Associated Baptist Press - 6/13/2008

Associated Baptist Press
June 13, 2008 (8-61)

IN THIS ISSUE:
SBC resolution could shrink church membership rolls further
Texas church targeted for ouster from SBC over homosexuality
Radical Islam among 4 apocalyptic forces threatening America, SBC’s Land says
Caspian more violent than virtuous, scholars say; but what about 3rd movie?
Opinion: The moral influence of a market economy

SBC resolution could shrink church membership rolls further
By ABP Staff

INDIANAPOLIS (ABP) -- The Southern Baptist Convention, struggling with a membership decline nationwide, passed a resolution June 11 that could significantly shrink church membership rolls even further.

Messengers to the SBC annual meeting in Indianapolis also turned back efforts to encourage Christians to remove their children from public schools and asked Congress to defund Planned Parenthood.

A resolution calling on churches to “lovingly correct wayward members” -- intended to ensure only true and obedient Christians make it onto church rolls -- was toughened even more with two amendments that encourage tighter definitions of a “member.”

The resolution, which reflects the growing influencing of Calvinism in the SBC, comes on the heels of denominational statistics that showed the 16 million-member convention shrinking.

Membership fell in 2007 for the second time in a decade. Even more discouraging, officials said, baptisms in SBC churches dropped for the seventh time in eight years – down 5.5 percent in 2007.

The resolutions -- a total of nine were adopted -- are simply statements that reflect the sentiment of messengers gathered at a particular annual meeting and have no weight of law for Southern Baptists. However, as resolution committee chair Darrell Orman, pastor of First Baptist Church, Stuart, Fla., said when introducing the resolutions, these statements “speak to the nation.”

Other resolutions included statements:

-- Celebrating growing ethnic diversity within the SBC.

-- Encouraging Christians to participate in the secular political process but warning against “potential problems of politicizing the church and the pulpit.”

-- Affirming use of the term “Christmas” in public life.

-- Offering “wholehearted support” for a petition in California requiring the state to place a referendum on the ballot in November defining marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman.

-- Recognizing the centennial anniversary of the boys mission education group Royal Ambassadors.

The resolution on “regenerate” church membership drew two amendments that encouraged churches to tighten membership definitions. The original resolution called for “churches to maintain a regenerate membership by acknowledging the necessity of spiritual regeneration of Christ’s lordship for all members” and urged churches to “maintain accurate membership rolls for the purpose of fostering ministry and accountability.”

It also urged churches to “restore wayward members,” reviving the principle of church disciple.

After much discussion, messengers adopted two amendments. The first, offered by Malcolm Yarnell, a professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, added to the definition of a New Testament church.

The original included the definition “composed only of those who have been born again by the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the Word, becoming disciples of Jesus Christ, the local church’s only Lord, by grace through faith.” The amendment added as further definition: “which church practices believers-only baptism by immersion, (Math 28:16-20,) the Lord’s Supper (Matt. 26:26-30) and church discipline (Matt. 18:15-20).

Messengers adopted an amendment by Tom Ascol, prominent in the Calvinist-inspired Founder’s Movement in the Southern Baptist Convention, urging “the churches of the SBC to repent of any failure among us to live up to our professed commitment to regenerate church membership and any failure to obey Jesus Christ in lovingly correcting wayward church members.”

Calvinist doctrine has been on the ascent in the SBC in recent years.

The amendment encouraged “denominational servants to support and encourage any church’s efforts to recover and implement this discipline of our Lord Jesus Christ …even if such efforts result in a reduction in the number of members that are recorded in those churches.”

Southern Baptist leaders have been worrying publicly about the decline in SBC membership and baptisms, which they say reflects the fact three-fourths of SBC churches are stagnant or dying. Outgoing SBC president Frank Page predicted that, without intervention, half of the SBC’s 44,000 churches won’t exist by 2030.

Some messengers tried vigorously to amend the resolution against same-sex marriage to include an admonition to withdraw children from public schools – a frequent but unsuccessful initiative at recent SBC meetings.

Ron Wilson from Thousand Oaks, Calif., said if the convention was going to pass a resolution opposing same-sex marriage, they ought to encourage families to remove their children from public schools, “which are the main training grounds for the teaching of same-sex marriage.”

