We're officially leaving the IFB movement.

[Tarheel Baptist]

We have officially proposed to our church family that we join the Southern Baptist Convention.
We have scheduled a secret ballot vote on the matter, September 23.

This has been a two year process with our leadership, and we are simply joining like minded churches.
We have a few old timers who remember leaving the liberal SBC back in the 60s, but for the most part, we have had no negative reaction.

What we have discovered is that, when we join, NOTHING will change in our church.....
What we believe, preach or teach will not change.
How we conduct business and other aspects of church polity will not change!
How we carry out our missions program will not change.

We will simply officially align ourselves with their missions program, their humanitarian outreach program and be able to access their resources and benefits. It was a win, win for us, as we already had little to nothing in common with other IFB churches.

I would appreciate prayers for us during this transition....even from the IFBs here..... 

 

[Tarheel Baptist]

And, no...the Schaap debacle had no bearing on this decision...

 

[Recovering IFB]

I'll be praying for you guys....things like this can, at times be difficult.

 

[brianb]

There's an IFB movement? Really?

It must not be very big even among those who identify as IFB or any variation on that term. I know church planters who just want to plant "Baptist" or "Bible Believing" churches. I think it's great that you are leaving the IFB movement as you call it but I wish you could just be a non-denominational Bible church or something like that and not another SBC church.

 

[T-Bone]

Welcome ...and Brian there is nothing wrong with another strong SBC church, especially for better mission outreach.

 

[OZZY]

What we have discovered is that, when we join, NOTHING will change in our

I would appreciate prayers for us during this transition....even from the IFBs here..... 

If nothing is changing  what transition are you referring to?

 

[brianb]

Welcome ...and Brian there is nothing wrong with another strong SBC church, especially for better mission outreach.

I didn't say it was wrong. I understand the mission outreach part (in other countries especially overseas the SBC is not viewed the same way as it is in America and Canada - In Canada at least it's better to just say you are Baptist and not be specific (especially if you are IFB a lot of Canadians don't even know what that is still but curious people with internet access will want to know). It's better if people come to the church and see and hear rather than get their information off the internet) but otherwise I just see it as better to be non-denominational yet still Baptist in polity. The trend in America is towards non-denominationalism not just removing the name Baptist (which I don't agree with - my church is still Baptist in name) but getting out of a Baptist denomination altogether. Many churches do this simply because they don't want to be associated with a controversial denomination and there's no doubt that the SBC is controversial. The only reason IFB is controversial these days is because of things like abuse which happen because of wolves or at best novice pastors took over churches. There are a lot of people who think that IFB is like the Catholic church in that the pastor not the Bible is the final authority. These people probably couldn't tell you when the first IFB church was established or when the movement started. They may assume it started with Jack Hyles but all he did was take a church out of the American Baptist Convention and hijacked fundamentalism and IFB. The term Independent Fundamental (the IF in IFB) was used as far back as 1930 for a denomination called IFCA which is still around today so it may have started then. This is just FYI because IFB is getting a bad rap when it shouldn't.

 

[Izdaari]

I wish Tarheel and his church much success with this change. It isn't a direction I personally would go (I'm not especially SBC compatible), but it sounds right for them.

 

[Biker]

Tarheel your posts seem to be showing you are growing in the Lord in my opinion, so I'd hate not to give my two cents here..I did not grow up in church. Started attending at age 35 (I am 41 yrs old) So how extra biblical organizations operate is not my expertise. I am surely missing the benefits here but food for thought is-

God saved only 8 people during the "first tribulation", the flood.

We are told the road is very narrow, few will find it.

These SBC people, they are not members of your church.

Example- If you're working with them to get lower airfairs maybe.. to send your own church members into the missionary field, well that may be ok. As long as a separate offering is allowed, not the normal givings (Not tithes, we aren't to tithe)

The command is for us to "GO out" and witness. Meaning witness throughout our daily life.

BUT... I see nothing prohibiting donating to Missionary work. Those who are contributing monies must personally examine, for themselves, the Missionaries Fruits. How well do they know these people? do we have reason to believe God has another plan for them, such as being a Mother to their young children? Or are they in a stage in life to be able to devote to the work without being conflicted? Will these Missionaries be paid to molest kids like Schapp while brainwashing others with false teachings such as comparing communion to sex with God?  Otherwise to dole out our hard earned cash would not be being a good steward. As Elders, we are to guide the sheep. Stay completely grounded in scripture. And always remember, VERY FEW people are saved, very very few. We must ensure everything we do is grounded in scripture, it's our life and those of others.

