Asking Southern Baptist missionaries who serve with the International Mission Board to affirm that their work and personal convictions are compatible with what their sponsoring denomination believes has been an interesting process. It was not unexpected that many among our Southern Baptist constituency who do not agree with the leadership and conservative direction of the Southern Baptist Convention—as well as those who are in disagreement with the faith statement itself—would disagree with this initiative.

However, reflection upon the negative response from individuals and the media over the past year has revealed that an alarming number of Southern Baptists have succumbed to the subtle influence of postmodern thinking and theological compromise. Many are offended that denominational workers would be expected to adhere to any defined commonality of faith. It is evident the precious doctrine of individual priesthood of believers is being distorted to justify whatever arises out of self-centered, independent thought, regardless of explicit biblical teaching to the contrary.

Criticism of the Baptist Faith and Message and accusations of enforced creedalism indicate that many have lost any understanding of what it means to be a confessional people. For more than 400 years, Baptists have been expressing their distinctive stance on social issues and doctrinal positions in drafting confessions of faith—and they will continue to do so.

Theological truth is absolute, so theology does not change, but as long as the world and society change it will be necessary for churches and denominations to express where they stand and what they believe the Scripture teaches on contemporary issues, if they are to maintain their distinctives and be salt and light witnesses in the world.

When many diverse denominations and cultic groups claim to base what they believe and practice on their interpretation of the Bible, it is essential that Southern Baptists express what they believe and where they stand in a commonality of convictions and faith. The London Confession in 1644 was written in response to the Westminster Confession to clarify who Baptists were in contrast to the Reformed tradition, both of which claimed the Bible as their authority for faith and practice. Rising ecumenism and Darwinism in the early 20th century precipitated the drafting of the original 1925 Southern Baptist statement, and the 1963 revision emerged almost 40 years later in reaction to the assaults upon the authority and truthfulness of the Bible.

While dismissing the BF&M as a creed, critics likewise demean it for supposedly attempting to change Southern Baptist beliefs. In reality, the 2000 BF&M has not changed any beliefs at all. Recent revisions have simply spoken to contemporary issues by confessing what the Bible has always taught—and Southern Baptists have always believed and practiced—about the role of pastoral leadership, the spiritual order of the home and to affirm that the entire Bible is the inspired, infallible Word of God, not just that spoken by and with reference to Jesus, all of which have been under attack by postmodern thinking.

Being a confessional people doesn’t contradict in any way the Bible as the sole authority of faith and practice nor an individual’s freedom to interpret Scripture as led by the Holy Spirit. Anyone can believe what they choose. No one has to be a Southern Baptist. But those who are Southern Baptists have the collective prerogative of determining, under God’s leadership, what they commonly hold as the teaching of God’s inerrant and infallible Word.

In reaction to the Baptist Faith and Message, many proclaim their conviction that the Bible is their only authority, but then refuse to be accountable for believing and practicing its specific and explicit teachings! A creed is simply a statement of what an individual or group believes. Perhaps the reason creeds are spoken of with such disdain is that so many, typical of postmodern thought, really do not believe anything as absolute truth anymore.

An extremely alarming trend is that many detractors of a statement of faith espouse the priesthood of the believers and autonomy of churches as the hallmarks of Baptist belief, neglecting to acknowledge that the foundational convictions of Baptists, and those upon which these two precious concepts are based, are the lordship of Jesus Christ and the authority of God’s Word.

One oft-repeated accusation is that the Baptist Faith and Message is being imposed on others. This is a hollow and distorted perception, as it has never been imposed on any church or individual. One believes what one believes—something that simply cannot be imposed by others. However, it is altogether appropriate that Southern Baptist churches expect those who represent them and who are entrusted with matters of faith—such as missionaries, seminary professors and denominational workers—hold personal beliefs and convictions consistent with what the denomination confesses to believe.

The BF&M was formulated by men and women, priests of God, who prayerfully and earnestly sought God’s will and guidance in expressing the consensus of their faith according to the teaching of Scripture. It was formulated under God’s leadership and is an expressed interpretation based on His authoritative, unchanging Word. Southern Baptists, gathered in annual session, prayed and expressed their sense of God’s will in voting to adopt the BF&M. Would critics who champion the case for individual priesthood as justification for dissension and independent thinking deny the very basis on which we practice church and denominational polity?

Denying that God had anything to do with leading Southern Baptists to boldly affirm what God’s Word teaches regarding church order, the marriage relationship and the inspired authority of all Scripture, reveals a contradiction of values. Unfortunately and sadly, the result has been many Baptist churches and individuals mimicking society, choosing humanistic thinking, cultural accommodation and theological compromise at the expense of abiding and eternal truth to guide faith and practice.

