Sec 2. Who Are We Southern Baptists

 During the drive towards Independence, Baptists played a vital role as lovers of liberty.  They were patriots in every sense of the word.  After the War of Independence, Baptist John Hart, of New Jersey, was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and represented New Jersey in the First Continental Congress in 1774, and was three times elected as Speaker of the House of Assembly for New Jersey.  John Leland, a Baptist from Virginia, was elected in 1788 to it’s Convention to ratify or reject the Federal Constitution.  He stepped down from this post only to give place to James Madison, who ratified the Constitution.  It was through Baptists, led by John Leland, the first Amendment which gives Freedom of Religion, was passed.(FN 1)

Having become numerous and forming themselves into local associations by the early 1800's, Baptists began serious mission work during the expansion westward and in foreign countries.  A need began to rise of a “sending agency” to promote and order missionary activity.  From this need and the need for fellowship and doctrinal issues, Baptists formed the Triennial Convention meeting in Philadelphia in May 1814.  Although, known as the Triennial Convention, because it met every three years, its original name was “The General Missionary Convention of the Baptist Denomination in the United States for Foreign Missions.”  One can see the attempt by General Baptists and Particular Baptists to unite in order to better do missions here as well as in other countries.  This new Convention immediately formed “The Baptist Board of Foreign Missions for the United States” and Luther Rice was appointed as its first missionary of the board with his first task of continuing to raise monies for sending missionaries into foreign fields.  Adoniram Judson and his wife [Ann (FN 2)] were appointed next at the same convention, to serve in Burma.(FN 3)  In 1817 mission work began in earnest in America.

Although most Baptists churches formed in the South  during the formative years of the Triennial Convention, were Arminian, beliefs began to change because of the First Baptist Church, Charleston, South Carolina (1683).  This church adopted the Philadelphia Baptist Confession shortly after its formation in 1742, and greatly influenced other Baptists churches in the South, and, the Confession “. . . .became the central statement of faith of thousands of Baptist churches in the century that followed.” (FN 4) 

Peace and advancement was short lived among the brethren and disagreement on several issues began to rise.  Northern Baptist, who were predominantly General Baptists, did not want missionaries to work in the westward movement among whites, but to go only to the Indians.  Baptists of the South, predominantly Regular/Particular Baptists) disagreed with the exclusion of settlers.  The Triennial Convention wanted to spend most of its missionary monies among the Indians and curtail foreign mission work.  Baptists of the South disagreed.  Northern Baptists were generally opposed to slavery.  Baptists of the South were generally slave owners, but many Negro’s were members of churches in the South, and mission work among blacks was a major emphasis of Baptists from the South. (FN 5) Alabama Baptists resolved in their 1844 Associational Meeting, that the Triennial Convention avow slave holders would be equally treated with non-slave holders, to all the privileges and benefits of missionary appointment, whereby the Convention excluded slaveholding as an issue for appointment as missionaries.  Yet, the Board of Foreign Missions of the Triennial Convention, flagrantly disobeyed the decision of the Triennial Convention and gave a negative reply to Baptists of Alabama.  It wasn’t until March 1845 that word of their decision was reached in the South.  The Virginia Foreign Mission Society called for delegates to meet in Augusta, Georgia, to discuss what was the best way to promote Foreign Missions and other interests to Baptists in the South.  This they did for five days, and then formed The Southern Baptist Convention and created the Board of Foreign Mission (now the International Mission Board, or the IMB) and the Domestic Mission Board (now the North American Mission Board, or NAMB).(FN 6)  The following is from the preamble of the constitution this convention adopted.

We, the delegates from Missionary Societies, Churches and other religious bodies of the Baptist Denomination, in various parts of the United States, met in Convention, in the city of Augusta, Georgia, for the purpose of carrying into effect the benevolent intentions of our constituents, by organizing a plan for eliciting, combining, and directing the energies of the whole denomination in one sacred effort, for the propagation of the Gospel, . . .(FN 7)

The following September first, S. C. Clopton was appointed as the Foreign Mission Board’s first missionary, appointed to China,(FN 8) beginning what has become the world’s greatest and largest mission enterprise in the world.


 According to the 2008 NAMB report to the SBC, the following report was presented as to the numbers of missionaries Southern Baptists have working in North America.

