When two churches in Rome, Ga., withdrew from the Georgia Baptist Convention and joined the Baptist General Association of Virginia (BGAV) earlier this year, some observers said it was the first step on a new path for Baptists. If so, it is prudent to ask where the path leads before journeying too far on this uncharted trail.
John Upton, executive director of the BGAV, described the choice well when he said, “There is no question that church affiliation by affinity rather than geography is an appealing option for many churches seeking the best resources to assist them in ministry.”
That is the choice — affiliation by affinity or affiliation by geography.
Historically, Southern Baptists have based affiliation on geography. Most associations and state conventions follow geographical lines. That pattern was developed when transportation and communication were not as accessible as they are today. Perhaps the strongest contribution of this organizational pattern, besides helping form a sense of identity, was to cause Baptists to find a way to live and work together for the sake of the gospel.
In recent years, geographical organization has begun breaking down. Second state conventions — some would say competing state conventions — were formed in Texas, Virginia and Missouri and are being discussed in other places. These new conventions are based on affinity. Some explain the new conventions as affinity over theology, while others explain them as affinity over polity — how Baptists do business together.
In some places where new associations have sprung up, a church on one side of the street may be in the older, geographically based association and the church on the other side of the street may be in a more recently formed association based on some affinity — usually dissatisfaction with the former.
To many this sounds like a split, something Baptist churches have done with regularity over the centuries. But the new phenomenon is more than a split — it could result in a total reorganization of Baptist life.
Already pastors of Baptist megachurches regularly meet for fellowship and to learn from one another. Some want this meeting to become their association, their supporting peer group. Then there are the pastors of the super-megachurches who have their own regular meetings and see these meetings as their own affinity group.
Some have suggested that traditional county-seat-type First Baptist churches form their own association because of the particular needs and problems of such churches.
But size is only one affinity criteria. Theology is another. Some point to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) as an affinity group based on theology. For some time, the CBF functioned within the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) as an affinity group in its earlier days. Now CBF has declared that it is not a part of the SBC and is a separate national organization.
On the other end of the spectrum is the Founders Group, a strongly Calvinistic organization. Among Baptists, there have been discussions of some churches pulling out of their local associations and forming a new affinity association composed of churches that endorse this particular theological persuasion.
In the last three years, there have been discussions about new associations that would be multi-state in scope and embrace a particular approach to theology and social issues. One such association would have sought members in parts of Alabama. Currently that discussion seems to have died down.
Size, ministries, theology, social issues and even personalities — all are possible ways for Baptists to reorganize along affinity lines. If this happens, Baptists will have given in to their worst selves, in this writer’s judgment. We will have indulged an “it is all about me” attitude and put the value of cooperation on the back burner.
Obviously the needs of a megachurch are different than the needs of a church served by a bivocational pastor. An inner-city church focuses on different ministries than a church in the wealthier suburbs. Such differences must be recognized and addressed by associations and state conventions.
The future should be for associations and state conventions to segment services that recognize and meet different needs, not reorganizing associations and state conventions around our differences. A “one-size-fits-all” approach to programming never worked. It really meant that the one size fit none. Neither is it helpful to try and make churches into a common mold. Churches are different from one another because the people in them are different.
Baptist historian Leon McBeth of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, said of English Separatists (from whom Baptists trace their roots), “From today’s perspective, they look fussy and judgmental, condemning those who differed from them even on minute details, and all too ready to separate from one another … .” Another historian said the Separatists were noted by “schism and bad manners.”
Perhaps disagreeing with one another is part of our Baptist DNA, something we can do nothing about. I certainly hope not. That would be a dark inheritance and a treacherous path to walk.
Much better would be to embrace the value of cooperation, a hallmark of Baptists for most of the last century. This cooperation would be marked by unity in the essentials of belief and charity to one another in all else. Walking this path would allow Baptists to hold each other up as we cooperate in the cause of Christ.
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