Randy Adams Interview

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. My name is

Mike Abendroth, and over the years, we've gone a little bit from, I don't know, some type of discernment, maybe radio, and we've moved more toward thinking about issues in Christ Jesus' church.

In my younger days, when I would think of No Compromise Radio, I wouldn't want to compromise, and I still don't want to compromise.

But ultimately, the show now is about the Lord Jesus and to imagine that He lived on earth and He never compromised.

The Lord Jesus said, I always do what's pleasing to my Father. And even His critics would say that they cannot convict

Him of any sin. And so that's amazing to me. And so today on the radio show, we want to talk to someone else who extols the

Lord Jesus and then, because of Him, does not want to compromise. And so today on the radio show, we have

Randy Adams. Randy Adams, welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. Thank you, Mike. It's a pleasure to be with you today.

Well, Randy, let's just cut to the chase. I live in New England now, and so we're just blunt. We ask direct questions. Why are you on the show today?

Well, I'm going to be a nominee to be president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Even though I live in the Northwest, you're in the Northeast, I'm in the Northwest, not normally considered a bastion of Southern Baptist strength, yet we do have hundreds of churches here, and I lead the convention, the

Northwest Baptist Convention, which serves the churches that affiliate with the SBC in the

Northwest. So, Randy, is the Southern Baptist Convention the largest evangelical denomination in the

U .S.? It is, and for that reason, I think it's, even if someone is not a

Southern Baptist, it's important what happens with the Southern Baptist Convention, because we do have over 40, about 47 ,000 churches, about 14 .5

million members. We have a very large missions organization. So we have influence beyond our own churches, you might say, and what happens in our seminaries, a lot of evangelical pastors attend one of our six

Southern Baptist seminaries, because we have an extensive seminary system. So we educate beyond our own convention, pastors beyond our own convention.

Well, Randy, as I think about Southern Baptist, I was drawn in the early 2000s to Southern Seminary, because I watched what happened at Southern Seminary, and even in the

PBS movie by filmmaker Stephen Lipscomb, the movie Battle for the Minds, I watched that and thought, you know, this is amazing.

Most every seminary goes liberal, right? It starts off conservative, and then it goes liberal, and then here,

Southern Seminary, we have a complete opposite, and so that's what drew me to Southern Seminary, to go get some more education in expository preaching in particular.

And now I look at Southern Seminary and some of the critical race theory issues and what's going on.

How can it be, and this is a broad question, you can go whatever direction you like, maybe

I should ask it this way. Do you think Southern Seminary and the other seminaries are going backward?

Are they heading back toward the direction or the trajectory that they used to be, that is liberal? Well, that's certainly the concern in some circles, and particularly with Southern and Southeastern, two of our seminaries, the extent to which they're doing that,

I'm not clear, to be honest. I have seen and I have heard, I attended

Southwestern Seminary, by the way, in Fort Worth, Texas, which is not, those allegations have not been made to my understanding of professors there, but they have been made of some professors at Southern.

And one of the issues in Southern Baptist life is we have a history that goes back to the days of slavery.

Southern Baptists were formed so that they could send missionaries who were slave owners.

So that is a part of our history that is not good. And it seems like in the last, really, going back to the 1880s,

Southern Baptists have made efforts to repudiate slavery, repudiate racism in varying degrees, all the way up to the present.

And so it seems like we're vulnerable when things happen in our country that cause racial division to rear its ugly head.

And, you know, sometimes I think some, in order to not be or not appear to be racist, latch on to ideas and theories and philosophies that, in fact, are racist.

You know, some of these anti -racist ideas, for example, the critical race theory and intersectionality incorporate, in effect, are racist themselves.

And I have seen and I have heard some latch on to some of those ideas, like the idea of systemic racism or the idea that if you're in the position of power, meaning the majority community, you are inherently racist or you're the beneficiary of racism.

If, however, you're a minority, by definition, you cannot be a racist. Now, that's not my view, but, you know, it has been said that racism requires power.

