Homosexuality: When ‘Discernment’ Leads to Disaster
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| English: Furman University - old campus, Greenville, South Carolina Postcard - cropped (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
The
historic First Baptist Church of Greenville, South Carolina, announced in May
that it would declare itself be “open and welcoming” to all people and that it
would allow same-sex marriage and ordain openly homosexual ministers.
The move came after the church had undergone a “discernment”
process under the leadership of a “LGBT Discernment Team.” That team brought a
report to the church’s deacons, who then forwarded it to the congregation. The
church then approved the statement by standing vote.
The statement is very clear: “In all facets of the life and
ministry of our church, including but not limited to membership, baptism,
ordination, marriage, teaching and committee/organizational leadership, First
Baptist Greenville will not discriminate based on sexual orientation or gender
identity.”
The Greenville News told of the congregation’s discernment
process and then introduced its news story like this:
“Would the
congregation be willing to allow same-sex couples to marry in the
church? To ordain gay ministers? To embrace the complexities of
gender identity? In an evangelical church born in the antebellum South?
Whose founder more than a century and a half ago served as the inaugural
president of the Southern Baptist Convention? Here, in
Greenville? The answer to each was ‘yes.’”
The congregation, now more than 180 years old, is one of the
most historic churches in the South. It participated in the founding of the
Southern Baptist Convention in 1845 and its pastor, William Bullein Johnson,
became the SBC’s first president. The church was largely responsible for the
birth of Furman University and its old “church house” became the first home of
The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1859. Few churches in the South
can match its historical record.
Nevertheless, First Baptist Greenville and the Southern Baptist
Convention had moved in very different theological directions in the last
quarter of the twentieth century. The church was moving steadily in a more
liberal direction and the Southern Baptist Convention was moving to affirm the
inerrancy of Scripture and a far more confessional understanding of its
identity.
The church and the denomination were set on a collision course,
and the congregation voted to withdraw from the Southern Baptist Convention in
1999. If that had not happened, the SBC would have moved to withdraw
fellowship on the basis of the church’s announcement in May. The denomination
has adopted a policy of withdrawing fellowship from any church that affirms or
endorses homosexuality.
By the early 1990s, it was clear that the historic church and
the denomination it helped to establish were operating in different theological
worlds. The Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention met
stiff opposition from many old-line churches like First Baptist Church in
Greenville. The Greenville church included many faculty members from nearby
Furman University, which also separated itself from the South Carolina Baptist
Convention.
The central issue of dispute was the inerrancy of the Bible. The
more liberal faction in the SBC affirmed that the Bible is “authoritative,” but
would not affirm inerrancy. Conservatives focused their arguments on the
necessary affirmation that the Bible is completely without error. Both sides
knew that the issues at stake ranged far beyond inerrancy, but both sides also
knew that inerrancy was the central axis around which all other issues
revolved.
On the masthead of the church’s newsletter announcing the report
of the LGBT Discernment Team, the church states: “We believe in the authority
of the Bible.” But the church’s affirmation of biblical authority did not
constrain it in any way from rejecting the clear teachings of Scripture or from
employing interpretive arguments that relativized the authority of the biblical
text.
Having abandoned and rejected the inerrancy of the Bible, the
congregation has no real means of affirming the authority of Scripture as
anything more than an historic point of reference — inspired in some way and
authoritative to some degree.
This is one of the central lessons now revealed two decades
after the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention had gained
control of the denomination. The moderate-to-liberal faction in the SBC is now
affirming theological and moral positions that the leadership of that movement
would have condemned at the height of the controversy. The old liberal wing of
the SBC is marching steadily left, and the new generation of more liberal
leaders is pushing far beyond where the older leadership of their own movement
would have gone.
