{"id":811,"date":"2008-07-14T15:27:27","date_gmt":"2008-07-14T23:27:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2008\/07\/14\/still-no-middle-ground\/"},"modified":"2008-07-14T15:27:27","modified_gmt":"2008-07-14T23:27:27","slug":"still-no-middle-ground","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/2008\/07\/14\/still-no-middle-ground\/","title":{"rendered":"still no middle ground"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some ongoing reflections on a discussion about “Conservative Evangelicals and Fundamentalists” held in Calgary, AB, June 27, 2008.<\/p>\n

See earlier notes here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the most interesting question on our minds for this discussion is just what Pastor Minnick thinks can be done in cooperation with conservative evangelicals. The question was raised by Mark Dever in his recently published interview of Pastor Minnick this way:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cWhat would we have to do to change for you to be free to preach here?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The same question has been discussed here<\/a> and here<\/a> with the majority of commenters seemingly unsatisfied with the specificity of Pastor Minnick’s answer at that time. You will see a commenter raising the question again in my last post on the subject and the question was raised both in the public discussion in Calgary and in personal conversation. The question is being framed in different ways, but essentially it is the same question. Dever’s articulation of it is as good as any.<\/p>\n

Apparently, some are of the mind that very little prevents someone like Pastor Minnick from being free to preach at a Capitol Hill Baptist Church. Some have said that it is merely the connections with fundamentalist institutions that prevent such cooperation.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

If you pause to consider what Pastor Minnick said in his careful answer to Dever in the interview, you will find that there is much more that would prevent any such cooperation at this time. Note especially the way Pastor Minnick gave his answer to the final version of Dever’s question in the interview:<\/p>\n

\n

Well, when you were in Greenville I think you told us that there is no liberalism left in the Convention<\/b>. I don\u2019t know enough about the Convention to know whether that\u2019s the case or not. But what I do know is that the convention<\/b> for all of these decades, um, has been conditioned by a philosophy, an approach on these things that is different than what I see the Scripture teaching<\/b> so I, I would think there\u2019s an awfully lot that would have to be done throughout the Convention<\/b> to bring the leadership, the pastors, the Christian leaders, you know, up to the point where they were consistently showing that they understand the sep… the need for separatism, and, and until such time … uh, you know you would have cause I think for concern about getting too affiliated with, uh, the Convention<\/b>. [my emphasis]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Note especially here these parts of the answer [as I paraphrase them]:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Dever claims there is no liberalism left in the Convention.\n
  • Our understanding of the Convention is that it has been conditioned by a philosophy of tolerance towards liberalism for many decades.\n
  • For cooperation to exist with any Southern Baptist and a fundamentalist today, there would have to be a great deal of reformation throughout the Convention.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    And my paraphrase of the concluding statement: without those kinds of changes, cooperation would really <\/b>be hard<\/i>.<\/p>\n

    In our discussion session, Pastor Minnick was able to expand on these thoughts. He reported again Dever’s assertion that there are no liberals left in the Convention. But while Dever made that assertion, he has also admitted that a large number of the membership in the Convention are unconverted, perhaps even a majority of its members (especially given the wide disparity between claimed membership and actual attendance at SBC churches). Considering those statistics, it is hard to imagine that there are no liberals in the SBC.<\/p>\n

    One area of SBC life that is especially problematic is the Cooperative Program that funds SBC missions, among other things. Given the pool from which SBC missionaries are drawn (and some recent resolutions aimed at SBC missions) it is hard to imagine that there is still not some taint of liberalism in the Convention. The Cooperative Program is a first class example of ‘cooperative’ effort fundamentalists are not comfortable to be associated with.<\/p>\n

    Another example Pastor Minnick raised as a barrier for fundamentalist cooperation with men like Dever involves relationships with a prominent evangelical who signed the ECT. Dever acknowledges that this individual’s actions are a concern, but can’t see breaking off cooperation with this individual because of all the good this fellow has done in his ministry. As fundamentalists, we acknowledge the good, but can’t cooperate because of the serious nature of the error. This is an area where there is still significant difference between Dever and fundamentalists.<\/p>\n

