Battle for the Bible won; time for SBC to return to normal, Chapman says_62804

Posted: 6/25/04

Battle for the Bible won; time for
SBC to return to normal, Chapman says

By Trennis Henderson

Kentucky Western Recorder

INDIANAPOLIS–Celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Southern Baptist Convention's “conservative resurgence,” Morris Chapman declared, “The crusade phase of the conservative resurgence has passed.”

“The battle has been won,” said Chapman, president of the SBC Executive Committee and former convention president. “Southern Baptists have experienced God's miracle of returning us to our biblical roots.

“Now there are other tasks at hand,” Chapman told SBC messengers during his Executive Committee report. “We must not linger at the base camp of biblical authority. We are people not only compelled to believe the book; we are compelled to live the book. Surrender, sacrifice, righteousness and holiness must consume our hearts and minds.”

During his report, Chapman warned that convention leaders “must never cease to be vigilant against heresy.”

Cautioning against both liberalism and hyper-independence, Chapman said: “If Southern Baptists steer too sharply to the right, we will end up on the road of separatism and independence. … If there's ever been a time the devil would like to see the SBC crash and burn, it is now.

“We cannot let this convention be driven by politics,” he added. Chapman urged the convention “to return to some sense of normalcy.”

Otherwise, he said, the SBC could “fall into the error of Pharisaism, … lifeless orthodoxy parading as true faith.”

Recalling his pledge as SBC president to “enlarge the tent” of leadership in Southern Baptist life, Chapman said convention leaders “have never executed to the fullest extent that promise to enlarge the tent.”

While those in trustee positions must be inerrantists, endorse the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message statement and support the Cooperative Program, leadership should be open to those “who listen to God's Spirit, not trustees who are susceptible to politics.”

“Politics does not die easily,” he acknowledged. “The death of politics in a spiritual environment only comes after we die to ourselves.

“We can be both conservative and cooperative,” he insisted. “God is looking for us to change the world and to do it now.”

Among major Executive Committee recommendations, messengers:

— Approved the Annuity Board's name change to GuideStone Financial Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention. The change will require a second vote next year, but the action allows the Annuity Board to use its new name immediately.

— Approved amendments to the Annuity Board's ministry statement that allow it to make retirement and insurance services available to evangelical ministry organizations outside the SBC.

Mitchell Jackson, a messenger from Miner Baptist Church in Sikeston, Mo., expressed concern that the amendments would allow the Annuity Board to serve groups not in sympathy with the SBC. He said some churches affiliated with a breakaway moderate convention in Missouri “literally hate the SBC and want it destroyed but they want the benefit of the Annuity Board.”

Annuity Board President O.S. Hawkins responded, “When the Executive Committee takes issue with certain new state conventions, we don't serve those folks.”

Citing the need to maintain and expand the Annuity Board's asset base, Hawkins said the goal is to “serve the Southern Baptist pastors at the crossroads.”

“We're trying to save an insurance program,” he added, noting that the only way to expand the board's asset base is to expand ministry opportunities.

— Approved a 2004-05 Cooperative Program operating budget of $183.2 million. Major allocations include 50 percent for the SBC International Mission Board, 22.79 percent for the North American Mission Board and 21.64 percent for theological education.

If the budget goal is exceeded, the first $250,000 over budget will be earmarked to fund CP education efforts at the SBC's six seminaries.