Fundamentalist's Leader

Do you mean support or pay their way?

How does your organization compare to Wycliffe Bible Translators. I have been told they are larger then the SBC. </font>[/QUOTE]Well, my little dig caught up with me! Don't want to get off topic too much, but I think this will be germane since my point is that IFBs are following the Great Commission more and more and individual leaders less and less.

First of all, what is the difference between "support" and "pay their way"? I'm not sure what you mean here. Just in case you don't know how IFB missions operate, the missionary first of all goes on deputation to visit many churches. Some of those churches vote to send support monthly to the missionary through his or her sending agency. The amount may be anywhere from $10 to $1000 per church. This is most definitely "support!" Through this the missionary and churches get to know each other and pray for each other. One of my SBC missionary friends in language school was jealous when he heard about this special prayer relationship.

Secondly, as to size, I realize that it is not size primarily that means success in God's eyes. However, this does make my point, so I'll address it. My own mission board serves about 350 missionaries and 6,000 churches. Add to that the other large IFB boards such as BIMI, BMM, ABWE, BBFI, etc. Add to that the many small boards and the many who are sent directly by their churches and you get a huge IFB missions force of probably 4000-5000 or more (depending on whether you add short-termers in).

Thirdly, it is hard to compare either SBC or IFB missions to Wycliffe, since Wycliffe is a specialized organization with a different way of counting missionaries. Their website says, "Wycliffe has since grown to include over 5,250 career and short-term expatriate workers." So they could very well have more missionaries than either the SBC or IFB movements--depending, again, on how you count the missionary force.

Okay, I just checked the SBC's IMB website and so I am editing this post, adding this paragraph. The site says, "The Foreign Mission Board, in Richmond, Va., held its first commissioning service in 1846. Since then more than 15,000 missionaries have been appointed, a third of them still serving today." So, the SBC, IFB missions and Wycliffe all have comparable missionary forces.

 

Paid,

I think the answer to your leadership vacuum may be a matter of perspective. Isn't it possible that there isn't a leadership vacuum at all? I submit that the successors of the last generation of fundamentalist leaders do exist in the likes of Chuck Swindoll, John Macarthur, Jerry Falwell, LaHaye, and all of the rest that have been labeled as new evangelicals.

Does anyone seriously believe that Chuck Swindoll, Macarthur, and Falwell fellowship with liberals?

There is this huge explosion of leadership today in fundamentalism that goes by a different name, not to the world, mind you, just to the passed over and left behind fundamentalists of years gone by.

Billy Graham was the poster boy of new evangelicalism, but all of the others who came after him and are accused of being new evangelicals aren't. They are carrying the same torch as the fundamentalists of the 1920s and fellowshiping across denominational lines.

Fundamentalism and its leadership is alive and well. We're just looking in the wrong place to find it. The left behind fragment that claims that they alone are the true fundamentalists aren't. But if that's where you are searching for leadership, then you won't find it.

 

"Fragment"?!?!?! 10,000 IFB churches constitute a "fragment"?!?!?! My mission board alone has a constituency of 6000 churches that openly claim the name Fundamentalist! And most of them trace their spiritual lineage to the Fundamentalists of the 1920's and 1930's. Pretty big "fragment."

 

To me, these two points are contradictory. If the leadership of by-gone days was immoral and egotistical, then we are much better off without them. Any crisis resulting from a lack of that type of leadership is no crisis at all. It is a blessing! I do think there have been abuses of power in fundamentalism. I think that many of the leaders today are excellent models of servant-leadership. As truly spiritual leaders they do not seek fame, glory, or power. I am happy to say that many of the leaders of fundamentalism that I have come to know (and I am not bosom-buddies with any of them) have displayed godly humility and warmth. This results in a fundamentalism that is quieter, less flashy, and less belligerant than in days gome by. I think this is good. If Jesus' kingdom is "not of this world", then it is appropriate that those who are in the forefront of it should conduct themselves in a way that confounds the world. I see this happening and I think that it is good!

 

Paul, you and I have been having some good interaction on another thread, and I've been enjoying getting to know you there. But I have to say that you are over the top here. Please back off and don't be so inflammatory. I know some wonderful, godly leaders of good character in the group you so casually dismiss. They don't make a big splash, they don't try to stand out, they just quietly go about fulfilling the Great Commission.

Perhaps that is where the current leaders of Fundamentalism are: working quietly without caring whether or not they are known to the public. I could mention many great men in leadership in the mission board offices, doing God's work around the world.