    In conclusion was a statement like this (my paraphrase):<\/p>\n

    \n

    We can’t give away the store just because conservative evangelicals are starting to see what the problem is.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    In my own conversation with Pastor Minnick, he assured me that there remain many differences that make cooperation impossible at this time, but that he is hopeful conversations between fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals may yield some positive fruit. The differences between fundamentalists and conservative evangelicals are NOT as simple as saying that Minnick is a BJU professor, but were it not for BJU he would be free to cooperate. If there were no BJU (or Mount Calvary Baptist Church, for that matter), the significant differences still would preclude cooperation at this time.<\/p>\n

    One last thing… Pastor Minnick pointed out during our discussion session the fact that Mark Dever himself acknowledges the significant differences that still remain. A point everyone is overlooking comes early on in the Dever-Minnick interview:<\/p>\n

    \n

    Dever: I had a great visit with Mark when I first met him a few months ago. I was down in Greenville, had lunch with Mark and some other pastor friends there and I would say Mark was obviously kind, charitable, articulate, … uh, and we disagree on some things so I thought there’s a good basis for conversation [laughter] … um … we were at a table with a bunch of other ministers where we would have a lot in agreement, so your basic Christian doctrines we’re agreeing, but where we came up with differences again and again was on the matter of how we associate with other Christians, how we decide to do that. So that’s the kind of thing we want to be talking about in this interview to try to gain a better understanding of fundamentalism and especially the doctrine of separation. So for our listeners who aren’t familiar with sort of current fundamentalism, Mark, uh, I often describe myself as a fundamentalist, you’ve heard me tell a couple of stories where I do that, but I’m not a fundamentalist in the way you mean that, am I<\/strong>? [emphasis mine]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    You see, Dever himself knows there is still a divide. Whether he ever comes to the place where he will move to the fundamentalist side of the divide remains to be seen. There are a host of changes that would have to be made.<\/p>\n

    ~~~<\/p>\n

    I really appreciate Pastor Minnick’s willingness to be grilled by local church pastors. There is wide interest in the Dever-Minnick interview, especially on the fundamentalist side. The wide commentary on the internet testifies to this. The intense interest of those listening in and participating in our discussion session likewise speaks to how critical this is to our movement. In fact, our moderator made an announcement to the crowd that the session might seem boring to the children and ladies and allowed them to be excused if they wished (men had to stay, bored or not). I don’t think many moved. I didn’t notice any boredom. I thought all were very attentive. This is a critical issue for our day.<\/p>\n

    I am not as optimistic about our fundamentalist future as some are. And by that, I mean the fundamentalist movement as we know it. There are many challenges facing us. How it will all turn out is uncertain.<\/p>\n

    The fundamentalist movement rests on certain theological ideals, especially our understanding of true Christian fellowship and separation. We are seeing a constant barrage against these ideals. There seems to be a curious quiet at the top of the heap of fundamentalist leaders. I hope for more forthright declarations (reasonable, rational, charitable, but forthright and clear) so that men on all sides will know exactly where we stand and who we stand with.<\/p>\n

    \"don_sig2\" <\/p>\n

    Publication note:<\/strong> This post was written about ten days ago, but I delayed publication in order to give Pastor Minnick an opportunity to review my comments. Having done that, the only alterations I have made to my original comments were to correct spelling errors and attempt to make one or two obtuse sentences a little less so (not sure on the success of that, but an attempt was made nonetheless).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Some ongoing reflections on a discussion about “Conservative Evangelicals and Fundamentalists” held in Calgary, AB, June 27, 2008. See earlier notes here. Perhaps the most interesting question on our minds for this discussion is just what Pastor Minnick thinks can be done in cooperation with conservative evangelicals. The question was raised by Mark Dever in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[61,37,71,87,77,44],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2fYWj-d5","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oxgoad.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}