What Is "Sermongate" All About?
Regardless of your views on the plagiarism scandal surrounding newly minted SBC President, Ed Litton, here is a good article from the New York Times that provides a fairly neutral perspective in describing the issue.
TL;DR - preaching another pastor's sermon is not new. It is a grey area where there are differing opinions. While not condemned, it certainly diminishes a pastor's credibility when discovered.
This quote by Scot McKnight probably best describes the sense of betrayal church members feel when they discover their pastor is not preaching his own material:
For many churchgoers, a sermon is not just a clever speech but proof of the pastor’s deep spiritual life. “A sermon is a person studying the Bible, encountering God in their own life and history, and then spewing it all out on Sunday morning for the good of the people of God.”
The article also points to the possible root of the issue with the various pastors involved: they all employed a company called Docent Research Group.
On their website, Docent describes their services:
We do everything from demographic research to help plan for a new campus launch or church plant to sermon series preparation and planning. We help churches craft position papers to articulate beliefs, and we write custom curriculum for small groups, Bible studies, and Christian education programs. If you need it, we can do it!
J.D. Greear was an endorser of Docent Group until the scandal broke, and his endorsement has been removed.
Still, all of the players involved in the plagiarism scandal are on public record as clients of Docent including Tim Keller, J.D. Greear, Matt Chandler, and Ed Litton.
Perhaps its not so much an issue of plagiarism as it is all of the pastors mentioned are drinking from the same well, which unfortunately is The Docent Group, not the Bible.
This scandal has also exposed perhaps some previously unknown schisms within SBC leadership. Danny Akin and Adam Greenway have both tweeted in support of Ed Litton, basically saying, "nothing to see here, move along," while Jason Allen tweeted a statement condemning plagiarism without mentioning Litton specifically. Al Mohler has remained silent on the issue.
SBC Adopts Vision 2025
On June 15, the 2021 SBC messengers adopted Vision 2025 as amended – a call to reach every person for Jesus Christ in every town, every city, every state, and every nation.
Vision 2025 was presented to the convention by Executive Committee President, Dr. Ronnie Floyd. The initiative is built around six key strategic actions:
Strategic Action 1: Increase our total number of full-time, fully funded missionaries to a net gain of 500, giving us 4,200 full-time, fully funded missionaries through IMB.
Strategic Action 2: Add 5,000 new churches to our Southern Baptist family, giving us more than 50,000 churches. This number will include new church plants, campuses, and existing non-SBC churches that seek to join the SBC.
Strategic Action 3: Increase our total number of workers in the field through a new emphasis on “calling out the called,” and then preparing those who are called out by the Lord.
Strategic Action 4: Turn around our ongoing decline in reaching, baptizing, and discipling those under the age of 18.
Strategic Action 5: Increase our annual giving in successive years to reach and surpass $500 million given through the Cooperative Program to achieve these Great Commission goals.
Strategic Action 6: Prayerfully endeavor before God to eliminate all instances of sex abuse and racial discrimination among our churches.
Vision 2025 Prayer Team
Vision 2025 can only be achieved through the power and work of the Holy Spirit through our churches. Towards this end, we are encouraging every pastor and every church member to make Vision 2025 a focus of prayer.
The Vision 2025 Prayer Team launched immediately following the adoption of the initiative by the 2021 SBC Messengers and currently has more than 5,500 Southern Baptists committed to pray.
You can become a part of this army of prayer warriors by texting VISION to 90885.
A response will be sent that confirms you have joined and a brief description of what to expect as a member of this Prayer Team. We want to know every single one of you by name so we're going to ask you for your name. And that's it.
You will begin this journey with us by praying through each initiative for the first 7 days. Following this, prompts will come periodically during specific strategic prayer emphases that call us to unified prayer.
SBC 2021 Annual Meeting Sets New Direction
Southern Baptists gathered in Nashville, TN, June 15-16 for the 2021 Annual Meeting. This was the first Annual Meeting in two years after the 2020 meeting was canceled due to COVID. With 15,769 registered messengers attending the 2021 meeting, this was the largest gathering of Southern Baptists at an Annual Meeting since 1995. More than 30 messengers attended representing Iowa churches.
As outgoing SBC President, J.D. Greear observed in his address to the convention,
I believe we are at a defining moment in our convention, at a crossroads. In fact, if I can be so bold, it might be the most important crossroads in our generation. Forty years ago a previous generation of Southern Baptists came to a defining moment, a moment in which they considered whether they would hold fast to the authority of God's word, whether they were going to follow the path of every other major denomination in America into the darkness of liberalism and the wilderness of cultural accommodation.
