Peter Witkowski Apologetics, Discipleship, Ecclesiology

Renewed Congregationalism: A Cure for What Ails the SBC

To reverse the decline of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), I believe the platform (the leaders of the SBC) needs to rediscover the goodness of congregational piety.

Of Messengers and Leaders

To date, many of the SBC’s leaders seem to be distrustful and dismissive of the messengers who elected them or perhaps more accurately stated they distrust the messengers who elected the committee members who elected them.

The President of the SBC’s Executive Committee which runs the convention when it’s not in session, Jeff Iorg, recently blamed the decline in Cooperative Program giving and the “reshuffling of sectarian loyalties in the SBC” on the messengers. He laments that the messengers have been taken captive by the “fracturing influence of expressive individualism.” Or as Iorg notes elsewhere, they have fallen prey to “Our cultural proclivity for tribalism and sectarianism rooted in the sins of selfishness and self-promotion.” He then calls the messengers to return to their Baptist roots and embrace his vision for “messy cooperation.” He writes, “Part of doing this successfully is tolerating considerable diversity in our movement – doctrinal, methodological, strategic, and practical.”

And while readers might assume that Iorg thinks messiness would be confined within the doctrinal boundaries of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000, Iorg’s actions indicate the opposite. Over the last few years, he (as well as other SBC leaders such as Kevin Ezell, the President of the North American Mission Board – NAMB) worked to defeat the Law Amendment which sought to strengthen the long-held Baptist belief that the office of pastor was reserved for qualified men. Iorg writes, “Let’s keep debating the issue of gender leadership roles in churches with the goal of persuading churches to change their position or practices rather than removing them from the SBC.” In other words, he invites churches to openly debate elements of the SBC’s doctrinal statement. Despite his embrace of doctrinal confusion, Iorg still blames the messengers for the state of the SBC. He calls them to embrace his undefined vision of messy cooperation or else be guilty of the sin of expressive individualism.

Similarly, a letter written in the defense the Ethics and Liberty Commission (ERLC) by ten former SBC presidents calls on the messengers to abide by the will of the platform and not to divisively vote for the disbandment of the ERLC. The presidents admit that the ERLC (the political wing of the SBC) lacks a clear mission. Still, the letter goes on to proclaim that the undefine mission of the ERLC is still “an important mission and should be kept in place.” The presidents then ask the messengers to trust that the ERLC’s trustees and its president will get this undefined mission right. Recall this is the same organization that has worked with George Soros funded foundations, opposed the abolition of abortion, and whose executive board recently fired its president only to then reinstate said president and force its chairman of the board to resign. Nonetheless, the presidents ask messengers to trust them, embrace the ERLC, and avoid the sin of being divisive.  

The Nature of Trust

While the leaders of the SBC should invite the messengers to trust them, the basis of that trust comes not from the possession of that office but from the faithful stewardship of that office in accordance with Scripture. As Jonathan Leeman notes, “our submission is never finally owed to other people. It’s exclusively and uniquely owed to God.” To quote the apostle Paul, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ (1 Cor 11:1).” In other words, the messengers should trust the leaders of the SBC entities in much the same way they trust their pastors and elders.

Trust & the Congregation

When Christians join a local congregation, they should anticipate that their elder board (or in some cases their deacon board) will hold itself to the teaching of Scripture, correcting one another’s sins and asking the congregation to only vote on wise motions and nominations. As Paul tells Titus, “For an overseer, as God’s steward, must be above reproach (Ti. 1:7).” If church members disagree with their elders over matters lacking biblical warrant, the members should usually submit to their elders, understanding that the “bar should be pretty high before disobeying an elder.”

Still, the elders of that church should recognize that the congregation’s trust is not ultimately given but won through preaching truth, calling for wise votes that align with Scripture or its principles, and through abandoning error and those programs that would harm the church. In other words, elders should invite the congregation to vet their nominations of church officers as well as their other motions to ensure that the elders’ vision for the church wisely aligns with the Scriptures. To quote Baptist Father J.L. Dagg, “The only rule which they [the pastors] have a right to apply is that of God’s word; and the only obedience which they have a right to exact, is voluntary.”

J.L. Dagg
J.L. Dagg

When elders violate the Scriptures or enact unwise policies that harm the church and the bar for disobedience is reached, the church’s members should speak up. Leeman writes, “Good loyalty says, “I’m committed to you and your successes as a leader and that means I cannot follow you into folly or unrighteousness.” This speaking up is not a defect of congregationalism but its glory. As Dagg notes the best way to prevent a church from falling into error is to have congregations “well instructed in the truth.” Since even the best elders and elder boards can err, the congregation must be prepared to stand for truth and wisdom even if their elders do not.

