Confessionalism: Southern Baptists and Confessions: Part 3

The following essay by L. R. Scarborough was first published May 7, 1925 in The Christian Index as one of a five-part series leading up to the historic vote in the SBC for the first convention-wide statement of faith adopted at the Memphis Convention the same year.

At the time, Dr. Scarborough was President of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.  His powerful influence helped seal the work President E.Y. Mullins and the committee prepared for the full support of the Convention. 

       The Convention’s committee will have ready a revised and enlarged statement of the New Hampshire Articles of Faith. The New Hampshire Articles of Faith is a great document. It has been the standard expression of the belief of Baptists, at least in the South, for nearly a century. It is probably the clearest and most explicit expression of Bible doctrine ever printed. it needs revision and enlargement.

There are some fundamentals of our faith now recognized by our people which are not emphasized in these articles, for instance, missions, stewardship, cooperation and such like. There is every evidence that the committee will report unanimously a great improvement and the needful enlargement of such articles. There will be no evasions, no hedging, no dodging, but a clarified, courageous statement of the fundamentals of our conception of New Testament doctrine. I give herein my opinion of what I think the Convention ought to do with these articles of faith.

I think the Convention ought to hear the committee’s report, carefully consider it, and recommend the articles of faith to the churches for their adoption, if they desire to do so. I do not believe that the Convention has any right to require any other convention, any church or any group of individuals to adopt these articles of faith. The Convention probably has the right to require the professors of the three South-wide seminaries, the only schools the Convention owns, and probably all of its boards and secretaries to adopt these articles of faith. I do not believe that such ought to be done.

All three of the South-wide seminaries have during all their existence had articles of faith for their teachers to sign and the boards of trustees have required such teachers to sign these articles of faith. I shall recommend to the Board of Trustees of the Southwestern Seminary that they adopt the articles of faith recommended by the Convention and require, as formerly, each teacher in the Seminary to sign these articles of faith. there will be nothing new in this procedure, with any of our three Southwide seminaries.

I think the only thing the Convention ought to do is to do what the Convention has done a number of times before, and do what the World Alliance did at Stockholm, receive the report of its committee and recommend the articles it brings to our Baptist people everywhere. The churches will adopt these articles of faith if they please. The boards of trustees of the schools owned by the states will, if they desire, adopt these articles of faith for their teachers. If they do not so desire, they do not have to do it.

In facing this question we must remember the rights and the limitations of the rights of conventions. These articles of faith are not a creed. Such articles of faith have never been regarded by Baptists as a dogmatic creed which one group of individuals can bind upon the consciences of other individuals. It is simply a statement of what we believe, a witness, a testimony of our conception of the heart of revealed truth as set out in the Bible. It is a standard of doctrine approximating the truth as revealed in the Bible.

Why Recommend It?

I believe the Convention should recommend these articles of faith for the following reasons:

1. Because such action will be in accord with Baptist history. Our people in England, in America, and in other lands have for centuries sought to put in brief and explicit language a statement of their faith. The fact is the New Testament is an enlarged expression of the articles of faith. The action of the church at Jerusalem was in the nature of articles of faith, on certain vital matters. The record of this is in Acts 15. The Philadelphia and New Hampshire articles of faith are but the summaries and heart of other articles of faith coming to us from our English Baptists.

The New Hampshire articles of faith were the report of a committee appointed by the Convention and their report was adopted by the Convention, according to Dr. Lemon of Massachusetts, who has made extensive investigation of this matter. The New Hampshire articles of faith have been the standard of Baptist churches in the south for seventy five years. Practically every church in the South has adopted them. Every newly organized church coming into an association in the South is required of the association to state whether or not it has adopted articles of faith.

Every individual coming into a church on experience of grace is asked certain questions by the pastor as to his faith, whether or not he has accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as personal Saviour, believes in Him, accepts Him as Lord and Master and is willing to follow Him in baptism and in all the duties required by him, whether or not he will be loyal to and support the church of which he becomes a member. All this is in the nature of a standard of faith and I think is in accordance with New Testament truth and practice.

In recent years many of the state conventions have adopted statements of fundamental truth on different subjects, setting out the belief of the people in certain doctrinal lines. The Southern Baptist Convention years ago appointed a committee to issue a statement of the belief of Southern baptist. Drs Gambrell, Mullins and others were on the committee. The convention received the report and recommended it to baptists everywhere. It was published in nearly every language on earth.

At the Kansas City Convention the president, Dr. Mullins, delivered a great statement on science and religion, embodying fundamental doctrines. The Convention unanimously approved it as its expression of Baptist belief. The Baptist World Alliance Executive committee appointed a special committee of which Dr. Mullins was chairman.

Dr . Truett and others were members of the committee. The purpose of the committee was to present to the Alliance a statement of the fundamentals of Baptist belief. The committee made a great report and the Baptist World Alliance almost unanimously recommended it to our people. It did not adopt it as its articles of faith. It approved it as the approximate statement of Baptist belief on certain great fundamentals.

The Southern Convention will be keeping up Baptist history and being true to the records of the past if it will receive the report of its committee and recommend the articles of faith to our people and churches everywhere.

This is what I think the Memphis Convention ought to do . It will take sense and religion to do it right. We ought to do it in a prayerful spirit.

 

With that, I am...

