Liberals, they just don’t get it

by T. C. Pinckney                                                                                                          Vol. XVII, No. 1, January 2004

I am always amazed that active liberals simply never seem to comprehend why biblical Southern Baptists believe, speak, write, and act as they do. Please note carefully that I am NOT saying these folks are not pleasant people. I am NOT saying they aren’t sincere. I AM saying that they give no evidence in their writings of really understanding what motivates conservatives or even of Baptist polity.

A case in point is the editorial in the December 2003 Baptists Today, journal of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. The editor discusses the issue of homosexuality, launching his comments with the Episcopalian election of practicing homosexual Eugene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire.

After his initial remarks, some of which are well formulated, comes this passage:

“Recently, the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina tossed out a church that simply baptized two men assumed to be gay. It was a fearful overreaction lacking any respect for the congregation’s own right to struggle with this complex issue.

“On the other hand, there is a group trying to pressure the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship into rescinding a hiring policy that prohibits employment of openly practicing homosexuals. To do so would surely lead to the loss of major contributors and ministry partners. ...

“Unless we stop fanning the flames of division, the heat will be so intense that it burns up a lot of ministry fuel and there will be fewer resources and relationships available for carrying out the church’s mission in the future.”

Now note some of the implications of his remarks. First, consider his characterization of North Carolina’s disfellowshipping that church as “a fearful overreaction lacking any respect for the congregation’s own right ...” He seems to proceed from the assumption that the local church is autonomous but that the state convention is not. This is simply wrong. In Baptist life each of our four areas of polity (local church, local association, state convention, and national convention) is autonomous. So, just as the local church has the right to baptize homosexuals, the state convention has the right to remove membership from a church that does so. No one has tried to control the church; it is still free to continue that practice; those men still belong to that church. What the BSCNC did was simply to implement its conviction about the biblical unacceptability of homosexual practice.

Second, look at the reason given for not rescinding the CBF hiring policy: “To do so would surely lead to the loss of major contributors and ministry partners.” No mention is made of God’s commands in the Bible regarding homosexuals. The only value stated is purely pragmatic, the impact of such a decision on dollar income and ministry partners.

Third, that focus on income and relationships is repeated in the last paragraph quoted: “... fewer resources and relationships available for carrying out the church’s mission in the future.” This raises the question, just what is the church’s mission?

Is it maximum income? Is it to be acceptable to as many other organizations as possible? Is it even to have as many practical ministries (health services, food supply, educational assistance, etc.) as possible? No, no, no. Of course we are to have tender hearts for hurting people and to minister to their needs as we can. But our primary duty in obedience to God is to go, tell. And we are to go and tell the full Gospel just as it is expounded to us in the pages of holy Scripture.

What hope can there be for a person or an organization who cannot stand firmly of God’s Word on an issue as cut and dried as homosexual practice? Only that they will eventually be saved.