Welch bashes bloggers, Burleson, over beverages

[William Thornton]

[T. D. Webb]

[Sandy]

[Haruo]

[Haruo]

[Rock]

[William Thornton]

[T. D. Webb]

[William Thornton]

[Neil Heath]

[T. D. Webb]

[Neil Heath]

[T. D. Webb]

[Jonathan]

[TimW]

[TimW]

[Sandy]

[Ed Pettibone]

[T. D. Webb]

[Wade Burleson]

William,

Contrary to your opinion, the alchohol issue is not a distraction, but the symptom of a deeper disease within the Southern Baptist Convention.

It is like a sore on the skin of a patient. A good doctor does not tell his patient "ignore the sore" as he treats the disease, but rather he is steadfast in treating the sore, while at the same time seeking to help the patient understand the reasons the sore burst to the surface in the first place.

The disease in the Southern Baptist Convention is getting sidetracked on periphial issues over which good, solid evangelical Christians disagree --- and arguing over them to the neglect of the spreading of the gospel.

We Southern Baptists easily proclaim our love for the sacred Bible, but then often ignore what the Bible actually plainly says about loving our brother, speaking only those things that edify, and other very practical exhortations, in favor of angrily excluding those who don't agree with our traditions and interpretation of the Bible. For our convention to forbid a missionary from speaking in tongues in his private prayers (as the new IMB policy forbids), even though the Bible states explicitly "forbid not the speaking in tongues" (I Cor. 14:39), is something I find difficult to explain. I have sought, and will continue to seek, an explanation for the need for such a policy from those who forced it through, and if one cannot be produced, will work toward reversing it.

However, until you can get the average Southern Baptist to see that the issue before us is the sufficiency of the Bible to speak to us in matters of faith and practice, and that our manmade traditions, creeds, and ideas of how we ought to live are at best insufficient, and at worst, restrictive of the freedom God gives us in Christ to live by the power of the Holy Spirit, then we will never move forward in our cooperation with each other.

So, William, your concern that I and other bloggers are being distracted is duly noted, but I think you will find that what you see as a distraction is in reality part of the process of healing.

In the end, I believe the SBC will be a place where people with different interpretations on minor doctrines (anything other than the person and work of Christ at Calvary), will be free to cooperate together in missions and evangelism.

[Norm]

Wade: ... In the end, I believe the SBC will be a place where people with different interpretations on minor doctrines (anything other than the person and work of Christ at Calvary), will be free to cooperate together in missions and evangelism.

Are you, then, saying, Wade, that non-inerrantists that believe in Jesus (as personal savior and Lord) and his salvific life (as witnessed in his life, death, and resurrection), said individuals are to be included in positions of leadership in the SBC?

[jerryl]

[Wade Burleson]

[Bruce Gourley]

[Neil Heath]