Every day I examine my life in order to strive to maintain a walk of consistency. Many times I say things that counter that consistent walk and thus become guilty before God of hypocrisy. It is at such times, just described, that I have to ask and receive God’s forgiveness and then I move on. I am the first to admit that I see hypocritical things in my life that I have to deal with. This term hypocrite, we all know, came out of the Greek drama where actors were called hypocrites because they wore a mask to play a part that was not really who they were.
In a post on SBC Outpost, we see that one of the contributors, and originator, of the blog called Dr. Patterson a liar. As was pointed out to me in the not so distant past, a liar means that you have a lifestyle of lying. It does not mean that you mis-speak on something that you truly thought was the truth, it means that you intentionally live a lifestyle that constitutes lying in order to gain an advantage. The article clearly tries to point to such in Dr. Patterson’s life. Because this contributor has placed this on the news organization’s website blog, Dr. Patterson has now been labeled a liar by the entire group of people behind SBC Outpost. (This group does this with no fear of retaliation from Dr. Patterson for libel. Why? They know that Dr. Patterson still believe 1 Corinthians 6.) Not only do those who are contributors to this news organization gossip mill hold responsibility for labeling Dr. Patterson a liar, but also those who have endorsed signed onto their cause.
Here is where the endorsements scream hypocrisy. These entity heads, plus the President of the Southern Baptist Convention, have endorsed signed onto a cause to get rid of Dr. Paige Patterson as President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. First, let me say that I disagree with the direction that the SBC Outpost guys desire to take our convention. By the public endorsements, we have now been told by the President of the Southern Baptist Convention, along with other men whose salaries are paid because my church gives to the Cooperative Program, that these endorsers have a desire to push the convention in a direction different than that of the framers of the Conservative Resurgence. Guess what that means on the local church level as my church begins budget planning? Also, guess what that means when the next literature order comes due? And, guess what that means for Lottie? Isn’t it amazing that the endorsement of our Executive Director and convention President came one year after the convention voted to ensure that those holding office as trustees should come from churches that have a goal of 10% of their undesignated funds? If the convention in Greensboro would have known about the, now seemingly, planned prayer meeting after the Presidential election in the suite of the very ones that on Wednesday Morning argued for the free use of alcohol, I believe the vote would have been different for Dr. Page.
Another hypocritical act in the endorsements concerns Dr. Patterson’s publicly stated intentions regarding his actions on Dr. McKissic’s chapel message. Dr. Patterson pulled Dr. McKissic’s sermon from being presented on the website at SWBTS because he spoke against the actions of a sister organization. Dr. Patterson respects anyone’s right to free speech. Dr. McKissic’s right to believe what he believes about Scripture is not the issue. I believe I remember somewhere, sometime Dr. Patterson acknowledging he is a continuationalist in his theology. Dr. Akin freely admitted his position to the entire SBC in San Antonio, and if you remember Dr. Akin received his theology sitting at Dr. Patterson’s feet, thus there is a high probability that Dr. Patterson will fall into the continuationalist camp. Dr. Patterson would not allow that message to go forth for a number of reasons, and the public chastisement of a sister entity coming from a sitting trustee was, as I remember, the main one he noted. We now have the President of the IMB, the very entity Dr. Patterson openly took harsh statements and character assassination for trying to protect the operational integrity of said entity, endorsing a group of journalist bloggers that consists of some who have privately and publicly called for Dr. Patterson to be relieved from his position at SWBTS.
In the rule of fairness, I am being told that endorsements are no more than a blurb on a book cover. Two responses to that argument. First, SBC Outpost is not a publishing organization, neither are they a news organization. Remember their “Breaking News“? Ask Pastor Robert Jeffress if he will give them an endorsement. He may, who knows! Endorsements are more than book blurbs. If that is the case, what Seminary Presidents have endorsed this group of journalist bloggers? Has the presidents of any of our seminaries been contacted? Why were they not? Was Dr. Patterson contacted to endorse this illustrious news organization group of bloggers?
The endorsers can try to say what they like, but it is as clear as the nose on your face that there is a group of leaders jockeying for position, in order to be the voice of the SBC’s future. That, my friends, is not how the SBC has operated in the past. The Conservative Resurgence did not come about because there were irreconcilable differences in the tight circle of moderate leaders. Those who led the Conservative Resurgence did not try to woo and encourage moderates to sign onto their movement. The Conservative Resurgence came about because the PEOPLE IN THE PEW recognized the leaders of the seminaries and other entities were not heading down the road of focused Baptist Distinctives but were trying to lead us down a road of fuzzy “Baptistic” Dissimilarity. Guess what? Inerrancy of the Scripture is just one distinctive for which the people in the pew fought. These same people in the pew have not lost their sight and they still remember that the fight then was for the Baptist distinctive of inerrancy of the Scripture–JUST ONE OF MANY BAPTIST DISTINCTIVES. These endorsers can endorse all they like but they fail to remember the words of one of the Conservative Resurgence past leaders–A skunk by any other name still stinks!