And if you don't have power as a group, then you can't be a racist. I reject that because the

Bible teaches that we're, you know, that sin is the inheritance of every child of Adam, that we're sinners by nature and by choice, and that we're responsible for our own motives and actions and behavior.

And CRT and intersectionality, they're founded upon the idea of groups, group identity, group guilt or lack thereof.

And I think it's very dangerous, but and I think it's dangerous to the extent that that would creep into the teaching or the belief system in some of our seminaries.

Talking today to Randy Adams, you can go to the website Randy Adams dot org if you'd like to read some of the specifics that he has written about in terms of what he would like to do in the

Southern Baptist Convention as president. Randy, most of our listeners would know the dividing, excuse me, the briefing.

Al Mohler, they've read probably some of his books and they've heard him preach, listen to him on radio shows and TV shows.

In my mind, and of course, I'm not a big Southern Baptist guru, but in my mind, I would think at least 10 years ago or 20 years ago, he,

Al Mohler, would be the conservatives choice and that he would stand up for the

Baptist faith and message and for gender roles and complementarianism and all these other things that he would just line up under and teach.

I don't know if this is correct or not, but in my mind, I see you as more conservative as Al Mohler.

And so now you're running as someone who's more conservative, at least in my mind. Correct me if I'm wrong. What differentiates you between the beliefs and practices of Al Mohler?

This isn't a personal issue, obviously, but what does he teach and stand for that you would disagree with or you would be more conservative on?

Well, one, I would say there's no one more influential in Baptist life, Southern Baptist life than Al Mohler.

His influence is far and wide and it has been for a long time. And I think, you know, there's reason for that.

His output is incredible, like you mentioned, the daily briefing. However, there are issues from time to time in which he has taken positions which have caused concern in some circles.

And issues of race are one of those issues, as you mentioned prior, CRT and intersectionality.

And also in some political concerns, meaning national presidential politics in the last two presidential elections, he actually took a position on the candidates.

And, you know, in Southern Baptist life, our tradition is we take strong biblical positions on issues, but not necessarily on candidates.

And so that also has been a matter of controversy in many quarters around the regarding Dr. Mohler.

I think what people see in me, in addition to conservative theology, which I am,

I'm very conservative. I'm an inerrantist. I believe in the sufficiency of scripture. I believe that we should build our theology and our belief structure from the

Bible and not from theories or philosophies, which at best address particular issues.

But they always address them in ways that are incomplete. For example, let me tell you a quick story that may help.

Several years ago, I was listening to a poet speak about the troubles in Northern Ireland. And, you know, that was the battle between the

Protestants and the Catholics back in the 60s and 70s, primarily. Hundreds and maybe thousands of people died.

And then they achieved a peace agreement, quote unquote, in the 1990s. And what the poet said,

I thought was interesting. He said, now, he said, we call it peace, but really, he said, we don't love each other.

In fact, he said, we hate each other, but we don't kill each other. And so we call it peace. He said,

I guess you could say we've achieved a peaceful bigotry. And my almost immediate thought was that is the best the world can do.

The world, whether it be through theories like critical race theory and intersectionality or almost any political philosophy, they don't pretend even to think that they can affect the human heart or really change the thinking of a man or a woman and take a person from a position of hate to a position of love.

Only the gospel, only the work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit in our hearts and minds can do that. But at best, what philosophies and political ideas can do is, you know, attempt to change behavior, but they can't change the human heart.

So I've really put my focus on biblical exposition, as you do. That was my focus in my doctoral work as well.

Believing that it's the work of the Holy Spirit through the truth of Scripture that changes the heart and mind of the person.

And to the extent that that's considered conservative, you know, then I'm very, very conservative.

The other thing that I see as a great issue in Baptist life is lack of transparency and lack of accountability.

And we need broader participation from more of our churches. So when it concerns maybe the other candidates or the entities of the

SBC, I see a great, and I don't just see this, I think many have joined me in this, a great deficit in financial transparency and in transparency in terms of performance.

