The Brewing Civil War in the SBC

(Written 5/30/18)
It is abundantly clear from Scripture that God hates divorce. Jesus said that it was only allowed because of the hardness of hearts and that the only acceptable reason to divorce was sexual immorality on the part of your spouse. Paul later added that if you were abandoned by your (assumed unbelieving) spouse you were not in bondage and (most assume) free to marry again.

One issue that Christians have debated for a long time the last few decades is what to do in the situation of an abusive spouse. Generally couched in terms of an abusive husband. Is it acceptable for the wife to seek a divorce in that situation? What if it is dangerous for her to remain living with her husband? Many evangelicals have attempted to make the argument that abuse constitutes abandonment and therefore is covered by what Paul says. However if you look at his actual words the connection is not readily apparent, to say the least. The key verses are 1 Cor 7:12-16, specifically v15 where Paul says, "if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace."

  

I've run into this from time to time, in my general studying of Scripture and theology, but what has made me think about it a lot lately has been the controversy surrounding Paige Patterson, the now former president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Texas. He has been accused of discouraging an alleged rape victim from going to the police, he has made marks that "objectified" women, from the pulpit no less, and he has apparently counseled women married to abusive husbands to pray to God and practice submission. 

This controversy has just about split the Southern Baptist Convention in half. The fault lines that were already showing between the New Calvinists/Gospel Coalition type folks who have become very focused on social justice issues and the more old school baptists who have not are even more pronounced now. This division was first made clear in the 2016 election when prominent Southern Baptist leaders publicly opposed Trump while he was quite popular among the rank and file Baptists.

It appears that most prominent SBC leaders have sided against him, however it is far from unanimous, with petitions being started both for and against him online. The Manosphere's residential Christian blogger, Dalrock, weighed in with "Patterson's Crimes Against Feminism."

Some women (and men) in the SBC have jumped on this issue as a reason the SBC needs more women in leadership positions. Perhaps most notably, the likely next president of the SBC, J.D. Greear said, "Our failure to listen to and honor women and racial minorities and our failure to include them in proportionate measures at top leadership roles have hindered our ability to see sin and injustice and call it out." He also mentioning preferential treatment for minorities, signalling his alliance with the social justice warriors in the SBC. Saying women need to have "top leadership roles" is very different from any understood definition of biblical gender roles historically, and is very concerning. Beth Moore has also spoken up about the ordeals she faced trying to become a preacher as a woman in the SBC.

The Southern Baptist convention this year could be crazy. Patterson is still scheduled to give a keynote sermon and many people are planning on protesting.

This is all part of a larger problem growing in the SBC which is that it is starting to go down the path of the mainlines 100 years ago in emphasizing the "social gospel" over sound theology and the actual gospel of Jesus Christ. We all know how well that worked out for them, so I am very concerned for its future well-being.

When I get a chance I will pick up the topic I started out planning on discussing here today which was whether or not abuse is biblical grounds for divorce. I apparently got sidetracked. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