Calvinist pastor likely to run for 1st VP(SBC) (updated May 26)

Biblicalrecorder.org ^ | 5-26-6 | By Robert Marus

[WKB]

WASHINGTON - A neo-Calvinist may face an evangelist for first vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) this summer - in addition to the meeting's contested presidential race.

Mark Dever, pastor of the Washington's Capitol Hill Baptist Church and a popular leader among SBC Calvinists, acknowledged May 24 that he would allow himself to be nominated for the post. Several members of a group of leaders concerned over the denomination's direction have been mentioning Dever's name for several weeks as a potential nominee for SBC office.

Dever's acknowledgement came two days after the denomination's official news service reported that a Georgia evangelist would also be nominated for the post.

Keith Fordham, an evangelist from Fayetteville, Ga., will run for the slot, according to a May 22 Baptist Press report. Fordham is the immediate past president of the Conference of Southern Baptist Evangelists. The organization's current president, Bill Britt, made the announcement and said he would nominate his colleague.

"Dr. Fordham is a dynamic and deeply spiritual evangelist who has been used mightily of God to impact our convention through his preaching and leadership," Britt, a fellow evangelist who lives in Gallatin, Tenn., reportedly said.

According to the news release, Fordham said he would focus on evangelism as an SBC officer. "Of all the denominations on earth, none has a greater opportunity of fulfilling the Great Commission than Southern Baptists. It is in our grasp," he said. "We must all work together in the 'unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace'. Let Southern Baptists join Jesus in an all-out effort to seek and save those who are lost."

Dever said he has indicated to several inquirers his willingness to allow his name to be placed in nomination, although none of them has promised that they will, in fact, nominate him. "I'm quite happy to turn up at the convention in Greensboro [N.C., where the denomination will meet in June] and not be nominated; that's actually my preference," Dever told an Associated Baptist Press reporter. "But if it's helpful and doesn't take a major time commitment," he said, he will allow himself to be nominated.

Dever said "a number of people" had approached him about being nominated for the VP office - which is largely ceremonial in the SBC - as well as the presidential nomination. He said the time commitment associated with the SBC presidency would cause him to decline a nomination for that position, but that he would serve in the vice-presidential slot.

Dever said he could not characterize those who inquired about nominating him as coming from any particular ideological niche or constituency within Southern Baptist life, but that there were "a bunch of people" who asked him, and that "some of them were definitely not Calvinists."

If he is nominated, Dever will be among a group of candidates for office in what will likely amount to the most contentious SBC annual meeting since fundamentalists solidified their control of the denomination in the early 1990s.

Already, two nominees for the presidential post have been announced. Ronnie Floyd, pastor of First Baptist Church in Springdale, Ark., is widely believed to be the favored candidate of the denomination's conservative power structure. His opponent, Frank Page, pastor of First Baptist Church in Taylors, S.C., will likely be favored by a broad coalition of SBC conservatives who are concerned about the denomination's direction and its inclusiveness of supporters not in the inner circle of powerful conservative megachurch pastors.

Dever said that he is only responding to requests from other Southern Baptist leaders. "I don't really keep up with denominational politics; I want to see Capitol Hill evangelized," he said. "We like the SBC, and we want to give them money...but I like to stay focused on the local church."

Dever's historic congregation, which dates from the 1870s and is located just five blocks from the United States Capitol, currently has 533 members, according to Dever's assistant, Mike Law. However, unlike the vast majority of Southern Baptist churches, its average Sunday-morning attendance exceeds membership. The congregation requires members to attend regularly, contribute and meet certain doctrinal standards to remain in good standing, Law and Dever said. Because of its location, near the homes of many transient young congressional staffers, Capitol Hill Baptist also regularly gets hundreds of Sunday-morning visitors.

Dever said his church had about $1.9 million in undesignated receipts in 2005 and forwarded $150,500, or 7.5 percent of that total, to the Southern Baptist Convention. The church stopped contributing to the national denomination through the District of Columbia Baptist Convention after the SBC's North American Mission Board de-funded the convention in 2002. According to multiple DCBC sources, Capitol Hill was one of two member churches whose leaders raised concerns with SBC officials about alleged liberalism in the small regional convention.

Dever said Capitol Hill Baptist sends its SBC budget giving directly to the denomination's Executive Committee and doesn't pass it through any other state convention to the SBC's Cooperative Program unified budget.

Fordham, meanwhile, is a member of Harp's Crossing Baptist Church in Fayetteville. The congregation, which listed an average Sunday-morning attendance of 870 in 2005, reported $1.57 million in undesignated receipts that year and forwarded $157,813, or 10 percent, to the Cooperative Program. It also gave $48,265 for the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions and $26,994 for the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering for North American Missions.