"NAMB’s missionary count was 5,611 on December 31, 2008. Of this number, 3,739 are missionaries and their spouses operating under various levels of cooperative funding with state conventions and local associations, and another 1,872 are long-term Mission Service Corps missionaries."

"A total of 1,641 high school and college students answered God’s call to summer, sojourner, or semester missions. Semester missionaries made 13,880 gospel presentations resulting in 1,226 professions of faith and 820 rededications. "

"Trained Southern Baptist Disaster Relief volunteers from 42 state conventions spent 118,951 volunteer days and prepared 7,914,391 meals and repaired 12,474 homes/buildings. More than 5,800 new Disaster Relief volunteers were trained in 2008, which brings the total number of trained volunteers to more than 88,800. A total of 3,487 gospel presentations with 448 professions of faith and 61 other decisions were reported."

"World Changers summer mission opportunities saw more than 22,096 participants in 95 projects. PowerPlant, a mission opportunity that mobilizes students in church planting and missions, saw 1,889 participants in 20 projects. Together participants in these ministries made 14,757 presentations of the gospel resulting in 997 recorded professions of faith."

"In 2008, two Strategic Focus Cities emphases: Embrace Baltimore and Vision San Diego, continued to see great results. Embrace Baltimore held 163 evangelistic events and saw 1,267 professions of faith. More than 4,900 volunteers have been mobilized for evangelism from 21 states to help with Embrace Baltimore. Vision San Diego now has 25 church plants in various stages of preparation. More than 6,400 volunteers have served in San Diego."(FN 9)

Doing a count of the above involvement, in 2008, 129,448 Southern Baptists were involved in some kind of mission work outside their own church.  Their witness resulted in 3,999 decisions for Christ, not including those made through the day to day work of those under appointment with NAMB.  This number does not include the many youth groups and building groups which serve all over North America each summer, and other times in the year.

As of July 27, 2009 Southern Baptist have 5,629 missionaries on foreign soil, starting churches and being involved in other missionary enterprises such as meeting Medical needs, Bible Training, World Hunger, Seminaries, and Missionary Support.  There were also, 5,226 volunteers who served short term assignments in foreign countries.  These missionaries saw 565,967 converts baptized; and, 26,970 new churches begun.  The converts and churches reflect the totals from 2007, as the 2008 totals had not yet been tallied at the time of the report.(FN 10)

One might surmise from the above information, although not directly stated or found in my research, that a great deal of the reason our Southern Baptist Convention was started arose out of doctrinal differences between the General Baptists and Regular/Particular Baptists.  How a person is saved, will determine what kind of missionary the sending agency will appoint to represent them on the missionary field.  In his book Advance: A History of Southern Baptist Foreign Missions, Dr. Baker J. Cauthen, past president of the then Foreign Mission Board, gives a revisionist history of the Southern Baptist Convention, indicating that Southern Baptists were more Arminian than Calvinistic/Augustinian in belief’s and practice.(FN 11  He said: “Though the Separates talked a Calvinistic theology, they practiced an Arminian theology.”(FN 12)  Dr. Cauthen was giving his opinion which was not arrived from research, but from his own wish and belief system.  He was following the trend set by E. Y. Mullins forty years prior which became the theological agenda of all the other Seminaries the Southern Baptist Convention began, from that point onwards.

Whereas, missions always have been a major function for Baptists joining themselves into associations, the need for fellowship and doctrinal unity, also, have been common denominators.  Associations as early as the Sandy Creek Association, formed in 1758, were begun to “impart stability, regularity, and uniformity to the whole. (FN 13) As early as 1650 in Wales, Particular Baptist saw their responsibility to include control over doctrines and practices of churches which belonged to its fellowship.(FN 14)  At first, these associations included all churches within their colony and later states.  When churches became more numerous, associations were formed in more local and accessible areas, but joining together to form state fellowships which later became state conventions.  Actually, national bodies arose before state bodies, but after 1845, state conventions began playing a vital part of Baptist life. 