The committee, however, did not “want to dilute the emphasis of this resolution by bringing in the corollary issue of the education system,” Orman explained.

The resolution on ethnic diversity encouraged nominating committees to “identify ethnic leadership” for SBC service and encouraged them to “strive toward a balanced representation of our ethnic diversity.”

Ethnic congregations are the only growing segment of the Southern Baptist Convention. Without that growth, the decline in SBC membership would have surfaced much earlier.

The resolutions committee declined to present statements on several proposed issues — the importance of doctrine for true unity; appreciation for women serving in SBC churches; online voting for the SBC; Cooperative Program education; opportunities for women in ministry; affirming the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message; ordination councils; small churches; and support of Baptist schools.

-30-

-- Reported by Norman Jameson. Greg Warner contributed to this article.

Texas church targeted for ouster from SBC over homosexuality
By Vicki Brown

INDIANAPOLIS (ABP) -- A Fort Worth, Texas, church, which long ago cut back its support of the Southern Baptist Convention, nonetheless could be ousted from that body because it welcomes homosexuals.

The possible ouster of Broadway Baptist Church, along with a move to expel churches with female pastors, may signal that the Southern Baptist Convention wants to further narrow the meaning of “friendly cooperation.”

Bill Sanderson, pastor of Hepzibah Baptist Church in Wendell, N.C., made a motion at the SBC’s annual meeting in Indianapolis asking messengers to declare Broadway Baptist Church not “in friendly cooperation” with the convention – which is the constitutional language describing membership.

The church, founded in 1882, has quietly included homosexuals in its congregation for several years. But a public dispute among church members over a pictorial directory -- and the pastor’s subsequent resignation -- brought the issue to the attention of Baptists nationwide, including Southern Baptist leaders who want to ban churches that affirm gays.

Sanderson’s motion, like the one targeting female pastors, was referred to the SBC Executive Committee, which handles the business of the convention during the rest of the year.

If eventually approved by the SBC next year, the effect of the motion would be to expel Broadway Baptist from the convention. But motions referred to the Executive Committee often result in no action.

The SBC’s constitution already prohibits churches that “affirm, approve or endorse homosexual behavior” from affiliating with the convention.

Rather than punishing only churches that send messengers to the annual meeting, the motion targeting Broadway could take SBC scrutiny to a new level by seeking out churches that violate the SBC’s constitution.

Harriet Harral, a former chair of deacons at Broadway, expressed regret that the motion had been made. “Baptists have traditionally upheld the autonomy of the local church,” she said in a telephone interview.

The motion targeting female pastors would again amend the SBC’s constitution to disallow affiliation by “churches which have female senior pastors.” It’s not known how many SBC churches have female senior pastors.

The convention’s “Baptist Faith and Message” doctrinal statement asserts “the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.” But Southern Baptists have not paired that declaration with a constitutional prohibition against churches with female pastors.

At the Indianapolis meeting, convention officials avoided a showdown over Broadway Baptist. Since the Texas church did not send messengers to the Indianapolis meeting, the order of business committee determined the convention did not face a credentials issue. But it suggested compliance with the SBC’s constitutional policy against affiliating with churches that “affirm, approve or endorse homosexual behavior” merits study.

Although some churches have been reprimanded at the national level in the past, the convention’s handling of the Broadway incident is unusual. Broadway sent no messengers to this year’s session, nor has it done so for several years. Generally, the SBC has refrained from interfering with affiliated churches unless the seating of its messengers is challenged at an annual meeting.

Baptist historian Lloyd Allen, a professor at Mercer University’s McAfee School of Theology in Atlanta, cannot recall a similar occurrence. “They usually refuse to seat a church’s messengers, rather than for the church to be censured without messengers there.”

“It’s been rare, I think, for a church to be censured, but I suspect [the Broadway incident] might not be the first time” in the convention’s history that a church has been censured without representation, he said.

The convention has attempted to reprimand churches over the homosexual issue in the past. In 1999, messengers proposed two motions against Immanuel Baptist Church in Little Rock, Ark., former President Bill Clinton’s home church.