We have just experienced the worst decade in our 175 -year history in terms of decline.

We're at a point in baptisms in 2019 where we were in 1938.

Church plants, giving to missions, to the cooperative program, all of those things have suffered an incredible decline in the last decade.

And I think there's reasons for that decline. But it's very difficult to get people to focus on the why.

You know, I think we know, most know, that we have a problem. But part of the problem is we're not willing to talk and open the books and actually be honest in confronting the brutal facts of where we are and how we got to where we are.

So that's probably what really sets me apart. Theology does as well. But also the need for truth.

And I even see some of the theological issues that you mentioned at Southern and some of our other seminaries as an issue of transparency, just being honest, you know, with what we truly believe.

Right, well, you have... Talking about them openly and confronting them and being clear about them and not trying to hide behind some cloak of secrecy, which

I think is a real problem. And so that maybe sets me apart as well. Sorry to interrupt you there,

Randy. I was just thinking about the nondisclosure agreements that professors were offered, at least

I know at Southern Seminary, and some didn't take them. Like, for instance, Russell Fuller. And it's, you know, why do we,

I think it's your question, why do we use these nondisclosure agreements? And your quote on your website was, what are we afraid of?

Learning the truth. And I think that's my concern as a, you know, I want the

Southern Baptists to do well. I want the gospel to go forward. I'm not against any particular denomination.

I want to see the Great Commission, obviously, and Christ proclaimed. So I want that. But it seems to me that, you know, people,

I mean, maybe I could put it this way. Here's my take on Southern Seminary. Correct me if I'm wrong or add or subtract.

There's a younger generation that have been imbibing critical race theory. The world is selling it.

People are understanding it. Some they think it's maybe a useful tool. While Al Mohler publicly in the briefing says, you know what, we don't teach it.

But there are people at Southern Seminary and I've seen their handouts and their syllabus where they do teach it.

In my mind, Al Mohler is trying to be kind of a politician. I can keep this stuff under wrap because if I blow it up, then who knows what'll happen.

Is that is that a wrong way to look at it? Am I naive? Am I on track? What do you think, Randy? I think you are.

And I think you put your finger on something, too, with regarding the NDAs, the nondisclosure agreements.

Because the purpose of a nondisclosure agreement in Baptist life is not to protect our proprietary information.

You know, if you're if you're a software company or something, you don't want a guy leaving and taking the software you developed or he developed for you to another company.

And so perhaps there's reasons for nondisclosure agreements and situations like that. But in our seminaries and our entities, nondisclosure agreements often are meant to keep the truth from people.

And it may be an ugly truth. It may be a truth that reveals hypocrisy or inconsistency.

But I think it's important for Baptists to know that and for everyone to know it.

And so I have a real problem with that. And that's one of the big issues at Southern, as I see it. I know you mentioned

Dr. Fuller. He did not sign an NDA. And because he didn't sign it, he forfeited dollars that were offered him to sign the

NDA, which is typical. And, you know, it's not only Southern. It's several of our entities use

NDAs as a as a standard operating procedure. And to me, it's an abhorrent practice, actually.

I just I never signed one. I've never asked anyone to sign one. I just don't believe in them as a, you know, as a as a standard procedure.

Sometimes I've seen we've had employees asked to sign NDAs, even when they didn't leave for any, you know, they weren't disgruntled or anything like that.

It's just it's just what they do in order to protect against the possibility that once not an employee, the person might say something harmful.

So it's almost preventative at times, even when there's nothing necessarily known that the entity is trying to prevent.

So I just I just I think I think we should not fear the truth. Whatever it is, and we should be able to argue our case for truth or falsehood openly and transparently.

And I've said, you know, we need to argue these things out in the middle of the street in the light of day, not in a smoke filled back room, you know, where.

The person in the pew can't see because it's the person in the pew and it's the normal church out there that's supporting our mission efforts, and they have a right to know they have a right to know what is being taught in our seminaries.

They have a right to know how we're spending our money and whether we're doing it wisely or not.

