Floyd and CP

I have been critical of Ronnie Floyd, pastor of FBC in Springdale, because of his sparse support for the Cooperative Program, the primary funding tool of the Southern Baptist Convention. However, today BP reports that the church is doing something very significant to increase CP support. Read it here.

Bravo to Bro. Floyd and FBC.

The SBC in Orlando

I thought I'd share my impressions of the SBC in Orlando, particularly with regard to the GCR report. The report passed, but I voted against it (seemingly one of the few). My reasons are simple—Great Commission giving was left in the report. Although I like the amendment which reads that designated giving is to be a supplement to and not a substitute for the Cooperative Program, the idea is still there. Yes I know that designated giving has been and always will be done, but I don't think we need to 'celebrate' is as much as we need to discourage it. I would have liked recommendation 3 to just reinforce CP and that's it. The recommendation is 'better' but not what I would have liked. The other reason I voted against the report was that there is still the 'cooperative agreements' problem out there between the state conventions and NAMB. That wasn't debated, but a change in those agreements may be detrimental to our smaller state conventions. I would have liked to have heard more about that.

With that said, I will support the vote of the convention. I believe that once a decision has been made in a business meeting (in this case the SBC), the decision should be supported (if it's not heretical of course or contrary to the Bible). Thus I support the report and now pray that its impact will be positive and not negative upon the denomination I love and support.

I greatly appreciated the spirit of the debate on both sides. There was no rancor. There was passion, but Baptists should be passionate about how we're going to reach the world. We may have different ideas on how to do it sometimes, but that is ok. Debate is not a bad thing if done with love. It was and that was good to see.

I voted for Ted Traylor for SBC president because I know him to be a good man and pastor who has led a great church. I do not know the ministry of Bryant White, but I'm sure he is as well. He will be in my prayers. I agreed with a statement that he made to the press that he would like to see a smaller percentage of CP funds allocated to the states and more to national causes (NAMB and IMB in particular). That may not ever happen, but I would like to see that debate here in South Carolina. I appreciate the work of the state convention but I have a problem with half of CP funds staying in our Jerusalem and Judea.

The sermons I heard were primarily 'resurgence' centered in some way. I liked it when Mac Brunson (pastor of FBC Jacksonville) said that we did not need resurgence, we needed a refocus to Jesus.

 

The Unchurched Used to Be in Church

share

SBC In Orlando

Everyone and his grandmother are commenting on the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force [GCRTF] report so let me do so as well with a handful of bullet points of comments and questions as I muse.

• The SBC has always had a commitment to the Great Commission, something to applaud.
  
• We are not reaching the masses, something to grieve us.
  
• No report by any denominational task force will bring a greater commitment to the Great Commission in the local church, something to remember.
  
• Will Great Commission giving reported alongside gifts to the Cooperative Program lead to a splintering of the CP? Something to pray about.
  
• The Great Commission giving idea should be scrapped for sake of unity. Something to consider.
  
• Will passing the report as it currently stands lead to a more 'societal' approach as in pre-CP days? Something to watch.
  

I felt that the TF was hamstrung from the beginning, given the makeup of the team itself and because of its chairman. While the team was tweaked a bit later, in the beginning the TF did not really represent a cross-section of Southern Baptists—mistake. Also, his increased giving to CP notwithstanding naming Ronnie Floyd as chairman, when his church gave little through the CP, was a critical error by Johnny Hunt [please keep in mind that comment in no ways reflects upon Bro. Floyd as a good man and pastor—his church's giving through CP is a matter of record.].

Is the recommendation to celebrate Great Commission giving a way to make more palatable the nomination of men to leadership in the SBC whose track record on CP giving is less than stellar? I don't know…this is just the musing of a country preacher.

I'm not naïve. I've been around for a day or two now. I believe the SBC could do with some stream-lining, and I would like the state to have less of my CP dollar (although I appreciate the fine work of the state conventions), but I think changes should come from the bottom-up and not the top down. Churches must change, send people to their state conventions for them to change, and then the SBC will reflect those changes.

