By Nate Adams 

Nate Adams

Though I grew up the son of a pastor and denominational worker, I was in my mid-30’s before I first attended a national Southern Baptist Convention. When the convention came to Indianapolis one year, a friend invited my dad and me to drive over and experience it with him. Though I was a Sunday School teacher and deacon in my church, I have to admit that my first thoughts at his invitation were, “Who cares? Who would want to take the time and spend the money attending what sounds like a large church business meeting?”

In fact, even after attending that first meeting, I came home thinking, “Well, that was kind of interesting, especially the big LifeWay bookstore and the exhibit area. But I don’t think it’s relevant enough to me or my church to go again.”

And so I didn’t, until the North American Mission Board invited me to join the staff there. That was 1997, in Dallas, and when I returned there this year it was for my 22nd consecutive SBC.

I think it’s probably healthy for me to remember that, as an Illinois Baptist layman, I didn’t find the annual SBC meeting particularly relevant, or at least worth the time and expense, until I joined the staff of the NAMB and now IBSA. But that’s when the phrase “who cares” stopped being a question for me, and started being the answer to a different question.

That different question became, simply, “Who decides?” Who decides who our missionaries are, and how our cooperative missions money is spent? Who decides how our national entities are led, and how we will speak to our culture? Who gets to decide Southern Baptist doctrinal positions, and how tomorrow’s pastors are trained?

What I’ve learned over the years is that the person who gets to weigh in on all those important questions and decisions is the person who cares. It’s the person who cares enough to attend the meetings, and to understand and participate in the process. The person who shrugs and asks, “Who cares?” doesn’t. The person who cares does.

Of course, not every person who cares gets his or her way in the process. There were several times during this year’s meeting in Dallas when I couldn’t believe what was being said by a messenger from the floor, or when I even disagreed with what was being said from the platform. At least one of the votes disappointed me.

But now that all is said and done, I look back on the annual meeting of messengers to the 2018 Southern Baptist Convention, and realize that, once again, spirited discussion among Spirit-led believers has resulted in both specific decisions and general direction that are trustworthy, and good stewardship of our shared beliefs and resources, and accountable to the churches.

Somehow the miracle of voluntary, grassroots cooperation by diverse, autonomous churches working together through respectful, democratic processes – led us once again to a place of blessing. And that blessing is the opportunity to do far more together than any individual church can do alone.

To be candid, I occasionally go back to the question form of “Who cares?” and wonder how relevant some of what happens at the national SBC level really is to the life of the average Illinois Baptist church. I’m sure some people ask that same question of their state convention or even local associational meetings. But things are decided at all those meetings that impact the mission of God through all our churches and missionaries.

While I can, I want to be in on those decisions, as one of the people who cares.

Nate Adams is executive director of the Illinois Baptist State Association. Respond at IllinoisBaptist@IBSA.org.

North Carolina pastor J.D. Greear answers questions at a press conference following his election as president of the Southern Baptist Convention. BP photo

Dallas | On a contentious first day, messengers to the 2018 Southern Baptist Convention debated whether Vice President Mike Pence should address the Convention, heard a call for the removal of Southwestern Seminary trustees, debated nominations for SBC trustee boards, and disagreed about a variety of other issues.

But they also came together to elect officers, including J.D. Greear, who was elected SBC president in a landslide victory. The pastor of The Summit Church in Raleigh-Durham received 68.62% of the vote to Ken Hemphill’s 31.19%. The election of Greear, 45, could be perceived as a turn toward a younger generation of Baptist leaders, and the Reformed theology many of them embrace. Greear, however, expressed a different view at a press conference following the election.

“What I don’t think this [election] represents is a passing of the baton where the older generation fades off into the sunset and the new, young generation is in charge,” he said. “We walk forward together.”

Related: The Christian Post reports on J.D. Greear’s 6 priorities for the SBC

Voters in Dallas also approved 16 resolutions and commissioned 79 International Mission Board missionaries to the nations, but only after the major issue of the day—Pence’s planned address Wednesday—had been discussed numerous times on the convention floor.

