SBCOutpost

No. It isn’t falling, but it appears to be in disrepair. Ed Stetzer has come out with Part Two of his analysis on SBC growth trends (or un-growth trends, as the case may be).

The wailing and gnashing of teeth has personally been quite unexpected. I never would have thought that his three-pronged prescription: seek to broaden convention participation, quit fighting so much, and get focused on the gospel, would have been viewed as so much poor medicine. I guess I continue to underestimate the penchant for people to deny what appears to be such clear reality.

I, like Todd, am a little incredulous that people would propose that the SBC has all of a sudden gotten a conscience about church membership or that a significant number of churches have gotten the will to act on that conscience. We’ve tried to address the regenerate church membership issue in our church and I continue to hear objections that “they might come back” or “aren’t we telling them we don’t care about them any more?” Admittedly, I’ve only been here four years and this issue has not necessarily been what I’ve been overly focused on. We’ve had our talks, but I’m not going to shove it down people’s throats. That’s just not how I tend to lead. We’ve been trying to talk more about missions, generosity, the gospel and community impact.

But maybe there are a significant number of churches cleaning up their rolls. Given the convention’s inability to express a positive resolution in favor of such a thing I remain quite skeptical. Let’s not forget that one chairman of the Resolutions Committee actually argued, publicly, that we should keep them on our rolls as prospects. And his argument won the day. This was but two years ago.

Now it appears that Thom Rainer, LifeWay statistician Cliff Tharp and Southern professor Chuck Lawless agree that the trends do not look good. You know where I stand (here, here, here and here).

As Ed says at the end of this second article, “…the fact is that we don’t need to say this is not real. It’s deadly real and has eternal significance. If trends continue, we are entering a period of decline and we need to repent and ask God for His power to change.”

Right you are, Ed. Right you are.

In late February the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma hosted its second Missional Ministry Conference. One of the featured speakers, Ed Stetzer, offered illustration of recent Lifeway Research during a breakout session. During the Q and A he sought to break down some of the technical features of statistical analysis for we average folks. I was left thinking it may be good to include a course in statistics for seminary students - and so we pastors.

I, like many pastors, tend to watch “trends.” For example, one of the trends I have watched over the past five or so years is attendance. Now that is not to imply some kind of weird disinterest in previous years. Instead, I began noticing attendance patterns changing in our church. I will go out on a limb and say ours is not the only church where attendance has “leveled” after a period of growth while we have continued to see additions to our membership over the years. Since we place such an emphasis upon the size of a church in order to imbue another with a sense of honor and prestige it is nigh impossible for we pastor types to leave attendance concerns to someone else. Why, when news breaks about a potential SBC President, it seems we always find mention of the size of church and the kind of growth of said church during the tenure of the “prestigious” pastor. But, I digress.

Growing up in an SBC church meant gauging “regular” attendance by weekly attendance. Over these past five years or so I have found we may need to re-think “regular” attendance. I cannot recall where I read it but it seems that we (SBC) have even adjusted our ruler for “regular” attendance to twice a month, and maybe even monthly. What do these patterns mean? We self-conscious types wonder what we may have done, who we may have neglected, what we have forgotten. After all, when attendance flags the most dreaded description has become, “plateaued or declining.” Yet, I wonder how often that particular category denigrates the work of a local congregation because analysts fail to take into account a host of factors involved in any given local context. When we see the trends we ratchet up our rhetoric and cast about for ways to invigorate and inspire to new heights (read: numbers).

Read the rest of this entry »

Today Ed Stetzer is reporting that, for the first time in our history, the Southern Baptist Convention is in decline in terms of overall membership. We’ve been in decline in baptisms for about seven or so years and now we are seeing that reflected in our membership numbers.

He writes:

…you cannot miss the fact that a dubious historical milestone has been reached—and it needs to be noted in denominational and church offices across the country.

There are three issues Stetzer says we, as a denomination, should address:

1. The absence of young leaders and ethnic leaders in denominational life.
2. Denominational infighting.
3. (most importantly) We’ve lost our focus on the gospel.

Check out Ed’s blog for more details. More commentary to come.

In a recent blog post Tom Ascol opines about the controversial nature of reform movements, remembering that for decades the Conservative Resurgence was, itself, a reform movement. He writes:

My editorial in this issue of the FJ [Founder’s Journal] looks at the “Calvinistic Resurgence” in light of the “Conservative Resurgence” and makes two points. First, the latter did not occur without significant controversy, which makes the makes the castigations against the doctrines of grace and those who believe them as being “controversial” lose their force (especially when they come from the very controversialists who led the charge in the 1st CR). Second, despite all of the good that was done in the 1st CR, by and large, the Southern Baptist Convention is in need of dramatic renewal in our day. Arguably, our churches are worse off today than they were in 1979.

If you want to know why he thinks so, order your copy of the Founder’s Journal today.

Yesterday, Criswell College trustees voted to reject a proposal whereby the Dallas school would be subsumed into Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Developing . . .

Duke University Scholar, Curtis Freeman, has authored a provocative assessment of W.A. Criswell’s “change of heart” in 1968 regarding the issue of racial segregation.

Read the full article here.

(HT: Sam Hodges)

I got a call the other day and was asked, “So why are you writing this series of posts?”

Well. I suppose on one level, as I survey the Southern Baptist landscape, I see some negative trends and I think we ought to own up to them. I think we should try to creatively address them. I’ve been a Southern Baptist since nine months before I was born. I’ve got a lot of life personally invested in the SBC and I’m not particularly fond of the idea of it becoming a shell of what it is now. I tend to be more of a kingdom-focused guy than a denominationally focused guy, but that doesn’t mean that I’m ready to throw the SBC on the trash heap - even though there are those who might like the SBC to throw me on one.

But I don’t have all the answers, either. I hope we can generate some positive discussion about how a re-visioned SBC might look. As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t believe the SBC has a positive vision that is capable of inspiring us to move ahead. We seem to be either stuck in the past (focusing on “Baptist Identity”), or we’re captive to the present (what’s the latest fad/program/novel idea?). I would like for someone to articulate a vision of the future that won’t just inspire a bunch of preachers in a convention hall, but will inspire the people of God known as Southern Baptists and most of what I hear in denominational life is geared more toward short-term inspiration. Whip the crowd into a frenzy for an hour. Read the rest of this entry »

Read it here:  Patterson on his firing from Criswell College, on SNAP, on his “every man ought to own one” comment to the Atlanta paper, and on much, much more.  Over the next few weeks, we will dissect different aspects of this bizarre, convoluted testimony.  For now, just absorb in full the eccentricities of a Southern Baptist leader gone Coo-Coo for Cocoa Puffs.

Patterson Deposition Part-1

Patterson Deposition Part-2

Patterson Deposition Part-3

Patterson Deposition Part-4

Patterson Deposition Part-5

Earlier this week James Galyon posted an interview with Bill Wagner specifically related to his position on missions and Dr. Wagner’s publicly stated position on Calvinism as it relates to missions and evangelism. Dr. Galyon does a fine job in this interview and we link to it as we all continue to consider who might serve as the next President of the SBC.

The state or health of the SBC is not only measured in the number of people who stay away from SBC events but also in what local churches are willing to give to.  The trends, once again, are not good.

I say that trends are not good.  I guess what I mean to say is that trends are not good for the denomination.  It is still possible that those trends are good for the local church and for kingdom work overall.  It sort-of depends. Read the rest of this entry »