You are bringing up a different topic. What would your response be if, to keep your job, or to keep your church in an association, you had to sign a statement? What if you disagreed with the statement?
As a Baptist I would not sign it even if I agreed with it as I do not believe any Baptist church, association, or denomination has the right to force me to do so. This not only violates the priesthood of the believer bur also the independence of the local church .... which is another cornerstone of Baptist beliefs.
When will 'Modern' Baptists return to being Baptist
Discussion in 'General Baptist Discussions' started by Crabtownboy, Jul 1, 2009.
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Crabtownboy Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
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I pastored a church that regularly invited the Mormon bishop to teach. I did not agree with that and eventually they told me to leave.Later God provided in ways I would have never imagined both spiritually and financially.
If I disagreed I would let God provide as he always has. That is the problem we have today. We have practical liberals/atheists who claim to believe the Bible but really do not in practice. They are suing people and seeking self preservation instead of trusting God.
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Revmitchell Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
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Revmitchell Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
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Crabtownboy Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
You contradict yourself. In fact, you contridict yourself in your statement above. First you say that no one is forced and then you say if you are going to associate you must agree. You cannot have it both ways.
I gently suggest you read Baptist history and see where you err in calling yourself Baptist.
An earlier post read:
Also no true Baptist pastor would sign such a statement because it is making a statement of faith a creed ... and no true Baptist pastor would sign a creed, even if he agreed with the words of the creed.
Would you sign the Apostle's Creed? Why or why not?
Again, read your Baptist history! -
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It is one thing to make a statement and quite another to live it out. It is the living out that people see and God is honored or dishonered. -
Revmitchell Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
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When cooperative progam dollars are used to help start a new church I'm glad that more questions are asked and that stipulations are placed on the use of the money such as agreement to the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. Why? The answer ought to be obvious but your sbc trashers refuse to see the logic.
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you guys have made the priesthood of believers the only distinctive of baptist life.
There is no point in continuing this. You're headed in a completely different, and i think wrong, direction -
Revmitchell Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
They have made a creed out of it. :laugh: -
Actually, I think that making a church agree to a creed before it is inducted into any Denomination is more against the Baptist Distinctive of Autonomy of the local church.
If a denomination can mandate things like this, where will you draw the line?
The gatekeepers of any denomination is the local association. The National level has NO business telling churches what they MUST believe.
That is akin to Roman Catholicism. -
Check out how we ABC/USA ers.. handle our SOF:
http://www.abc-usa.org/identity/idstate.html
Notice it says...
and
NO church has to sign something stating we agree before the churches can be allowed into a local association.
I would run from a denomination that had that much power. -
Actually each level of Baptist life is autonomous. A church has a right to set up a standard for beliefs to be a member. In the SBC, an association has the right to say who can be a member of it. all through the state and national.
No one has a right to be a SBC or an AB for that matter. I would imagine that your local Christian Science church has a set of beliefs that if they wanted to be a part of the AB, the denom/organ or whatever you all call it would say, "No, sorry you don't believe what we believe."
So a church in the AB could choose not to accept the inerrancy of Scripture or the deity of Jesus or His substitutionary death and still be a part of the AB? -
Everything that is done should be done to the glory of God not with doublemindedness and separation between those who supply their own money and those to whom it is given (1 Cor. 10:31). To see a difference because of a money issue is nothing more than worldly theology.
It is people like you who are trashing the SBC by your liberal theology. -
Tom Bryant asked:
If a church in our local association started teaching heresy, then the association would remove fellowship from it, thus disenfrancishing it from the ABC, and State/Region.
But the National Level would have no recourse to do it at that level.
The National level of the ABC/USA does not control the churches.. the churches controls the National level.
Does this present problems... yes.. .
The whole homosexual affirming mess is a byproduct of not ruling from the top down.
But we are not willing to give up the rights of church autonomy or priesthood of the believer in order to make sure that all churches believe the same thing.
It is a dangerous precedent to allow a denomination to dictate what it's church's can and cannot believe.
Suppose the BF&M would change to say that all SBC churches must be Calvinistic?
Or use the KJV.
Or Use only CCM or P&W.
Or Use only Hymns...
????
If local associations would do their jobs right, there would be fewer problems.
The National level should exist for missions.. Not dictating. -
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Revmitchell Well-Known MemberSite Supporter
The SBC is not a denomination. And denominations do rule from the top down. In a denomination the church has no choice to stay or go. The church, its name, its property, its pastor all must do as directed by the hierarchy. This is not so on the convention. The church, its Pastor, the property may come or go at any time. Guidlines for cooperating should be set by cooperative and is done by the votes of the cooperating churches.
Broadway was not expelled by the leadership in the convention, it was expelled by the vote of the cooperating churches. The difference between what the cooperative has done, And it is false that the leadership did this, and a denomination is night and day. -
So your structure trumps biblical truth? I am really trying to understand this. So a local church could actively support and allow as members active couples and if the local ass'n did not remove the church, the denomination would have to accept that?
But because your primary truth is autonomy and priesthood, they would have to allow it? Sounds like a prescription for weakening and destroying the whole group.
My primary truth would be the Word of God and from it flows the priesthood of all believers and the autonomy of the local church.
If the BF&M was amended (which is a long and involved process) to include or exclude those things, I would tip my hat and ride off into the sunset long before they ever asked me to leave.
The national organization is autonomous and can if they get enough votes do exactly that.
But the issues that are at the forefront of the liberal controversy a few years ago was nothing so trivial. What was center stage was the inerrancy of the Bible and demanding that seminaries and organizations that received CP dollars were faithful to that stand. The liberal will argue that it was a power grab. But they are wrong about that as well as lots of other things.
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