I could name some missionaries (myself certainly not included ) who had they stayed in the homeland would be pastors of large churches, looked up to and followed by many pastors in the American fellowships. Instead they chose to reach the world for Christ and be little known in the homeland, except to their faithful prayer warriors in the supporting churches.

Some of them are just as good at writing and theology as Swindoll, Macarthur, Falwell and LaHaye. However, they write their tomes in other languages to much smaller constituencies. This means they don't profit from their books and buy houses in the States, much less million dollar homes. And that's my two yen worth.

 

Data is from THE ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN WORLD,
1991-1992 Edition (Tyndale, 1990) p373-376

# of churches:
------------------------
American Bapt. Churches in the USA - 5,339
Assembles of God - 11,123
National Baptist Convention of America - 11,396
National Baptist Convention USA Inc - 26,000
Southern Baptist Convention 37,517

and for sport, those gay coddling folk:
Metropolitan Community Churches - 34,000

 

Well said, swaimj, and I agree completely.

 

Ditto with our mission board (same roots, Squire).

 

What you described is support. The SBC fully funds the individual person. The individual does not have to raise support for himself. There are pros and cons to each. Too often missionaries will return home especially if they have been on the field a long time because support has diminished due to death or other reasons among their supporters.

 

To me, these two points are contradictory. If the leadership of by-gone days was immoral and egotistical, then we are much better off without them. Any crisis resulting from a lack of that type of leadership is no crisis at all. It is a blessing! I do think there have been abuses of power in fundamentalism. I think that many of the leaders today are excellent models of servant-leadership. As truly spiritual leaders they do not seek fame, glory, or power. I am happy to say that many of the leaders of fundamentalism that I have come to know (and I am not bosom-buddies with any of them) have displayed godly humility and warmth. This results in a fundamentalism that is quieter, less flashy, and less belligerant than in days gome by. I think this is good. If Jesus' kingdom is "not of this world", then it is appropriate that those who are in the forefront of it should conduct themselves in a way that confounds the world. I see this happening and I think that it is good! </font>[/QUOTE]You do error in assuming that points one and two refer to the same individuals. Therefore, your conclusion is wrong. Some individuals were conspicuously left out in my listing of great leaders. It was the imitators of the great leaders who became the demagogues. The excesses came at lower levels usually. The points are not contradictory unless you assume (and wrongly so) that they refer to the same individuals.

 

"Fragment"?!?!?! 10,000 IFB churches constitute a "fragment"?!?!?! My mission board alone has a constituency of 6000 churches that openly claim the name Fundamentalist! And most of them trace their spiritual lineage to the Fundamentalists of the 1920's and 1930's. Pretty big "fragment." </font>[/QUOTE]OK, Point well-taken.

But my main point is that the fundamentalists who moan about their children leaving the fundamentalist camp for Piper, Swindoll, et. al. really aren't leaving fundamentalism. And therefore, there isn't a leadership vacuum.

 

Paul, you and I have been having some good interaction on another thread, and I've been enjoying getting to know you there. But I have to say that you are over the top here. Please back off and don't be so inflammatory. I know some wonderful, godly leaders of good character in the group you so casually dismiss. They don't make a big splash, they don't try to stand out, they just quietly go about fulfilling the Great Commission.

Perhaps that is where the current leaders of Fundamentalism are: working quietly without caring whether or not they are known to the public. I could mention many great men in leadership in the mission board offices, doing God's work around the world.

I could name some missionaries (myself certainly not included ) who had they stayed in the homeland would be pastors of large churches, looked up to and followed by many pastors in the American fellowships. Instead they chose to reach the world for Christ and be little known in the homeland, except to their faithful prayer warriors in the supporting churches.

Some of them are just as good at writing and theology as Swindoll, Macarthur, Falwell and LaHaye. However, they write their tomes in other languages to much smaller constituencies. This means they don't profit from their books and buy houses in the States, much less million dollar homes. And that's my two yen worth. </font>[/QUOTE]Hi John,

I'm speaking in very broad terms here in reference to national leadership, not to the many faithful servants in both your brand of fundamentalism and mine.

Again, my main point is that the next wave of fundamentalist leaders are on the scene but going by a different name, namely conservative evangelical, sometimes at their own perogative, but mostly at the whim of the old guard fundamentalists who are quick to label others "new evangelicals."