That year Clinton had issued a proclamation to declare June as “Gay and Lesbian Pride Month.” One motion at the annual meeting “formally suggested” the Little Rock congregation exercise church discipline against Clinton. The other requested the church’s formal position on the president’s policies. Both were ruled out of order.

Whatever decision the convention ultimately makes regarding Broadway might have little impact on the church, Harral noted. Like many other moderate and progressive congregations, the church has not sent messengers to the SBC annual meeting in several years and has pared back its Cooperative Program giving.

Broadway members determined a number of years ago to funnel most undesignated receipts through the Baptist General Convention of Texas, with a percentage for state ministries and a percentage passing to the national CBF, said Harral, current Cooperative Baptist Fellowship national moderator.

The church has maintained a budget line item for cooperative giving, a piece of which is earmarked for the SBC in order to maintain membership. Church members also can designate gifts to the SBC.

The Executive Committee could reject the motion or investigate the church and return a recommendation to messengers to the 2009 annual session in Louisville, Ky. According to news reports, Broadway’s leaders intend to cooperate with any SBC investigation.

The debate over Broadway’s pictorial directory began last fall when a few gay couples showed up to have their pictures taken together. Some members felt that allowing the photos of the couples as families pushed the church from its “welcoming” stance to “affirming” homosexual behavior. Others saw refusal to include gay couples as demeaning.

The church ultimately determined to publish a historical booklet with directory information, but it would not include photographs of families.

Some members formed Friends for the Future of Broadway to challenge then-pastor Brett Younger’s leadership on a number of other issues. The group called for a vote to oust Younger, but 200 other members signed a counter petition to oppose his firing.

In March, a motion to fire Younger failed. In April, he resigned as pastor to accept a post as an associate professor of preaching at McAfee. He said his decision to leave Broadway was based on his desire to teach, not on the controversy. He preached his final sermon at the Fort Worth church on June 8.

-30-

Radical Islam among 4 apocalyptic forces threatening America, SBC’s Land says
By ABP Staff

INDIANAPOLIS (ABP) – America is haunted by the “four modern horses of the apocalypse” – including homosexuality and “radical Islamic jihadism” – which threaten to destroy America and take over the world, according to Southern Baptists’ top ethicist.

Updating a biblical reference from the book of Revelation, which uses apocalyptic language to warn Christians of coming calamity, Richard Land said the four evil forces have “been let loose and are riding forth to wreak havoc and destruction in our society.”

Land identified the four modern horsemen of the apocalypse as the denial of the sanctity of human life, the deluge of hardcore Internet pornography, the radical homosexual agenda and its attempt to undermine marriage, and radical Islamic jihadism.

Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, spoke during his agency’s report to the SBC annual meeting in Indianapolis. He saved his toughest words for radical Islam, which he called a “death cult.”

“Radical Islamic jihadism has declared war on America and American civilization and Christianity,” he charged. “Radical Islamic jihadism is a death cult that has taken root within the religion of Islam. Not all followers of Islam are followers of radical Islamic jihadism. In fact, most of the people who have been killed by radical Islamic jihadists have been Muslims who refused to knuckle under to their perverted, twisted distortion of the Islamic religion.”

The one major obstacle to radical Islam’s attempt to take over the world is the United States, he said.

“The hope is not from Washington, D.C.,” he said. “The only answer is a revival that ripens into a spiritual awakening that will then become a reformation that will then shake America for Jesus Christ. That is the only answer.”

Land challenged Southern Baptists to make personal commitments to bring revival to America.

“Our nation needs a greater movement of the Holy Spirit and it will not happen without a great movement of the Holy Spirit within each of us,” Land added. And that will require personal repentance and prayer.

-30-

-- Reported by Bill Webb

Caspian more violent than virtuous, scholars say; but what about 3rd movie?
By Lee Ann Marcel

WACO, Texas (ABP) --“You may find Narnia a more savage place than you remember,” a dwarf says in the movie The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian.

The dwarf is undeniably right. The second movie in C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series is more violent and less virtuous than its predecessor, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, say two scholars who study the renowned Christian writer.

So is this the same Narnia that millions fell in love with in Walden Media’s first film? And what does Hollywood hold for the rest of The Chronicles of Narnia novels?