Those who claim Southern Baptists have abandoned what it means to be Baptist seem to have a short view of history. Their heritage goes back no further than the last generation, when leadership and seminaries were embracing higher criticism, an erosion of biblical authority that was moving the denomination toward the precipice of liberalism over which mainline denominations had fallen. As we hold missionaries accountable today, they forget that the Foreign Mission Board denied appointment to Southern Seminary professor Crawford Toy and withdrew the appointment of John Stout and T.P. Bell in 1881 because they did not hold to the verbal, plenary inspiration of Scripture as other Southern Baptists did. They forget that the chairman of the original Baptist Faith and Message committee in 1925, E.Y. Mullins, made it clear that this definitive confession of faith was to be an instrument of doctrinal accountability for preachers, professors and those representing the denomination.

One has succumbed to the relativism of postmodern thought when one says missionaries deserve our support regardless of what they believe or teach. Exaltation of independent, self-centered thinking has supplanted submission to the Word of God when individuals sent out and supported by the denomination are unwilling to affirm they will carry out their work in accord with what the churches they represent believe.

The few missionaries who rejected my request to affirm the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message made it clear that they will be accountable to Southern Baptists only the way they themselves choose to be accountable. Others say, “I want you to support me, but I am accountable only to the Lord!” How would a local church respond to a pastor who said, “I no longer believe or will preach and teach what you as a church have said you believe, but I want you to continue to support me as your pastor since I have served so well in the past”? Such independent attitudes and thinking certainly have nothing to do with the priesthood of the believer and one’s relationship with God, as some claim. God leads believers within the body to live and work in mutual submission to one another and with respect for those God has called to servant leadership in His Kingdom.

Missionaries are called of God and are accountable to their Lord. They don’t have to serve with Southern Baptists, but those who are sent and supported by the Southern Baptist Convention have a stewardship and trust to teach, preach and represent what Southern Baptists believe with integrity and personal conviction. Asking for that affirmation is not a politically coerced initiative; it is the simple bottom line of accountability to those we represent.

The issue is not about individuals being terminated; it is about the credibility of the International Mission Board being doctrinally accountable to our denomination. It is about holding to the fundamentals of our faith that will enable us collectively to fulfill the Great Commission and reach a lost world for Jesus Christ.

Few Southern Baptists would admit to postmodern views. It is both sad and frightening that so many are unconsciously succumbing to these kinds of societal influences and that they would be challenging the truths and convictions that have distinguished us as Southern Baptists.

But when one denies absolute truth and embraces a theological relativism that says what one chooses to believe and practice is only a matter of personal choice, when one advocates soul competency but without any adherence to the authority of God’s revealed Word, and when one insists that self-centered, independent personal opinions supercede any sense of doctrinal accountability, one is, indeed, moving from the foundations of our historic faith to the nebulous, humanistic standards that characterize our postmodern society.

The inevitable result should be apparent—a diluted, ineffectual witness for the Lord Jesus Christ and diminished influence on a pluralistic and valueless society that would be disastrous in our churches and erode any potential for fulfilling our Great Commission task.

Jerry Rankin and I have a lot in common. We were both missionaries to Indonesia. We have both served as area director for Southeast Asia and as International (Foreign) Mission Board president.

We agree on several basic beliefs. We agree the Lordship of Christ and the authority of God’s Word are foundational to the kind of Baptists we have been historically. We agree churches should expect missionaries they support to have sound doctrine. We agree those who reject absolute truth and embrace theological relativism deny our heritage, dilute our witness and erode the potential of fulfilling the Great Commission task. We both have given our lives in the cause of reaching all people with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

When asked to write a response to Rankin’s editorial, I was reluctant to do so. I did not want to re-engage in the distasteful controversy that has so damaged our witness and our denomination. But in reading what he wrote, it was clear what he and I believe has happened and why are very different. So I feel obligated as a Baptist concerned about missions and missionaries to state a different view. I believe strongly in the old Baptist saying that we must “Trust the Lord and tell the people.”

In recent years, the “official Southern Baptist Convention position” is that Baptists can no longer be trusted to make up their own minds on issues. Editors have been fired and some state papers print only what is acceptable to the SBC’s elected officials. But it is important to challenge some of Rankin’s presumptions. Most of his views mirror those of other leaders who now control the SBC. They differ radically from our traditional Baptist heritage.

Rankin presumes that elected leaders, both of the SBC and IMB, have priestly authority over Southern Baptists. He believes that because committee members who revised the Baptist Faith and Message prayed and brought recommendations that were affirmed by a few thousand Southern Baptists voting at the SBC annual meeting, everyone should accept them as being from God. Then he makes the astounding claim that those who do not accept this and still believe in the priesthood of every believer are denying the very basis on which we practice church and denominational polity! He believes in the doctrine of “priesthood of the believer” for committee members, but denies it to rank-and-file members. Baptists have never believed in a hierarchical church—with authority from the top down.

His editorial ignores the most glaring fundamental change in the 2000 BF&M. The Lordship of Jesus (the Living Word) is supplanted by making Him secondary to the Bible (the written Word). The statement, “The criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted is Jesus Christ,” in the 1963 BF&M is removed from the 2000 BF&M. One committee member defended this, declaring this phrase was being used to justify too many heretical views. Does this mean that, rather than Jesus, SBC leaders who define orthodoxy have become the criterion by which the Bible is interpreted?

