Declaring “our total opposition to the … consuming of alcoholic beverages,” Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) messengers adopted a resolution on the issue June 14.
Messengers adopted 15 resolutions presented by the SBC Resolutions Committee on issues ranging from genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan to “human species-altering technologies.” But the resolution on alcohol was the only one to spark extended debate.
Benjamin Cole of Dallas cautioned that abstinence is “not an essential for unity and not an essential for the proclamation of the gospel.”
Committee member Dwayne Mercer countered that Southern Baptists “have always stood for total abstinence.”
Warning that some believers advocate drinking alcohol “under the guise of freedom in Christ,” Mercer said committee members “feel that the SBC ought to address this and be aware of what is going on all across America.”
Citing Proverbs 23:29–35, the resolution noted that “years of research confirm biblical warnings that alcohol use leads to physical, mental, and emotional damage.”
A proposal on “engaging the direction of the public school system” drew brief discussion.
Voicing concern about public schools teaching “dogmatic Darwinism” and acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle amid a pervasive “humanistic and secular orientation,” the resolution urges churches to solicit members to seek election to their local school boards and exert “their godly influence upon these school systems.” The measure also affirms “the hundreds of thousands of Christian men and women who teach in our public schools” and encourages young people “who are seriously considering the teaching profession as a possible calling of God to pursue that calling.”
Messengers also adopted resolutions about:
• Marriage amendment,
• Nomination and confirmation of federal judges,
• China’s treatment of North Korean refugees,
• Conflict in Sudan,
• Illegal immigration crisis,
• Human species-altering technologies,
• Environmentalism,
• Off-campus biblical teaching,
• Bivocational, volunteer and part-time ministers,
• Appreciation for disaster relief workers in the wake of hurricanes Katrina and Rita,
• Praying for President George W. Bush and the U.S. military,
• LifeWay Ridgecrest Conference Center’s upcoming 100th anniversary, and
• Appreciation for the people of Greensboro.
In other action, messengers rejected an appeal by Tom Ascol to consider his proposed resolution on integrity in church membership. The vote came after the Resolutions Committee declined to act on his proposal, which affirmed the practice of church discipline.
Messengers also rejected a request to consider a resolution on prayer for and support of Israel. Committee Chairman T.C. “Tommy” French explained that the committee opted not to take action on the proposal because the convention had addressed the issue in 2002.
The committee also declined to recommend proposed resolutions addressing Baptist dissent, the SBC’s support for what the person who submitted the resolution called “the unjust war in Iraq,” a call for an external financial audit of the International Mission Board’s (IMB) Central Asia region, the IMB’s adopted policies on baptism and private prayer language, doctrinal parameters of cooperation and the exercise of religious freedom and freedom of speech “to make America a better place.”
To read the full text of the resolutions adopted during the SBC annual meeting, visit www.thealabamabaptist.org. (Editors’ Network)
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