[WKB]

Baptist ping

BTW our fellow baptist "full court"
has been banned or suspended.

[Arkinsaw]

I guess he was pre-destined to make this attempt.

[WKB]

but was he predestined to win???

[OB1kNOb]

Neo-Calvinist running for office in the SBC????
The "B" in SBC still refers to Baptist doesn't it or am I behind the times?

[JamesP81]

Neo-Calvinist running for office in the SBC???? The "B" in SBC still refers to Baptist doesn't it or am I behind the times?

There are some baptist with calvinist tendencies. Even my pastor as a few of those tendencies, although not very many. About the only point of calivinism my pastor is hardcore about is security of the believer. OTOH, we don't take it too far; our church sends missonaries to Brazil and South America as often as we can.

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

BTW our fellow baptist "full court" has been banned or suspended.

Do you know why?

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

Even my pastor as a few of those tendencies, although not very many. About the only point of calivinism my pastor is hardcore about is security of the believer.

The problem that develops with that position is that a lot of lost souls end up feeling very secure about their so-called salvation. If the sinner is in control, he can believe for a moment and never let it change his heart, yet he is led to believe that he is eternally secure. It's a spiritually dangerous evangelistic position. That's why we have 80% of the U.S. saying they are Christians and only 9% possessing true saving knowledge.

[WKB]

It happened on the this thread
It appears she said something wrong
about one of the FR "Protected Classes"

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1636009/posts?page=303#303

[WKB]

I mainly disagree with the "L" in
the Calvinist TULIP.
"Limited Atonement"
Christ only died for the elect not all the "who so ever wills"


http://www.thecaveonline.com/APEH/calvinTULIP.html

[Liberal Bob]

That's why we have 80% of the U.S. saying they are Christians and only 9% possessing true saving knowledge.

Could you enlighten this heathen and tell me what true saving knowledge is?

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

Yeah, I thought most Southern Baptists were 4 point calvinists. That's what I was always taught. Though on reflection during my adult life I have grown more comfortable with the limited atonement idea.

[NZerFromHK]

Full blown hardline 5-point Calvinism belongs to Presbyterian or (some) Reformed churches. It has no place in the Baptist church.

[CindyDawg]

Sounds like one of those dreaded business meetings:')

[HarleyD]

There are some baptist with calvinist tendencies. Even my pastor as a few of those tendencies, although not very many.

Oh, my. Good thing Charles Spurgeon isn't around anymore.

[HarleyD]

Let Southern Baptists join Jesus in an all-out effort to seek and save those who are lost.

I'm glad they included Him. Maybe a good Calvinist is precisely what the SBC needs.

[NZerFromHK]

In Asia churches planted by 19th century British Baptists (explicitly Calvinist) have now joined Presbyterian churches to form new ecumenical denominations, while those planted by American Baptist denoms (officially not Calvinist) remain Baptist.

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

That's why we have 80% of the U.S. saying they are Christians and only 9% possessing true saving knowledge. Could you enlighten this heathen and tell me what true saving knowledge is?

True knowledge of who God is and who you are, and then yeilding your life to the Lordship of Christ. It means you understand that you are a sinner, that God is holy and justly judges your sin, that Jesus is God, yet He humbled himself and became a man so that He could pay your sin debt for you. That He offers salvation to you by grace alone, through faith alone. And that faith (which encompasses repentance) is evidenced by a changed heart and a lifetime process of sanctification.

It's a lot more than a get out of hell free card.

Example of true faith: Let's say you receive tomorrow's paper today and learn that your home will be destroyed by fire tomorrow afternoon at 2:00pm. Faith means you change everything you do because of that knowledge. It's proof that you really believe it will happen. Saving faith is like that. There will be evidence that you believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord and confess that God raised Him from the dead.

[alpha-8-25-02]

"The old truth that Calvin preached, that Augustine preached, that Paul preached, is the truth that I must preach to-day, or else be false to my conscience and my God. I cannot shape the truth; I know of no such thing as paring off the rough edges of a doctrine. John Knox's gospel is my gospel. That which thundered through Scotland must thunder through England again."—C. H. Spurgeon

http://www.spurgeon.org/calvinis.htm

COME NOW THE REFORMED POSITION HAS ALLWAYS BEEN FOUNDATIONAL TO BAPTISTS.!

p.s.wkb,i don't think your mail is working

5 SOLAS!

[alpha-8-25-02]

TOO FUNNY!