Posted on 06/16/2018 4:56:13 PM PDT by Salman
America’s largest Protestant group moves to cut ties with the Republican Party and re-engage with mainstream culture.
It was immediately clear that change was afoot in Dallas. I’ve attended the annual gatherings of the Southern Baptist Convention dozens of times, but walking around the convention center this week, I was struck by how unfamiliar it all felt. When I was a child, the convention hall was a sea of silver combovers and smelled of denture paste. While the older, more traditionalist crowd was still present in Dallas, the younger, fresh-faced attendees now predominated.
“The generational shift happening in the SBC has thrust the group into the middle of an identity crisis,” says Barry Hankins, chair of the department of history at Baylor University and co-author of Baptists in America: A History. “The younger generation thinks differently than the old guard Christian right about culture and politics, and they are demanding change.”
To enact this change, young Baptists nominated 45-year old pastor J.D. Greear from North Carolina to be president of the denomination. In a campaign video, Greear called for “a new culture and a new posture in the Southern Baptist Convention.”
...
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Jesus Christ.
"For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe."~1 Corinthians 1:17-21
__Satan's plan has always been to diminish the Lord's commands and word of truth and replace it with watered down lies. "Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said..."~Genesis 3:1
We live in a time of great deception.
Maybe they should look at the other denominations that went left, how’s that work out for them? They are dying from emptiness and not standing for anything. I have watched these”modern “ churches in my small town drying up and dying while the conservative ones hold their own or are growing.
My church is a SBC church and if they go left and wobbly it will quickly dump the SBC and watch it die like the rest who chose the wide open and crooked path of the militant left.
The article says they are changing direction, but never says WHAT.
One part that got my attention was:
“They appear to recognize that tethering themselves to Donald Trump—a thrice-married man who has bragged about committing adultery, lies with impunity, allegedly paid hush money to a porn star with whom he had an affair, and says he has never asked God for forgiveness—places the moral credibility of the Southern Baptist Convention at risk.”
Excuse me? Whom do you think the vast number of your parishioners voted for?
Organized religion sucks! Jesus, the bible, is all you need.
Jesus, the one church leader you can count on. Too many of today’s (and yesterday’s) church leaders are perverts and pedophiles.
You got me. I’m Evangelical Reform Sadducee.
Independent Baptists remain biblically-based and use only the King James Bible. They are unlikely to surrender in the culture war.
Independent Baptists have thus far, as I understand, stuck with the hymns and not gone “chorus”.
Methodism is an outgrowth of Episcopalian.
Most SBC churches can’t ditch the SBC without paying a hefty amount of money. It’s that way with conservative PCA churches trying to form from the ultra-liberal PCUSA.
Independent Baptists (3 million)
That is correct and it is following the same path.
Here are a couple of resolutions that passed. I have issue with them - wolves in sheep’s clothing:
RESOLVED, That messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Dallas, Texas, June 12–13, 2018, do grieve and decry the epidemic of gun violence resulting in mass shootings across America; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we express solidarity with all those victimized by gun violence and seek every available opportunity to minister to them in the name of Jesus Christ; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we commend the heroism of police officers, first responders, and bystanders who bravely intervene in violent situations to eliminate additional threats and provide emergency aid to victims (Romans 13:1–7); and be it further
RESOLVED, That we call on federal, state, and local authorities to address the epidemic of gun violence by evaluating the societal maladies that lead to escalations in gun violence and mass shootings; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we call on federal, state, and local authorities to implement preventative measures that would reduce gun violence and mass shootings while operating in accordance with the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution
[Note: The SBC has not expertise in gun laws...so STAY OUT!]
RESOLVED, That we desire to see immigration reform include an emphasis on securing our borders and providing a pathway to legal status with appropriate restitutionary measures, maintaining the priority of family unity, resulting in an efficient immigration system that honors the value and dignity of those seeking a better life for themselves and their families; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we declare that any form of nativism, mistreatment, or exploitation is inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we encourage all elected officials, especially those who are members of Southern Baptist churches, to do everything in their power to advocate for a just and equitable immigration system, those in the professional community to seek ways to administer just and compassionate care for the immigrants in their community, and our Southern Baptist entities to provide resources that will equip and empower churches and church members to reach and serve immigrant communities
[Note: My wife is a legal immigrant, but this is NOT something the SBC has ANY business sticking its nose in!]
RESOLVED, That the messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Dallas, Texas, June 12–13, 2018, maintain and renew our public renunciation of racism in all its forms, including our disavowal of the “curse of Ham” doctrine and any other attempt to distort or misappropriate the Bible to justify this evil; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we not be satisfied in our hearts with embracing any doctrinal belief that contradicts human dignity expressed in the creation account and beg the Almighty to purge all remaining dross of this false teaching from our hearts to the glory of God; and be it further
RESOLVED, That we remain vigilant to bring about the healing and restoration of individuals affected by this sort of doctrine, not allowing any future version of this wicked teaching to creep into our hearts or our pulpits...
[Note: What the heck? 40 years in the pews and I’ve never heard ANY SBC church be anything but contemptuous of the ‘doctrine of Ham’. It has been the MORMONS who pushed it!]
http://www.sbc.net/resolutions/search/results.asp?query=2018
I’d like to see the church I’m in leave the SBC but I won’t hold my breath. Seems like the SBC is starting to bow down to the SJWs!
I’d like my church to get out. We could still support missionaries, but I don’t think the seminaries are worth a bucket of warm spit and the “leadership” of the SBC is even worse!
“Most SBC churches can’t ditch the SBC without paying a hefty amount of money.”
Believe that is the second time you’ve claimed that. I’m 99% certain it is false. I’ve never been in a Southern Baptist church that had ANY financial obligations to the convention.
If you have evidence, please present it.
I can’t speak for all Independent Baptists, but the ones I grew up around and am most familiar with, want anything other than to be the conscience of the world. They want to be separate from the world above most anything else, and have even come under criticism for remaining aloof from politics-they were never a part of the Moral Majority or any political movement, as such.
True, for the most part, though the rot is creeping into some Independent Baptist churches, not many, so far. But in these end days of apostasy and “itching ears”, no church is immune without constant vigilance. I know that the “7/11” music sometimes sneaks in through the recorded music used for the “specials” sung before the sermon. It takes a pastor, and indeed a church flock, with Berean discernment to keep the creeping rot of apostasy out.
bump
I had never heard of this policy before.
I'd dismiss his opinions on the topic.
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