01:37:26

It would take probably at least five years to really get anything done because then the presidents are the ones who appoint their guys to the committees.

01:37:35

So don't expect any big turnaround, even if you're in the SBC and have hope and wanna stay in, it's gonna be a long process, even if you're able to get some things passed.

01:37:45

It's a long haul. And so, and of course, I've made my opinion clear on this. I think, I don't see how the

01:37:51

SBC recovers, quite frankly. I think that the damage has been done. Even if the law amendment passes,

01:37:57

I kinda think the damage has been done, though that would be a great thing. The fact that that's even a debate shows you that there's been a lot of significant damage done.

01:38:05

So that's my opinion, obviously. But if you're in the SBC and you wanna fight good, make sure that you actually fight, make sure that you're sending at the least amount,

01:38:15

I would say, that you can send while it's in the control of people that don't have the best interests of,

01:38:22

I would say the more orthodox, conservative Christians in mind. And the only mechanism that you have is to show up at the convention and vote and try to get a president who's gonna appoint committee members.

01:38:34

That's it. There's really no other mechanism other than civil lawsuits. There's no other way to do anything, to influence anything.

01:38:40

You could make blogs and put out opinion pieces to try to convince people, but that doesn't usually go too far.

01:38:49

So, yeah, I don't know of any other mechanism, sorry. All right, so, yeah, someone's bringing up the fact that you're not supposed to sue other

01:39:01

Christians. Yeah, I would agree. And the question then becomes, at what point, like if you're suing

01:39:07

Russell Moore, have you considered him at this point not to be a believer? It's hard to do Matthew 18.

01:39:13

You don't go to the same church. Perhaps you've tried to confront him and you've tried to as best you can to complete that process.

01:39:20

But at what point do you just say, okay, this isn't a believer I'm dealing with. I'm going to, I'm going to go to court, right?

01:39:26

So, I think someone can try the best of their ability to pursue that process, but that becomes a big part of it.

01:39:34

And I think, yeah, you should be slow to do those things. But yeah, if someone's going to blatantly violate your rights or I think the

01:39:40

Will McCraney case is a good example of this. Will McCraney took legal action only after trying to go through proper channels, not getting anywhere and realizing he's against a really corrupt cabal.

01:39:51

And so, yeah, this is a last resort, but he's going to do it. And I think he's doing the right thing in going to the courts because there's a failure to resolve these things in the way that it should be resolved.

01:40:03

And it is to the shame, frankly, it's to the shame of Kevin Eazell and the North American Mission Board that they didn't work things out with him.

01:40:11

Okay. Someone wants to say, hey, do a James O 'Keefe style operation. Christians just don't generally do that.

01:40:20

I'm just going to be honest with you. There have been. I remember there were some recordings from classes at Southeastern and I remember

01:40:26

I covered one of them and then all of a sudden, Southeastern bans recording in the class. I mean, this is something, even though they're a two -party or a one -party consent state, it just, yeah, it's not something that Christians are generally going to do.

01:40:41

Russell Moore obviously did this to Mike Stone and this is why there's a legal case there. So I guess that's an option that's on the table, but you have a second witness, you have your recording to expose what's going on.

01:40:55

But even then, the problem is when you have people who are pushing the needle in the wrong direction in control of the denomination, you can take someone, like this is a good example would be

01:41:05

Ed Litton. Ed Litton is thoroughly embarrassed by being a plagiarist. Thoroughly. And yet what happens?

01:41:12

Nothing. He just, he doesn't run the next year and they put someone else who's just as bad in his place, who's going to keep pushing the needle in the right direction for them or the wrong direction for them.

01:41:21

So, you can do that kind of thing, but what good does it do? The thing you have to do is get your guys in positions of authority.

01:41:28

And until you have that, there's not much you can do. Okay. Yeah, I'm not gonna get into this whole civil lawsuit thing more than what

01:41:37

I've already said. Yeah, obviously civil lawsuits with other Christians is not good.

01:41:44

It's not your first step. And certainly with people, but there's a difference between that and people who claim to be

01:41:50

Christians. That's all I'm trying to say. There are people who claim to be Christians who aren't Christians. And there are cases to be defrauded when, you know, suffer the harm because this is a brother in Christ and we're gonna bring shame to Christ.

01:42:03

I think it is shame that the lawsuits going on with McCraney and North American Mission Board, but it's exposing something deeper that's going on there, which is really the point

01:42:13

I'm trying to make, which is that these people don't operate like Christians. These, at what point do you call someone's bluff and say, you claim to be a

01:42:21

Christian, but you are not acting like one. And there's a process by which you are hurting Christians over and over and over again, bringing shame to our

01:42:29

Lord. And I'm trying to do the Matthew 18 thing. I just have to consider you to be a Gentile and tax gatherer at this point.

01:42:35

And I'm in well within my rights to take legal action. So if you can't understand that distinction,

01:42:43

I don't know if I can help you. All right, more could be said, but that's where I'm gonna end the show because we've been going almost two hours.

01:42:50

It's been a long show. This is, again, for the Southern Baptists out there. More coming. Don't forget the church search stuff.

01:42:57

If you email info at truestrip .com, if your church conforms to that statement of faith on the

01:43:03

True Strip website, we would love to have your church on our church search. It'll benefit your church. It'll benefit us, benefit others.