 

"Fragment"?!?!?! 10,000 IFB churches constitute a "fragment"?!?!?! My mission board alone has a constituency of 6000 churches that openly claim the name Fundamentalist! And most of them trace their spiritual lineage to the Fundamentalists of the 1920's and 1930's. Pretty big "fragment." </font>[/QUOTE]OK, Point well-taken.

But my main point is that the fundamentalists who moan about their children leaving the fundamentalist camp for Piper, Swindoll, et. al. really aren't leaving fundamentalism. And therefore, there isn't a leadership vacuum. </font>[/QUOTE]Paul, I don’t think Piper, Macarthur, Swindoll, LaHaye & company are really Fundamentalists although they believe the fundamentals. Furthermore, I don’t think they would identify themselves with the Fundamentalist label. They are evangelicals. Fundamentalism was born out of Evangelicalism. These two are kin but they are not one and the same.

 

If you're using "evangelicalism" as a synonym for orthodoxy, you're right. But if you're using it as a synonym for what Ockenga declared to be the New Evangelicalism, (which is the common use of the term when it's compared to Fundamentalism), you've reversed the chronology. And these guys do follow the philosophy of New Evangelicalism.

Well, maybe not MacArthur...

 

If you're using "evangelicalism" as a synonym for orthodoxy, you're right. But if you're using it as a synonym for what Ockenga declared to be the New Evangelicalism, (which is the common use of the term when it's compared to Fundamentalism), you've reversed the chronology. And these guys do follow the philosophy of New Evangelicalism.

Well, maybe not MacArthur... </font>[/QUOTE]Two of my five preacher uncles went to MacArthur about 20 years ago and had a good long talk with him. At that time he said yes, he was a Fundamentalist. Don't know that he's ever said so in public though.

 

If you're using "evangelicalism" as a synonym for orthodoxy, you're right. But if you're using it as a synonym for what Ockenga declared to be the New Evangelicalism, (which is the common use of the term when it's compared to Fundamentalism), you've reversed the chronology. And these guys do follow the philosophy of New Evangelicalism.

Well, maybe not MacArthur... </font>[/QUOTE]No, I'm deep into the technical, theological, historical definitions. New Evangelicalism is an offshoot of Evangelicalism dating sometime close the founding of Fuller Seminary. Fundamentalism came from the same common background but went in the opposite direction. Fundamentalism has been a longtime evolving and Evangelicalism predates Fundamentalism. Evangelicalism was and is still pretty much mainstream in America. Fundamentalism is not but it is a current unto itself. Historically, evangelicalism grew out of orthodoxy and remains theological and associationally in that stream but there are orthodox groups that are not evangelical.

 

If you're using "evangelicalism" as a synonym for orthodoxy, you're right. But if you're using it as a synonym for what Ockenga declared to be the New Evangelicalism, (which is the common use of the term when it's compared to Fundamentalism), you've reversed the chronology. And these guys do follow the philosophy of New Evangelicalism.

Well, maybe not MacArthur... </font>[/QUOTE]Two of my five preacher uncles went to MacArthur about 20 years ago and had a good long talk with him. At that time he said yes, he was a Fundamentalist. Don't know that he's ever said so in public though. </font>[/QUOTE]Yeah, he still wanted to court some Fundamentalists. He maintained personal ties with BJU people. Charles Smith left BJU to work with Macarthur. Of course, Falwell and Dobson were claiming to be staunch Fundamentalists too. Perhaps he would claim the Fundamentalist label. I don't know and really don't have any close ties in that direction.

 

The scene is constantly changing, like watching a cloud in the sky. (Remember when you had time to do that?) The New Evangelical world developed many subsets. MacArthur is, apparently, his own man and would not agree with much of what Ockenga & Co. were doing when they announced the New Evangelicalism as a departure from Fundamentalism (i.e. the Old Evangelicalism).

Labels tend to say too much. Although I accept various labels, it doesn't matter because I, myself, don't matter. But I doubt that MacArthur would allow a label for himself, simply because it probably wouldn't fit well and he has no intention of conforming to it, anyway.

 

No, not really. In the early days (20s-40s), fundamentalism and evangelicalism was the same thing. There was no difference. The term "fundamentalist" was coined in 1915 by Laws (I believe the date was 15). In those days there was no difference between evangelical and fundamentalist. In fact, that is why the New Evangelicals called themselves that. They were delineating themsevles from the "old evangelicals," the fundamentalists. Marsden's "Reforming Fundamentalism" explains this evolution. That book is the history of the New Evangelical movement, which actually came some 10 years or so after Fuller started, as I recall.