Barnabas File

When President Eisenhower left office on January 17, 1961, he warned the nation about the increasing power of “the military-industrial complex.”     This was surprising to many due to his career service in the military culminating with becoming a five-star general.     Some have suggested he did not go far enough and should have used the term “the political-military-industrial complex.”   In a Facebook post this week, a friend identified himself as recovering from the “religious industrial complex.”  I think he could have added “political” that term as well.  Many ministry leaders in the second half of the twentieth century not only grew up in the paradigm, but we helped to perpetuate it.  I know I did.   As a Southern Baptist, I grew up in a church that used denominational literature, supported denominational programs, and followed a denominational (not liturgical) calendar.  The Southern Baptist Convention and its a...

Cecil Sherman, the first coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, said, “The son comes up at different times for different people.”  He was commenting on that fact that not everyone perceived the changes in Baptist life in the south at the same time and was leaving the door open for other Baptists to join the Fellowship movement. I have been reminded of this recently as friends who have continued to support traditional Baptist structures in our state have found themselves cast aside because they do not agree with the predominant agenda being pursued by those entities.  Twenty years after many Baptists, including myself, turned their backs on the old way of doing things, they are ready to move on.  The sun has come up for them.  I applaud their decision and identify with the grieving process they are going through. At least one acquaintance has suggested to me that this is a good time for Fellowship Baptists to take advantage of this disillusionme...

I appreciate the work on movements that my friend StephenCurrie has allowed me to share in recent blogs.  He ends his comments on the nature of “Gospel movements” with these conclusions: “God invites human effort, and God does work through leaders and churches that care about restoration and reform.  But it is God who provides the source of movement energy through the Holy Spirit.  So we must pray fervently.  We must sow the Gospel widely and faithfully without the baggage of nuanced theological dogma or complex church practices that are more cultural than they are biblical.  Then, when the Holy Spirit stirs to generate a Gospel movement, Gospel seeds can germinate seemingly spontaneously in unexpected places.  And we can be in the right place at the right time to be part of something big that only God can do.” I got the question again last week:  “What do you think the future of CBF is?”  We have at least gotten beyond the other ques...

“Bein’ a cat herder is probably the toughest thing I have ever done,” says a grizzled cat herder in the EDS commercial shown during the 2009 Super Bowl.  The humorous commercial depicts the challenge of herding “10,000 short hairs” to market.  Attempting to get independent creatures such as cats to follow any kind of direction is not easy and comes with some scratches. When I see this commercial, I am reminded how challenging it is to work with Baptists.  We are congregational in polity and individualistic in practice.  As a result, those who would attempt to lead either a church or a “denomination-like” organization find themselves “herding cats.”  As Baptists, we are defensive not only about our congregational autonomy but our individual freedom as well.  We have taken the doctrine of the priesthood of the believer in one primary direction:  “It’s just you and me, God.”  If we think about the doctrine as the priesthood of ALL believers, ...