Posted: 6/010/03
RUSSELL DILDAY:
Baptists Today, yesterday and tomorow
Below is the text of a message delivered by Russell Dilday, former president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, upon his receipt of the Judson-Rice Award for leadership and integrity from Baptists Today April 25.
By Russell Dilday
I consider this recognition as immensely significant in part because of the other recipients: Jimmy Allen and Tony Campolo. To be included in that noteworthy duet is humbling.
Second, it is significant, too because of the heroic personalities for whom the award is named. Adoniram and Ann Judson and Luther Rice founded the modern missionary movement and brought together their scattered Baptist congregations into a cooperating denomination. The Judsons and Rice personify the core ingredients of what it means to be Baptist.
Third, the recognition comes from Baptists — my extended family. I know being a follower a Jesus — being a Christian — is the crucial identity, but what kind of Christian you are really matters.
Our Baptist identity, history, heritage, and convictions are very important to me and I know to you too.
BAPTIST ROOTS
When the Dilday family settled on the east banks of the Tennessee River in the early 1800s, they established The Baptist Church at Dilday’s Landing. The church site was covered by the Kentucky Lake, but you can still see the stone steps when the water is low. My great, great grandfather was the church clerk.
My grandparents and my parents were active Baptist believers. My wife Betty and her family have a long history with Dr. James Leavell and Dr. E.D. Head at First Baptist Church, Houston and Dr. Truett at Palacious Encampment on the Texas Coast. Our children and grandchildren continue that tradition.
And to top it off, a few weeks ago, because of research done by Baylor professor Frank Leavell and my sister Ann, I discovered that I am the great, great grandson by marriage of Noah T. Byars – Texas Patriot and Baptist pioneer. It was in Byars’ blacksmith shop at Washington on the Brazos that the Texas declaration of independence and the Constitution of the Republic of Texas were signed.
He served as Sam Houston’s official armorer, a hero of Texas Independence. But he also became a Baptist minister and missionary.
Noah T. Byars (my great, great grandfather by marriage), founded the First Baptist Churches of Waco, Corsicana, and Brownwood as well as 60 other churches in north Texas. He also organized a dozen associations including the one that became the Dallas Baptist Association.
He was on the small committee that organized Baylor University and was co-founder of Howard Payne University where I am completing my term as interim president.
So. Betty and I have deep Baptist roots, and therefore any recognition that comes from our Baptist family is meaningful to us .
Another reason this recognition is important to me is my high regard for Baptists Today — its work, its history all the way back to Walker Knight and SBC Today, its current staff, and the exceptional luminaries who serve with Chairman Jim McAfee. on the board.
This is one of those causes worth living for and giving for.
LOOKING BACK
The name of the news journal is especially enlightening: Baptists Today. It calls to mind the two other dimensions on either side of it: "Baptists Yesterday" and "Baptists Tomorrow." All three are important.
Twenty-five years ago, who could have imagined the Baptist scene today – this peculiar mixture of disappointments and exhilarating prospects? What a mess and what an opportunity!
We take great pride in Baptist men and women today – lay persons and ministers – who refuse to cower in the safety of a non-commitment that brags on the fact that it hasn’t taken sides.
We admire persons who with courage tempered by a Christ-like spirit do what they can to correctly define and defend authentic Baptist principles today. That’s what the Baptists Today organization is trying to do and all of us here are grateful.
What about "Baptists Yesterday?" No one wants to get bogged down in a nostalgic reflection that dwells in the past.
But the Bible says: "Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their lives and imitate their faith."
We must never forget our spiritual birthright — the Baptist heritage — because our history informs us who we are.
Tragically, there is an effort being made by some to rewrite our history. They want to erase the true Baptist vision and reshape it. Some have called them pseudo-Baptists, rogues inside the family who never knew or have forgotten what our true identity is and are distorting it.
Unless this effort is addressed, the species called Baptistus Authenticus is threatened with extinction and a new breed called Baptistus Counterfeitus will be grafted in its place.
My plea is for us "Baptists today" to help shape "Baptists tomorrow" by preserving the authentic heritage of "Baptists yesterday."
DISTINCTIVE MARKS
What are the distinctive historical marks of Baptists yesterday — Baptistus Authenticus?
