Liberal Baptist....

Concur. I didn't intend for a KJVO debate to begin. Just commenting on the OP topic of what constitutes a liberal baptist.

 

What a sad day among Baptists when condoning sodomy is the litmus test of one's fidelity, or lack thereof, to God's word. Does this mean if a group of churches condemns sodomy that they are in the pail of Baptist doctrinal respectability?

For the record, the Alliance of Baptists, a group of formerly Southern Baptist churches located primarily in the southeast, is on record as being fully supportive of sodomite relationships. Such churches ceased being authentic Baptists long before they embraced the sodomite heresy.

Mark Osgatharp </font>[/QUOTE]In answer to your original question, I would say no. I would, however, state that I believe that affirming sin on their part is just a symptom of their earlier liberal theological philosophies which reject the Bible as the inerrant Word of God. For me, that is the test of whether or not a Church is to its core a liberal Church, or a Christian Church.

Joseph Botwinick

 

I totally agree. The sodomy heresy is just an outgrowth of the theological liberalism that has been taught in many Baptist schools for the past 100 years.

Mark Osgatharp

 

Rhetorician:

I have been told the same thing. I am afraid the whole thing will blow up in everyone's face and not much will be left.

Many of my friends have left the SBC. Not one of them would side with the CBF theologically. Most of them do not want to see another SBC church again.

People who do not even know anything about what happened in the SBC and are not SBC know something is wrong. Where I moved from in CA there are a number of SBC churches which will close their doors soon.

 

I have lived in Texas, Indiana, Iowa, Arizona, California and Washington.

When I was a student at SWBTS I did not see any liberalism. The professors I had, had been there a long time and did indicate the SBC had some liberalism but seemed to balk at the idea of wholesale liberalism. Most of them had been there at least 20 years. They gave no credit to Judge Pressler or Paige Patterson because they had been teaching a conservative theology long before Patterson ever came on the scene . Some of them were teaching at the time when Patterson would have been a kid or possibly in diapers. To lump them with the liberals would have been an insult. What I saw was a commitment on the part of the faculty to teach the students well and teach them proper theology and proper methods of interpreting scripture. I did not come from a Baptist background and appreciated very much the integrity I saw among most of the faculty at SWBTS. In my personal discussions with professors I asked them about some issues I saw. One was integrity in publishing. One professor told me that the publisher had changed his manuscript in some parts to say what they wanted it to say and not what he actually believed and taught. I asked other professors about that as well. They agreed that it was a problem.

The following is an excerpt from a letter I received from Jerry Rankin's office in 1998 in response to some questions I had on an official position of the SBC regarding ordination. At the time it seemed there were a number of opinions on this issue by a number of leaders I met in the SBC.

1. Ordination is not required or prohibited for missionary appointment. We do not keep records of which missionaries have been ordained. We are aware of a few women who have been ordained.

2. We do not appoint missionaries to the specific role of pastors, but rather to the more specifically missionary role of extending the Gospel to new areas through church planting. There would be some exceptions to this such as those who go to serve English language congregations. We would not appoint women for such roles.

3. We believe that there is no New Testament teaching which prohibit women from exercising other gifts of ministry such as evangelizing with the expectation that new congregations will come out of the ministry. This obviously means that we do not see the roles of pastor and church planter as being identical.

See any problem with, “There would be some exceptions to this such as those who go to serve English language congregations. We would not appoint women for such roles.”? What is the difference between English and non-English speaking in regards to scripture?

A friend of mine wanted to pastor in the state where he was from and a DOM would not help him to get a church because he had graduated from Moody Bible Institute. He had been saved through a Southern Baptist church, attended a SBC church and was later a student at SWBTS after going to Moody. When that happened he went back to Moody to seek a church to work at. So his first church was not SBC.

A friend of mine was in a church near SWBTS and during the upheaval he was attending a church which was seriously effected by the political nonsense just a few years ago. A number of people started leaving the SBC to go to other churches in the area which caused a serious financial burden on the existing people left in that church. They were facing a possible bankruptcy or refinancing shortly after finishing a building. He told me the church was great and so was the pastor.

Leon McBeth was asked him to write a book on the history of women in the SBC. He wrote the book and a few books were published. Shortly thereafter it was killed and out of print. The leadership in the SBC did not like the information in the book. I thought that was something SBC folks accused RCC folks of. Where is the integrity in facing past problems? Is the answer to ignore them?