Much has been made of the slavery issue.  Regular Baptists, at the time of the Southern Baptist Convention’s beginning, never excluded slaves from being members of their churches, nor did they refuse to send them out as missionaries.  Two former slaves were appointed in 1815 as missionaries to the black people around Richmond, Virginia.  In  1824, they and their families were appointed as foreign missionaries by the Baptist General Convention of the United States (The Triennial Convention) to be the first foreign missionaries appointed from the South to Africa.(FN 15)  When the Southern Baptist Convention formed the Board of Foreign Missions, and on subsequent meetings of this board in May and June, 1845, they assumed responsibility for these families and others, support.(FN 16)

In the Annual, reported by the new Southern Baptist Convention in 1845, it is recorded that this new convention of Baptists began “to promote Foreign and Domestic Missions, and other important objects connected with the Redeemer’s kingdom. . . .”(FN 17)  We must never forget nor slack our pace of involvement in carrying out this aspect of our Convention; rather, we must accentuate it with an Acts 1:8 attitude and participation.  Never let it be said of historical Regular Baptist churches that we do not believe in missions and evangelism.

Some of the early great Southern Baptist Statesmen, Missionaries and Important Persons of our Convention are as follows:

1. William B. Johnson (1782-1862) was president of the South Carolina convention, who proposed a new convention in the spring of 1845.  He was elected the first President of the Southern Baptist Convention.
2. John Lewis (1814-1863) and Henrietta Hall (1814-1844) Shuck were the first Baptist missionary to China appointed by the Southern Baptist Convention in 1845.
3. Lott Cary (1780-1828), a freed slave, appointed to Liberia in 1821 by the Triennial Convention.  Support was assumed by the Southern Baptist Convention in 1845.
4. James P. Boyce, guiding spirit of the founding of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1859 and its first President.(FN 18)
5. John Albert Broadus (1827-1895), Southern Baptist denominational leader and one of Southern Seminary’s founders and professor.
6. Benajah Harvey Carroll (1843-1914), pastor First Baptist Church, Waco, Texas and professor of theology at Baylor for 32 years.  He was the organizer of Southwestern Baptist Seminary which started at Baylor University, and later moved to Fort Worth, Texas around 1910.
7. Annie Armstrong (1850-1912), one of the founders of Woman’s Missionary Union and its first corresponding secretary, and is the name sake for the their annual Home Missions offering..
8. Lottie Moon (1840-1912), appointed missionary for forty years to China.  Is the name sake for the Woman’s Missionary Union’s annual Christmas offering for Foreign Missions.
9. George W. Truett (1867-1944), long time pastor of First Baptist Church, Dallas, Texas.(FN 19)

Edgar Young Mullins (1860-1928), became President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1899 – 1928.  One of the major reasons he was so influential was because of what he called the Axioms of Religion.  They are:
1. Theological: the holy and loving God has a right to be sovereign;
2. Religious: all men have an equal right of access to God;
3. Ecclesiastical: all believers have a right to equal privilege in the church;
4. Moral: to be responsible, the soul must be free;
5. Religio-civic: a free church in a free state;
6. Social: love your neighbor as yourself.(FN 20 )

Axioms two and four are where those who feel Mullins went wrong and began leading the Southern Baptist Convention down the slippery slope of liberalism.  In turn, all six Southern Baptist Seminaries began giving themselves to his axioms, and for the next fifty plus years liberalism became the theological trend within our Convention.  Remember, the influence of Arminianism was still strong in those early days, and there were those who truly felt they had the right to change the direction the Convention was going.

In 1975, led by a coalition of strong conservatives, our Convention began to turn around.  The strong leaders were: Judge Paul Pressler of Houston; Paige Patterson (1942), then of Criswell Bible Institute and now President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary; Adrian Rogers  (1931-2005), pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church, Memphis, Tennessee, and first president elected in 1979 by the conservatives; James T. Draper (1935), then pastor of First Baptist Church, Euless, Texas, and later president of LifeWay (formerly, The Sunday School Board, of SBC); Morris Chapman (1941), then pastor of First Baptist Church, Wichita Falls, Texas.  Now president of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee and it’s Chief Executive Officer; and a host of others too many to list, but who have contributed greatly to conservative Baptist principles and beliefs.  Yet, Arminianism hangs on.

SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION TODAY

Controversy does seem the way of Baptists.  Yet, it is not because we are Baptists.  Controversy always exists when people have strong feelings about what they believe.  Some of the controversy stems today because of generational ideas.  Young ministers today feel like most young people of today, that they know as much and have as much right as the older leaders to take over and change things the way that suits them.  Change, like that initiated in 1979, becomes expected with little respect for the hard fought battles which have been won.  Many young pastors today want nothing of the Baptist name in their church name.  Many are not following polity upon which our Convention was formed.  Dr. John Bisagno published Inside Information, 2008, where he lists eleven things he says are tearing our Convention apart.(FN 21)  I mention this simply to note that there are differences of opinions within our Convention about which many people feel strongly; and, other differences theologically, in which we should not be differing.  But, until the Lord Jesus comes and gathers us to be home with Him, I’m sure they will be around.  What I wish could be the rule of our Faith, would be that those who want to differ from the historical theological foundation of our Southern Baptist Convention, would either find a denomination that believes as they, or start one just as Southern Baptists did in 1845.

Our Convention today does not look like it did in 1845, structurally.  Then, we had the Board of Foreign Mission(now the International Mission Board, or the IMB) and the Domestic Mission Board (now the North American Mission Board, or NAMB).  Yet, the framers of the Convention stated:

"Article V, . . .The Convention shall elect. . . .as many Boards of managers, as in its judgment will be necessary for carrying out the benevolent objects it may determine to promote, all which boards shall continue in office until a new election. . . . To each Board shall be committed, during the recess of the Convention, the entire management of all the affairs relating to the object with whose interest it shall be charged."(FN 22)

And from that time until now, the Convention has changed to meet the needs of the largest Protestant denomination in the world.

We are a convention of churches.  There is no Southern Baptist Church.  In other words, we are not like any other religious denomination.  Every church is free from all other Baptist entities, and all conventions, associations, and other Baptists bodies are also free.  Free, meaning, no church, convention, association, or other entity can tell any other body what to do.  We voluntarily associate ourselves in order to do greater work for the Kingdom of our Lord.  Freely associating, today our Convention structure is as listed below.

• The Local Church: Every church is autonomous; that is to say, self-governing.  No higher authority rests upon the local church other than that of the Lord Jesus Christ and His wishes made known through His inspired Word.  Local churches can join themselves into what is known as associations, state conventions, national conventions, and world-wide conventions; yet, they can not be dictated to by these groups.  Many times you will see this pictured with a church building in the center and all other entities radiating outward from it.

• Baptist Association: Today, the Association exists to aid churches in carrying out the great commission; encouraging the churches in fellowship; disseminating information from the state and national conventions; and many other things that are asked of it by the churches.  Associations are, also, autonomous.

• State Conventions: From the beginning, state-wide/area conventions played a huge role in the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention.  Today, they are not quite so involved in the process of SBC decision making.  That is because of the autonomous nature of the local churches.  However, state conventions do have great import in the handling of and disseminating of information and monies which are returned to them by agencies of the SBC.  State Conventions are autonomous, also.The Southern Baptist Convention: As with the Association and State Conventions, the whole purpose of the SBC is to aid churches in carrying out its mission of proclaiming the gospel to all the world.  Being by far the largest of the bodies, it aids churches in numerous ways;

• Executive Committee of the SBC—was begun in 1917, 72 years after the formation of the Convention to enable the Convention to carry out the wishes and decisions of the churches which met in the previous years , in the interim.  The Convention elects the members each year at the annual Convention and they serve as the Convention out of session.

General Boards :

1. GuideStone Financial Resources: Begun as the Annuity Board in 1918, it was started to assist churches in caring for the retirement needs of ministers.  Today, it provides services to pastors in the area of retirement management, health/life insurance, and other retirement services of SBC employees and pastors.
2. International Mission Board (IMB)—founded in 1845 it has changed its name several times, but its major purpose is to send missionaries from local churches to overseas missions work.
3. LifeWay—began in 1891 to meet the needs of the churches with helps in teaching the Bible and in church development material, and leadership training.  It is located in Nashville, Tennessee, where it has undergone several name churches through the years.
4. North American Mission Board (NAMB)—along with the IMB it was founded in 1845 mainly to aid the starting of churches in the Western frontier and the sending of missionaries from local churches to the American Indians.

