WASHINGTON (BP)–Why should Southern Baptists care about the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship?
That was the question bouncing around my mind after spending three days in Washington, D.C., attending the CBF’s General Assembly as a correspondent for Baptist Press.
With all of the responsibilities I have in life as a husband, pastor, student and employee, it seems like I have enough to occupy my time without worrying about a group of moderate Baptists with which I am not even affiliated. And with all of your responsibilities in life, it may seem at first glance like reading about such a group of moderate Baptists is not the best use of your time.
But if you think Southern Baptists have no need to think about the CBF, I urge you to reconsider. There are at least two important reasons why Southern Baptists should take note of what our moderate counterparts are doing.
First, for younger Southern Baptists like myself, the CBF should cause us to give thanks to God for the SBC’s conservative resurgence.
Though many Southern Baptists remember vividly the battles over inerrancy, I had not yet been born in 1979 when the resurgence began. And by the time I first became aware of SBC politics, the battle had already been won. For those of my generation, it is easy to view the conservative resurgence as something in the past that does not have any relation to life now.
But a trip to the CBF can change that mindset quickly. The list of speakers at the General Assembly reads like a who’s who of what might have been in the SBC if not for the conservative resurgence. CBF executive coordinator Daniel Vestal would have been elected SBC president in 1990 had conservatives not voted for Morris H. Chapman. CBF speakers Bill Leonard, Frank Tupper and Glenn Hinson all could have been my professors at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary had not conservatives turned the school around.
The contrast is striking between the shallow refrain of freedom from confessional boundaries sounded at the CBF and the white-hot passion for orthodoxy I hear from SBC leaders and my own seminary professors on a daily basis. For younger Southern Baptists, noting what’s said at the CBF should make us aware of the debt of gratitude we owe our conservative leaders — because things could have been otherwise.
Second, observing the CBF should call us to unity as a convention.
At a time of some disunity in the SBC over questions of private prayer languages, missionary baptism guidelines and Calvinism, the CBF reminds us that we have something worth unifying around.
One of the saddest moments during the entire General Assembly was when the Lord’s Supper was served at a joint worship service involving the CBF and the American Baptist Churches USA. No one at the service ever explained the meaning of the Supper or who should take it. In fact, during the entire General Assembly I never heard anyone celebrate the Gospel or express passion about the glory of God displayed in Christ. The Lord’s Supper seemed only to be a generic symbol of Christian unity rather than a remembrance of the glorious salvation we have in Jesus.
So I let the elements pass by, discouraged that Fellowship Baptists only celebrated unity abstractly without articulating a solid doctrinal foundation for that unity.
That sad celebration made me think of how much we have that’s worth unifying around in the SBC. We share the conviction that the Scriptures are totally true and without error, a belief in the Gospel as the only way anyone can be saved and a Baptist Faith & Message that unashamedly articulates our central convictions.
Even with all our disagreements, Southern Baptists have substantive convictions worth unifying around. Seeing unity without substance should be a vivid reminder that we must take full advantage of the opportunity to unify with those who share our most valued convictions.
If you think the CBF is not worth thinking about, think again. Taking a little time to see what Southern Baptists could have been might help you celebrate and unify around what we are.
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David Roach is pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Ky., and a Ph.D. student at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.