Peter

Comments

[Big Daddy Weave]

Joe Trull (former NOBTS prof and SWBTS alum) told me a story about L.R. Scarborough just a few weeks ago. During the early 40's, African-Americans were allowed to attend Southwestern. However, those who chose to live on-campus were forced to live in what Trull described as a "basement." They were segregated from their white Southwestern students.

As you know, T.B. Maston lead the fight for racial justice in the SBC beginning in 1927. Maston was a role model especially for the African-American students. Maston lobbied Scarborough to integrate the Southwestern dorms. But Scarborough refused, time and time again.

As the story goes, Maston declared that it would take an "act of God" for the dorms to be integrated. The following week, L.R. Scarborough died. Soon after his death, the dorms at Southwestern were integrated.

[Michael Westmoreland-White]

I like Scarborough's emphasis that these articles were not meant to be a creed and the limits to which the convention could do with them. When he says, however, that the New Hampshire Confession was adopted by "practically all" the SBC churches for 75 years, he's clearly exaggerating. If that had been so, there wouldn't have been such resistance to the Mullins committee. Especially in the Southeast, many churches had church covenants but no confessions of faith--especially in Sandy Creek traditions.

The Western churches hated creeds but often treated the "Old Landmarks" of the Landmarkers as a de facto creed. But they didn't want anything as elaborate as the New Hampshire Confession/BF& M.

BDW, I join you in saluting Maston's work on racial justice. At SBTS, that had been started by J.B. Weatherspoon, and continued by O.T. Binkley and Henlee H. Barnette. And, at first African-American students were allowed to attend SBTS. Then, Kentucky passed the "Day law" (named after someone named Day) which made it a felony to teach whites and blacks in the same classroom. SBTS profs. went to elaborate ruses to get around this--such as having black students in the hall with an open door or teaching them in their offices--or sometimes outrightly defying the law. (The last was risky because some racist students were known to turn in profs.) And at SBTS, President John R. Sampey was the racist who resisted.

Isn't it fascinating that racial justice is not a part of any SBC confession of faith?

[peter lumpkins]

Dear BDW,

Thanks for the cookie. And for reminding me of Professor Maston's role in leading the charge against racism. I think Dr. Trull's hero was Dr. Maston, was he not?

Incidentally, Dr. Trull was my ethics Professor at NOBTS, a great guy indeed. I tried to get close to him while there but it was at the height of the CR and many professors were suspicious of any student wanting to cozy up for fear, I suppose, of being revealed for their "closet Liberal views."

The first "letter to the editor" I think I ever penned was in response to Dr. Trull's little essay on Philemon in The Louisiana Baptist. I shall never forget him making ground chuck of my letter in class, though I've surely forgiven him :^)

Give him my regards when you see him again, Aaron.

Grace always, my Brother. With that, I am...

Peter

[peter lumpkins]

Michael,

I trust you are well. I agree the statement about the NHC appears entirely bloated. That aside, Dr. Scarborough holds a finely balanced view of Confessions that most SBs could embrace.

I agree also with the ugliness under which our otherwise wonderful heritage hangs concerning racism. The only consolation--if indeed any may dare be named--is that racism was, culturally speaking, an acceptable womb to tome concept few questioned. No one can whitewash (no pun intended) its dispicable presence from our past.

It seems, at least to me, we are attempting to deal with it and good Professors like T.B. Maston, whose prophetic voice continues to echo from the grave, begs much of our gratitude.

Peace, my Brother Michael. With that, I am...

Peter

[volfan007]

michael,

are we gonna get into this again? why cant you try to understand how things were back in that day of segregation? you can call it hate all of you want to...but, it just wasnt hate with a lot of southern christians. they just believed that the races should stay separate.

it was a different day back then....and it's very easy to judge them from todays perspective...after years of making great strides. maybe, one day, michael, people will look back on something that you just assumed was a way of life and condemn you for it in their day and age.

david...volfan007

[Michael Westmoreland-White]

I didn't bring this up, Big Daddy Weave did. Yes, it was different then. That means we should honor those who rose above those times and saw further: The T.B. Mastons, the Henlee Barnettes, the W.W. Finlators, the Clarence Jordans, the Carlyle Marneys. And, I think, we should see the failures of those like Scarborough to see anything wrong with racism as THEOLOGICAL failures, not just moral ones. Unless we address the theological inadequacies that allowed millions of Southern Baptists to lead the way in supporting slavery and segregation (and led to the marginalizing of those like Maston & co. who resisted this trend), we will not see whether or not those same weaknesses are blinding SBs to similar evils, NOW.

[Michael Westmoreland-White]

Southern Christians during segregation "just thought the races ought to be separate." Now, can we see the THEOLOGICAL errors here? Such a belief was similar to first century Jewish Christians who "just thought that Jewish Christians shouldn't eat with Gentile Christians." We know what Paul said about that to the Church at Galatia! We know what Peter said to the Jerusalem council in Acts 15.

Any belief in segregation or apartheid, whether or not accompanied by personal feelings of hatred, constitutes an error in atonement doctrine, too. For it denies that in Christ's death the "dividing wall of hostility has been torn down" as Ephesians says. Atonement is not only about our reconciliation to God, but to each other as well.

So, historic Southern Baptist support for slavery and segregation constitutes several enormous theological errors. If we are talking about the nature of Baptist confessions and about what kind of Baptist identity we need to be forging, now, shouldn't those kinds of errors be front and center?
And this doesn't even touch the accompanying errors of believing that one people group is superior to another.

We cannot separate our ethics from our doctrine and worry only about getting the latter right. The twain are inextricably linked.