The Changes Conservatives made in the SBC | Eastern North Carolina Now

    A quick review of Conservatism at work in the Southern Baptist Convention is a good analysis of Conservatism at work in politics and NC. Since Southeastern Seminary is located at Wake Forest and was the first target of an educational institution being subjected to their mentality, it is the same as the new aggression on the Public Secondary Education in NC of late.

    I came to Rocky Mount in 1986 as the Eastern NC Representative for Ministers Life Insurance Company. Part of my territory was Wake Forest and Southeastern Seminary. It was only a 45 minute ride from Rocky Mount to there and many students were prospects as well as faculty who already owned a ML policy. From day 1 I was out and about as I journeyed to Durham and Raleigh by way of Wake Forest.

    The result of the Conservative Resurgence in the SBC began to focus its changes on my Seminary. Dr. Randall Lolley had become the President some 8 years prior. Under his guidance the number of students had grown dramatically along with private funding from several Trusts and Foundations. One was Broyhill Industries of Winston-Salem. Lolley had been pastor of FBC Winston-Salem prior to becoming the SEBTS President. I happened to be the Associate for the Alumni President who was the Senior Minister at Hartsville (SC) FBC when Dr. Olin Binkley reached retirement age and a new President was being sought.

    The choices were the Dean at SEBTS who was an academic --- and a fellow alumnus who had graduated in the late 50's and risen in the ranks of churches to one of the leading ones in NC. It was noted for its mission giving and affable Pastor. Lolley was as good a speaker as possible along with abilities to make friends and influence his town through his big church.

    The Alumni Association was contending that SEBTS was lacking in practical ministry training. It was outstanding in the academic aspects of ministry with numerous earned Doctor degreed Professors from a wide variety of institutions. It was as diverse as it got in the SBC Seminary atmosphere where graduates tended to come back as professors.

    Once Dr. Lolley got to SEBTS, it became common practice for the Nashville SS Board people to come for a week at Wake Forest and talk with students during their class on Christian Education. How I wished I could have attended a Seminary like mine was becoming. My school was becoming more popular with people having a call to ministry and wanting advanced training for a Master's Degree in Divinity. From VA to GA and all surrounding states they were coming in droves to be practically taught.

    The Seminary, like all the other 4, was supported by Cooperative Program funds. Anyone wanting to attend had to have endorsement from a SBC church back home. The cost of the education was minimal since church giving cared for about 80% of such. Now, SEBTS was also getting financial backing from friends of the school all over NC. The wealth of the Broyhill Family came with Dr. Lolley. They wanted best-trained clergy to pay back their investment.

    I had a front row seat for the "New SBC outlook on life and education." The appointive process to the Committee on Committees by Conservative Presidents brought great changes to all the Seminaries and Missionary enterprises of the SBC. You now were forced to sign the "New Baptist Faith and Message Statement." It had been altered to say "Scripture is Inerrant." It barely passed at the annual meeting, but was being used as a CREED rather than a general statement it had been before. The Preamble still said it was a "guide and general statement of Baptist beliefs." Previously, the SBC basis was over Mission Giving much more than a Precise Theology out of a Fundamentalist stance. Battles of the past always failed to destroy. NON-CREEDAL meant much to Baptists of the past.

    From congregations in the mountains who shouted and handled snakes to the high church practices of robed clergy in large old churches, theological judgmentalism was OUT / Mission Giving was IN. Few outside the Southern Baptist Convention could understand how uniquely such diverse people and churches could get along together. It's "magic" was in the non-creedal nature of a mission support conglomeration. It was identical to the US Constitution forming a basis for diverse people to come from all over to find a new kind of free land and reasonable unity.

    Soon after my arrival in NC with Ministers Life the ax began to fall at Wake Forest. It was perceived to the "most liberal" of the 5 seminaries. My experience showed me it was simply "middle-of-the-road." New Orleans was more a real conservative Seminary. Southern Seminary was similar to SEBTS, but steeped in inbred professors and great influence on churches who wanted "a proven SBC candidate for Pastor." That had been used against my father who came from a little country church and went to Andover-Newton outside the SBC structure. He chose that school because of its reputation as "the best in America." It left him without a political base when being considered as a SC pastor. He had to take a teaching job for a short time before his influence grew to the point people in churches knew him to be a "good Southern Baptist" rather than a "radical from up north."

    Southeastern got a new majority Board of Trustees with instructions to "fire Lolley." All his abilities to overcome conflict were useless and, within a year, he was forced to resign as President of SEBTS.

    Next came many changes through Conservative Takeover:

        •  Spending mission money to change the President's office and home

        •  Change from Servant Pastor training to King Pastor

        •  Revolt by students and Faculty

        •  NC Baptist Colleges and Duke opening graduate schools for ministers

        •  Students from only Conservative schools with questions about the Church giving

        •  Faculty changes to a narrow base and background only

        •  Redaction of the history of SEBTS and the SBC

        •  Formation of a new group of Baptists honoring local church freedom

        •  Takeover of the NC Baptist State Convention and Biblical Recorder

        •  Reduction in numbers of churches participating in NC SBC work

    I shall address these in detail in my next article.