I also think the strength of the SBC is in cooperation. We can still do much more together than separately [even the super-churches]. Whatever moves we make should strengthen cooperation and our resolve to reach the masses with the Gospel. I'm concerned Orlando won't do that.

The Key Question in Hermeneutics

There is a key question when approaching any biblical text. Where one begins is where one ends. The issue: is a biblical text anthropocentric or theocentric? In other words, is a text man-centered or God-centered?

Sidney Greidanus has written eloquently on the topic:

 

"Fundamentally, the Bible is more than an ordinary history book, more than

artistically pleasing literature; it is religious literature . . . As religious literature,

the Bible reveals its theocentric nature. Everything is viewed in relationship to

God: the world is God's creation; human beings are image-bearers of God;

salvation belongs to God—in short, all of life belongs to and is governed by

God.

 

Every genre of biblical literature is theocentric. Even Esther, although God is not mentioned in the book, has a theocentric viewpoint. God is obviously working to protect the Jews. Theocentric interpretation seeks to expose in every passage the God-centered focus of the entire Bible.

Anthropocentric interpretation, on the other hand, is focused not upon God but upon human beings. Too often an anthropocentric emphasis is found in preaching and teaching. Interpreters love to focus on the human drama in the text. Bible characters are often seen as either good or bad examples of what one should or should not do for God—and because those examples are easily found in a text and resonate with the interpreter, a "man centered" spin is placed upon a text that was ultimately meant to teach a great truth about God.

While this is obviously a New Testament narrative, a good example of anthropocentric interpretation is found in the denials of Christ by Peter. As Ernest Best pointed out, "The incidents in which the weakness of Peter are (sic) shown are not recorded primarily to tell us about Peter's weakness but about the mercy of God who forgives him." Thus, Best argued, "The selection of incidents which we have been given about Peter has been dominated by an interest other than the character of Peter himself. It is foolish of us therefore to use these incidents to build up a picture of the character of Peter and then to go on and apply it to men generally. We ought to use the incidents of Peter's weakness instead to argue for God's mercy and strength."

Keep the following principles in mind when interpreting a passage of from the Old Testament:

• The Bible was given to reveal the character and purpose of God, not us.
  

  
   

• Even the moral requirements of Scripture reveal God and his intentions.
  

  
   

• Every text can be studied to discover what it tells us about God.
  

  
   

• Theocentric interpretation does not mean the sermon or Bible study is about
  God
  

  
   

• Theocentric interpretation asks, "What does this text tell me about God?"
  

  
   

• Use the basic concepts of a passage to consider how they point to God.
  

  
   

• In the New Testament, the basic question would then be, "What does this text tell me about Christ?" In essence, texts in the New Testament are Christocentric. The approach of a New Testament text would essentially be the same as that of the Old Testament.
  

  
   

Allow me now to turn to Genesis 22, the account of Abraham offering Isaac as a sacrifice. More often than not, interpreters focus on Abraham and offer a moralistic sermon or study on faith. Obviously, Abraham's faith is important in the passage, however, when one focuses only on the Patriarch, it is an anthropocentric interpretation of the text.

If the text is theocentric (and it is), then let us ask the key question: What does this text say about God? When one looks at the text from this perspective there is a change in focus. What did Abraham and Isaac learn about God that day? The answer to that question is found in verse 14 after Abraham found a ram caught by his horns in the thicket: "And Abraham called the name of that place Yahweh-Jireh (The Lord Will Provide)."

One meets biblical characters who are extremely human. Remember, however, they are never seen in isolation. They are always part of a much larger story—the story about God. Hence, when interpreters pass on the biblical story, "they ought to employ biblical characters the way the Bible employs them, not as ethical models, not as heroes for emulation or examples for warning, but as people whose story has been taken up into the Bible in order to reveal what God is doing for and through them." [Greidanus]