Connect with Brandon on Facebook and Twitter
—
Ed Stetzer, Vice President of the Insights Division at LifeWay and phenomenal researcher/writer, was kind enough to take the time to answer some of my questions regarding SBC life. I hope this will encourage us all!
BRANDON: There has been a semi-resurgence of debate surrounding Calvinism and Arminianism among Southern Baptists as of late. How can we find and focus on unity and what does the future hold?
ED: Many were concerned that the issue of Calvinism vs. Arminianism would prove more problematic than it was at this year’s Southern Baptist Convention. Despite a respite from the issue this year, Southern Baptists must reach a peaceful definition of a Southern Baptist on a theological level. I think that the tone of the SBC meeting is a good sign—statesmen spoke up and drowned out the voices that wanted to attack—but there are still issues that need to be addressed.
As I see it, there are two groups currently exist in the Southern Baptist Convention that ultimately, I don’t think will stay in the SBC.
The first group is composed of the anti-Calvinists who fundamentally believe that Baptist Calvinism is close to heresy and must be rooted out of the denomination. In many ways, these are the same people who believed both the contemporary church movement, and later those who called themselves missional, needed to be rooted out of the denomination. These individuals often do not want to have anyone in the denomination who is unlike themselves. For this reason, they will ultimately find they are not comfortable in the Southern Baptist Convention. They want a more narrowed parameter than the Baptist Faith and Message provides.
The second group of individuals I think will not remain in the denomination are those whose defining narrative is Calvinism. Though they are by no means the majority of Calvinists, some of the more vocal and well-placed Calvinists are driven by a strictly Calvinist agenda. They will struggle being in the denomination. I’m not sure they like the convention and, when they see they can’t reform it in the way they want, will ultimately leave.
However, the anti-Calvinists and aggressive Calvinists are small groups. They are not MOST Southern Baptists. Most Southern Baptists (and, it appears those who voted at the SBC this year), want a convention that is united around Jesus, believe the Baptist Faith a Message is our shared confession, and wants to cooperate for evangelism, church planting, and global missions.
So… despite certain groups whose beliefs and agendas may not fit in the SBC, Southern Baptists, regardless of where they fall on the Calvinism issue, can unite under belief in a common confessional system, statement of faith, and desire to cooperate with one another. The starting place for such unity is an honest conversation. I trust Frank Page to lead that conversation and Southern Baptists to engage in it with grace and discernment.
When parameters were narrowed in the past, many Calvinists did not join with us to defend those who were the targets then. Now, those same Calvinists are shocked to discover the impact they felt when they were narrowed out beyond the confines of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. My hope is that some of those Calvinists will defend others who, in the past, were preached out—and my hope is that all Southern Baptist will see that it is the wrong path to make the majority way the only way. The Baptist Faith and Message really should be our standard.
Interestingly, being in favor of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 is now considered by some the “liberal” position. While this demonstrates that some people are driven by a narrower agenda, ultimately a denomination needs a faith statement that it actually lives out, believes, and uses as its standard of cooperation.
BRANDON: What is your greatest hope for the future of the SBC?
ED: After the convention each year, many ask questions concerning the future of the SBC. I believe the greatest hope for Southern Baptists as a convention is that we hold a high view of the Word of God. The battles for the Bible really mattered.
I attended a Southern Baptist seminary before/during the conservative resurgence. There, I was actually taught that the Bible could not be trusted. I was taught things that were more influenced by Hellenistic culture than the inerrant, authoritative Word of God. As a result, I am incredibly encouraged that the kind of arguments we are now having are driven by people who love the Word of God and take it seriously. Therefore, one great hope is that we will continue to stand on the inerrancy of the Word of God.
A second great hope for the future of the Southern Baptist Convention is our love for global missions. Southern Baptists have always emphasized global missions, which, of course, is incredibly important. However, I find hope in seeing individuals think and act like missionaries right where they live as well. God’s children no longer have to look beyond their neighborhood to find hurting people in need of a Savior, or people of other nations in need of basic care. My greatest hope is that Southern Baptists will be driven by a missional impulse, both here and around the world, that changes everything.
Thank you, Brandon, for the interview. I’m looking forward to seeing what people have to say. I might even interact a little bit since it seems now that even agency VPs are allowed to interact. Thanks!
Always like what Ed has to say. I was in Seminary when our Pres was locked out of his office – what a great testimony to the world. I think we have the Bible authority issue straightened out but we keep letting other things side track us and keep us from doing what we should be doing best which is missions and evangelism. Let’s live our faith and make a difference….
Agency VPs are allowed to interact on SBC Voices, but only if they behave.
I have no way to predict how the Anti-Calvinist vs. the Calvinist influences will turn out in the SBC. I know it has not been very God honoring the majority of the time and I have fallen into not honoring God and having to repent for my comments on blogs and what has passed through my mind even more.
