William

MABTS was a new, different kind of Southern Baptist seminary in 1978 when I matriculated. I persevered through three plus years of  seminary education, complete with Greek and Hebrew. It was a great time. I graduated in 1981. Gray Allison, founder and president at the time (he died in 2019) was a great man by any measure. He started the seminary with nothing - no money, no Cooperative Program, no denominational backing, just an idea for an alternative to the six SBC seminaries. Somehow he made it work. Now, MABTS is a partner with the Conservative Baptist Network. Fine. I understand … [Read more...] about I’m embarrassed by my alma mater, Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary

The strangest day of my life was November 21st a decade ago. That was the Monday following my last Sunday at the church I'd served for fifteen years and from which I retired. Monday morning with no sermon to think about for next Sunday, no hospital visits to make, no office to go to, no Christmas events, revivals, vacation Bible schools or other church events to think about. No budget to worry about...and...no more paychecks to pick up semi-weekly. Weird, but your humble hacker and plodder blogging pastor managed to cope (and is anything more retro than blogging?). Ten years later, not … [Read more...] about The weird world of retired clergy: I’ve been retired for a full decade this week.

Happens every time. It's in our DNA as Southern Baptists. In those periodic times when there is dissension and conflict in our Grand Denomination the cry goes out, "Don't send them your money!" That's seldom appropriate and seldom effective. I daresay that every pastor of an SBC church has been in the place where individuals or groups have declared their intent to withhold their giving to the church in objection to church staff or direction. The beleaguered and formerly beloved pastor is usually the focus of the giving boycott. Sometimes this is the kind of pressure that works. More … [Read more...] about The inevitable resort to weaponizing money in church and denominational conflict

...and these last weeks have been more drama since the hot years of the Conservative Resurgence. I have observations and opinions but perhaps the investigation will prove beneficial in the long haul. No one knows. One might note this significant change in the Baptist Press policy on reporting abuse: Baptist Press will continue to report every instance of abuse related to Southern Baptist churches or leaders of which we are made aware. BP made this change earlier, not as a result of the past weeks of turmoil. Some of us were attuned to clergy sex abuse when BP would never carry and news … [Read more...] about In any SBC drama and conflict the Cooperative Program takes a hit

Here is the press release of the SATF: Today, the members of the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention voted to fully fund the third-party independent investigation by Guidepost Solutions as requested by the Sexual Abuse Task Force. It also encouraged the Executive Committee officers and Task Force to work toward a solution within 7 days regarding the waiving of attorney-client privilege as directed by the Messengers in their motion. While we are glad that the investigation can begin, we are disappointed that so far, the Executive Committee has not followed the … [Read more...] about What we need is a little more optimism, a lot less doomsday

I learned an early lesson about the realities of Southern Baptist life: Anyone who asks honest, respectful questions about individuals, entities, budgets, policies and the like gets looked at askance, with disapproval, with suspicion and wariness. I asked some questions about the new Sex Abuse Task Force. Others have done the same. One hopes that the current reaction of the SATF is a pattern for the future. The TF brethren and sistren are issuing regular updates and have answered some questions. They declare that they will be open and transparent. This signals a new day in the SBC where the … [Read more...] about Reasons for close scrutiny of The Sex Abuse Task Force