SBC Pres. Seeks Input on New Name for Denomination

Actually, nothing happens if you don't turn a report in.

Some of our SS classes use the material from lifeway, some use from Group, some use the Bible. It depends on what the teacher desires. We suggest that they use a curriculum because, as a church, we want to know what is being taught. There have been years that we haven't used any of the Lifeway material. We pick and choose from a number of publishing groups based upon what the teacher and the church leadership decide.

In terms of giving the money. A church can bypass giving to the Cooperative Program simply by designating the money. There is a minimal amount of money that must be given, but if a church doesn't want to be a part of the SBC, they don't have to give anything. It is purely a local church decision.

All baptist churches are independent. Some just choose to cooperate.

 

Almost all of my life I was IndiBap and shared and thought that the accusations that you are addressing were necessarily so. I've been to several SBC churches that made no mention of the SBC nor used the their SS material. As I am no longer "IndiBap", and being that I've come to understand SBC, I've seen that many of the claims against SBC churches and the convention "aint necessarily so".

Some Independent Baptist churches are very dependent! Case in point, a pastor may not support a certain missionary because if they were to support them then their own missionaries might LOSE support from some other IndiBap churches. That doesn't mean that I think that ALL IndiBaps are this way, I just recognize that churches (SBC and IndiBap) can become lazy or 'dependent'.

 

Have you been around the SBC in the last 5 years? What about in the last few days. You ought to read what is being said in the blogs about even the idea of studying a name change. You should have been around during the GCR debate over the past 2 years.

Baptists don't quit being baptists because we're in the SBC.:smilewinkgrin:

 

I thought I should add that no one here is calling your dad a liar. We are simply saying that whoever told your dad that he had to teach SBC Curriculum was either making that decision themselves, or was led to mistakingly believe they HAD to do that. The simple fact is that no church is required to use SBC curriculum by the state or national convention.

As a matter of discipleship, I might suggest that you would be better served if you selected one church to both attend and be a member of, where you could invest your life. It is very difficult to be and active part of two churches.

 

No they haven't. This is just a false understanding with no substantiation.

 

I am a member of the local church back home and preach there as often as I am asked.
I have been working away from home for 10 years now usually year or so at a time so it is a little hard to invest my life in the churches in the towns I work in and then move on. I served one as temporary music director and taught SS of on in one town.
The churches here in this town one doesn't have an evening service so to attend church on sunday evenings I go to the other service at the church that does. I have an opportunity to preach in the prison on Wednesday nights here as the Lord opened up the place. But I am seeking someone who can take it permanently once I leave when my assignment is done.
So how do you see someone who is only in a place for a short time investing their life in any church other than how I am doing it right now?

 

Revmwc,

1. you are correct that to be considered a "cooperating" Sbc church, a church must do certain things, but those things are very minimal, (like giving ANY amount to the cooperative program...amount determined by the church itself). So while it is true to say they are not completely autonomous, the are very nearly so, and there is no state or national coersion about what types of things to teach, or even how to run the church.
--If several independent churches started an association for fellowship and cooperation in ministry, and that association charged a $10/year dues, would those churches be giving up their autonomy?

2. I did not realize you moved around so much. It will be difficult, and i suppose you have to do the best you can. I have often thought it would be interesting to visit other churches on a few Sunday evenings...

 

Okay, fair enough.

The reason people mention autonomy is because it happens to be true, whether you support the SBC or not. Facts are facts. I am not a defender of the SBC by any means, but I also don't tolerate blatant falsehoods about it. You can have opinions about the SBC all days long, but the autonomy of the local church in the SBC is a cut-and-dried fact, even if some SBC churches are so ignorant they don't understand that.

Furthermore, no church is dependent upon the SBC for anything, unless they choose to be. My church, a perfect example of this, gets absolutely nothing from the SBC except grief, accusations and condemnation. Yet, we support Cooperative Program missionaries (as well as missionaries through other organizations and a few directly) so we are officially a Southern Baptist church. We even send messengers to the annual meetings from time to time.

Your conclusions are faulty because your premises are not factual.

Right back at you.

If you could provide any substantial evidence that the Convention, I would be your biggest supporter. But I've paid attention to the SBC for years and I can't find it. Furthermore, I actually expect the SBC to tear itself apart over the next decade BECAUSE of the desire for a subset of SBC churches to try to enforce more conformity on the rest. So I'm actually sympathetic to your concerns, but I just can't find any evidence of it.

quote]Independent autonomous means dependent upon no organization, the Pastor and deacons following the Holy Spirit and the church body by vote determine the course of the church.[/quote]
Yes, that is the definition of a good SBC church.

Yes, bit this is done in terms of being neighbors and colaborers in the field, not in terms of having any authority or right to make choices for the congregation in need.

Yes, this is done quite a bit on the associational level.

This is false.

This is probably true.

