The SBC, Ecclesiastical Responsibility, and the Image of God

For those who are actively engaged in the fight for the preborn and are within the Southern Baptist Convention, as I am, there was a very poignant and revealing moment during the most recent

convention in Anaheim that was extraordinary revealing, even if you are outside of this large protestant denomination. Jacob Jackson, a messenger from Virginia, filed a motion to incorporate the support of sidewalk missionaries to the preborn in the official stance of the Southern Baptist Convention. This motion was a breath of fresh air after all the compromised issues occurring earlier in the day. Unfortunately, the response from the leadership to this motion was simply following suit: compromised. 

"Jacob Jackson of Virginia moved that the SBC take the necessary steps to support the sidewalk ministers supporting pro-life causes. Bylaw 2 prohibits the presentation of outside causes not already provided for in the convention's work. ... ... These motions are not in order for the reasons given."

Jackson asked for clarification by stating the following:

"I made a motion (or tried to make a motion) about helping equip gospel ministry happening outside of abortion clinics and other places where people are trying to minister to the lost and brokenness happening there, and as I understand it that motion was struck down as "being outside of the work of the convention", and so my question is this: how is trying to take the gospel to people that are in desperate need of the gospel, in a very hard place, outside of the work of the convention?"

After vague words of affirmation, President Ed Litton ended with this: "The committee has ruled that this is not the responsibility of the Southern Baptist Convention to do this. It doesn't fall within the purview [of the convention]." Moments later, another question went seemingly unanswered, and the session ended. "And we are out of time for the committee on resolutions."

Just like that, the plight of preborn children was forsaken by cowardly men hiding behind cowardly decisions. These acts of cowardice are not to be found in isolation. Whether it is your state GOP convention party convention (as here in Indiana, or in Texas), we see a phenomenon I like to describe as hiding behind Parliamentary Procedure. That is to say, sticking to and interpreting the letter of the meeting's rules in such away that allows you to shift responsibility for standing up for these little children in the womb.

Let's put this in perspective. Instead of treating abortion as it is - a literal holocaust in our midst - politicians, legislators, and even clergymen will fail to treat the slaughter of the preborn with appropriate urgency and importance. 

The irony, however, is that this vigour is spent elsewhere on, while important, comparably lesser injustices such as indefinite and unclear "social justice" issues. Can you imagine how this battle against abortion would be shifted if all of those in the church committed to "social justice" properly understood justice as requiring the most innocent and vulnerable, those in the womb, to receive priority?

Indiana abolitionist legislator John Jacob once gave the analogy of a car accident in which a person is badly injured. Upon arrival at the hospital, imagine if the doctor attempted to treat the man's small foot fracture over the internal bleeding or brain trauma! 

In like fashion, every church that has full knowledge of a nearby abortion clinic, knowing of the slaughter occurring every week, must trust and obey God's command to bring the gospel into conflict with the culture of death. Not just in thought and word, but in deed also, having prioritized that which Christ prioritizes. And the convention in which these churches are a part of must encourage the same. Yes, Christ is Lord over your vacation Bible school and flower ministry, and those are great things, but they will not receive God's blessing if in order to maintain them you have to neglect the shedding of innocent blood.

It is in these ways that the lives of the preborn are constantly laid on the back burner. The SBC committee effectively alienated all abolitionists and even committed pro-lifers, and truly and anyone who has participated in the hard labor of sidewalk ministry, by categorically delimiting our work to that of secondary, tertiary adiaphora, akin to any number of sundry ministries such as the aforementioned ones, instead of what it really is: obedience to God's command to rescue the weak, provide for the widow and orphan, and to expose the evil deeds of darkness. This work, St. James' epistle calls, "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father..." (Ja. 1:27). 

And if that work is not explicitly affirmed under the work and mission of the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S, then there is an inherent deficiency in its mission.