Garrett Kell a messenger from Del Ray Baptist Church in Alexandria, Va., brought a motion to replace Pence’s address with a time of prayer and reflection. The motion failed, but two other motions made on the floor asked SBC leaders to avoid inviting political figures to address future annual meetings. And Pence’s visit continued to be a source of debate online, in hallway discussions, and at meetings scheduled around the Convention.

Multiple motions also were made to dismiss trustees of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, who terminated President Emeritus Paige Patterson following weeks of controversy over his comments about women and domestic abuse, and his handling of sexual assault allegations at the two SBC seminaries he has led as president. The Committee on Order of Business announced the removal of the trustees would be put to a messenger vote at 2:45 p.m. Wednesday.

Other SBC officers elected include: AB Vines, pastor of New Seasons Church in San Diego, first vice president; Felix Cabrera, pastor of Iglesia Bautista Central Oklahoma City, second vice president; John Yeats, executive director of the Missouri Baptist Convention, recording secretary; and Don Currence, minister of music at First Baptist Church of Ozark, Mo., registration secretary.

Tuesday evening concluded with an International Mission Board sending celebration and a message from evangelist Ravi Zacharias. “It’s a miracle in our times when the finger of God is in all of history,” he preached. “When God moves the masses…when he says, ‘Child of mine you don’t have to go 10,000 miles anymore. They are outside your door.’”

-Lisa Sergent, with reporting from Baptist Press

Patterson withdraws from preaching role; messengers poised to discuss women, leadership in SBC

Southern Baptists will convene in Dallas next week, looking to put several divisive months behind them and unite around the purposes they have in common.

Memphis pastor Steve Gaines is completing his second one-year term as SBC president.

“The past two months have been tough for our convention,” SBC President Steve Gaines told Baptist Press. He referenced high-profile leadership resignations and terminations, which include Executive Committee President Frank Page and Southwestern Seminary President Paige Patterson.

“This shocked us, but it did not shock the Lord,” Gaines said. “I believe God has allowed all of this to happen to drive us to our knees. He is calling us to repent of any sin in our lives and seek His face in humility and faith. And if we will humble ourselves and pray, I believe God will be glorified in and through us as we gather in Dallas.”

Leadership will be a major theme of the June 12-13 meeting, as Baptists elect a new president to follow Gaines. J.D. Greear and Ken Hemphill are the two candidates who have announced their intentions to run. Their election, which echoes the 2016 race in St. Louis between Greear and Gaines, is set for 1:50 p.m. Tuesday.

J.D. Greear and Ken Hemphill will be nominated for SBC president when Baptists convene in Dallas next week.

The annual meeting will also include reports from three SBC entities currently led by interim or outgoing presidents. The Executive Committee’s interim president, Augie Boto, will report Tuesday, while International Mission Board President David Platt, who announced earlier this year he will leave the role to return to the pastorate, will bring his report Wednesday morning.

Southwestern’s report will be of particular interest to those watching the proceedings. Jeffrey Bingham was named interim president after trustees removed Patterson, first naming him president emeritus and then terminating his employment because of comments and actions related to the treatment of women. All six Southern Baptist seminaries will present a unified report Wednesday morning.

Patterson was scheduled to preach the convention sermon until he withdrew from the role June 8. In a letter to the “Southern Baptist Family,” Patterson acknowledged his “poor choice of words…in and out of the pulpit,” but defended himself against allegations that he discouraged the reporting of sexual assaults at the two seminaries where he served as president.

In place of Patterson, Pastor Kie Bowman of Hyde Park Baptist and The Quarries Church in Austin, Texas, will preach the convention message Wednesday morning.

The role of women in the SBC figures to be another major theme at the 2018 annual meeting, which marks the 100^th anniversary of women serving as voting messengers to the convention. Kathy Litton and Suzie Hawkins have submitted a resolution celebrating the milestone, and Midwestern Seminary President Jason Allen has submitted a resolution on “affirming the dignity of women.”

The Illinois Baptist will be in Dallas reporting from the meeting and the SBC Pastors’ Conference, which begins Sunday, June 10. Follow our coverage here at IB2News, at IllinoisBaptist.org, and on Facebook and Twitter.

-Meredith Flynn