The cigar on B.H. Carroll is painted out on the painting in the rotunda at SWBTS. Again, an effort to cover up the past. Why not just admit the past and move on? People are more accpeting of wrong in the past admitted rather than covered up. Gotta have a good image though.

While I was a student at SWBTS on the campus of Houston Baptist University the school newspaper regularly had the weekly horoscope printed. This was well after the conservative resurgence. When I asked someone closely connected with the president at the time about it, they said they had no control over that because there were non-Christian students at the school working on the school newspaper. Why would a “Christian University knowingly admit non-Christians? Money? The SBC schools knowingly admit non-Christian students. At HBU there were plaques which had pictures of the big money givers. The state paper in TX printed the nickels and noses of the churches and how much cooperative money was given. States listed the top money givers and cooperative program givers. Several DOMs I talked with about that said it helps to raise money. What about trusting God?

The trustees at SWBTS complained about a book which Dr. Dilday had written and claimed it was liberal. I immediately went to the library and checked it out. It did not have any ideas of liberalism. Later, it was pulled from the library shelves while other books on Mormonism and other cults remained. I was in Ft. Worth when the trustees lied about Dilday.

A few years ago when I was pastoring I began to see some changes in the SBC. One of the deacons in the church I was pastoring was on a state board and asked me what I thought about bringing people in from the outside to be on state boards and on advisory boards in the SBC. Everyone of them being considered were dispensationalists.

Several faculty at SWBTS are dispensationalists. The provost is one who has written some books from a dispensationalist point of view. He is a graduate of DTS. Paige Patterson is a dispensationalist. He has hired some folks from DTS. I was told that Mohler at SBTS hired some administrators from outside of the SBC.

The leadership in the SBC wants cooperative program money yet hires non-SBC people as faculty and administrators? Especially those who teach the future leaders of the SBC. None of the seminaries in the SBC have ever adhered to or taught dispensationalism. Yet so many dispensationalists have been recently hired. You can go back to 1845 and will not find one dispensationalist who was on the faculty of any SBC seminary. In fact as students we were taught the ills of dispensationalism. Now SWBTS has a president who is a dispensationalist. Make sense?

Does the SBC want to change their theology to dispensationalism? Well they are through those seminaries which teach it.

 

What is the name of the book that offended the trustees, and what, specifically, offended them about the book?

Joseph Botwinick

 

When does any liberal among Baptists say "I am a liberal"? Liberals must try to pass themselves off as conservatives among Baptists so they can suckle the Baptist denominational teat.

I had extensive conversations on another discussion board with a pastor who taught in an SBC related college but who was an outspoken critic of the "Fundamentalist" takeover and who openly denied the inerrancy of the Scriptures. One day I viewed the web-site of the college in which he taught and on the home page it stated that the school upheld the "inerrancy" of the Scriptures.

I asked the pastor who taught there if he held contrary to the position of the school or if the school was lying about holding to inerrancy. His only response was that there were some definitions of inerrancy to which he could subscribe - and that after he had vehemently castigated others for believing in inerrancy.

All of which goes to illustrate that liberals use duplicity to cover their tracks so they can continue to enjoy the largesse from the Baptist churches which actually hold the Bible to be true. The only way to expose them is to pin them down on specific matters - such as, did God command Abraham to sacrifice Isaac or did he not.

You can say all day long that those who were driven out of the SBC seminaries were not liberals, but they were. Some of them extreme left wing liberals. For example, those who started the Alliance of Baptists are self-confessed condoners of the sodomite lifestyle.

Some others involved in the so called "moderate" wing of the SBC started their own theology school at Mercer University and now that University is severing their ties with the SBC because they are allowing sodomite advocacy groups on campus.

The man who says that the SBC educational system was/is not permeated by modernism is either an ignoramus or a liar. Thank God there are some men who recognize this fact and are determined to drive them out.

Mark Osgatharp

 

Doctrine of Biblical Authority

I think it had more to do with the name of the author than anything.

 

They are the old German Baptist denomination. My grandparents were in it when they came from Germany. My dad left the group in the 40s over liberalism. I believe their Sioux Falls seminary is very liberal.

