by William Thornton » Fri Jan 04, 2019 7:53 am
When I read the title with the buzz phrase, "centrist Baptist", I expected another self-serving, virtue signalling, anti-SBC screed about how the writer hasn't moved but everyone around him has moved; however, I thought it was an interesting piece.
Welcoming but not affirming.
Genuine Gospel evangelism that aims for conversions, not social gospel evangelism that aims at everything but.
OK with female deacons.
Supportive of female pastors.
Conservative but not BFM2K
Agreeable with a mix of liberal relgious conference speakers but not to the exclusion of any conservative.
No same sex relationship folks in church leadership or to be married in the church
I'd say Travis Collins was expressing about the same concerns that a few mods I know would express. Yeah, SBC would be an uncomfortable place but with less hard lines than the CBF if one goes down his list.
Looks like the national CBF has wholly embraced social gospel matters to the almost total exclusion of evangelism and discipleship. Dan Vestal was an evangelist. The outgoing ED is an activist warrior who did not seem to have viewed her role as leading anything much in the direction of traditional, orthodox evangelism and discipleship. Point me to anything that would prove me wrong.
CBF has reimagined itself away from people like Collins. The train has left the station and he and his type are left on the boarding platform watching it head leftward. The best thing about the CBF is BNG which will air out differing opinions.
If SBC state conventions follow that of the KBC and disallow dually aligned churches, I'd speculate that more of those churches that are somewhat friendly towards CBF, maybe have some people who prefer to give in that direction, will drop CBF formally and stick with SBC. I mean, how many Baptist churches are like Keith's or FBC and one other in Athens? Not many.
The CBF, seems to me, has deliberately moved leftward with Paynter, and has succeeded in narrowing its market, Collins bearing witness to that, so what's the consequence? I'd guess it is that churches pastored by folks like Collins would be lukewarm about supporting CBF causes, not that there's anything new about this. Other than that, looks like independant churches choosing from the buffet of ministry causes.
I defer to Keith on the local situation. Evidently, FBCH made an autonomous decisions that once their prominent mod/lib pastor was gone, they would like to move rightward.
In another generation will the CBF exist? Can't think of a good reason why it should, frankly. There are better choices on both the left and the right.
My stray thoughts on SBC stuff may be found at my blog,