Voices: The problem beneath the BGCT’s problems

I am a local church pastor who supports the Baptist General Convention of Texas and wants it to fulfill its mission. I am grateful for BGCT Executive Director Julio Guarneri’s efforts to travel the state and listen to Texas Baptists. Recent articles in the Baptist Standard also have offered thoughtful counsel as the convention considers its future.

In my opinion, the BGCT’s conflict is not only about doctrine, mission, governance, or institutional relationships. It also reflects the emotional process of a chronically anxious system responding to perceived threats. Unless we attend to that reality, calls to pray, reason together, focus on mission, and preserve unity will have limited power to change what happens next.

In this article, I will describe the problem beneath the problems. In a second article, I will consider the kind of leadership needed to address it.

How chronically anxious systems behave

In a chronically anxious system, people do not ordinarily become more reflective simply because leaders call for prayer and unity.

Anxiety—whether the threat is real, perceived, or some mixture of both—narrows perception. It intensifies either-or thinking, accelerates reactivity, and makes complexity feel dangerous. The BGCT is nothing if not complex.

When people are anxious, they will work for a sense of safety through certainty, control, distance, and affiliation with those whom they believe are like-minded. This means much of our deliberation occurs not only in the stated arguments, but also in the emotional process surrounding them.

Concerns under the concerns

“We need doctrinal clarity” may also mean, “My church and my children may be carried into theological compromise.”

“We must remain a broad tent” may also mean, “People like me may lose their place in Texas Baptist life.”

“We need institutional accountability” may also mean, “Powerful institutions may use our money while ignoring our convictions.”

“We must stop fighting” may also mean, “Conflict may destroy the convention and the ministries I value.”

“We must focus on the Great Commission” may also mean, “The institution may be losing its purpose and relevance.”

“We must preserve Baptist freedom” may also mean, “A controlling group may capture the convention.”

These concerns are understandable, and the theological arguments are genuine. But the intensity surrounding those arguments may come partly from the threat beneath them. That helps explain why better theological reasoning alone rarely settles denominational conflict.

Participants are not merely deciding what is true. They also are seeking relief from their sense of threat or anxiety.

Baptist history, including the history of the BGCT, reveals our tendency to manage anxiety through separation. Baptists divide because convictions matter. I suggest we also divide because separation provides immediate emotional relief.

This does not mean every separation is unnecessary. The question is whether separation follows thoughtful differentiation and honest engagement, or functions primarily to relieve anxiety by removing people who make us uncomfortable.

The tension of staying connected or separating

Remaining connected requires people to tolerate ambiguity, disagreement, and limited control.

Separation is simpler and produces several short-term benefits: clearer boundaries, reduced contact with dissenting voices, stronger group identity, simplified moral narratives, leaders who speak with apparent certainty, the reassurance of being among “our people,” and an identifiable opponent who explains why we are in distress.

In this emotional cutoff, the disagreement has not necessarily been resolved. The anxiety has been managed by creating distance. The unresolved dynamics then reappear inside the new, supposedly purer group. Threats reappear. The circle must be drawn again. This is why movements organized around purification often continue fragmenting.

The adoption of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message did not produce safety through doctrinal uniformity. Twenty-six years later, Southern Baptists continue debating who belongs, what cooperation requires, and which differences can be tolerated.

Wise voices among Texas Baptists recommend practices such as asking questions, listening seriously, distinguishing first-order from second-order matters, believing the best about one another, praying, reasoning together, remaining engaged, and focusing on mission.

These are good and necessary practices. But they presume people can regulate their anxiety sufficiently to use them.

Sound guidance without attention to emotional processes at work will have limited effect. It is not enough to tell Texas Baptists how mature Christians ought to behave without helping anxious people in an anxious system become capable of that behavior.

Appealing to the Spirit and praying for revival does not exempt us from the difficult human work through which the Spirit forms mature people: truth-telling, self-examination, repentance, patient relationship, and disciplined responses to feeling threatened, especially when we believe something essential is about to be taken from us.

An example of how the anxiety plays out

For example, women who feel called to ministry may not feel safe in the BGCT when others say these women disobey the clear teaching of Scripture and do not take the authority of God’s word seriously.

It may be unreasonable to expect these women to simply listen, believe the best of their accusers, remain engaged, and focus on mission. They may experience the debate as a threat to their calling, belonging, and future.

Likewise, a person who embraces the complementarianism of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message may regard close cooperation with egalitarians as a threat. That person may fear compromise in one area will lead to theological drift in others, changed sexual ethics, or institutional betrayal.

It may be unreasonable to ask such people simply to focus on mission while disregarding what they believe faithfulness requires.

All of these folks may be speaking sincerely about the mission of Texas Baptists while also trying to preserve something that gives them identity, belonging, or safety. Until those threats can be named and examined, calls for rational deliberation may have limited effect.

What is needed

The way forward will not be produced by better slogans, prayers for revival, or a more forceful appeal to unity. We need leaders who can regulate their own anxiety, remain connected across differences, and create the conditions in which a faithful future can emerge. That is the work I will consider in Part Two.

Scott Jones is pastor of First Baptist Church in Rockport and a member of the Baptist Standard board of directors. The views expressed in this opinion article are those of the author.