My Convention Service Debut

One of two things has happened: Either Dr. Frank Page has selected me to serve on this year's SBC Committee on Committees, or I have a long-lost brother named "Bert" whom I have somehow failed to meet in spite of attending the same church together! (find my misspelled name here) Bro. Benjamin S. Cole, known far and wide for his reluctance to put people on the spot, quizzed me about (among other things) whether I would make cessationism a "litmus test" for the exercise of my duties on the committee. I do have a litmus test, but cessationism is not it. I would be opposed to the deliberate stacking of convention entities with non-cessationists—our institutions ought not to depart from the beliefs of her people—but I do not find, for example, the situation on the SWBTS board (a tongues-speaking voice vastly overwhelmed by non-tongues-speaking voices) an unhealthy one. I am a supporter of the Conservative Resurgence. I favor the same litmus test that defines the Conservative Resurgence. Anecdotally, I have heard that a member of the SBC Executive Committee, when someone mentioned the Conservative Resurgence, replied with a bewildered look, "What's that?" I credit this person with the profound intelligence to know what he does not know. I periodically read things that make me wonder about whether a lot of people fail to grasp the nature of the Conservative Resurgence. The Southern Baptist people did not become more conservative during the Conservative Resurgence. I submit to you that the people of the Southern Baptist Convention have been conservative all along. The story of the SBC since Reconstruction has been one of periodic conflict between the consistently conservative Southern Baptist people and the increasingly non-conservative Southern Baptist employee pool. Yes, the SBC has had some liberal churches and some liberal members all along, but they have been a fringe element. The Toy controversy, the Evolution controversy (occurring around the time of the 1925 BF&M), the Elliott controversy, the Broadman Commentary controversy, and the Conservative Resurgence reveal a century-long pattern of aggressively-lefward-leaning denominational bureaucrats and educators being reigned in by a conservative Southern Baptist rank-and-file. Here's what happened in the Conservative Resurgence: the architects of the Resurgence asserted (successfully, as it turned out) a new standard for denominational leadership: No longer was it sufficient to be conservative personally; the people of the SBC required of their leadership that they be willing to fire other people who were not conservative. Thus, to say, "I support the Conservative Resurgence," is the equivalent of saying, "I think any non-conservative working for the SBC ought to work elsewhere for an institution that agrees with them, and I'm willing to fire them if necessary to make that happen." That is the heart of the Conservative Resurgence. I will concede that it is a harsh solution. Being fairly soft-hearted myself, I could not support it but for the fact that every other alternative was explored for a century, yet unsuccessfully. Diplomacy failed. It amounted to modernist SBC elites suffering through the occasional obligatory exercise of issuing empty "there, there"s in attempts to placate the conservative SBC plebians (in their view) while all continued as before. Another way to view the Conservative Resurgence litmus test is that Southern Baptists began to place into leadership only people who would not suffer such foolishness. As a genuine supporter of the Conservative Resurgence, I affirm the same litmus test.