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A Little Bit about Being a Baptist

On June 11-12, messengers from Southern Baptist churches across our country will gather for the annual business meeting of the largest evangelical denomination in the United States. Being Southern Baptist is a part of my heritage. I grew up in the home of a Southern Baptist pastor, went to Southern Baptist schools for my education, and pastor a Southern Baptist Church.

We are far from perfect as a denomination, and I expect that the annual meeting will result in a fair amount of politics and controversies. Being millions of member strong and 50,000 churches, doctrinal and practical diversity are part of what it means to be Southern Baptist. Here are a few general observations about our denomination.

We believe in the gospel and the authority of Scripture. Decades ago grassroots Baptists anchored the denomination on the inerrancy and inspiration of Scripture. This doctrinal and political battle waged on the floors of annual meetings in the 1980s, and the result has been that Southern Baptists retain a high view of the authority of Scripture which undergirds the gospel that saves.

Missions is the reason we cooperate. The reason we give, gather, and go is for the spread of the gospel to the nations. The cooperative program has been around nearly 100 years and combines giving from churches across the US to support missions across the globe. When giving from thousands of churches is combined, missionaries can go to the nations with the gospel and not have to fundraise for their income. While we don’t always agree on everything (see below), we do agree that cooperation for the spread of the gospel is the primary reason we exist.

Church autonomy and doctrinal latitude have resulted in Southern Baptists being a big tent. At the annual meeting, messengers gather from cooperative churches for two days. The convention is only for two days with messengers making up the decision-making body of the denomination. In Southern Baptist life, there is no church hierarchy or governing body that decides for the convention messengers. If you’ve ever been to a church business meeting, the SBC annual meeting functions similarly. This means that votes will happen about business (budgets and denominational entities), leadership, and even theological issues when we gather next week. The messengers attending, the votes cast, and the decisions made will vary. Church autonomy means that each local Southern Baptist Congregation is responsible for governing itself and decides whether or not it will cooperate with the convention. The convention can separate its cooperation from churches whose practice or doctrine does not function within the parameters of the Baptist Faith and Message. Some of the decisions at this year’s annual meeting reflect these tensions. For example, the messengers will vote on an amendment to the denomination’s bylaws establishing who is eligible to pastor Southern Baptist churches and remain cooperative within the denomination. Positions on this issue vary even though the prevailing doctrinal position of Southern Baptists has a strong consensus that the role of pastor/elder is reserved for qualified males. Even so, how this doctrinal consensus will be applied at the denominational level has a variety of perspectives and will receive attention at the upcoming meeting.

If you are reading this as a member of a Southern Baptist church, like Wilkesboro Baptist, I would encourage you to pray for the upcoming annual meeting. Pray that Christ would be honored when we gather and as we interact with one another. Pray that messengers and guests would act in a Christlike manner toward each other. Pray that the decisions made, the budgets passed, and the missionaries commissioned will help to spread the gospel to our neighbors and the nations.

If you would like to learn more about Southern Baptists, here are a few links to follow.

Photo by Joshua Rodriguez on Unsplash

Will your new year have new habits?

Each year many plan their New Year resolutions. Each year resolutions made become resolutions broken. Resolutions are good, but we are not our resolutions. We are our habits.

An anonymous quote I came across several years ago says it all:

Watch your thoughts for they become words. Watch your words for they become actions. Watch your actions for they become…habits. Watch your habits, for they become your character. And watch your character, for it becomes your destiny!

As a pastor, I have conversations with Christians and non-Christians alike regarding their spiritual lives. One of the more consistent conversations revolves around one’s identity or self-perception. We live in a culture that suggests we can be or become whatever we think or dream. The identity crisis that permeates gender and sexuality found its roots in the self-help ideology that believes we can define ourselves, our future, and our successes.

After a recent win for Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers, Rodgers articulated a belief in himself and self-fulfillment. He went on to say: “I do believe in the power of manifestation and I do believe in momentum and I believe very strongly in the force of the mind. And when you start to believe something strongly, some miraculous things can happen.”

That’s well and good, but the Packers lost last night agains the Detroit Lions. Manifestation and the force of the mind failed Rodgers and the Packers in a game where a win would get them to the playoffs.

Identity and belief is tremendously important, but not in the way self-help gurus and the identity culture we live in would have us believe.

We are first and foremost who God says we are. This means we are image-bearers of God (Genesis 1:28). This truth about identity is for every person on earth regardless of religion, experience, background, or environment.

For those who follow Jesus, we are described as new creatures and the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:17-21). While we are sinners by nature, we have been justified by God through Christ (Romans 3:21-26). We have been given the privilege of becoming children of God by faith in Christ (John 1:12). On an on the Bible goes about our identity in Christ.

This is where our habits come to play in our Christian experience. Our habits either support what the Bible says about our identity in Christ or they align with cultural values. Our habits teach and form us. Reading the Word, praying, attending church, memorizing Scripture, being involved in an accountable community, and other disciplines remind us regularly of our identity in Christ and his redeeming and transforming work in our lives. Christians who neglect these spiritually forming habits are in danger of buying into the cultural shortcomings that so pervade education, media, and ideologies.

So in this new year, will you review your habits? Discover whether you’re Bible reading, prayer, and church engagement are adequate to form your faith and walk with Christ spiritually. If you’d like to consider these questions at a deeper level make plans to attend Wilkesboro Baptist during our series on the book of Hebrews. We’re learning what it means to follow Christ who is greater than the patterns, promises, and prophecies of the Old Testament. If you’re not in our community, make sure you’re a part of a Bible-believing church with healthy leadership where you can grow in your knowledge of Christ and find accountability for your habits.

Photo by Joel Muniz on Unsplash