The Annual Meeting began under a cloud of controversy following the leak of two incendiary letters by former president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, Russell Moore. More resigned from the ERLC June 1 to take a position with Christianity Today and with a non-SBC church.
Moore's letters highlighted the growing conflict between the moderate wing of the SBC and the conservative wing.
Great Commission Baptists
The theme of this year's Annual Meeting was "We Are Great Commission Baptists."
During his convention address Greear noted, "My prayer is that this will be more than a theme for our annual meeting, that it will be a declaration of who we are and who we aspire to be. Our convention is a coalition of churches committed to doing whatever it takes to get the gospel to those who haven't heard it."
Election of New SBC President
A primary item of business during Day 1 of the SBC Annual Meeting was the election of a new president. J.D. Greear served a three-year term after last year's convention was cancelled.
Four men were nominated to become the new SBC president:
Randy Adams, who serves as the Executive Director of the Northwest Baptist Convention.
Ed Litton, who serves as pastor of Redemption Church in Saraland, AL.
R. Albert Mohler, who serves as president of the Souther Baptist Theological Seminary.
Mike Stone, who serves as pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Blackshear, GA.
Ed Litton was elected president in a runoff with 52 percent of the messengers voting for him versus 48 percent voting for Mike Stone. The divided election results reflect the divisions and fault lines within the SBC.
Resolutions of the Southern Baptist Convention
The Resolutions Committee, chaired by James Merritt, presented 10 resolutions to the messengers for consideration. These included,
Baptist Unity and Maintaining Our Public Witness — the priority of Christians to “walk worthy of their calling” and “make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit” (Eph. 4:1–3).
On the Sufficiency of Scripture for Race and Racial Reconciliation — affirming that Scripture in “inspired by God” (2 Tim. 3:16–17) and that all people are “one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:26–28).
On Taxpayer Complicity in Abortion and the Hyde Amendment — affirms the sanctity of human life (Gen. 1:27; 9:6) and opposes the use of taxpayer money to fund abortion procedures.
On the Equality Act — affirms that God created two distinct sexes (Gen. 1:27; Matt. 19:4) and opposes the Equality Act that “seeks to revise the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by adding a prohibition of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.”
On Abuse and Pastoral Qualifications — affirms that Scripture teaches pastors, elders and overseers are to be “above reproach” (1 Tim. 3:2) and states that any person who has committed sexual abuse should be permanently disqualified from holding the office of pastor.
On Sole Membership — upholds the Southern Baptist foundational belief that each individual church member is in a “legal relationship” with the SBC and convention entities and that only the convention in session — not the Executive Committee — is the legal “sole member” of the various agencies and institutions of the convention.
On the Uyghur Genocide — denounces atrocities inflicted by the Communist Party of China against the Uyghur people.
On the Coronavirus Pandemic — expresses grief for the more than 3.78 million lives lost during the COVID-19 pandemic.
On Appreciation for the City of Nashville — adds an extra emphasis because of how many top officials worked together to allow the SBC Annual Meeting to continue in Nashville when restrictions were still an issue up until a few weeks prior.
The messengers also voted by two-thirds majority to call one additional resolution out of committee that the Resolutions Committee chose not to present. This resolution, which passed, called for the Abolition of Abortion, immediately and without compromise.
All of the resolutions were approved by the messengers.
Critical Race Theory
Since the approval of Resolution 9 by the SBC in 2019, there has been strong disagreement over the acceptance of Critical Race Theory/Intersectionality by the convention.
According to Kimberlé Crenshaw, one of the leading scholars to develop Critical Race Theory and Intersectionality,
It is an academic discipline composed of civil-rights scholars in the United States who seek to critically examine the law to show, first, that it maintains white supremacy, white power, and enforces societal or structural racism; and, second, that transforming the relationship between law and racial power, and also achieving racial emancipation more broadly, is possible.
Many Southern Baptists have argued that CRT is incompatible with the New Testament teachings concerning racial reconciliation and the hope for true unity found through the gospel.
The Resolution Committee chose to omit any mention of Critical Race Theory in Resolution 2, which was submitted to reverse the decision of Resolution 9 in 2019 that affirmed Critical Race Theory and Intersectionality as an analytical tool to help Southern Baptist better understand racism in America.
When a motion was made from the floor to specifically address Critical Race Theory in Resolution 2, James Merritt made an impassioned statement:
It’s time to find out who we are and where we are headed. If some people were as passionate about the gospel as they were CRT, we’d win this world to Christ tomorrow.
We are all created in the image of God. We’ve been given the ministry of reconciliation. …
We are not the 2019 Resolutions Committee. We are the 2021 Resolutions Committee. We are not going to limit anything to just one thing (responding to questions about the resolution on race and racial reconciliation, see above).
