Commentary: Tensions in Baptist identity, Part 1

The world is a very different place than it was when Baptists formed their first churches four centuries ago. The intellectual and cultural shifts that created the modern world were only just beginning, and many of the views Baptists championed were thought to be both heretical and dangerous.

Subsequent developments have proven out the wisdom of those fathers and mothers of our tradition.

They advocated for, and sometimes died for, a world that was more free and more humane. Whether they meant to or not, they reframed the way Christians view their disagreements, and they prepared western societies for a world far more diverse than many imagined possible.

Nevertheless, there always were questions about the kind of Christianity for which Baptists advocated, and though we may not like their methods, the persecutors of the Baptist faith gave voice to concerns still viable today.

Moreover, voices have emerged within the Baptist tradition that question the validity and applicability of some of our most cherished distinctives.

For more than a century, Baptist individuals and institutions have displayed a significant vulnerability to heresy and a particular resistance to efforts at theological, moral and political accountability. One cannot help but wonder whether these trends are related to how Baptists understand themselves and to how they construe the basic doctrines of the Christian faith.

Examining Baptist identity

I will examine the various components of Baptist identity, asking hard questions about their biblical basis and their consequences in a rapidly changing religious and cultural context.

I hope to help Baptists understand why some of our institutions are under so much strain.

I am not an expert in North American religious history or systematic theology. I simply am an informed observer who wants every branch of the universal church, and especially the one I inhabit, to be faithful representatives of Jesus.

I will be using Karen Bullock’s rubric for understanding Baptist identity as my guide. Dr. Bullock is an imminent historian of Anabaptists and Baptists, and she has been a friend since I was in seminary a quarter of a century ago.

More importantly, her rubric—presented and developed in her Pinson lecture of 2024—is clear and comprehensive, even if others would prefer to present Baptist identity with different emphases.

Telling my story

A friend used to describe himself as “a 9-month Baptist,” by which he meant he was a Baptist nine months before he was born. My roots in Baptist life don’t run quite that deep, but they do frame much of my acquaintance with the teachings and institutions of Christianity.

My mother was from an Assemblies of God family, and to this day her theology retains a mildly Pentecostal tinge. My father was part of a Landmark Baptist denomination. When they got married, they compromised by attending a Southern Baptist church, though we also attended churches in these other denominations from time to time.

Like many who grew up in the rural South, I did not have as wide an exposure to the church’s vast variety of denominations as those from more urban settings.

Studying in an ecumenical divinity school for my doctorate helped me see the church, and my own tradition, from vantage points I had not before. It also helped me contextualize the conflicts that by that time had afflicted Baptists in the southern United States for decades within a more comprehensive accounting of North American religion.

A preliminary question: Is Baptist identity parasitic?

There was one experience, however, that got me particularly interested in Baptist identity—and especially in its problems. A friend of mine was looking for a new denominational home. He also was teaching in a school that had been deeply influenced by Reformed thinking but whose students were often from Baptist or quasi-Baptist churches.

One day, my friend asked me what I thought was distinctive about the Baptist tradition. I rattled off some of the things I had learned from H. Leon McBeth in my Baptist history course while my friend listened politely.

When I finished my unplanned soliloquy, my friend said something to the effect, “So, Baptists did not take a unique position on the core doctrines of the church?”

I understood what he meant. He was thinking in terms of the soteriological controversies between Calvinists and Arminians (or Wesleyans) or between Lutherans and Catholics. As many observers have pointed out, much Baptist soteriology in those early days was intentionally Calvinistic or semi-Calvinistic in flavor.

So, were Baptists really just parasites? Were they moochers off of the Reformed tradition, or did they make a meaningful contribution to the theological discourse of the church?

We can acknowledge with gratitude that most of the Trinitarian and Christological issues that have been important in defining orthodoxy were settled long before Baptists came along.

We can also acknowledge there has been no consensus among Baptists about soteriology—except to affirm the Protestant view that salvation is acquired by grace through faith alone. Indeed, though most Baptists have leaned Calvinistic, others have adopted a more Arminian soteriology.

Baptists’ own identity

Nevertheless, I am convinced Baptists do have a doctrinal identity of their own, and I am convinced they need not be ashamed of their place in the pantheon of Christian traditions.

As I will discuss in subsequent parts, Baptists confronted the church with serious questions about its nature, composition and purpose.

Moreover, as Russell Moore pointed out in his 2024 lecture at Dallas Baptist University, Baptists rightly emphasized the personal nature of salvation and explicated the implications of that truth for a wide variety of controversial topics.

It even could be argued Baptists provoked serious discussions of what sola scriptura really means.

In Part 2, I will turn to the question of Scripture. Its authority is the undisputed starting point for most Baptists as they consider their heritage and theology, but it also has been the source of significant controversy among Baptists for decades.

Wade Berry is pastor of Second Baptist Church in Ranger and has been resident fellow in New Testament and Greek at B.H. Carroll Theological Seminary. The views expressed in this opinion article are those of the author.

CORRECTION: Spelling of Arminian has been corrected.