To quote Leeman again, “the final judicial court of appeal is the whole congregation.” And when the whole congregation speaks on behalf of the Lord and rejects the elders’ poor leadership, the elders should listen, repent, and correct their course. Like King David who at the behest of his troops refrained from battling Absalom, elders should heed the biblical wisdom of their congregation (2 Sam 18:2-4), recognizing that the Holy Spirit resides in the pew just as assuredly as he resides in the elder board.  

Congregationalism in Action

Caleb Morell’s book A Light on the Hill helpfully demonstrates the preservative power of congregationalism in the face of erring leadership. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Agnes Shankle, a long time Sunday school teacher a Capitol Hill Baptist Church (CHBC), raised concerns about her church’s pulpit committee’s recommendation to install a moderate as the church’s next pastor. After she spoke, others joined her opposition. United in their defense of the truth, the congregation of CHBC defeated their leaders’ recommendation and thereby saved their church from theological ruin. CHBC continues “as a Bible-believing, Gospel-preaching church” in-part because a faithful member challenged her leaders’ unbiblical and unwise recommendation.  

Trust and the SBC

SBC Leadership Flow Chart

Similarly, the willingness of the messengers to challenge the unbiblical and unwise actions of their leaders is neither a defect nor a rejection of Baptist polity but one of its truest expressions. The SBC entity heads should listen to their boards as pastors listen to their fellow elders or deacons. Moreover, there is a good deal to be said for bringing about reform through the SBC trustee process (the process by which messengers elect the SBC President who nominates other men and women who upon their election by the messengers to the nominating committee nominate other men and women who upon their election to the various SBC boards then elect SBC entity presidents). But that level of accountability does not absolve the leaders of the SBC from being accountable to the messengers. The biblical concerns of the messengers should be heard and not dismissed as (to quote Vance Pittman, the President of the Send Network), “100% BS.” Moreover, no number of Baptist Press editorials in support of the platform will convince messengers to trust those leaders who have led the executive committee into financial ruin, who have muddled the witness of the SBC to the broader culture, and who have undermined the theological integrity of the SBC.

The Path Forward

If the trajectory of the convention remains unchanged, I suspect there will be more division…more need for groups like The Baptist Review, The Center for Baptist Leadership, and The Association of Churches for Missions and Evangelism (ACME) to form and more churches withdrawing from the convention. To quote Leeman, “If one belongs to a church where he cannot trust the elders to make biblical decisions, he should find another church.”

And in such cases, the fault will lie not with the messengers nor with expressive individualism but with the SBC’s leadership…with the platform. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones aptly says of the Reformation, the cause of the church’s division at that time (and I would argue that of the SBC today) was not the reformers like Luther but the “state of the Roman Church that was the tragedy.” Speaking of voluntary Baptist associations, Baptist father Edward T. Hoscox concurs. He writes that the only option left for those who disagree with the trajectory of their association is to “refuse to affiliate, and withdraw.” In other words, messengers who do not trust the platform should not and will not forever remain with the platform.

If the SBC is to reverse its decline, its leaders must win the trust of the messengers and once again embrace congregationalism. They must hear the concerns of the Agnes Shankle’s in their midst and allow the wisdom of the Scriptures to triumph.

At the 2025 Annual Meeting, I encourage the stage to abandon its criticism of the messengers and to welcome their biblical corrections. I encourage the stage to join with the messengers and to help us pass the Law Amendment, the motions for increased transparency, and any other reform that will better align the SBC with the Scriptures. In short, I encourage the platform to renew its commitment to congregationalism.

Peter Witkowski Discipleship

Rebuke: An Overlooked and Yet Essential Means of Grace

Though the idea of “rebuke” makes many evangelicals queasy, the discipline is not an archaic tool of yesteryear. Nor is it the exclusive domain of those discernment blogger types the crawl around twitter and Tik Tok. It is an essential means of grace. As the fall of King David makes clear, even the most faithful of Christians can become desensitized to their sin and stand in need of a rebuke.

David and Nathan

At the conclusion of 2 Samuel 11, the readers find King David moving in with Bathsheba and at peace with having had an affair with her and with having had orchestrated the murder of her husband – one of the David’s mighty men. David no longer thinks of his sins and encourages his conspirator in Uriah’s murder, Joab. to do the same. He tells the anxious general: “Don’t let this displease you (2 Sam 11:25).” Despite David’s self-assurances, God is still displeased with his sins.

