“The Future of SBC in Four Paragraphs”

SBC is a denomination in peril. Its redemption will not come from its current leadership and regime of power, but from “ethnic/immigrant Christian churches” and “minority leaders” who have gone through the fire of hell, dehumanization, and common suffering in this weary land, and from the racialized disciples of Jesus Christ who share a collective history of exclusion and alienation from the life and power of SBC leadership, institutions, and churches.

In all of their trouble and collective history of suffering and rejection, they have learned to abide in Jesus, remain faithful to SBC while SBC has not been faithful to them, and trust in God’s transformative power and healing presence to boost up their self-esteem and shape their Christian identity and character to those of Jesus Christ. They have borne the mark of the Christian cross and experienced the calvary of the American culture.

The good news is this: God is not done with SBC nor has he abandoned SBC churches. There’s redemptive hope that could foster institutional transformation within the SBC leadership and life. This hope is not cheap grace; it demands a radical renunciation of the political gods and cultural demons that have poisoned SBC leadership, churches, and institutions. This liberative hope also makes urgent demands from the people of God in the SBC to become a people of justice and zealous ambassadors of reconciliation and unity.

Finally, six ethically paired words of action–which are also moral imperatives–are required toward this denominational restructuring, shifting, and rebuilding: repentance and forgiveness, self-denial and humility, inclusion and diversity, Christian fellowship and relationality, racial sensitivity and multicultural partnership, and submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and living out the liberating message of the Gospel.