So to me, it's a it's a very significant issue. Well, Randy, I hope someone like you and I hope you are elected president, because I think

I think it's really for the honor of the Lord Jesus when I, an outsider with, you know, some skin in the game, as it were, when

I look at the Southern Baptist Convention, things pop into my mind and things pop into my mind like Lifeway.

I would think it was a complete disaster on some of the things that they would sell and giving money to the outgoing president.

I think about a million dollars. And so I think of Lifeway. I think of the North American mission, NAMB, where it's like,

OK, where does this money go? And if I send a dollar for missions, does it go to critical race theory or does it go to the resurrected

Savior and begging people to believe in him, this risen king?

And then I also look at Russell Moore and the ERLC and in my mind, and again,

I'm just I'm a nobody up here in New England, but between Lifeway, the NAMB and ERLC, I just think it's a complete disaster and it needs to be somebody needs to clean house.

Well, you've identified several problems, and of course, I've written about some of those and I concur that we have huge issues there.

And one way to understand how this happens in Southern Baptist life, I was just thinking about this even in the last couple of days, that most non -profit organizations, charities, religious charities, they're supported through the donations of individuals.

Our churches are Samaritan's Purses, but Southern Baptists, we support our entities in a cooperative fashion through our churches.

So it's not necessarily through the individual donation of a person. It's through the decision of a church.

And the churches have made those decisions now pretty consistently for almost 100 years.

This cooperative funding system was started in 1925, and so it changes very slowly.

So, for example, if a church 30 years ago was giving 10 percent of their budget to missions through the cooperative program, for them to lower that percentage is not an easy thing to do, and it doesn't happen quickly.

And so there's a reservoir of inherited trust, I think, that our current leaders have. They've inherited these agencies.

They didn't build them. They didn't start them. Russell Moore didn't start the ERLC. Kevin Itzel didn't start the

North American Mission Board, but they inherited the mantle of leadership, and I would say the mantle of trust, and this financial river that's been flowing to those organizations for 100 years or thereabouts or decades.

And it's being diminished. Our churches are giving less.

In fact, they're giving less than half of what they did 35 years ago. But still, last year our churches gave $467 million due to the cooperative program.

And even with all the issues we have, but 10 years ago they gave over $500 million.

So the offerings are being reduced, but they're not falling apart like it would if you were an individual donor -based church or ministry, if that makes sense.

Yeah, it does. So I think what that means is it doesn't put the pressure on the leader in the same way because the leader has inherited a trust, and it takes years to squander that trust in our system.

And that's a strength of our system, and it's also a weakness because it takes a long time to address some of these problems, much longer than it should.

Well, Randy, we don't have tons of time left, but maybe we could kind of wrap things up this way.

We have a new president in the United States, and I think the first day or two he signed,

I don't know, 40 or 50 executive orders that were put on his desk, and he just signed one after another after another.

If there's an equivalent to an executive order in the Southern Baptist Convention as president, what executive orders would you sign day one?

If I could do anything day one, it would be to open up the financial records of all of our entities.

I would do something equivalent to a forensic audit. I don't have the authority to do that, the president doesn't, but you do have a bully pulpit, you can call for it.

And so I would call for something like a forensic audit. Some people bristle at the word forensic because it has legal implications.

But for example, just to give you an idea, the North American Mission Board, the church planting budget is $75 million.

Now, last year they spent $69 million of the $75 million, but how that money was allocated in specific, we don't know.

All we get is the big chunk number, $69 million. That's a big number.

That's a lot of money. I think we ought to know some details, especially when we're planting far fewer churches and spending far more dollars to do it than we did 10 years ago.

So I think if we could get some opening of the books, we would learn a great deal.

And to me, all of the issues that we're talking about, whether they be theological or how effective we are in accomplishing the mission, those things could much more be easily addressed if we had transparency and accountability, which

I think we don't now have in the measure we should have. And, but if we did,

I think it could bring correction, not only theological, but also in terms of our mission strategy, for example, because I think we've taken a bad step with regard to our overall strategy in missions.