The official SBC view of polity reflects drastic changes made in the SBC. Prior to the mid-‘80s participation in the convention was based on financial support of missions and other agreed-upon causes. The originating documents state the convention’s purpose was to “elicit, combine and direct the energies of Southern Baptists for the propagation of the gospel at home and abroad.” Churches that contributed to these causes qualified for messengers. The shift from being the kind of Baptists who cooperated around missions to the kind of Baptists who control with doctrine culminated in the 2000 BF&M.

After asserting that “the 2000 BF&M has not changed any beliefs at all,” Rankin then defines the importance of the changes. He declares it affirms “what Southern Baptists have always believed and practiced” about pastoral leadership and the spiritual order of the home.

Actually Southern Baptists have never agreed on the authoritarian role of the pastor. Nor have they previously accepted control of one Baptist body (the convention) dictating requirements for leadership (pastor) of another Baptist body (the local church).

Nor is it appropriate Baptist practice to deliberately exclude part of scriptural teaching because it fails to buttress one’s viewpoint. The committee adamantly refused calls to include Ephesians 5:21 stating husbands and wives should submit to one another when quoting Ephesians 5:22-25 to emphasize “a wife’s gracious submission to her husband’s servant leadership.”

Rankin is correct when he declares Baptists believe in the Word of God. It is our interpretation that differs.

Another significant reshaping of our Baptist heritage is the way the 2000 BF&M is used. It is the very first Southern Baptist confession to claim its purpose as “doctrinal accountability.” In describing confessions of faith, the 1963 BF&M states, “Such statements have never been regarded as complete, infallible statements of faith, nor as official creeds carrying mandatory authority.”

As used in religious terms, a creed is defined and enforced by religious authority. A confession is defined and expressed by individuals. A confessional group says, “This is basically what we believe. If you agree and want to, let’s walk together.” A creedal group says, “We have determined what you must believe to be acceptable. Otherwise, you cannot join with us.”

The confessional approach affirms individual Christians are to be trusted when they declare their study of Scripture leads them to be Baptist. The creedal approach insists that some denominational authority will determine who really is Baptist.

If the 2000 BF&M changes nothing in belief or practices of the past, why was it mandatory for missionaries to sign? When have veteran missionaries ever been required to sign such a document? If it is no different, why is it the only decision that has resulted in so many missionary resignations and early retirements? (The numbers reported by the IMB do not cover the numbers who resigned quietly because they were afraid of losing retirement and insurance benefits if they protested openly.)

Rankin accuses those who reject the 2000 BF&M of postmodern theology, which he seems to define as rejecting absolute truth as revealed in Jesus Christ and recorded in Scripture. Let it be understood that liberal, postmodern theology was never accepted among staff or missionaries of the Foreign Mission Board! Never once was I accused during my 38 years with the FMB of unsound doctrine. My offense was that I would not support the politically-motivated ultra-conservative resurgence.

During my tenure as FMB president, out of nearly 4,000 missionaries, 10 were accused of unacceptable doctrine. I personally reviewed every case in consultation with missionaries, staff, board members and other Baptists. Only two were dismissed because their doctrine had become unacceptable after their appointment.

Historically, most Southern Baptists have rejected a Baptist creed, believing a confession of faith was adequate. The 1963 BF&M declares, “The sole authority of 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.”

By contradicting this, Rankin has joined other current leadership in seeking not only to rewrite history but in accusing anyone who rejects a creed of not believing in absolute truth.

Countless missionaries and other Southern Baptists who have a high view of Christ, the Bible and the work of the Holy Spirit have contradicted this false presumption. They have demonstrated their steadfast belief in absolute truth to such an extent that they refused to compromise their integrity even at the cost of their calling and livelihood.

It is unfortunate that all Southern Baptists cannot hear the testimonies and read the writings of all the godly, veteran missionaries forced to resign their posts because their consciences would not allow them to subjugate their God-given convictions to the dictates of human religious authorities.

I am aware many committed missionaries continue to serve faithfully. I know the gospel continues to be preached, churches are being started and God continues to bless those who serve. The same is true of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and many other mission efforts. Unfortunately, trying to impose control over all Baptists has hampered cooperative mission efforts that had worked so well for more than 150 years.

Rankin's editorial reveals some of the regrettable changes that have created a different kind of Baptist mission effort, such as:

Southern Baptists are a drastically different denomination with a radically altered mission program. Baptists who are committed to biblical truth and missions will examine these changes and decide if they are consistent with their own interpretation of God’s Word.

If they cannot agree, they must find ways to obey Christ’s command to take the gospel to the whole world. They cannot allow disillusionment to cause them to turn inward and disobey the God of missions. We must be missionary because God is missionary. And there will be new, exciting ways to join Him in this task.