Evidence of that is seen in the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship,
a group that broke away from the Southern Baptist Convention in the early
1990s, rejecting the affirmation of biblical inerrancy. On May 9, 1991, the
Cooperative Baptist Fellowship adopted an “Address to the Public” that
explained why the group had separated from the SBC. “Many of our differences
come from a different understanding and interpretation of Holy Scripture,” they
said. “But the difference is not at the point of the inspiration and authority
of the Bible.” They went on to state clearly: “The Bible neither claims nor
reveals inerrancy as a Christian teaching.”
Significantly, the claim that the difference between the SBC and
the CBF was not over the inspiration and authority of Holy Scripture is
undermined by the document as a whole. While the SBC and the CBF may both
affirm the inspiration and authority of the Bible, these are not equivalent
affirmations. If the inerrancy of the Bible is not affirmed, plenary verbal
inspiration is also not affirmed, nor is the authority of Scripture affirmed as
extending to its very words. Moderates in the SBC generally affirmed a
“dynamic” model of biblical inspiration that extends to the ideas of Scripture
rather than to its words. This means that the Bible, when claimed as authority,
is a collection of inspired ideas and that the actual words are not, in
themselves, binding.
That explains how, in one generation, more liberal churches have
reversed themselves on the question of homosexual behavior and relationships.
Just one generation ago, virtually all of the churches now in the CBF clearly
affirmed the sinfulness of homosexuality. Now, many are moving to affirm
same-sex marriage and to ordain gay ministers.
The lesson — once a church or denomination is untethered from
the inerrancy of the Bible, there is no brake on the relativizing effects of
cultural pressure.
Interestingly, one key question now is whether the Cooperative
Baptist Fellowship can survive this transformation intact. A younger generation
of leaders is pressing forward with the full normalization of homosexuality,
acceptance of same-sex marriage, and ordination of gay ministers. The CBF,
however, while embracing many churches that have taken such actions, does not
hire openly-gay staff. In 2000, the CBF National Coordinating Council adopted a
policy that states: “Cooperative Baptist Fellowship does not allow for the
expenditure of funds for organizations or causes that condone, advocate or
affirm homosexual practice. Neither does this CBF organizational value allow
for the purposeful hiring of a staff person or the sending of a missionary who
is a practicing homosexual.”
The CBF is now set on a collision course with its own rising
generation of leaders. They are not going to let that policy stand. How can
they, when they are enthusiastically joining the LGBT revolution?
That 2000 CBF policy, still in effect, dates back to when an
older generation was leading the CBF and it reflects the fact that many of the
churches that were ready to join the CBF in the 1990 were not (yet) ready to
endorse homosexuality. The CBF has no argument against homosexuality on
biblical terms, so it is only a matter of time before it changes its policy.
Even in 2000, the group announced the policy but claimed to take no “position”
on homosexuality itself: “CBF values and respects the autonomy of each
individual and local church to evaluate and make their own decision regarding
social issues like homosexuality.”
Amazingly, a similar claim was made by Jim Dant, the pastor of
First Baptist Greenville. The church announced that it was officially ready to
ordain gay ministers and celebrate same-sex weddings, but the pastor told his
church “we made no decision regarding the issue of homosexuality.”
That is theologically, biblically, morally, and even logically
incoherent. The church most certainly did make a decision regarding
homosexuality. Every single member of that church is now a member of a church
that will accept same-sex couples as members, celebrate gay weddings, and
ordain LGBT ministers. That is making a decision.
The congregation assigned a LGBT Discernment Team, but there is
no evidence that the team made any effort to discern the Scriptures. Instead,
it discerned the congregation itself, determining that “being open and
welcoming to all is a part of the essential nature of our community of faith.”
There are big lessons here for every church, every denomination,
and every Christian institution. Once biblical inerrancy is abandoned, there is
no brake on theological and moral revisionism. The Bible’s authority becomes
relative, and there is no anchor to hold the church to the words of Scripture
and 2,000 years of Christian witness.
The discernment process at First Baptist Church in Greenville
offers us all ample lessons that should lead to a more fundamental discernment:
Without the affirmation that the Bible is inerrant, “discernment” leads to
disaster.