Even if your church don't pay a cent to this organization... imagine how this organization exists. Can you partner with them on an equal level to discount costs so your OWN missionaries can benefit? Anything can happen at church, but when scripture is followed, then we never have to worry if our own sin contributed to it, or actually caused it via our dollars.  Did we pay a child molester to counsel and molest children, or did we pay a Man of God to perform duties of an ELDER and Leader when hiring a Pastor?

DO we need to partner with an extra biblical parachurch organization who is not operating under a churches oversight to fulfill the command to go out into the world and witness? Because being an Elder, it's likely I'd oppose it. Blessings to you and your church




.

.

 

[Tarheel Baptist]

What we have discovered is that, when we join, NOTHING will change in our

I would appreciate prayers for us during this transition....even from the IFBs here..... 

If nothing is changing  what transition are you referring to?

We have some old timers who remember the SBC in the 60s when the liberals were in charge.
Now, the liberal churches are leaving to join the Co Operative Baptist Fellowship.

The transition is merely to formally approve this move....we have a church wide Q & A Wed nite and a secret ballot vote on the 23rd.

So far, we have had virtually no opposition, but I want to give everyone ample opportunity to voice their opinion and get their questions answered.

SBC churche are as autonimous and independent in their actions, ministry and decision making as are IFB congregations.

 

[Tarheel Baptist]

Tarheel your posts seem to be showing you are growing in the Lord in my opinion, so I'd hate not to give my two cents here..I did not grow up in church. Started attending at age 35 (I am 41 yrs old) So how extra biblical organizations operate is not my expertise. I am surely missing the benefits here but food for thought is-

God saved only 8 people during the "first tribulation", the flood.

We are told the road is very narrow, few will find it.

These SBC people, they are not members of your church.

Example- If you're working with them to get lower airfairs maybe.. to send your own church members into the missionary field, well that may be ok. As long as a separate offering is allowed, not the normal givings (Not tithes, we aren't to tithe)

The command is for us to "GO out" and witness. Meaning witness throughout our daily life.

BUT... I see nothing prohibiting donating to Missionary work. Those who are contributing monies must personally examine, for themselves, the Missionaries Fruits. How well do they know these people? do we have reason to believe God has another plan for them, such as being a Mother to their young children? Or are they in a stage in life to be able to devote to the work without being conflicted? Will these Missionaries be paid to molest kids like Schapp while brainwashing others with false teachings such as comparing communion to sex with God?  Otherwise to dole out our hard earned cash would not be being a good steward. As Elders, we are to guide the sheep. Stay completely grounded in scripture. And always remember, VERY FEW people are saved, very very few. We must ensure everything we do is grounded in scripture, it's our life and those of others.

Even if your church don't pay a cent to this organization... imagine how this organization exists. Can you partner with them on an equal level to discount costs so your OWN missionaries can benefit? Anything can happen at church, but when scripture is followed, then we never have to worry if our own sin contributed to it, or actually caused it via our dollars.  Did we pay a child molester to counsel and molest children, or did we pay a Man of God to perform duties of an ELDER and Leader when hiring a Pastor?

DO we need to partner with an extra biblical parachurch organization who is not operating under a churches oversight to fulfill the command to go out into the world and witness? Because being an Elder, it's likely I'd oppose it. Blessings to you and your church




.

.

Huh?

 

[Castor Muscular]

Out of the frying pan, into the skillet.

 

[Tarheel Baptist]

Welcome ...and Brian there is nothing wrong with another strong SBC church, especially for better mission outreach.