 

Dr. Dilday espoused in this book in ch 7 on pg 96 that the Bible is "inerrant in purpose" rather than inerrant in text and also claimed there were inconsistencies between the gospels. He used a very poor example earlier in the book of some who claimed Jesus was not human at all comparing that to the idea that some go to far in saying that the Bible has no human element. The point however, and where his example falls apart, is that Jesus even in human form was still perfect but he insists the Bible is not perfect. Throughout the entirety of the book he gives a mixed message claiming the Bible's power but then criticizing it and saying that is what makes it so powerful.

By the way I have this book in my hands copyright 1982.

Also if Dilday was not liberal why was he and his wife so threatend by the participation of Judge Pressler in the convention as to be rude and try to lecture them about why they should not be there at the 1979 Annual meeting?

Source: A Hill on Which To Die- Paul Pressler pgs.102 and 103

Why did Dilday rally his students against the conservative resurgence?

Pg 141

Why did Dilday make the following statement if he was not liberal:

"Whether the Bible is inerrant is of little concern to the Southern Baptist in the pew....The Bible never misleads us in its message but maybe in technicalities."

Statement from the Denver Post by Dr. Russell Dilday, President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary as reported on page 56 of the book SBC...House on the Sand.

 

I believe that on of the of the problems lies in the accepted definition of inerrant by Webster's and what some of Christians have redefined it to be. Anyone who has read their Bible knows there are inconsistencies in word usage in the gospels but read with an understanding of the context there are no inconsistencies in the message. The problem is that too many ignore that fact and are unwilling to deal with the matter except to ignore the issues and leave their followers speechless, embarrassed, and with a load of ignorance unable to deal with the issues that non-believers and believers raise. Even non-believers have caught onto the ignorance of those who make claims of believing the Bible yet have no answers for the discrepancies.

An example of an inconsistency in word usage but not in the message and purpose would be Luke 5:19, and Mk. 2:4.

Luke 5:19, "But not finding any way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down through the tiles with his stretcher, into the middle of the crowd, in front of Jesus.

and Mk. 2:4, "Being unable to get to Him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Him; and when they had dug an opening, they let down the pallet on which the paralytic was lying."

You cannot dig through a tile roof but you can through a thatched or one made with straw.

We do know that Paul uses texts form other places in his messages that were certainly not inspired and at times were nothing more than a saying. I think that some of the faculty at SWBTS would have done a better job of explaining the issue better. The faculty member I had for NT studies did a great job of training us to interpret in light of the historical context and to see how particular words were used during the time the NT was written.

I am unable to answer your question but I have heard many say they believe that was Dilday's downfall.

I am sure that you are aware of how much things have changed today. The WWJD bracelets and the book In His Steps was written by a liberal pastor yet it is promoted in conservative circles.

It was not too many years ago that people just used their Bible to study and share their faith. I had never heard of inerrancy until I lived in the south. I associated with those who studied their Bible and made disciples. Inerrancy was never an issue. We never doubted the words of our Bible. We never doubted God.

Some have redefined inerrant to mean what they want it to say and little of which they can prove. Some well known leaders at DTS teach that it is quite possible that there were mistakes in the original autographs written by the amanuensis when dictated by Paul and that he corrected the original writing by crossing out the particular letter and wrote the correct letter above it to say what he wanted. There are words and sounds in Greek which are similar sounding.

The accepted definition in Webster's of inerrant is "free from error; infallible."

Anyone reading the Bible knows that dates and numbers are not always in exact agreement throughout the entire Bible. It is our job to understand why and study enough to give correct answers. That requires work. When we understand the differences then we have answers and the Bible is viewed as credible. When we do not have ll the answers then we must be humble and not teach things we do not know for sure.

The fact is that we do not have all the answers in how to translate certain words in the Bible.

 

Remember what I wrote,"When I was a student at SWBTS I did not see any liberalism." I had come from a backgpound that would make the SBC look very liberal today and lacking scholarship. There was a time when the SBC was viewed by others are charismatic.

Where I moved from the SBC is almost gone today while new conservative churches are being planted and the area is growing in population.

 

This is only inconsistent if you use your personal concept of tile. You might want tor research that.

Which would come in handy in your last point.

If that is the case it is quite curious and he was but on of tens or hundreds that acted that way toward Pressler, Paige etc.