In Prince Caspian, the Pevensie children -- Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy – find the land they remember quite changed. They are summoned back in Narnia, where 1,000 years have passed since they left. The siblings are called back into combat with the creatures of Narnia to fight against the tyrant who has stopped the rightful heir, Prince Caspian, from ruling the land.

What ensues is a storyline that is noticeably more violent than The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Ralph Wood, professor of Lewis and Tolkien literature at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, noticed the difference between the two movies. He felt the film lacked the magical quality that distinguished The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

“I thought it was well done considering their basic intention was to create an action flick with a lot of excitement and a lot of battle scenes,” said Wood, whose many books include The Gospel According to Tolkien: Visions of the Kingdom in Middle-earth.

“The first battle was entirely invented,” pointed out Wood. “It’s clear the filmmaker knew the teenage audience.”

Wood explained that the book had only one battle, and it lasted a minute. He mentioned that Lewis never went into the gory details of the battle.

“Lewis wants to avoid cheap violence,” said Wood. “He didn’t want to distract from his main point.”

In the novel Prince Caspian, Lewis attempts to convey a vision of pride that can corrupt even the best of intentions. Pride can weave its way slowly into our lives unnoticed until it rears its ugly head when we least expect it. Even the hero, Peter, can have a fatal flaw of pride.

Wood also pointed out the emerging character and strength of Edmund was portrayed well in the film. In the first movie, Edmund starts off under the influence of evil but eventually becomes a hero. Wood said that is Lewis’ way of showing a need for divine grace that can redeem evildoers.

“Overall, I’m grateful for the creation of a new generation of Lewis readers,” Wood said. “But those who haven’t read the book, I fear, will draw the conclusion that the movie is saying, ‘If we Christians go to battle we can wipe them all out.’ With a culture so obsessed with violence one could go to the movie and walk away with the endorsement of violence.”

Another scholar gave his thoughts about the adventure film Prince Caspian.

“I think the film, in some ways, was better than the first,” said Michael Ward, a writer, speaker, Anglican clergyman and Cambridge, England, native. He has recently released a book titled Planet Narnia in which he discusses Lewis' use of the seven medieval heavens.

Ward suggested that Lewis alludes to the heavenly realm of Mars, the god of war, in Prince Caspian. This explains the frequency of battles in the novel.

“The film got this part well, a little too well,” he said. “There was a great deal of violence and extra battle scenes than the book. And they also downplayed the trees’ role.”

In Narnia the trees are alive and move when Aslan the lion bids them to. Aslan symbolizes Jesus Christ -- a divine character who creates, sustains and redeems the world of Narnia. As he works to right wrongs, he triumphs over the tyranny of the wicked king, Miraz.

According to Ward, Mars was also known as a deity of the forest [Mars Silvanus]. The month of March, when the trees come back to life after winter, is named for Mars. Ward pointed out all the events of Prince Caspian took place in the Narnian month of “Greenroof,” the only month ever named in the Lewis novels.

“In the book, these two strands [war and trees] are carefully balanced,” he said, “though in the film 90 percent of it was battle scenes and 10 percent were the trees. The film gave a different feel than the book.”

Ward described another difference between the two novels. In The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, there is a more distinct connection with the gospel. But in Prince Caspian there are less obvious ties.

“My suspicion is that most Christian viewers see the Christian messages and that some non-Christians do. And those who don't see these messages (both the Christians and the non-Christians) nonetheless may imbibe them at an imaginative level,” Ward said.

With the grand success of the first film -- $65.6 million in ticket sales -- it’s surprising that Prince Caspian only brought in $56.6 million. The next movie in line, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, is set to be released in May 2010.

“I have to admit, the first movie was better than the second,” said Wood, “I hope this isn’t the mark of a downward trend.”

He likened it to a similar slump in The Lord of the Rings movies. In Wood’s opinion the first was better than the second and third movies.

“There is less room for inserting battles in this third [Narnia] story which seem to have dominated the first two adaptations so unduly,” Ward said, “Of course, that doesn't mean they won't try! But The Dawn Treader has such a mystical atmosphere that I feel that even the most tone-deaf adapter can't fail to sense it.”

However, Ward mentioned that there will be a different director for this third film -- not Andrew Adamson this time but Michael Apted.

