Barnabas File

I receive a daily e-mai l from   Christian History  magazine citing significant historical events from that particular date.     The magazine is part of the Christianity Today family, so you can expect a rather conservative bent to their material, but what they point out is usually very accurate.     I look at these each day and post (with some editing) on my Facebook page.     They often use the term “greatest” or “most influential” about a person, and I think those terms are always dependent on the larger context, so I usually take those out.       I am often surprised by the responses I receive on these posts. This was one of my posts last week:   May 8, 1845: The Southern Baptist Convention organizes in Augusta, Georgia, separating from the Triennial Convention in order to support the appointment of slaveholders as missionaries.   The post received 71 likes, 26 comments, and 37 shares.  Following the shares w...

You never know what responses you will get when sharing your opinions on a blog.  On my blog—Barnabas File-- I write about things that interest me or get my attention.  Occasionally, they get someone else’s attention, too. In reviewing my posts for the past year, these received the greatest response.   1.   The Church is in Decline:  What a Great Opportunity for the Church!   In this blog, I encouraged churches to get back to the basics—to love God and to love one’s neighbor.  I noted the decline of disciple formation and spiritual practices in churches, but concluded in this way:   Even so, in these days, I see signs of hope for the people of God.  I talk with pastors who love engaging the Word of God and sharing it with their people.   I meet lay leaders who are bright, creative, and open to new ways of doing church.  I work with seminary students--many mid-career folks--who see new opportun...

When I was in seminary, a chapel speaker said that someone asked him one time, “If you were not a Southern Baptist, what would you be?”     He said that his response was, “I would be ashamed.”   This is the context in which I was born and bred.  In 1998, I made the leap to what I believed was a more progressive Baptist tribe.  Between 2005 and 2008, I moved even further into positions where I could work with a more diverse family of believers.  Those experiences have been rich and rewarding.   There are many reasons for my decision (one that I did not make lightly).  One was the theological shift of the Southern Baptist Convention that sought to bring all of those in convention life—not only employees but churches—into lockstep.   Baptists have not traditionally been a creedal people, but groups of Baptists have historically adopted confessions of faith such as The Philadelphia Confession (1742) and The New Hampshire Confe...

Time for full confession.     Until I read All My Knotted-Up Life , I had never read anything by Beth Moore.     To the best of my knowledge, I have never heard her speak.     Of course, I knew who she was.     I understood that she was Lifeway Resources’ (formerly the Baptist Sunday School Board) most popular and profitable author. I also knew that she had a significant reputation as a Bible teacher and speaker.     It also was clear to me that she had finally decided she could no longer remain silent in a denomination that refused to address sexual abuse and the submission of women.   As a result, I came to this book with few preconceptions.  To be honest, I found it both painful and insightful.  Painful because I can identify with the structures that failed women like Moore (I was even part of them).  Insightful because of her willingness to be honest about her own complicity in these structures. ...

In his farewell address to the nation, President Dwight Eisenhower was emboldened to make this statement:   “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”   Some have said that, if he had a little courage, he would have termed this the “congressional-military-industrial complex.”  Even so, it was an unexpected warning from one who had a first-hand take on this alliance as both a military commander and an elected leader.  He had certainly benefited personally from this alliance.   I find myself in a similar situation.  I was formed by and benefited from a religious-industrial complex.  It was called the Southern Baptist Convention.  In my rearview mirror look, the organization that bears that name today is very different from the o...

Rick Warren has been one of the most influential pastors in Baptist life for the past forty years.     Under his leadership Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, became a flagship for many evangelicals including a number pastors in the Southern Baptist Convention, the tribe with which Saddleback chose to align itself.     I would say that he was a major influence on a generation of pastoral leaders.   There is much to admire about Warren and his leadership.  Although he identifies as a conservative theologically, in recent years he has been criticized as not being conservative enough, especially on the role of women in church leadership.   Warren chose to take a major role in the recent Southern Baptist Convention meeting in New Orleans, seeking to overturn the decision to expel Saddleback from the SBC because its ordination of women leaders showed that it was not in “friendly cooperation” with the SBC.  He was also a vocal propo...

Let me be very clear.     I am a former Southern Baptist who attended Southwestern Seminary.   When I was a young minister, fellow alum Rick Warren was a role model for pastors.     He was not only a challenging teacher and preacher, but he was emerging as a successful church planter with Saddleback Community Church. It is now one of the largest congregations affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.   My respect for Warren as a pastor continues.  I have a couple of his books on my bookshelf.  Due to some family experiences, Warren has been a strong champion for Christians to address mental health issues.   He championed evangelicals fighting AIDS overseas.  In recent years, he led the Saddleback church to ordain three women as staff pastors. His successors in pastoring Saddleback will be a married couple with the wife recognized as “teaching pastor.”   Even so, Warren misses the boat on some key issues.  ...

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...

The idea of how a church pursues missions has changed drastically in the last fifty years.    Although my perspective comes from being a Baptist in the South during that time, I believe that many of the changes have also impacted churches of all denominations across the United States in some way. The paradigm in which I was indoctrinated saw “missions” as something that was done somewhere else by people who were specifically called to leave their homes and do evangelistic and philanthropic work in strange and exotic places.  The denomination had overseas, domestic, and state mission boards who were responsible for this work.  The role of those of us in local congregations was to pray for the missionaries, learn about their work, provide the funds for them to pursue their ministries, and give them a platform to tell us about what they were doing.  There may have been a few local mission opportunities such as a “rescue mission” for the down a...

I am grateful for my heritage as a Southern Baptist.  I was exposed to the Bible and worship from a very young age.  I grew up in a church in south Alabama that supported the Cooperative Program of missions giving.  This meant that our church had the benefit of being part of a supportive group of local churches and the educational opportunities that afforded. Our state convention provided varied and effective ministries with groups like orphans, ethnic groups, and college students.  We supported missionaries at home and abroad.  We had good Bible study and training literature (which we paid for, of course).  I went to an accredited seminary and paid a remarkably low tuition.  Wherever you went on a Sunday morning (in the Southeast and Southwest, at least), you could find a church that sang the familiar hymns and studied the same Bible lesson. In hindsight, I realize that this Southern Baptist utopia was imperfect.  There were significant...

The Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant denomination in America, has reported last year’s numbers gathered by Lifeway Christian Resources and leadership is not happy. According to the report, “ the nearly 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention . . . lost more than 105,000 members and 188,000 Sunday worshipers. . . .This marks its sixth straight year of membership decline. ” Numbers don’t lie, but they don’t always  tell the truth.  The good news is that there are probably thousands of individuals who attend Southern Baptist churches each week who are not members, don’t think membership is important, and may never become members of a church although they will be regular attendees.  For a younger generation of believers, membership is not important (despite what the American Express commercial says).  They find the church they like, the one where their friends go, or where they experience spiritual growth and ...

A couple of weeks ago, we received a mailer from a new church start in our community.  Actually, the pastor has been working on this for about four years, but evidently they are moving toward more visibility in the community, thus the mailing. When I went to the church’s web site, I found this paragraph: “We are the first Theologically SBC church in Rutherford County, TN to start with out [sic] “Baptist” in the name and take an interdenominational approach to people.  Every church has core theology that ties them to a denomination.  This directs all the teaching and doctrine of a church, but we refuse to focus on the dogmas [sic] of a denomination!  Jesus is so much bigger than a denomination.” So what’s this all about?  After reading this, I have to ask questions like, “Is this a Baptist congregation or not?” “Did you feel that you had to put this on your web site because you are receiving funds from the state Baptist convention to get started?”...