It has motivated me to study some passages in the bible a little more and actually has strengthened my Calvinistic views based on reading scripture along with commentaries on passages. I consider this part of Gods sanctification in me over time. 10 years from now I cannot say that I will be a Calvinist in my soritology. What I am sure of, I will be a Christian going through sanctification. If it is Gods will I am still on this earth in 10 years, I will be open to learning from God.
The battles over the inerrancy in Bible really matter. Mans battles of interpretation of soritology do not compare. I’ll leave it to Christ to judge the heresies and the heretics. I’ll just watch out for them.
I urge you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them. For such people are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. By smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naive people. (Romans 16:17-18)
So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter. (2 Thes 2:15)
1 Corinthians 11:19(ESV)
19 for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized.
Thanks Dave for all you do at SBC Voices.
I agree with Ed Stetzer those who have to have it their way or the hi-way will never be happy in the SBC which allows the local church to run itself. Most people sitting in the pews do not see this as a Calvin vs. Armenian debate they see this as a power struggle using labels and terminology they do not see in the bible. Most Southern Baptist parishioners do not know what a Calvinist or an Armenian is. They will take each sermon one at a time and accept it or reject it based on what they believe the bible teaches.
There is reason to fear that many do not either understand or know the theology upon which the denomination was founded. They also are unaware of the fact that prayer has been continuing for more than eighty years for another visitation of God, a Third Great Awakening, one that transforms civilization world wide and lasts for a 1000 generations. In a brief period, from approximately 1740-1820 Protestantism was transformed from a Gospel recovery effort filled with conflict, deadly and destructive in many respects, into an outgoing, we will win the world with persuasion…not force or manipulation. Quite a change, to say the least. With prayer’s answers must come the means to produce such effect, namely, the theology that produced the First and Second Great Awakenings and launched the Great Century of Missions and, as a side effect, produced the freest and greatest nation that has ever been in history, a so-called calvinistic republic as it was called in the 19th century by one of the leading American historians of that era. How in the world did a theology which Mr. Stetzer regards as divisive at best and anti-mission and anti-evangelistic at worst bring to pass such a a visitation that a writer of a circular letter in Va. in 1816 would state:
While we reflect with the highest pleasure on the
rich and sovereign mercy of God…and contrast the
means employed with the end accomplished, the con-
clusion is irresistible: “It is the Lord’s doing, marvelous
indeed in our eyes.”….Our ministers, with very few ex-
ceptions, were called from ploughing, or some other
laborious employment, to proclaim to poor sinners the
glad tidings of salvation through the dear Redeemer….
the situation of Virginia at the time…required something
of an extraordinary nature to be done, and although
really miraculous did…and we may with almost entire
certainty conclude that we never shall see another set
of preachers…nor is it necessary that we should. Southern Baptists had their beginnings in one of the greatest periods in world history, 1740-1820. During that time Protestantism was transformed from a Gospel Recovery effort filled with conflict, often deadly, into an outgoing, we will win you with persuasion effort. Quite a change, to say the least. And the cutting edge of the great change is to be found in the Baptists. Here are a few facts to consider. The General Baptists in North Carolina were neither very evangelistic nor missionary minded. Dips and Drapes them was the name of their game. If one said he believed, they baptized him or her, as the case might have been. The General Baptists held to a General Atonement, Christ died for everyone without exception. According to present day thinking they should have been the ones starting the great missionary movement, etc. But it was the Regular and Separate Baptists Who got the ball rolling. The Regulars came to North Carolina in 1755 and persuaded some General Baptists to adopt the Regular Baptists’ view of Particular Redemption, what some call Limited Atonement, and the group went along for the next 46 years having 25-30 baptisms a year. Then in 1801, the Second Great Awakening occurred and they baptized about 870. The Separate Baptists also came, starting Sandy Creek Church and the Association (1755, 1758 respectively). They, too, experienced the Second Great Awakening, and they had been established by people converted in the First Great Awakening.. In 1816 Luther Rice came to enlist Sandy Creek and the Separate Baptists in the launching of the Great Century of Missions. Present at that Annual Meeting was messengers from the Mt. Pisgah Church, organized in 1814, and its articles spoke of Christ dying for the church…not a word about Him dying for everyone. From that church will come the first missionary of the Southern Baptist Convention to China, Matthew T. Yates. What most people do not know is that the theology that produced such a creative outburst of Awakenings and Missions with the side effect of the greatest and freest nation on earth (called a calvinistic republic by one of the leading historians of the 19th century) was the theology of Sovereign Grace. It is the theology that is most intensely evangelistic and missionary, and it was what made for a true liberalism (the first place in the… Read more »