Akin: SBC’s future ‘hopeful’ if committed to Great Commission

JACKSON, Tenn. (FBW) ? With “seismic changes” creating an “unprecedented” historical moment for the Southern Baptist Convention, Danny Akin is not optimistic about the future of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination but he is “hopeful” ? if Southern Baptists will fully commit themselves to the Lordship of Christ and His Great Commission.

If, on the other hand, Southern Baptists are not moved to a complete commitment to missions, “We don’t deserve a future,” Akin concluded in an Oct. 8 address on the future of the Southern Baptist Convention at Union University in Jackson, Tenn.

Citing the promise of Rev. 7:9-10in which heaven will be populated by vast multitude of all peoples, Akin said, “The question that stares Southern Baptists in the face is this: will we join hands with our great God in seeing this awesome day come to pass or will we find ourselves sitting on the sidelines watching?”

Akin spoke at Union’s conference, “Southern Baptists, Evangelicals, and the Future of Denominationalism.” The Oct. 6-9 conference is being held in recognition of the 400th anniversary of the Baptist movement.

Akin is president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., and primary author of the “Great Commission Resurgence Declaration,” which later resulted in the Southern Baptist Convention’s authorization of a GCR Task Force that is currently studying the SBC to seek greater effectiveness in fulfilling the Great Commission. Akin serves as a member of the GCR Task Force.

Noting the “spiritual stakes are high,” Akin said his “conversations and experiences” in recent months have “only heightened and made even more clear where the dangers to our future lie.”

Akin launched the GCR movement in April with a chapel address at Southeastern Seminary outlining “Axioms for a Great Commission Resurgence” and invoked several of the same themes in his Union address.

Akin asked conference participants to consider “eight points of observation” that he asserted are necessary for the SBC to have a hopeful future.

Lordship of Christ

As with his axioms address, Akin first asserted that Southern Baptists must “return to our first love and surrender ourselves fully to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.”

Akin said he has “experienced significant grief” that this matter received so little attention in the wake of his axioms address. While Southern Baptists passed over this issue claiming they already believe it, Akin asked, “Do we live it? Is Jesus Christ really our passion and priority?”

Citing Jesus’ final words in Matt. 28:18-20and Acts 1:4-8, Akin said a “right reading of Scripture will not set these statements in opposition to or at odds with one another. Any appeal to Acts 1:8to justify not getting more personnel and resources to the unreached nations is wrong headed. Actually, it is shameful. Most of our Jerusalems have a Gospel witness. Large portions of the uttermost parts of the earth do not.”

Southern Baptists need to think and act like Jesus, Akin said. “If we fail here, we will fail everywhere.”

Inerrancy, sufficiency of the Bible

Praising Southern Baptist leaders like Paige Patterson, Adrian Rogers and Jerry Vines who led the Conservative Resurgence during the 1980s and ’90s to oppose the “poison of liberalism” in the SBC, Akin said these “heroes of the faith” should be honored and not forgotten ? and newer generations of Southern Baptists need to be told of their sacrifices.

However, Akin added, the “war for the Bible is not over and it will never end until Jesus returns.” He warned younger generations “not to squander away precious theological ground” essential for a “healthy and hopeful future” for the SBC.

Those who would deny the “full truthfulness of the Bible” should leave the SBC, Akin asserted.

“We love you and pray for you, but we do not want you infecting our people with a spiritual disease that is always fatal to the Church of the Lord Jesus.”

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