You tend to bring up irrelevant issues of proof of I know not what. Where it came from and who uses it is not relevant to this discussion.

The issue became important with the advent of heretical teachings that were destroying the belief in scripture. As an example in the apendix B of "A Hill on Which To Die" the Judge presents a poll result in 1976 of students at Southern Seminary. When students arrived at that school they believed in Jesus as the Divine Son of God, God really exists, Miracles happen, Jesus as Savior, and by the time they reached their Doctorate the numbers dropped as low as in the 30's in some questions. It is very necessary.

Some have but it is not the conservatives. And the rest of this is the reason for the need for inerrancy.

Nothing has been redefined. It is the application of the word you seem to have a problem with. Copiest errors have nothing to do with inerrancy and infallibility.

 

You did not challenge me on the issue of inerrancy but on the historical context of scripture. Whatever position you take on the roof one is an incomplete description.

When you get older as well as study Baptist history you will realize that in many cases the pendulum keeps swinging back and forth. Whitsitt taught the same thing as every Baptist historian teaches today. He was fired as a liberal. Does that make the SBC heavily laden with liberals?

Paige Patterson is on the opposite end of Piper and Mohler. Which one should be fired?

When Dilday was fired the trustees lied to the SBC, the non-Christian public, and the students at SWBTS at the time. One of the professors told me at the time to not believe a word of it. The next day things changed and the trustees were found to be liars. If you take the position that Dilday was a liberal and the trustees were conservatives (one of which was involved in promiscuity at the time) who were the real liberals in practice at the time? I am not aware of any time when they were confronted that they ever repented or made a public apology. I am aware that I read the excuses they made. I personally believe the SBC in store for far more trouble in the future because of that kind of humility and repentance if it keeps up that kind of accountability.

I happen to believe that few Christians really believe the Bible beyond the lip service of “conservative”.
Part of that was shown when I posted about 1 Sam. 16:14-23.

That is one of the reasons why I wanted nothing to do with Southern at the time. I had heard that from a friend of mine who attended Southern for a short time. He also mentioned that the scholarship level was poor. When he came to SWBTS there were several classes he had to retake because he did not have enough hours in each class. He was very poorly prepared academically. I was also told that Southern was in tough shape financially too. I do not attribute the liberals being gone to just two people. I believe it was a concerted effort by many outside of Southern.

I also know that several professors at SWBTS told the classes I was in that they were committed to teaching the Bible and good scholarship. Even today I think I got a first class education there. The professors I had, dealt with various interpretations of texts and various theologies. Then they would tell us where they stood and how they arrived at that point. I had professors who had been pastoring and were Christians a long time. Some of the best theology and best sermons I ever heard were in Greek and Hebrew classes. What I heard in those classes would make most of the SBC look like they did not know their Bible and just repeated what they heard some other ignorant person say.

I believe there is a lot more liberalism in the SBC than one can imagine and the Chicago Statement will not cure the chameleons from that. I have seen the leaders of the past who have changed to conform to the theology of those in power now. I have also seen the response of some of those who know the truth. I have seen the chameleons of today too, to get the job they want.

I was not writing about copiest errors but errors in the original writing by the amanuensis and corrected by the author.
If one uses the word inerrancy then he must also either explain or assume the person in the pew understand the Chicago Statement.


Under Infallibility, Inerrancy, Interpretation

Similarly, inerrant signifies the quality of being free from all falsehood or mistake and so safeguards the truth that Holy Scripture is entirely true and trustworthy in all its assertions.

We affirm that canonical Scripture should always be interpreted on the basis that it is infallible and inerrant. However, in determining what the God-taught writer is asserting in each passage, we must pay the most careful attention to its claims and character as a human production. In inspiration, God utilized the culture and conventions of His penman's milieu, a milieu that God controls in His sovereign providence; it is misinterpretation to imagine otherwise.
The first part makes the assertion that scripture is absolutely accurate.
I would contend that it is accurate considering the message and the language sued to communicate the message so that people understood.

1 Ki 7:23, Now he made the sea of cast metal ten cubits from brim to brim, circular in form, and its height was five cubits, and thirty cubits in circumference.”
A circle of ten cubits in diameter would have a circumference of 31.4159 cubits. By today’s standard that is inaccurate and incorrect. Therefore the first sentence is wrong by today’s standard. If I know how to correctly interpret scripture then I am able to address that issue correctly and give the correct interpretation in light of its historical context and not what someone says about scripture.

