An Evangelism Problem?

Those who know me, know that I’m committed to missions and evangelism. Our small church has doubled their baptisms every year for 3 years running now. We’ve gone door to door and shared Christ in over 1,000 homes in the past year alone. We have increased our missions giving from around $1,000 the first year that I was there, to around $7,000 today. I’m not trying to brag (you’ll see that clearly in a minute) but I want to help you to understand that I’m not trying to cop out of the work of evangelism. After all of this “success” it seems to me that we’re failing miserably. Let me illustrate:

In America, 70% of evangelical “converts” leave the church within one year of their “conversion.” Of those “converts” left in the church, a large amount would be children, of which 88% of churched children leave the church at 18 yrs of age, and never return. This would lead me to conservatively estimate that maybe 15% of our converts are legitimate. Maybe!

Then, if you consider that divorce rates are higher in the church than out, teen promiscuity is just as high in the church rather than out, etc., etc. etc., it seems to me that of those left in the church, many of those are not truly “regenerated” or “changed” by God’s power. Billy Graham has said before that some 70% of church attenders are lost. That reduces the amount of legitimate conversions to something like 3-4%.

I say all this to say that I’m conerned that our understanding of evangelism is seriously flawed. I can certainly identify the problem, but I struggle with finding an answer to the problem. I’d be curious to hear your thoughts, particularly as it relates to potential solutions.

This is hilarious!

I don’t know what to think of it. I’ve never, EVER, thought of myself as in the vein of the Wesleyan/Methodism tradition. This will take some thinking on my own part. The only saving grace is that Fundamentalist is on down the list, just above neo-orthodox. Take the little test yourself, it’s fun.

Our church has struggled through the controversy surrounding the new Baptism policy of the International Mission Board (IMB) with much fervor over the past months. This controversy hit home, strongly, this week at our church. You see our Youth Pastor (YP) and his wife are in process with the IMB to become Missionary Apprentices which would lead to career missionary status. They want to work with unreached people groups, probably Muslim peoples and very possibly in Central Asia which features some of the greatest lostness in the world, statistically. The hang up is that our YP was saved and then baptized in a church that is strongly evangelical but who belongs to a denomination that believes that you can lose your salvation, although the specific church does not. The IMB has stated that he must be baptized in an appropriate church in order to proceed and this caused a quandary for our church, and for me personally. Do we, and I, re-baptize them to satisfy the IMB or do we stand firm because we believe that his previous baptism was sufficient?

We finally came to the following conclusion and I thought it might be helpful to others to hear what we went through and so I thought I would describe our conclusions.

1. We believe that biblical baptism is by immersion, post-conversion as a symbolic testimony to our affiliation with Christ. Since this affiliation is with Christ, and not any specific church, it is not necessary that it be in a church that is doctrinally unified with our church. As long as the prescribed processes above are completed, it is biblical baptism.

2. As we believe in biblical baptism as outlined above, and as we believe that the current IMB requirements place extra-biblical requirements on baptism, we then interpret the decision to require extra-biblical baptism to mean that those who are espousing extra-biblical requirements are understood to be weaker brothers and sisters in the faith. (i.e. many of the IMB trustees. I realize that it is probably not popular to call the trustees of a SBC entity weaker brothers/sisters, but it is our understanding that in this issue of biblical baptism, for the reasons listed above, they would be weaker. This not a condemnation of their theology as a whole but a recognition that, in this area, we believe them to be weaker.)

3. Re-baptism of anyone would not be a sin (although biblically unnecessary) and therefore permissible if conscience is able to be complicit.

4. As the spread of the gospel among unreached peoples is a higher priority than a non-essential doctrinal/theological disagreement, and for the sake of building harmony among those of our fellowship (SBC) who are “weaker” we would go ahead with the re-baptism.

That is why we ended up participating in the re-baptism of one of our church’s most dedicated members, faithful Christians, and fantastic staff members last night. We did choose to do it on a Sunday night so as to do away with potential confusion for any non-believers or young, immature believers who might be in the audience. All in all, while I’m not happy with having to participate in the activity of re-baptizing an already baptized believer, I’m thankful that we can have a part in the propogation of the Gospel around the world.