And I think that could be rectified in part if we were more transparent. That'd be number one.

All right, good. Well, thank you, Randy. It just popped into my mind as you were speaking. Do you think the Southern Baptist Convention wants someone that's not white and not male?

Do you think that's what they're after in light of all this, you know, oppressor, victim, oppressed stuff?

Do you think there's any push for that? We just need a non -white, non -male. Well, I don't think so.

We have, we are the most diverse denomination in America. We have, I think, 4 ,000

African -American -led churches. We've got, like in the Northwest, about 30 percent of our churches worship in a language other than English.

Now, it doesn't mean our individual congregations are mixed because a lot of our diversity is linguistic diversity.

So we have a lot of Korean language and Russian language, Vietnamese and all of that. So I think we are a diverse denomination, but we're still, you know, predominantly

Anglo. And we have had African -American leaders. We've had one president of the SPC who is black, a very respected pastor,

Fred Luter. In fact, he's going to recommend one of the four candidates. And he'll do a great job in that recommending speech.

But I don't and I don't think either it's very much on the edges, those who would say anything about having a woman lead, because that that's never happened.

And, you know, typically our leaders are always pastors or someone who has a pastoral background.

And we don't have female senior pastors in Southern Baptist life. Now, we do have a female pastor issue in Baptist life, but not and usually those are teaching pastors, but not the senior pastor.

So it would be really, really unusual for a woman to be elected as president of the

SPC. And I don't even know that a woman's ever been nominated to be president.

But and there isn't one at this point, at least this year. Well, thank you,

Randy. It's it's an odd thing for me to, you know, interview a candidate for presidency.

And so I don't really know how these things work, although it's not for the president of the

United States. Let me just kind of give you a couple of minutes. You can take whatever time you want to wrap up.

I don't know. Do you say if I'm elected president, I will do this, that or the other or a closing statement.

But you have the floor. Well, I appreciate that. You know, I'm from Montana originally, so not a land that the

Southern Baptist bastion, but I actually became I was saved as a child, not in a in a

Southern Baptist church. I became a Southern Baptist in college because the only Christian group on our college campus was

Baptist Student Union, supported by Southern Baptist. And it was really through that that I learned the benefit of cooperation, that if we cooperate, we can accomplish more because the assemblies weren't there.

The Methodist Presbyterians are no independent group. So I really learned the benefit of cooperation. I believe in who we are as Southern Baptists, but but I do believe we're heading down the wrong road.

And I really think this is a fight for the heart and soul of our convention, that 10, 20 years from now will be greatly reduced from where we are if we don't build back a reservoir of trust.

The level of trust in our convention is at the lowest point it's been maybe ever, certainly in my ministry lifetime, and I'm almost 60.

So I think we have to build back trust, and the way to do that is to be transparent and to be accountable and to be forthright and honest about things.

And if we're not, we're not going to build back trust. And if we don't build back trust, we're going to continue to diminish our resources and rightly so.

And I've said, you know, this is not about whether the mission of God's going to be accomplished. God will accomplish His mission. The question is, is whether He'll do it through us, you know, or whether He'll choose to do it through someone else in an increasing way.

And our influence will be diminished because of our disobedience.

And to me, that's the real issue. Well, I like what you said, especially, Randy, about what the

Lord's going to do, even in 1 Corinthians. Of course, the Corinthians were completely carnal and a really messed up church.

And I find it fascinating that even in chapter one, right from the very beginning, he talks about the revealing of our

Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end guiltless in the day of our

Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ, our

Lord. Well, Randy, I'm not a Southern Baptist, but if I were a Southern Baptist, I'd vote for you for president of the convention.

And I just think it's a strange day when when people say, is Al Mohler the conservative candidate?

And for those in my corner, the answer would be no. So who will step in to do things in a biblical fashion?

Come what may. And I appreciate you and your ministry. Thanks for being on No Compromise Radio Ministry today.

Thank you, Mike. I appreciate it. Appreciate the opportunity to address your audience. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston.

You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.