Though a reader of 2 Samuel might assume that David stumbled into the muck because he had allowed the Scriptural wall around his heart to fall into decay, the text asserts the opposite to be true. When Nathan tells the story of a wealthy man who had stolen a poor farmer’s only beloved sheep, David correctly applies the Old Testament law which declares that “If a man steals…a sheep, and kills it or sells it, he shall repay…four sheep for a sheep (Ex 22;1).” David tells Nathan that the rich man, “shall restore the lamb fourfold (2 Sam 12:6).” And in that reference of Scripture, David reveals the insidious and blinding nature of sin. David can quickly and correctly apply the Scriptures to the thefts of others but cannot see the adultery and murder that he committed. Well did Jesus warn us: “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye (Matt 7:5).” Thus, the Lord mercifully sends Nathan to show David the tree in his eye and to declare, “You are the man (2 Sam 12:7)!” Apart from Nathan, David could not have grasped that he had sin, would not have sought repentance, and could have perished for his sins. Nathan’s rebuke delivered David from the fog of deception that had enveloped his heart so that he could once again see the brilliance of his Lord and pursue holiness. To quote the words of King Solomon – David next son with Bathsheba, “Faithful are the wounds of a friend (Prov 27:6).”

A Pastoral Responsibility

Though no pastor or elder should delight in the need for rebuke, all must be prepared to both offer and accept rebuke. To neglect rebuke is to neglect the foundations of soul care and discipleship. Paul tells Titus that pastors must “rebuke those who contradict” sound doctrine (Ti. 1:9, 13) and Timothy that, “the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will (Tim 2:24-25). The pastor who loves his sheep neither ignores their sin nor wishes it away. He preaches the warning of Scripture from the pulpit and shares them with those sitting opposite his desk. As with Nathan, obedience and love compels the faithful pastor or elder to rebuke his congregants so that they too may be rescued from their sins.  

A Congregational Responsibility

But what proves true of the church’s pastors and elders also proves true of those in the pew. Jesus invites the whole church to engage in rebuke when he says in Luke 17:3b that, “If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.” When we encounter a brother drunk at work, a sister dating an unbeliever, or a teenager disrupting her class with vulgar jokes, we must tell them that they too are the man or the woman so that they will not be lost to sin. As the theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer noted, “Nothing can be more cruel than the tenderness that consigns another to his sin. Nothing can be more compassionate than the severe rebuke that calls a brother back from his sin.” Or to quote the Old Testament law: “You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him (Lev. 19:17.” If we love our fellow church members, we will rebuke them.

Your Responsibility

In addition to giving rebukes, we must also accept them. Because as Bonhoeffer noted all evangelical are prone to turning the “justification of sinners…into the justification of sin,” we all stand in need of rebuke. Spiritual health depends upon it. To foster such a spirit, Christians must ground their lives in local church. It exists in-part to foster relationships between future Davids and Nathans so that when the time comes for rebuke someone from your small group, Sunday school class, or book club will lovingly tell you, “You are the man…You are the woman.”

And when they risk the relationship for our good, we should also welcome the rebuke and repent.  We should not recoil at our pastor’s words nor excuse our sins to the small group member. Rather, we should thank them for seeking to help us and ponder the merits of their rebuke against the Scripture. We should have the mindset of David who wrote in Psalm 141:5, “Let a righteous man strike – me it is a kindness; let him rebuke me – it is oil for my head; let my head not refuse it.” Though rebukes can be painful in the moment, we should view those faithful corrections as acts of God’s mercy for the Lord has not surrendered us to the power sin and judgment. When confronted about our sins, may God give us to grace to confess as David did, “I have sinned against the Lord (2 Sam 12:13).”

Moreover, we should not despair because someone had to rebuke us for even in the darkest hours Jesus is at work in us. Jeremiah Burrough helpfully notes, “the art of arts and the science of sciences…[is] to understand…that God…will bring life out of death, joy out of sorrow…and many times…grace out of sin, that is make uses of sin to work the furtherance of grace.” Do not sulk about the need for rebuke. Rather praise God for using even your rebellion to grow your faith through repentance and its resulting restoration.

Final Thoughts

The tool of rebuke is neither antiquated nor useless. Its use proves essential to the well being of our churches and our souls. Christian growth cannot happen without it. May God give us the grace to both give and accept rebuke.

Peter Witkowski Discipleship

David and Jonathan: The Illusion of Sex and the Nature of True Friendship

While those who adhere to the historic Christian faith love to champion the shepherd boy’s bold defeat of Goliath, they are much less comfortable with David and Jonathan’s relationship. In 2 Samuel 1:26, David famously pens the following oration for his dead friend, “I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan; very pleasant have you been to me; your love to me was extraordinary surpassing the love of women.” Finding some parallels between David’s language above and that of the various sexual revolutions, some theologians have concluded that David had a romantic relationship with Jonathan. Such claims rightfully trouble those who defend the historic understanding of the Scripture’s sexual ethics. But do the such claims have merit?