IMB Broadcasts

As many of the current trustees are calling for openness and because the trustee board of the IMB reports directly to the convention at large, and also because most of SBC observers are not able to take the time and/or money to be at IMB BoT meetings I think that it is time to start providing all public meetings of the BoT online in a downloadable format. The cost to handle this would negligible and the staffing would not need to be increased as the time involved would be minimal. This would solve many problems as far as public support and trust for the IMB BoT is concerned. As these sessions are already open to the public there would be no concerns about the information getting out. This seems to be a win/win situation to me. This is already accomplished by the SBC with our annual meetings and so the technology should be readily available. I would encourage you to write the trustees and encourage them in this way. This should be a very workable solution to the issue of openness and accountability that is so needed.

I can’t take credit for the idea, either. Thanks to Ben Cole for being the brainchild behind this option.

DAWN Online

Our DAWN Missions Conference sessions are now available online. Of particular interest is the personal testimony of Robak Hoospianmer, a refuge from Iran who works with Voice of the Martyrs. Check it out here.

Fearless and Faithful

As the recent meetings of the Board of Trustees of the IMB has created a windstorm of interest and drawn a variety of conclusions, I thought I would add my thoughts.

1. The decision to not attempt to remove Wade Burleson as a trustee was wise. It was wise, first of all, because it was wrong. I’ve explained my thoughts on that many times on this blog. Secondly, however, it was wise because if they had continued with it I’m convinced that they would have experienced a sound defeat in Greensboro in June (more on that to come.)

2. The new handbook on Trustee Policy is both positive and negative. The policy on public dissent is frustrating. Trustees are supporters and mobilizers and policy makers, not robots. This is a departure from hisotric Baptistic polity, and a policy without biblical merit.

The policies regarding communication about IMB personnel, missionaries and other trustees is a very good thing. This will keep ridiculous dissent concerning Dr. Jerry Rankin and other IMB leadership limited and for that I’m grateful.

3. From all accounts Dr. Tom Hatley did a wonderful job moderating the meeting. I like to think that this is a combination of his own personal character and the message that he got from so many Southern Baptists regarding recent trustee actions.

4. Finally, in reference to the message that Hatley received and in reference to the potential showdown in Greensboro, I’m thankful to hear that the trustee’s recoginze and respect the Younger Leaders in the convention. The Baptist Recorder in North Carolina reported, “Hatley said IMB trustees are now more aware of the younger generation of Southern Baptist pastors and leaders who rallied to Burleson’s defense. “This high-tech generation is fearless,” he said, adding their fearlessness is often taken for insolence.” This is a wonderfully positive move in the right direction and one that could lead to beneficial dialogue in the future. I praise God for that.

In conclusion, I’m certainly not ecstatic after the meeting. I would like to have seen more change. However, I realize that in order to achieve harmony we must give some and they must give some. This appears to be what has occured. This brightens my day. If we can continue to meet in the middle we may yet be able to save much of what God is doing among Southern Baptists. Let’s pray to that end.

Mmm, Mmm, Good!

I’m sitting here at my desk right now, studying and eating a bowl of Blue Bunny Bunny Tracks ice cream. I’m not kidding you, this must be the greatest ice cream ever made. I’ve not been without a carton of Bunny Tracks for a year or more now, I’m hooked on the stuff. You should get to know Bunny Tracks because I’m pretty sure that God will serve it in heaven someday.

A West African drought?

My parents attended the missionary commissioning service in Tampa, FL last night for a group of 45 new IMB missionaries. After attending some of them myself I’m sure they are right when they relate that it was a tremendous service. I thank God for these families that are responding to His call to service and sacrifice!

There was some news, however, from the meeting that was discouraging to me. Of the 45 commissioned last night, none was going to West Africa. What’s more, according to my dad, in the next group of missionaries that have just been approved, there’s also not a single one going to West Africa.

With so many people who are absolutely lost without hope, West Africa makes up one of the greatest missions fields in the world. The unfortunate reality, however, is that West Africa is an ugly, smelly, sad and difficult place to live. Many missionaries live without electricity, running water, toilet facilities, phone service, etc. when they chose to go to West Africa. Issues like this can often make it difficult to move there. When you serve there you will often live out beyond anyone else who is like you and you can often spend weeks at a time, if not a month or two, without seeing another person who speaks english, let alone another missionary.

I say all of this to say, please pray that God will send missionaries to West Africa. Pray that God will give them a desire to go to the hard places with the gospel. Finally, pray that God will open ears, eyes, and most importantly, hearts to the gospel, and that ultimately West Africa would follow Christ. Finally, consider going yourself if God is calling you into missions. Consider serving Him where it’s hard to serve Him and learn what it’s like to have nothing to trust in the world, but Him. I can promise you, from personal experience, that it will be an unbelievable life-changing experience for you.