Private Prayer language policy, cont'd: Pulling Back the Curtain on Southern Baptist Convention's Power Politics

[Harold Schiffman]

Thursday, April 10, 2008
Pulling Back the Curtain on SBC Power Politics

 The International Mission Board convened this week in the Dallas/Fort
Worth area for a trustee meeting. The Chairman of the Board for the
past two years has been Dr. John Floyd, an administrator at
Mid-America Seminary. Dr. Floyd was Chairman of the IMB Personnel
Committee that introduced the policy changes for missionary candidates
regarding baptism and a private prayer language, and he often publicly
chided me for my blog. I felt I was keeping the Southern Baptist
Convention informed of events occuring at the IMB, but obviously, he
and others viewed it differently. Dr. Floyd believes that ministry
matters involving the IMB should be dealt with behind closed doors,
and the Southern Baptist Convention at large should not be informed of
issues being dealt with by the board until after decisions have
already been made. The notion that a blog would inform the Southern
Baptist Convention as a whole of the issues, and the debate
surrounding them, was anathema to certain trustees. One such trustee.
a member of Dr. Floyd's generation, publicly informed the full board
that she believed blogging was like 'internet porn,' an obvious
indication she had never seen either.

The International Mission Board has been tightly and secretively
controlled by a handful of trustees over the past few years, and the
politics of getting additional like-minded trustees appointed to the
IMB and elected to board leadership was often more manipulative than
national politics. It is not widely known that the real control of the
Southern Baptist Convention is not through the President of the SBC,
but through the trustees who control the boards. I served six months
on the International Mission Board of trustees (June 2005 - December
2006) before I ever began to blog. The reason I began to blog is
because I saw trustees who were undermining the leadership and vision
of the President of the International Mission Board, using power and
control to silence dissent on the board, unfairly marginalizing those
who dared to disagree, and ultimately attempting to remove anyone from
staff positions or trustee positions that they could not control.

I'll give you one example. When trustee leadership, led by Dr. John
Floyd, began to propose that new policies on private prayer language
and baptism were needed, Dr. Rankin expressed his belief, in writing,
that if the proposed policies being pushed by Dr. Floyd and his
Personnel Committee were actually implemented they would be
"detrimental to the unity and focus of the board." Dr. Rankin wrote a
nine page letter on April 28, 2005 articulating his concerns and
showing, point by point, why the proposed policies would create
unnecessary difficulties for the Board. Dr. Rankin requested
assurances that his letter be given 'appropriate consideration" and
that his concerns "be communicated (to the board) constructively."

I do not know if Dr. Rankin was ever given any assurances, but his
requests were not granted. I and other trustees did not find out about
the President's letter till the fall of 2005, six months after it had
been written, and it took a motion from this 'rookie' trustee (as Dr.
Tom Hatley called me), to get the letter before the Board before the
vote on the policies. My recommendation for the trustees to see the
letter, a recommendation opposed by trustee leadership, barely passed
during a lunch meeting of the full board, and when it did, we were
told that we would be given the letter several hours later, after
trustee leadership had an opportunity to prepare it for distribution.
We did get the letter several hours later, with hand written notes
from Dr. John Floyd scribbled all over it. Dr. Rankin's letter may be
viewed here, exactly as we trustees received it, with Dr. Floyd's
handwritten notes penned in the margins.

The notes that Dr. Floyd wrote speak for themselves. It illustrates
the very thing I have said has been taking place for the past few
years in the IMB and the Southern Baptist Convention as a whole.
Ideological like-minded Southern Baptists are attempting to
marginalize, and in some instances remove, those who disagree. To call
the arguments and conclusions of the President of the IMB
"ridiculous," "unscriptural," "illogical," and the like, is
unconscionable conduct, particularly considering the timing of the
release of the letter (right before a vote by the board on the
policies).

I have a question. What is the difference between a blog that sways
SBC opinion after the adoption of a policy, and Dr. Floyd who used his
position to keep from the board of trustees valuable information in a
letter from the President, only to release it when forced to do so,
and then with handwritten criticisms all over the letter? The old way
of keeping control by limiting the flow of information, stifling
dissent, and ridiculing those who disagree is over. The Southern
Baptist Convention needs and demands transparency, the free flow of
information, the ability to dissent, and cooperation in the midst of
differences on tertiary issues.

Our convention of cooperating churches is harmed over demands for a
uniform, homogenous Baptist identity that some seek. In addition,
agencies are harmed when there is never any true debate allowed among
the trustees. To act as if God is only on one side of an issue, and it
is 'our side,' is the heighth of spiritual arrogance. Unhindered and
transparent debate keeps all Southern Baptists humble and honest.
Southern Baptists better realize that the power of the gospel must not
be replaced by the power politics of a Baptist identity religion.

Finally, I believe the letter above proves that the reason some don't
like blogs is because they lose control of the both the amount and
kind of information they wish released. The IMB President desired his
letter to be communicated widely. Southern Baptists operate CHRISTIAN
ministries, and Rankin's request for open communication is the mark of
genuine, Christ-like leadership. The ability to debate issues among
Southern Baptists with civility, cooperate with brothers holding to
divergent views, and keep our focus on the gospel is the need of the
hour. Hopefully, the new IMB Chairman, Paul Chitwood from Kentucky,
will help the board keep the focus on the mission and purpose of the
IMB and not digress into narrowing the doctrinal parameters of
participation by adopting policies that exceed the BFM.

John 12:42 said that of the many who believed on Christ some "did not
confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue." It is high
time Southern Baptists become more concerned about cooperative
missions than we are our fear of being branded or removed from
denominational service by leaders who wish to define Baptist identity
according to their narrow beliefs. In time, the SBC will be better
because the pastors and churches who support her Cooperative Program
speak up and speak out for cooperation and not against it.

In His Grace,


Wade

http://kerussocharis.blogspot.com/2008/04/pulling-back-curtain-on-sbc-power.html
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