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By Walter B. Shurden
Callaway Professor of Christianity
Executive Director, The Center for Baptist Studies
Mercer University, Macon, Georgia
Note: This article was published in Texas Baptists Committed, National Edition, October 1999, p.19
1. The most prophetic line
of the Southern Baptist Convention Holy War: We will
have a great time here, if for no other reason than to elect Adrian Rogers our
president. It came from W. A. Criswell at the
SBC Pastors Conference in Houston,
Texas, in 1979. It brought the SBC house
down with cheers and applause. More pessimistic observers would simply say that
those words brought the SBC house down.
But they didnt.
2. The saddest moment of the controversy: Oct. 22, 1986, at Glorieta, N.M., when the SBC seminary presidents caved
in before the fundamentalist juggernaut. Glorieta marked the end for the moderates.
You do not compromise with truth-oriented fundamentalists who think that they have
the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
3. The reason for the outcome: passion won; culture played a part; leadership wasvery important.
4. One of the most often-heard and
biggest myths during the controversy: The
fundamentalists will moderate once they get in power. I stand by what I said regarding the new SBC in my final chapter
of the revised edition of Not a Silent People.
Theologically and ideologically the SBC
has been fundamentalized; ecclesiologically
the SBC has been centralized; culturally,
in terms of gender issues, the SBC has been
chauvinized; ecumenically the SBC has
been sectarianized; denominationally the
SBC has been de-baptistified.
5. The greatest error history will make
in interpreting the controversy: thinking it
was a lopsided victory. It was a much closer
fight than history will reflect. But history
will mark it up as a win for the fundamentalists and a loss for the moderates
without paying attention to the very close percentages by which the fundamentalists
won the presidency year after year.
6. A warning to all from the controversy: The Southern Baptist Church has
replaced The Southern Baptist Convention.
Moderates must work at carrying their
emerging connectionalism lightly. The
community in Baptist life is primarily
the local church. This is neither
Landmarkism nor sectarianism. It is historic Baptist church polity.
7. The bad news coming out of the controversy: It was worth doing then. It will be worth doing again when Baptists have forsaken their Baptistness.
8. The biggest casualties of the war: little
girls born into SBC churches during the
struggle who would grow up wanting to be
a part of the SBC ministry in the 21st century.
9. The most appropriate biblical text
for the Holy War: Acts 19:32. Meanwhile,
some were shouting one thing, some another; for the assembly was in confusion,
and most of them did not know why they
had come together.
10. The most surprising outcome of
the controversy: the belief, as Fisher
Humphreys said, that the Bible alone is
Gods word was unaffected by the controversy. Moderates believe that as much as
fundamentalists. Nothing has changed regarding the place of the Bible in Baptist
life. Difference in interpretations of the
Bible continue, as they always have.
11. The most forgotten dimension of the controversy by the moderates: that moderates are defined by the two decades of
struggle. One understands the moderate
longing to get beyond the controversy,
but the truth of the matter is that moderates
are who they are because of what they both
resisted and affirmed in the controversy.
Moderates will forget or get beyond at
their peril.
12. A moderate hero who should never
be forgotten: Cecil Sherman. He was right
more times in more ways on more issues
than any other single person. I am grateful
for him, for his courage, for his tenacity,
for his wisdom, and for his leadership.
13. The most overlooked dimension of
the controversy: the doctrine of God. Alan
Neely, another of the many moderate heroes of the war, said correctly that the
controversy was fundamentally an argument about God. He meant, I think, that
fundamentalists were mired in a concept of
God that was exclusive, intolerant and
legalistic, while moderates pleaded for Gods inclusiveness, forgiveness and acceptance.
14. One of the biggest victories for the
SBC fundamentalist leadership: the triumph
of creedalism in SBC life. Even some moderates, under the influence of that triumph,
long for a statement of what we believe.
It is a dangerous itch. Let it itch. Dont
scratch it.
15. The most pathetic people in the controversy: those who said, plague on both
the fundamentalists and the moderates and
who serenely stayed out of the line of fire.
Next to the most pathetic are those
megachurch pastors who waited to see who would win before they cast their sails
toward the winning fundamentalists. If moderates had won, these ambitious pastors
would have gone with moderates.
16. People who have never heard
enough thank yous from moderates: old-
line SBC leadership that helped launch the
new moderate organizations and then gladly
stepped aside: Duke McCall, Grady Cothen,
Jimmy Allen, Carolyn Crumpler, Foy Valentine, Randall Lolley, and a few others
who have been too often derisively labeled
the the good old boys (and girl). They
were indeed a group of good old boys and
girl.
17. Im glad to be done with the fundamentalist leadership of
the SBC that transformed some good, basically conservative
denominational agencies into a bastion of
fundamentalism. The new SBC is not even
close to my Baptist identity. The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and The Baptist
Alliance are much closer. It feels good to be
able to embrace the larger Baptist tradition
and the larger Christian community.
18. I hope moderates will grow more
and more into issues of social justice while
keeping their Bibles open and their hearts
warm. My prayer is that moderates will
take seriously what Jesus took seriously.
Baptists of our ilk have been big on missions and big on personal devotion, and
that is very good. We need to become bigger on justice issues.
19. I hope moderates will not dumb
down our worship simply because dumbing
down is the fad and draws crowds. I hope
moderates will never get stuck again on
issues of size, but I also hope that we will
explore the possibility of being Baptist with
other Baptists, especially American Baptists, Canadian Baptists, and some African-American Baptists.
20. The biggest nonsurprise of the controversy: Historic Baptist principles
regarding the importance of the individual, the centrality of the local church,
religious liberty and the separation of church and state,
anticreedalism, and the priesthood of all
believers, may be more important at the
turn of this century than at any time since
Baptists began in 17th-century England.