‘That We May Be One’

The most important meetings that took place during the time the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) held its annual meeting in Houston, June 11–12 may not have taken place inside the meeting hall. The most important meetings may have been those sponsored by various parachurch networks that congregate around the SBC. 

Inside the meeting hall SBC officials gallantly tried to emphasize traditional SBC values such as cooperation and partnership along with evangelism and missions. International Mission Board President Tom Elliff told messengers “We used to pride ourselves on cooperation. Now it seems we have lost it and we need to recover it.” 

During the SBC Executive Committee (EC) report church planters and others told their stories about how God had blessed working through Southern Baptist partnerships to plant churches in underserved areas. 

Repeatedly messengers prayed for these workers, emphasizing that cooperation and partnership help all Southern Baptists be a part of the evangelism and missions efforts of Baptists in the United States and around the world. 

Richard Land, outgoing president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), stressed how ERLC has partnered with national Woman’s Missionary Union to provide tools to fight the spreading plague of pornography that is invading churches and destroying families. ERLC brought its information about the impact of this moral evil, and WMU provided a distribution network unmatched in SBC life.

Over and over again, SBC leaders emphasized the value of cooperation and partnership to do missions and evangelism. Even the theme Revive Us That We May Be One stressed that point.

This annual meeting was not about personalities. SBC President Fred Luter, pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church, New Orleans, was re-elected without opposition. There was only one candidate for first vice president and only two for second vice president. And no one seemed to be campaigning to succeed Luter when the convention gathers next year in Baltimore.  

Nor were activities in the convention hall about politics — sacred or secular. Yes the messengers adopted resolutions dealing with numerous social issues now in the public square, but the tone of the resolutions was civil.

Messengers clearly stated their differences with certain policies and positions but there was no condemnation of political leaders, political parties or other Christian groups. Voices from the stage were not angry or strident. Nor did the resolutions claim that Baptists alone have a monopoly on truth. 

Indeed Russell Moore, the new president of ERLC, said, “We fight against demons. We do not demonize our opponents.” 

Inside the meeting hall, the focus was on the program Baptists do together: on planting churches in North America; on taking the gospel message to unreached people groups around the world; on training a new generation to serve as pastors, missionaries and other Christian vocations; on providing valuable literature, study guides and training resources for church members; on helping people live out their call to missions in family life and in all other relationships; on bringing Christian values to bear on issues of society. 

The value of the national convention was reaffirmed in one of the parachurch meetings. In response to a question about why we have a denomination of churches at all, David Platt, pastor of The Church at Brook Hills, Birmingham, responded, “We would be fools not to take advantage of what we have been given.” He went on to explain that Southern Baptists sometimes lose sight of the valuable resources available to them through convention life.

Southern Baptists have resources that most Christian bodies do not have, he pointed out. 

At another parachurch meeting earlier that day, the primary topic was “Truth, Trust and Testimony in a Time of Tension,” the report released in May by the Calvinism Advisory Committee appointed by EC President Frank Page to advise him as he works with Baptists of both stripes. 

At the meeting, some pastors with Calvinistic leanings noted they were not sure they wanted to cooperate with non-Calvinists. It took the prodding of acknowledged SBC Calvinistic leaders Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., and Danny Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., to move the meeting toward cooperation. Both seminary presidents acknowledged they have differences with others in the SBC but plan to cooperate as Baptists have done through the years. 

Without this kind of leadership it is questionable if the study committee report would have been given opportunity to succeed. And there are still many on both sides of the question who are not sure it will work.

In these ways, the parachurch meetings were helpful to what took place on the convention floor. 

Unfortunately when the conversation turned to state conventions, the responses were not as positive. Participants were told if they had to choose between participating with a state convention or the national body, to choose the national. The issues are more important and the decisions more far reaching with the national convention, panelists said. 

Using his home state of North Carolina as an example, Akin said the state was becoming more supportive of the national convention. “As long as they are headed in the right direction, I am there but if they ever stop, I am gone,” he declared. 

One state convention executive director who sat in on this meeting commented, “I thought I was a part of the team until this meeting.” Evidently for some, cooperation and partnership means doing things one way — their way. That is unfortunate.

It is equally unfortunate when one “partner” on the SBC team publicly questions the value, contributions or directions of other team members. Such actions seem in direct opposition to the goal “that we all may be one.” 

Southern Baptist partners include local churches, associations, state conventions and the national body. Each fulfills an important role. Appreciation and support for the role and contributions of each partner helps build cooperation and strengthen the partnership.

The annual meeting of the SBC itself was a positive, uplifting meeting. It was refreshing to focus primarily on the program Baptists do together through cooperation and partnership. But a question lingers about the roles of parachurch groups that follow the annual meeting. How much are these groups using the SBC to promote their own agendas and how much are group leaders using these networks and organizations to advance their own goals? 

Cooperation and partnership are important Southern Baptist values. We do our best for the cause of missions and evangelism when we encourage working together in sharing the message of Jesus Christ. Perhaps that is why Jesus prayed that His children “may be one” (John 17:31).