Nope. You're reading way too much into the charter. Notice that it is for directing the "energies" - not the churches - for the propagation of the gospel, that is, the cooperative missionary activities. A church may choose to join the mission or not and if they join the mission, they have the right to help direct it. Making the decision to cooperate does not preclude the individual church from doing other mission work or supporting other programs. My church supports cooperative SBC missions, BGCT missions, our associational efforts, and CBF missions.

Think of it this way, just because I work closely with a woman each day for a common purpose doesn't mean that we are married, much less dating. The other day i say a woman in a van break down in the middle of a busy interesection here in town. I found a place to pull over and hopped out to help. At the same time, several other men did the same (all different ages and ethnicities) and helped the woman get out of the street to a safe place where she could call for help. We had to push a heavy van up a ramp into a parking lot, so one of the men said, "Everyone ready. 1, 2, 3, PUSH!", and we expended our energies under his leadership because it was a reasonable plan. We shook hands afterward and went about our business. In the same way, there is a world of people out there stranded in sin and in danger of their eternal lives. Christians of all tribes and nations see those in distress any automatically (because of Christ in us) respond to the need and work together to rescue those who are perishing. We doesn't necessarily give up any autonomy (although we are NOT autonomous from Christ), by working together doing Christ's business. When we believe our part in the work is completed, we can shake hands and go our way. If we believe that the person who provides leadership is wrong, we can suggest a new course of action or go our way.

It is very easy to work with others and remain autonomous in all of your decisions and not have any necessary dependency.

I'm not going to argue about the meaning of the word "denomination" in 1845, but saying that a group is a denomination does not imply a certain type of polity.

 

The answer to the independent forming that is what the BBFI/IBF churches have done and they have given up some of their autonomy to do so. I don't consider them to be totally independnet either.

To be a Member or active member a church must be certain criteria:

Here is according to the by-laws the Membership requirement:
Article III. Membership: The Convention shall consist of messengers who are members of missionary Baptist churches cooperating with the Convention as follows:

1. One (1) messenger from each church which: (1) Is in friendly cooperation with the Convention and sympathetic with its purposes and work. Among churches not in cooperation with the Convention are churches which act to affirm, approve, or endorse homosexual behavior. And, (2) Has been a bona fide contributor to the Convention's work during the fiscal year preceding.

2. One (1) additional messenger from each such church for every two hundred and fifty (250) members; or for each $250.00 paid to the work of the Convention during the fiscal year preceding the annual meeting.

3. The messengers shall be appointed and certified by the churches to the Convention, but no church may appoint more than ten (10).

4. Each messenger shall be a member of the church by which he is appointed.

 

So their big crime is that they seek cooperation from like-minded churches who are willing to put their money where their mouth is, and won't tolerate a single large church (or group of large churches) easily dominating the smaller churches.

By your standards, the churches of the New Testament weren't autonomous because Paul requested an offering from them to assist the saints in Jerusalem.

 

Never said it was a crime I said they are not totally autonomous or independent. They must meet certain requirements to be Member churches there by giving up some of their autonomy.
I said in my original statement that they were submissive to the SBC and they are. They are submissive in following the rules set forth by the National Convention. They submit to the rules of membership, they submit to the authority of the co-operative effort, they submit to the paying of for lack of a better word annual dues, they submit to the by laws of the SBC in order to be member churches. They are Submissive Baptist Churches to the Convention in order to remain members.

So:
Do they submit to following the rules of membership?

Do they submit to the authority of the co-operative program in allowing the program to distribute the funds?

Do they submit to the paying of dues (for lack of a better word)?

Do they submit to the by-laws set forth in the constitution and by-laws of the SBC National Convention?

If they do then they are submissive churches and are not fully autonomous.

 

Paul presented a need and they gave an offering. That is quite different from giving annually to the co-op. What Paul did is more like the Mary Hill Davis and the Annie Armstrong donation taken up and given for that purpose.
Why doesn't the co-op money support these instead of needing an annual fund raising?

 

What are you talking about?

 

My answer was in response to baptist believers statement "By your standards, the churches of the New Testament weren't autonomous because Paul requested an offering from them to assist the saints in Jerusalem"

 

More specifically:

 

The Mary Hill Davis offering is a Texas mission offering, so you may not be familiar with that one.

 

There are those on the left that do so, as well, but the SBC has already distanced themselves from them. Those names that I mentioned represent racism, judgmentalism, elitism and arrogance to the rest of evangelicalism and the culture as a whole.

I have been hurt by the SBC, that's true, but I've been out there a good bit in different parts of the country and know what people think about the SBC. I know what other evangelicals think of it and what non-Christians think of it. The younger generation as a whole is turned off by the arguing and bile and all the indefensible, extreme positions that have been championed by some weirdos that have found their way into leadership positions.

There's a reason the numbers have started to decline. And that's going to keep right on happening until the SBC is a non-factor. It might not be today and it might not be tomorrow, but it's going to happen, and probably within my lifetime.

 

The SBC has not done that in the least.

That is pure rubbish

I doubt it

The numbers in the SBC are declining less than most others. Either way they are declining everywhere. It is not an SBC thing. Your suffering from wishful thinking more than anything else here.