Prominent Waco church breaks
ties with Southern Baptist Convention
___By Marv Knox
___Editor
___WACO--Seventh & James Baptist Church in Waco has voted to "declare that we are not related to the Southern Baptist Convention."
___The vote, approved 105-2 during a recent church conference, actually was "positive in nature," Pastor Raymond Bailey said. The church expressed its strong identification with four other Baptist groups--Waco Baptist Association, the Baptist General Convention of Texas, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and the Baptist World Alliance.
___"It really was lay-motivated," Bailey said of the initiative. "The SBC had become a source of embarrassment, which consequently had a negative impact on our evangelistic and missions efforts.
___"Each year, it seems, the SBC would come out with some new radical attack. And then people would call us and ask, 'How could you do this?' Then we would have to explain that 'we' are not doing this."
___Bailey cited three examples of "embarrassing" SBC behavior.
___First is the SBC's recent use of the word "targeting" to describe its evangelistic efforts aimed at minority groups, particularly Jews, he said. "This is a most unfortunate choice of words to describe ministries to people who have been subjected to violence throughout history," he explained.
___Second is the 1998 amendment to the Baptist Faith & Message doctrinal statement that called on wives to "graciously submit" to their husbands, he added, noting the broader instruction of Scripture calls for both husbands and wives to mutually submit to each other.
___Third is the change in the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message that insisted women are not to be senior pastors of Baptist churches, based on the idea that women should not have "authority" over men. "This is fallacious at two points," Bailey said, claiming that the SBC's concept of pastoral authority runs counter to the church's understanding that a pastor should be a "servant/guide" of the church and that the notion of suggesting people can tell God whom to call as a pastor is ludicrous.
___In addition, the church long had noted that the SBC systematically excludes members of churches like Seventh & James from service on the boards of the national convention's agencies and institutions.
___"The (SBC's) systematic exclusion of a moderate voice in the appointment of trustees to its various boards and its tendency to adopt policies and confessional statements that deviate from traditional values, we feel, make an association of our church with that body untenable," the motion approved by the church states.
___About a decade ago, Seventh & James discontinued providing funds to the SBC unless they were designated for specific missions causes. The church will continue to honor members' requests to designate their contributions to SBC missions projects, Bailey said.
___The church, which is located adjacent to Baylor University, has associated with the moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship since it was formed, largely in protest against the conservative drift of the SBC, in 1991.
___The church finally decided to state specifically its denominational affiliations, explained Naymond Keithly, chairman of the worship council and a religion professor at Baylor. "We thought ... that we were really just setting the record straight," he told the Waco Tribune-Herald. "We haven't been giving money for almost 10 years, so why not just make a formal statement that's not who we are?"
___Seventh & James considered its action for about six months before the Oct. 18 vote, Bailey said. The church's vote preceded and was unrelated to recent actions by the Baptist General Convention of Texas that reduced funding to the six SBC seminaries and two other SBC agencies, he added.

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