Traditional Baptists share with most other evangelicals those core biblical beliefs of Creation, Trinitarian, Christology, Redemption, and those great Reformation doctrines Sola Scriptura and Justification by Faith. But there are other convictions that taken together are unique to true Baptists:
1. No Creed but the Bible (Some call us non-creedal but we’re not. We are one-creedal)
2. Believer’s baptism by immersion, a regenerate church membership
3. Symbolic ordinances
4. Security of the believer
5. Voluntary cooperation
6. Soul competency and the priesthood of each believer
7. Religious freedom, liberty of conscience and the separation of church & state
This individual freedom to respond to God through Christ without coercion is so central. Baptists treasure their freedom.
Paul said, "I was born free." Baptists were born free too. Individual liberty of conscience is deep in the genetic DNA of Baptistus Authenticus.
Unfortunately, these seven distinctive convictions are, as theologian Leo Garrett says, "threatened with serious attrition if not absolute extinction."
They are being challenged by another set of opinions from a group often labeled "fundamentalists" — or what Roger Olson calls "maximal conservatives." E.Y. Mullins called them "ultra brethren."
ELEVATED OPINIONS
Here are some of the alternative ideologies promoted in place of our historil Baptist distinctives:
1. An absolute form of Biblical inerrancy
2. Calvinism in its more extreme form
3. Pastor-centered authority
4. Male domination and female subjection
5. Pre-millennial dispensationalism
6. A "young earth" version of creationism
Olson, a theology professor at Baylor’s Truett Seminary, makes a helpful distinction between dogma, doctrines, and opinions:
Dogma, he says, comprises the great historical essentials of the faith upon which all evangelical Christians agree such as Creation, Redemption and the Trinity.
He defines doctrines as those convictions such as believer’s baptism by immersion, autonomy of the local church, once saved always saved.
They are important. We would die for them, but we don’t condemn those who don’t hold these views as being non-Christian.
Opinions, however, are those details about the end times, worship styles, the days of Creation, Calvinism vs. Arminianism and capital punishment. Baptists have always honored differences of opinion in these areas.
The trouble comes when a group elevates their opinions to the level of dogma and then demands everybody accept them or be excluded. The Baptist way has always been: "In essentials – unity; in non-essentials – liberty, and in all things – charity."
Rejecting the strengths of "Baptists yesterday," these revisers are trying to reshape "Baptists tomorrow" by minimizing our traditional beliefs and promoting their opinions as non-revisable dogma.
QUESTIONABLE METHODOLOGIES
It is not just their beliefs that are often alien to historic Baptist convictions, but their methodologies are questionable as well.
J.I. Packer, a well-known conservative Anglican scholar, has edited a book called Power Religion which is a critique denouncing this brand of fundamentalism. The book description of "Carnal Conservatism" sounds very familiar.
1. Authoritarian styles of pastoral leadership
2. Use of secular political strategies even though the Bible forbids the use of such weapons in Christian service (II Cor. 10:3-4, 6:7)
3. Fanning emotional fears by supposed conspiracy theories
4. Government entanglements in which the church is reduced to nothing more than another political special interest group
5. Using peer pressure to enforce conformity (ganging up, ostracizing and withholding rewards from those who don’t fall in line)
6. Total defeat of those who disagree — an ugly denominational version of ethnic cleansing.
Sounds all too familiar don’t they? Well let me leave you with one example of how this revision of our Baptists heritage is being carried out.
In a new Broadman & Holman book by Southern Seminary president Al Mohler, he criticizes E. Y. Mullins, one of Southern Baptists’ most respected theologians and the subject of my doctoral dissertation.
Mullins, a former president of Southern Seminary, was a definer and defender of traditional Baptist distinctives in the early 1900s. He believed — as most historic Baptists — in biblical authority, the priesthood of every believer, local church autonomy, separation of church and state, a regenerate church membership, and believer’s baptism.
He named "soul competency" as the basic Baptist distinctive on which most other distinctives were grounded. For Mullins, soul competency is not human self-sufficiency. It is the idea that every human being is free to respond to God directly through Christ without human mediators — a priest, a church, a creed, or a civil authority. It is indeed a priceless concept, distinctive to Baptist thought and practice.
But Mohler in a tragic misreading or an unfortunate distortion of his theology, blames E. Y. Mullins for "setting the stage for doctrinal ambiguity and theological minimalism." In other words, E. Y. Mullins is to blame for what Mohler believes is a drift towards theological liberalism in Baptist life.