I didn't say it was wrong. I understand the mission outreach part (in other countries especially overseas the SBC is not viewed the same way as it is in America and Canada - In Canada at least it's better to just say you are Baptist and not be specific (especially if you are IFB a lot of Canadians don't even know what that is still but curious people with internet access will want to know). It's better if people come to the church and see and hear rather than get their information off the internet) but otherwise I just see it as better to be non-denominational yet still Baptist in polity. The trend in America is towards non-denominationalism not just removing the name Baptist (which I don't agree with - my church is still Baptist in name) but getting out of a Baptist denomination altogether. Many churches do this simply because they don't want to be associated with a controversial denomination and there's no doubt that the SBC is controversial. The only reason IFB is controversial these days is because of things like abuse which happen because of wolves or at best novice pastors took over churches. There are a lot of people who think that IFB is like the Catholic church in that the pastor not the Bible is the final authority. These people probably couldn't tell you when the first IFB church was established or when the movement started. They may assume it started with Jack Hyles but all he did was take a church out of the American Baptist Convention and hijacked fundamentalism and IFB. The term Independent Fundamental (the IF in IFB) was used as far back as 1930 for a denomination called IFCA which is still around today so it may have started then. This is just FYI because IFB is getting a bad rap when it shouldn't.

Im not sure exactly what you're saying.
That churches should be Independent period....with no association?
And, how is the SBC controversial, outside liberal attacks for their stand on homosexual marriage or the role of women in culture and ministry?

Our joining the SBC has less to do with IFB and more about us...and the SBC!

 

[Tarheel Baptist]

Out of the frying pan, into the skillet.

Skillet is a little out there for my taste.....

 

[samspade]

It seems that most people who criticize the SBC have no idea what it does as an organization or how it does it. Unless you use a SBC hymnal (which most SBC churches don't use anymore anyway), no one should be able to tell the difference in your services. I wish you well as you lead your congregation in this direction as I think it is ministerial hara-kiri to cling to the IFB moniker.

 

[Castor Muscular]

It seems that most people who criticize the SBC have no idea what it does as an organization or how it does it. Unless you use a SBC hymnal (which most SBC churches don't use anymore anyway), no one should be able to tell the difference in your services. I wish you well as you lead your congregation in this direction as I think it is ministerial hara-kiri to cling to the IFB moniker.

So SBC means Same Basic Crapola?

 

[Torrent v.2]

We have officially proposed to our church family that we join the Southern Baptist Convention.
We have scheduled a secret ballot vote on the matter, September 23.

This has been a two year process with our leadership, and we are simply joining like minded churches.
We have a few old timers who remember leaving the liberal SBC back in the 60s, but for the most part, we have had no negative reaction.

What we have discovered is that, when we join, NOTHING will change in our church.....
What we believe, preach or teach will not change.
How we conduct business and other aspects of church polity will not change!
How we carry out our missions program will not change.

We will simply officially align ourselves with their missions program, their humanitarian outreach program and be able to access their resources and benefits. It was a win, win for us, as we already had little to nothing in common with other IFB churches.

I would appreciate prayers for us during this transition....even from the IFBs here..... 

Good for you. It will be a good move all around. I was IFB for many years and since then have attended numerous SBC churches and the differences are mentionable.  The Sunday School classes were much better. The outreach was much more positive. No one had to beat anyone over the head to be involved.  The music was much better in content.  The preaching did not have the legalism laced throughout it.  And the KJV was not waved as the answer to all problems, even though about half of the ones I have been in used the KJV.

 

[brianb]

Welcome ...and Brian there is nothing wrong with another strong SBC church, especially for better mission outreach.

I didn't say it was wrong. I understand the mission outreach part (in other countries especially overseas the SBC is not viewed the same way as it is in America and Canada - In Canada at least it's better to just say you are Baptist and not be specific (especially if you are IFB a lot of Canadians don't even know what that is still but curious people with internet access will want to know). It's better if people come to the church and see and hear rather than get their information off the internet) but otherwise I just see it as better to be non-denominational yet still Baptist in polity. The trend in America is towards non-denominationalism not just removing the name Baptist (which I don't agree with - my church is still Baptist in name) but getting out of a Baptist denomination altogether. Many churches do this simply because they don't want to be associated with a controversial denomination and there's no doubt that the SBC is controversial. The only reason IFB is controversial these days is because of things like abuse which happen because of wolves or at best novice pastors took over churches. There are a lot of people who think that IFB is like the Catholic church in that the pastor not the Bible is the final authority. These people probably couldn't tell you when the first IFB church was established or when the movement started. They may assume it started with Jack Hyles but all he did was take a church out of the American Baptist Convention and hijacked fundamentalism and IFB. The term Independent Fundamental (the IF in IFB) was used as far back as 1930 for a denomination called IFCA which is still around today so it may have started then. This is just FYI because IFB is getting a bad rap when it shouldn't.