If I know about the inspiration of scripture and how to interpret I need nothing else. I do not need a man made statement about scripture. I need to know scripture and be able to interpret it correctly.Scripture is inspired by God and that is good enough for me. The Chicago Statement is a reaction to something and it is not inspired by God. It is inspired by men.

When I talk with young believers and non-Christians it is not helpful to use words they do not understand. I use the same language the English Bible uses and an English dictionary.

In recent years when I talk with non-Christians it has been surprising to me how many know about “errors” in the Bible through the press and news. Seldom did I hear that, years ago. We believed the Bible. We believed God and used our Bible to learn more about God and to be able to share our faith.

Recently I spoke with the lady who teaches OT and NT survey at the university where I teach. We were in a class together and had gotten to know a little about each other. She is a Catholic and seems to have a decent grip on what the Bible actually teaches. She told me what salvation is and her view of the RCC. I was pleasantly surprised. She told me about some of the things some students have told her. She told me about their ignorance of scripture and what is actually taught. She actually thinks of them as conservatives. I think most of us would think of them as ignorant folks who know more about issues that are preached on than what is in their Bible.

I believe we have a situation on our hands today that is just as bad as liberalism. We have an all time low of Bible literacy. We have ignorant people declaring things they know nothing about and cannot explain. Just a few years there was an ignorant deacon in a church I was pastoring who told a non-Christian man that the Bible was true and that he either believed it or he did not. That man spent a lot of time reading his Bible and asking questions of the person who told him how accurate the Bible was. The problem was that the man found numerous things that did not seem to agree and the deacon could not answer. The man came to me and we had many conversations but still insisted on what the deacon told him. I would like to tell you that the man became a Christian but he did not. He actually quit reading his Bible because he came to the conclusion that he would never get all the answers. He was under the assumption that he would only believe everything by understanding everything. I told him what he needed to do to be saved but he continued to stick to the point of understanding everything. How many of us are able to prove and understand every point the Bible teaches?

The churches today spend too much time in defending the Bible and making statements about it when they should be learning more about what it teaches and sharing their faith.

If I know how to interpret scripture in light of its historical context and study it, I will be able to answer a lot of questions that come my way and I will also be able to explain what I know using common English and the terms scripture uses. I do not need to memorize a statement on inerrancy.

I have never met a Christian who knows his Bible well who ever said that God does not exist and the Bible is shot full of holes. In contrast I have never met someone who left the faith and who claimed there are all kinds of errors in the Bible who has not missed the mark in how to correctly interpret.

I have talked with many Christians who tell me they believe the Bible but also have no explanation of things that seem to disagree. Would you witness to someone with the fear of that being thrown back in your face with no answers to give the person?

 

Nothing is incomplete when you are willing to accept the facts.

What does this mean?

Yes well if one of the professors told you them I suppose that puts it to and end. No one lied and it is obvious to all you you like to demonize the conservatives in the SBC. You are not credible based on these supposed anecdotal experiences. I have supplied you with specific sources.you give me anecdotes. Got anything else?

That is because that is what makes you comfortable with your liberalism. See you liberals like to set a false sense of "we work hard and conservatives do nothing" mentality. It makes you feel better about tearing down the foundation (the Bible) of our faith. Do you know that it is a proven statistic that conservatives nation wide give more money to charities out of their pocket than do liberals? Significantly more. Seethe difference is conservatives do a grat many things we just do not have a need to use those actions as a prop to support our liberalism. And most conservatives like to serve others without bragging about it. Our consciences do not need to be soothed.

Of course

Again what?

And it is liberal ramblings like this that needs to be addressed by inerrrancy.

And?

So then your problem is not specifically with inerrancy but statement of faiths?

This is a sorry excuse.

Yes because the news and the press are reliable.

What has this to do with anything? You have to stay on track.

Your long rants about who you know and what you supposedly have done are not credible or impressive. Stick to the subject.

You do not know what churches do today. This is clear.

Again your problem is not with inerrancy but with statement of faiths.

Bub I know both inerrancy and my Bible. I witness with no fear. I understand the differences between two differing eye witness accounts and do not try to capitalize them to tear down my Bible. But liberals like your self want a way to leave things open ended so you can justify what you want.