Mohler calls Mullins’ emphasis on soul competency "an acid dissolving religious authority, congregationalism, confessionalism and mutual theological accountability."
But on the contrary, E.Y. Mullins is considered by most traditional Baptists to be an ideal example of Baptistus Authenticus. From 1899 to 1928 he served as seminary president under circumstances remarkably similar to those we face today.
He was involved with what has been called the "Modernist-Fundamentalist" controversy in the 1920s. He became a spokesman for what I like to call the "constructive conservative" faction, rejecting liberalism on the left with its lack of convictions, and rejecting fundamentalism on the right with its authoritarian legalism.
Mullins was neither a hardened traditionalists nor a faddish liberal, but a constructive conservative who sought to communicate the Christian faith in contemporary terms. He showed you can be conservative without being cranky.
‘A SMIDGEON MORE’
By the way, are you having trouble like I am with names for all the theological positions today — fundamentalist, conservative, moderate and liberal?
David Solomon, a Texan and a Baptist who is now teaching at the Center for Ethics and Culture at Notre Dame, said he had some friends who are "not liberal, but a smidgeon more than moderate."
Some of us have never been too fond of the term moderate, so I guess you could say that Baptists like Mullins — and like some of us — are not fundamentalist, but a smidgeon less than moderate.
Mullins spoke out intelligently against theological liberalism: naturalistic evolution, rationalistic higher criticism, and the social gospel. But on the other hand, he strongly opposed the legalistic, hard line extremism of the fundamentalists that he also saw as a serious threat to our Baptist heritage.
He objected when fundamentalists from the seminary board set up what he called "smelling committees" to periodically visit faculty members in their search for heresy. He openly worked toward the defeat of "radicals and extremists who want to put the thumb screws on everybody who does not agree in every detail with their statements of doctrine."
Mullins described the fundamentalists as "hyper-orthodox," "ultra-brethren" and "lacking in common sense."
In his ongoing conflict with fundamentalist leader T. T. Eaton, Mullins pointed out that he rejected both the "half Baptist" (or liberal) who had no convictions as well as the "Baptist and a half" (or fundamentalist) who could not tolerate any doctrinal differences.
By the way, Eaton countered Mullins’ challenge by saying he gloried in being a "Baptist and a half!"
AVOIDING EXTREMES
As a constructive conservative, Mullins faulted both fundamentalists and liberals for their extremism that led to name-calling rather than fruitful communication.
He represented the historical Baptist approach when he declared, "The really safe leaders of thought are between the extremes." Gordon Fee calls this position the "radical middle."
Mullins strongly repudiated creedalism. "No creed can be set up as final and authorit-ative apart from the scriptures," he said. "For Baptists, there is one authoritative source of religious truth and knowledge. It is to that source they look to in all matters relating to doctrine, to policy, to the ordinances, to worship, and to Christian living. That source is the Bible."
But Mullins made it clear that the Bible is authoritative only because it leads persons to God through Christ.
"The Scriptures do not and cannot take the place of Jesus Christ," he said. "We are not saved by belief in the Scriptures, but by a living faith in Christ.
"The authority of Scripture is that simply of an inspired literature which interprets a life. Christ as the Revealer of God and Redeemer of men is the seat of authority in religion and above and underneath and before the Bible. The Bible is the authoritative literature which leads us to Christ."
Mullins sought to avoid both extremes. He rejected the liberal position which makes the Bible little more than another ancient book, full of errors and contradictions, and not authoritative. On the other hand he rejected the fundamentalist tendency to elevate the Bible to a level it never claims for itself, in some cases to a position even above God himself.
With a voice that divided Baptists need to hear today, Mullins warned against the destructive nature of bitter denominational disputes with all the name-calling and pigeon-holing. He knew that divisiveness and loss of trust within the Baptist family diverts us from our main functions of evangelism and missions.
"I have no right to refuse to call a Baptist my brother merely because he does not happen to be my twin brother," Mullins reminded his fellow Baptists. "And I also maintain that another Baptist has no right to refuse to call me brother (and nag and torment me) because I am not his twin."
As a heroic representative of Baptists yesterday, I believe E.Y. Mullins is an example to follow as we look to the future. No wonder those who want to reshape the Baptist vision don’t pay much attention to him.
So my plea tonight is for us "Baptists today" to help shape "Baptists tomorrow" by preserving — like E.Y. Mullins — the authentic heritage of "Baptists yesterday."
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