Im not sure exactly what you're saying.
That churches should be Independent period....with no association?
And, how is the SBC controversial, outside liberal attacks for their stand on homosexual marriage or the role of women in culture and ministry?

Our joining the SBC has less to do with IFB and more about us...and the SBC!

Well as long as your church has a good reputation in the community you should continue to do well. I was just thinking about the future of the church - the next generation. There are churches within the SBC which some have considered abusive and these are the newer one. There's also the coverups of past sexual abuse cases and yes I know that the SBC is doing something about that. Associations or Conventions are not bad in and of themselves but they can become corrupt if churches are not vigilant. I believe it is more important to have a good (but not a phony) moral reputation because there are so many denominations to choose from that people will leave the "bad" one for the "good" one.  In the past (I may have to go back several decades) Christians (within Evangelicalism) would change denominations just because of secondary issues like changing from a non-Calvinist Baptist church to a Calvinist one because of a new conviction. It's not that there is immorality in the church - that's been going on since the beginning but now it seems to tolerated especially when it's ministry people - no church discipline for them because they can do no wrong or it wasn't their fault. This has never happened in my church or any church I've been to  just so you know that I'm not speaking from personal experience. In my church ministry people are treated equally with other members - being in ministry is not considered better than being a police officer for example - people in ministry wouldn't be in ministry if it wasn't for the rest of us - they're just like government workers. This is why our church has never even been accused of immorality - we are all equal though with different roles or positions.

 

[Castor Muscular]

Good for you. It will be a good move all around. I was IFB for many years and since then have attended numerous SBC churches and the differences are mentionable.  The Sunday School classes were much better. The outreach was much more positive. No one had to beat anyone over the head to be involved.  The music was much better in content.  The preaching did not have the legalism laced throughout it.  And the KJV was not waved as the answer to all problems, even though about half of the ones I have been in used the KJV.

Which just goes to show that not all SBC churches are the same.  My experiences:

SBC church #1:  Typical sermon:  Pastor preached that you need to keep your lawn mowed and landscaped well in order to be a good Christian witness to your neighbors.

SBC church #2:  Sermons were very legalistic.  Treated divorced people like they were lepers.

SBC church #3:  Pastor was a coward and taught whatever the biggest donor (a female doctor) wanted taught.  She was the Sunday School Cop, and sat in every Sunday School to make sure you were teaching HER interpretation of everything.  She was just plain nasty, too, and she hated me.  She talked me into being a "model" for a small magazine.  What she didn't tell me is that she planned to use my picture (posed talking to a doctor) with a caption saying I was getting AIDS counselling. 

SBC church #4:  Pastor was a frustrated rock star, and build his entire church around entertaining the women.  All "Jesus is my boyfriend" music, all the time. 

At this point I swore off SBC churches and stopped trying them out. 

 

[Izdaari]

Good for you. It will be a good move all around. I was IFB for many years and since then have attended numerous SBC churches and the differences are mentionable.  The Sunday School classes were much better. The outreach was much more positive. No one had to beat anyone over the head to be involved.  The music was much better in content.  The preaching did not have the legalism laced throughout it.  And the KJV was not waved as the answer to all problems, even though about half of the ones I have been in used the KJV.

Which just goes to show that not all SBC churches are the same.  My experiences:

SBC church #1:  Typical sermon:  Pastor preached that you need to keep your lawn mowed and landscaped well in order to be a good Christian witness to your neighbors.

SBC church #2:  Sermons were very legalistic.  Treated divorced people like they were lepers.

SBC church #3:  Pastor was a coward and taught whatever the biggest donor (a female doctor) wanted taught.  She was the Sunday School Cop, and sat in every Sunday School to make sure you were teaching HER interpretation of everything.  She was just plain nasty, too, and she hated me.  She talked me into being a "model" for a small magazine.  What she didn't tell me is that she planned to use my picture (posed talking to a doctor) with a caption saying I was getting AIDS counselling. 

SBC church #4:  Pastor was a frustrated rock star, and build his entire church around entertaining the women.  All "Jesus is my boyfriend" music, all the time. 

At this point I swore off SBC churches and stopped trying them out.

Four is not a large enough statistical sample. Tarheel's will at least be a biblically sound church with a good pastor, and so necessarily better than any of those you mentioned. But SBC is part of the conservative evangelical movement and is also complementarian. I don't wish to be associated with the former and am actively opposed to the latter.