What we have done in this resolution is settle this issue once and for all, yesterday today and forever. We reject any theory that the problem is anything other than sin and the solution is anything other than salvation.
There is a world watching out there and this (division about CRT) is exactly what they want.
We can either build bridges and tear down walls or we can put up walls and tear down bridges.
To build a bridge it takes hard work, sacrifice, commitment to reach to the other side but do everything we can to get them there.
IMB Sending Celebration
By many accounts, the highlight of the week happened before the Annual Meeting began. Monday, June 14, at the conclusion of the Send Conference, the International Mission Board presented 64 missionaries to be sent to foreign fields around the world.
Reflecting on the difficulties presented by the COVID pandemic and 20202, IMB President Paul Chitwood stated, "I questioned at times if we would be able to do everything that is necessary to appoint, train and deploy new missionaries in the midst of a global pandemic. But by God’s grace and with His help, your sending of missionaries through the IMB has not. even. slowed.
The majority of the 2021 missionaries being sent were presented from behind a screen to conceal their identity because they are going to closed nations.
Future Impact of SBC 2021
While the decisions and statements made in Nashville during the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting have little direct impact on Iowa Churches, it does signal the overall direction the convention is moving. Local church autonomy is still the hallmark of the Southern Baptist Convention and ensures that each local congregation holds full control over their own doctrinal positions and missional efforts. Southern Baptists agree to voluntarily cooperate for the gospel and the expression of this cooperation is in giving through the Cooperative Program.
Next week, we will examine one of the key initiatives to be approved by the messengers to the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting: Vision 2025.
The SBC Alamo
In 1716, Spanish Roman Catholic missionaries established a small chapel in an unexplored and relatively uninhabited piece of land in what would one day become Texas. The nearest Spanish settlement was more than 400 miles away.
By 1744, the mission was home to more than 300 Indians who had converted to Christianity.
It was at this site, in 1836, that one of the most memorable battles in American history would be fought.
Texas was in the midst of a revolution. Settlers from the United States and native Tejanos (Texas Mexicans) started an armed resistance to the rule of the Mexican government, which had become increasingly centralized and authoritarian, eroding away the individual rights and local autonomy of the Texans.
Determined to put down the rebellion, Mexican president and general Antonio López de Santa Anna sent Mexican troops into Texas in early 1836.
On February 23, the first shots were fired at the small Catholic mission now simply known as The Alamo. Over the next 13 days, the small contingent of Texans and Tejanos would be overwhelmed by the Mexican troops and eventually defeated.
Determined to strike terror into Texans, Santa Anna ordered the execution of the remaining troops at The Alamo, but he spared the women, children, and slaves. These survivors were sent to let other Texas settlers know what happened at The Alamo and to warn them to join with the Mexicans in pursuit of peace.
Rather than discourage Texans from pursuing independence, The Alamo became a battle cry--"Remember The Alamo!" Regrouped under Gen. Sam Houston, the Texans attacked the Mexican Army at San Jacinto, and on April 21, 1836, defeated Santa Anna and the Mexican Army.
An Opportunity to Unify
Many Southern Baptists see the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting in Nashville this week as The Alamo for the Southern Baptist Convention.
Set to be the largest gathering of Southern Baptists in a generation, the stakes could not be higher, or more divisive.
The battle lines are drawn and include the issues of ordaining women as pastors, anti-racism and Critical Race Theory, the sexual abuse of children and the mistreatment of sexual abuse survivors, and a redefinition of the Southern Baptist Convention leaning more towards central authority and away from its historic belief in local autonomy.
The hope and prayer is that when people gather together in the same room, there is a graciousness, love, and unity that is not found on social media and in the blogosphere. It is much easier to call someone “woke” or “racist” in a tweet rather when you are in the same room and you see this person as a brother or sister in Christ.
One issue Southern Baptists cannot ignore is its treatment of sexual abuse survivors or communicate an unwillingness to protect the most vulnerable among us.
While the other issues are important, we must be better at articulating what we are for rather than what we are against.
Is the 2021 Annual Meeting the "SBC Alamo?" Only time will tell. In the years ahead, it is my prayer that when we look back at 2021 we see a convention of churches that unified around a common doctrine and a common mission, but not at the expense of one over the other.
The SBC is fundamentally conservative in its historic interpretation of Scripture. I believe this is expressed in the Baptist Faith and Message. At the same time, I do not ignore the fact that there are agents within the SBC who are determined to pull the convention to the left (what they perceive as the middle). This downgrade will spell the end of the SBC as we know it if it is allowed to progress.