Institutions:

1. Southern Seminary (1859), Louisville, Kentucky, was started to meet the need of educating pastors in practical and theological education.
2. Southwestern Seminary (1908), Fort Worth, Texas, is the largest of the SBC seminaries and was the first to offer degrees other than in the field of theology.
3. New Orleans Seminary (1917), New Orleans, Louisiana, was begun to meet the needs of churches in the lower South and to train ministers in reaching the French/Catholics of America.
4. Golden Gate Seminary (1944), Mill Valley, California, was begun to train pastors in the far West.
5. Southeastern Seminary (1951) Wake Forest, North Carolina, started to train ministers in the area east of the Smoky Mountains.
6. Midwestern Seminary (1957), Kansas City, Missouri, the youngest of the SBC seminaries, it was begun to train pastors and ministers in the nation’s Midwest.
7. Southern Baptist Historical Library and Archives created in 1985 to collect historical data for their preservation and today its information is being automated to the world wide web making its acquisitions available to more people and for better use.

Commission:

The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission begun in 1939 as the Public Affairs
        Committee, it now lists its responsibilities as: awakening, informing, energizing,
        equipping, and mobilizing Christians to be the catalysts for the biblically based
        transformation of their families, churches, communities, and the nation.

Associated Organization:
Woman’s Missionary Union begun in 1888, it exists as an auxiliary to the Convention in 
         providing Mission Education and support for both the North American Mission Board and
         International Mission Board.(FN 23) 

As Southern Baptists stay people of the Bible, the appearance of our organization will most likely change.  To some this is good, but to others it is not tolerated so well.  Change in its self is not wrong, nor is it right.  Yet, our Lord is all about change.  He is the great change agent in our lives.  As long as we do not allow the world to change us, we are on safe ground.  If and when we allow the world to sway the Biblical Truths upon which our Faith was begun, then we cease to be what we were and become part of the world’s system of beliefs, attitudes, and actions.  Methods do change, and most are welcomed by younger generations.  Yet, we must not follow the old adage of “the means justify the end” mentality.

OUR BELIEFS

Baptist churches are as different as the people within their membership.  It is very difficult to say what Baptists beliefs really are, because, we do not have a formal catechism.  That is why while in Convention, the majority of churches have said regarding the Baptist Faith and Message, these are our beliefs.  So, we will use this statement of faith as the catalyst for our discussion on our beliefs.

The Baptist Faith and Message was first adopted in 1925 to answer A pervasive anti-supernaturalism in the culture.(FN 24)  Basically, this was the New Hampshire Confession of Faith revised with additions to speak to needs Southern Baptists had at this time.  In 1963 the Convention revised their confession of faith to address the authority and truthfulness of the Bible.  Again, in 1998, the area of the Family was addressed.  In presenting the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message report, which was adopted, it lists five guidelines the Convention in 1924 were given.  The following are given below , because they are important to the principle of the autonomous nature of Baptist bodies, including the local church:

1. That they constitute a consensus of opinion of some Baptist body, large or small, for the general instruction and guidance of our own people and others concerning those articles of the Christian faith which are most surely held among us.  They are not intended to add anything to the simple conditions of salvation revealed in the New Testament, viz., repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord.
2. That we do not regard them as complete statements of our faith, having any quality of finality or infallibility.  As in the past so in the future, Baptists should hold themselves free to revise their statements of faith as may seem to them wise and expedient at any time.
3. That any group of Baptists, large or small, have the inherent right to draw up for themselves and publish to the world a confession of their faith whenever they may think it advisable to do so.
4. That the sole authority for faith and practice among Baptists is the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.  Confessions are only guides in interpretation, having no authority over the conscience.
5. That they are statements of religious convictions, drawn from the Scriptures, and are not to be used to hamper freedom of thought or investigation in other realms of life.(FN 25)

In meeting the requests of the 1999 Convention, the Study Committee said: we have been charged to address the “certain needs” of our own generation.  In an age increasingly hostile to Christian truth, our challenge is to express the truth as revealed in Scripture, and to bear witness to Jesus Christ, who is “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”(FN 26)

The Baptist Faith and Message