Context Matters

While the hypothesis that Jonathan and David were friends with benefits makes sense of the modern belief that unrestrained sexual expression is the highest good, it does not make sense of David’s world or of adherence to Biblical morality. The ancient Jews believed that communion with the Lord and not sex proved to be man’s greatest good. David said of himself in Psalm 16:9 that, “My heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure” because “The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup (Ps 16:5).” David found his validation not in the bedroom with his latest lover but in the Lord’s sanctuary worshiping. As David wrote in Psalm 145:16, The Lord satisfies “the desire of every living thing.”

This is not to say that David forever found joy in the Lord. He did transgress God’s sexual ethic. A few pages over in 2 Samuel 3:2-5, the author of Scripture reveals that David had six wives. Moreover in 2 Samuel 11-12, the author explores David’s affair with Bathsheba and resulting judgment in detail. In other words, the Scriptures never whitewashed David’s sins or violations of God’s commands, presenting and condemning them as sin. Had David’s funeral oration implied a sexual relationship with Jonathan, a violation of Leviticus 18:22 which declared that laying with “a man as a woman” was “an abomination,” readers would expect the author of 2 Samuel to have offered an editorial condemnation of David’s actions. But no such condemnation exists.

David was not discussing a sexual connection. To imply otherwise, readers must negate both the historical setting of David’s words and the witness of David’s other Scriptural writings. They must give the text a meaning that David did not intend and that his original readers would never have seen. In short, the homosexual reading of this text so transforms David’s words that they come mean the very opposite of what author originally intended to convey.

What was David Saying?

Rather than exhorting the glories of male sexuality, David was championing the glories of faith-based friendship. In other words, David is answering the question of “what is better than sex?” His answer is: “Friendship that is built upon a shared trust in the Lord.” In 1 Samuel 14, readers meet Jonathan scaling up a mountain to almost single-handedly defeat a garrison of philistines. He does so because he believes that “The Lord has given them into the hand of Israel.” Similarly, David burst onto the scene against Goliath declaring, “This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, I will strike you down and cut off your head…that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel (1 Sam 17:46-47).” The men bonded over their shared love for and trust in the Lord. Jonathan famously testified to the nature of their relationship when by faith in God’s future promises he asked the then fugitive David to care for him and his family, saying, “If I am still alive, show me the steadfast love of the Lord, that I may not die; and do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever, when the Lord cuts off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth (1 Sam 20:14-15).” Jonathan’s friendship proved better than sex for it pointed David to the Lord who satisfies every desire through the keeping of his promises.

Like David and Jonathan, Jesus also affirms that humans find their greatest fulfillment in worship and not sex. Commenting on an odd question from the Sadducees about marital relations in heaven, Jesus said, “For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven (Mk 12:25).” At death, sex ends. However, the worship of the Lord and relationship with both God and man continue. Thus, for the Christian, the greatest friendships are not tied inherently to sex or to procreation but to the unity built upon a shared trust in the Lord. Thus, Paul can say that he wished all believers were single as he was (1 Cor 7:7). Sex ends. Our love for God and those who love God does not.

So What About Marriage?

Though David praises Jonathan for his friendship, the shepherd’s friendship with the crown prince does not negate the beauties of marriage. The Bible exhorts men and women to marry because the institution pictures Christ’s love for the church (Eph. 5). Moreover, sex should not be a joyless, professional duty for the purpose of procreation. As Solomon says of his bride, “For your love is better than wine (1:2).” Rather God designed it to be a joyful expression of a unity built upon a shared faith in Christ whose fruit can produce both children and salvation. The biblical ideal is for couples to experience both spiritual and physical oneness.

But David’s relationship with Jonathan also warns against pursuing sex apart from a shared embrace of God’s Word. A single man or woman in a god-fearing asexual relationship with someone of the same gender can achieve a greater sense unity, love, and fulfillment with a believing friend than a believer can achieve with an unbeliever in the marriage bed. Sex cannot satisfy or make up for a lack of spiritual unity. Sex will fade and then disappear at death. But friendships built on a shared love for the Lord will last forever. May we never exchange eternal relationship for momentary gratification.

Final Thoughts

Though the secular mind declares most every sexual impulse to be a good and a rightful means of fulfillment, the Scriptures present a different narrative. They declare that man’s chief end is found in glorifying God. The truest and best relationships end not in sex but in worship. Though a Christian marriage should result in both spiritual and physical oneness providing the world with a beautiful picture of Christ and his church and a new generation of children, spiritual unity can be achieved outside the bonds of marriage. In other words, David was not a homosexual but a heterosexual man who delighted in the eternal joy that comes from having a friend who pointed him to the Lord. May we all (single and married) find such a friend and be such a friend!