“Michael Apted is a more mature filmmaker than Adamson and has done good work with Amazing Grace…. His brother is an Anglican clergyman. Of course, none of this means that Apted will necessarily understand The Dawn Treader intimately, but it does perhaps bode well.”

In the third movie, Edmund, Lucy and their cousin Eustace go across the seas with King Caspian on his ship, The Dawn Treader. They encounter mermaids, dwarves, and even dragons. Audiences may find the movie more venturesome than the second.

If the screenwriters remain faithful to the book, audiences will have a lot to look forward to, Ward suggested.

Of the final three chapters, Ward said simply: “Heart-breakingly beautiful. A taste of heaven.”

-30-

Opinion: The moral influence of a market economy
By David Gushee

(ABP) -- I was at the Mall of Georgia the other day, walking by a brand new car that for some reason was being displayed in the open air, just off the food court. It had all the marks of a new car, including one of those information sheets in the window telling the onlooker about its gas mileage and average annual fuel costs.

I have to admit that I don’t remember the make or model of the car. But I do remember that it promised 15 whole miles per gallon in the city, and 23 on the highway. What I was most struck by was that it calculated average annual fuel costs with gas priced at $2.80 a gallon. And this was a new car. Was it so recently that gas actually cost $2.80 a gallon? Oh, the good old days!

For those who wondered just what it would take for Americans to change their conspicuous consumption of gasoline, the answer seems to be a price of $4 per gallon. From the four corners of society, the news is in -- $4 per gallon demands a lifestyle transformation for all but the richest Americans.

News stories abound with the details: More and more people are unable to fill their tanks when they go to the gas station. Trying to scrape by until the next paycheck, many are running out of gas, their old cars and trucks abandoned by the side of the road. For the first time since the 1970s, gasoline is regularly being siphoned out of cars by thieves. (Remember gas cap locks? They’re back.) The poorest are spending as much as 15 percent of their take-home pay on gasoline and are facing choices of gas vs. meat and gas vs. health care. Some employers are sending cars around to pick up their workers who cannot afford to drive to work.

General Motors is looking to sell off its Hummer unit. No one wants Hummers, that ultimate symbol of conspicuous consumption. SUV sales are plummeting. On the other hand, dealers cannot keep the hybrid Prius in stock. There is a two-month wait to buy a Prius in many locations. GM is rushing to bring the Volt, an electric-powered car, to market by 2010. The use of mass transit is up considerably.

Long-term trends in housing will be affected. In Atlanta, for example, where “the good life” has long been understood to mean a move to the northern suburbs accompanied by a grinding 20-mile commute one way, the combination of gas costs and traffic nightmares demands reconsideration. Some predict the partial or wholesale abandonment of certain exurban neighborhoods, with their long commutes, and McMansions, too expensive to maintain. Combined with the problems in the housing market and the rise in foreclosures, in some areas this suburban/exurban collapse is already happening.

What are we to make of all this? Should we be looking for politicians who will promise an end to the pain? What does this mean for stewardship and the life of the church?

One disappointing lesson is that the market often affects behavior a whole lot better than moral suasion. For decades, a number of church leaders and environmental activists have been calling Christians and other Americans to a simpler lifestyle. But with gas at $2 a gallon, few cared. People adjusted their “inner attitudes” while driving their Hummers to church. Now smaller cars, less driving, working from home, and mass transit look a whole lot more compelling.

The government does have a role to play. It would have been rational government policy to require higher fuel efficiency standards even when gas was $2. And there are things that government can do now to both ease the burden on the most desperately affected and aid the transition to a radical transformation in our national energy use. But still, nothing focuses the mind like paying $75 to fill up your car with gas. Some are suggesting that the best thing government can do to change American habits is to ensure that gas never goes below $4 a gallon again.

Churches and families will get those energy audits, build greener buildings, buy more fuel-efficient vehicles, and stay closer to home. The pleasures of a quiet evening around the dinner table or the fellowship hall will be rediscovered. People will turn off lights and stop cooling their buildings to the freezing point in the summer.

It would have been nice if a hundred earnest books and a thousand sermons had triggered these behavioral changes. Necessity seems to work better. I guess human beings really are sinners.

-30-

-- David Gushee is distinguished university professor of Christian ethics at Mercer University. www.davidpgushee.com