Fort Worth, Texas (ABP)—A Baptist pastor said moderates should be on guard against renewed attempts by fundamentalists to gain control of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

Paul Kenley, pastor of Grace Fellowship Church in Lampasas, Texas, penned an article for the moderate political group Texas Baptists Committed’s newsletter in advance of the BGCT annual meeting.

The veteran of the Southern Baptist Convention struggle between conservatives and moderates noted he sees signs of “subtle, precursory efforts” toward a fundamentalist “repositioning” aimed at reclaiming leadership of the state convention.

Kenley said many churches that followed their pastors 10 years ago into forming a breakaway conservative statewide body did not realize that, apart from promoting the national convention’s conservative leadership, the new group did not support traditional state-convention ministries. Unlike other state conventions, the conservative Southern Baptists of Texas Convention was not initially created to support hospitals, universities, seminaries or children’s homes.

Kenley said SBTC leaders recognize the lack of institutions is a drawback, but it is unlikely they will start new ones in a weak economy.

“I believe they will make a strong and reinvigorated attempt to do it as their parent-leaders in the SBC did it in the ’80s and ’90s—by stealing ministries and institutions that are already in existence,” he wrote.

The shortest route to that, he added, is to “take over the Baptist General Convention of Texas.”

Kenley explained the BGCT’s moderate leadership faces a dilemma in responding to a nascent conservative shift. If they exclude conservatives, they risk alienating large conservative churches that never fully cut ties with the BGCT that in turn might respond by cutting off gifts to the state convention.

Kenley said he has been serving this year on a key BGCT committee, where he observed what he believes “to be subtle, precursory efforts toward a fundamentalist ‘repositioning’ aimed at reclaiming leadership.”

“There is no one incident that, by itself, proves this suspicion, but the preponderance of events has alarmed this old (Texas Baptists Committed) warrior,” he wrote. “We must be careful, lest the noble cry that ‘We must be inclusive’ winds up empowering those who, perhaps unknowingly and with the best intentions, would take us back into a precarious position.”

Founded in 1998, the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention set missions and evangelism as priorities, alongside a doctrinal foundation of affirming biblical inerrancy.

The new convention’s affiliated ministries include Criswell College in Dallas; Jacksonville College, a two-year school started by the Baptist Missionary Association of Texas, which affiliated with the SBTC in 2004; East Texas Baptist Family Ministries and Texas Baptist Home.

The convention also has fraternal relationships with Houston Baptist University and Baptist Credit Union. Its ministry partners include Texas Baptist Men.

The BGCT’s new executive director, Randel Everett, made news recently when he spoke in chapel at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, a conservative bastion long estranged from the state convention’s moderate leadership.