Southern Baptists have been ‘fighting the wrong battles,’ president insists

Posted: 6/14/07

Southern Baptists have been ‘fighting
the wrong battles,’ president insists

By Charlie Warren

Arkansas Baptist

SAN ANTONIO—Southern Baptist Convention President Frank Page challenged challenged Baptists to lay aside factionalism and cold-hearted legalism to develop a new strategic battle plan that goes beyond doctrinal rightness to speak the truth in love to a lost world.

To illustrate his message from Psalm 51:1-13, Page referred to France just prior to World War II. French leaders, particularly André Maginot, minister of war, poured enormous financial resources into a state-of-the-art defense system along the nation’s eastern border, with the exception of dense forests they considered impenetrable.

When war began, the German army marched through the forest and Paris fell within three weeks, Page noted. The Maginot line of defense had failed.

“We (Southern Baptists) have build our own Maginot line,” Page said. “We have built wonderful entities, programs, agencies and great churches, thinking we can hold off defeat of the enemy. But the enemy has outflacked us over and over.”

Baptists are guilty of an arrogance with which God is not pleased, he said. Page, pastor of First Baptist Church of Taylors, S.C., charged that instead of transforming the culture, it has transformed Southern Baptists.

“We hold our battle lines against flesh and blood,” he said. “Is this our only line of defense? … We are not the only game in town. … God has blessed us for a reason—not that we will become spiritually obese, but so we will be on mission for him.”

Satan has robbed Southern Baptists of integrity, fellowship, passion for the lost, the joy of salvation, humility, unity, relevance and a sense of godly balance, Page asserted.

“We have lost much and there is more to be lost,” he warned, adding the problem in the convention starts with each individual Southern Baptist.

“Where’s the joy God gave you when you were saved?” he asked. “You may be doctrinally right, but you sure don’t look very happy about it.”

King David, who wrote Psalm 51, “was painfully aware of his inadequacies. … We strut while we’re still sitting down,” Page said.

“This convention does not belong to you, and it sure does not belong to me. It is God’s. … Though we have significant differences, will you take my hand, and let’s work together to reach the lost for Christ?”

God wants Southern Baptists to speak the truth in love, whether they blog or don’t blog, Page said.

“When we speak the truth without love, it leads to a cold-hearted legalism the world sees as characteristic of Christians,” he warned.

To regain the victory, Page urged Southern Baptists to get right with God, confess our sins, plead for forgiveness and “a spiritual heart transplant” and seek revival.

“Our baptisms languish in a day when people are receptive to the gospel,” he said. “… It’s because we have not been right before God. … We’ve been fighting the wrong battles.”

He said the convention has returned to theological rightness, “praise God for that, but if we do not seek the hand of God, our churches will be right but empty. … The early church was met with persecution. … We are met with a yawn.”