The audacity to tell faithful laborers who witness dozens of homicides every week and risk the safety of their families in order to save children that their work is not part of the “great commission” is, at best, wholly deficient, and, at worst, altogether ungodly and disrespectful. Perhaps some of these leaders would do well by actually quoting the entirety of the great commission they profess to practice, instead of leaving out the “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” and “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” parts which they all so often do.

Unfortunately, it seems this deficiency is simply a representation of the cultural milieu surrounding the urgency (or lack thereof) to rescue the preborn. Too many professing Christians have taken the bait of Planned Parenthood's euphemisms, whether consciously or not. And while the abortion industry thrives in darkness, a darkness which allows its kill-mills to be situated next door to daycare facilities and churches, the call of the Scripture is the antithesis of this, namely, to "Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them." (Eph. 5:11). 

This should give us great reason to rejoice that the abolitionist movement is growing. Unfortunately, that means that those in opposition are slowly becoming no longer able to hide behind their failure to act for these little ones. I used to believe many of these persons, say, in the SBC, were being apathetic. But I no longer think this is the case; they are increasingly becoming purposefully anti-abolitionist. And what's worse, is that these pastors and church leaders, such as Bart Barber, the newly elected president of the SBC, attempt to keep their congregants far away from anyone associated with the abolitionist movement by slandering some of its most vocal proponents. Anything to shroud this topic in darkness.

I was once at a dear brother's wedding and many influential leaders of large, non-denominational churches were present. As I was sitting at the table of one such men, the topic of school shootings came up. I mentioned how sad it was that while these dreadful and appaling displays of depravity and taking of human life had been occuring all around the county, less than 15 minutes from us in South Bend dozens of image bears had been killed too. His response? shock! Who wouldn't be shocked! What had happened? Was there a shooting in South Bend that he hadn't heard the news of? I then informed him that at Whole Woman's Health, an abortion clinic not far from the airport we were near, was the location of this massacre. 

"Oh, that's about the abortion, right?" 

"Yes, that's right." 

"Oh, I see."

All of a sudden there was explicit cognitive dissonance. No more sense or urgency or outrage, these feelings had been completely quelled. After all, this has been going on for decades, right? Planned Parenthood has succeeded every time this inconsistent reaction to abortion happens, and this is the exact inconsistency that the SBC leadership fell into in Anaheim.

When asked about Equal Protection, a concept fundamental to the biblical clarion call for justice, this same exhibit of cognitive dissonance was seen. One SBC leader responded with the following quips:

"My wife and I have given thousands and thousands of dollars to local pregnancy crisis centers."

"I am very pro-life"

"I believe in supporting life, from the moment of conception to natural death."

"I would not support pro-choice legislation."

While these propositions are wonderful and blessed truths, their meaning is something agreed upon by all parties, and therefore they are simply redundant and serve to confuse the messenger body about what should be an easy concept, namely, that the same laws that protect you and I should protect all human persons, including preborn human persons.

The heart of man is wicked and easily deceived, especially in light of evils having been institutionally accepted and culturally promoted. This may be why we are seeing such an inadequate and unacceptable response from SBC leadership in regard to human abortion. 

So, how can we, those people who God has pierced to the heart with a burden for the preborn, create a culture that causes others to have the same priorities? Simply put, Imago Dei. We must check all claims of being "pro-life" against the standard of God's image in creatures. Was the Southern Baptist committee on order of business acting according to the Christian axiom that all men are made in God's image? Certainly not. It is therefore our responsibility to remind those men and women who neglect the Imago Dei to remind them what abortion is. The killing of an innocent human being that has the image of the living God ineffably imprinted upon ever fiber of their existence. And no committee, elected official, or denominational leader will ever thwart this cherished truth.

"Look forth and tell me what they do

On Life's broad field. Oh, still they fight,

The False forever with the True,

The Wrong forever with the Right.

And still God's faithful ones, as men

Who hold a fortress strong and high,

Cry out in confidence again,

And find a comfort in the cry:

'Hammer away, ye hostile hands,

Your hammers break, God's anvil stands.'"