Editor’s note: Woodland Baptist Church in San Antonio, Texas, is one of two churches recently expelled from the Baptist General Convention of Texas after being found out of compliance with the BGCT’s stance on sexuality. What follows here is the sermon Woodland Pastor Garrett Vickrey preached at his church the next week, Sunday, June 18. The sermon is based on Galatians 5:1-6.
There’s an old poem that might have been inspired by Baptists:
Our fathers have been churchmen
1,900 years or so
And to every new suggestion
They always answered no.
Make no mistake about it, the gospel Paul proclaims to the Galatians suggests a radical departure from the faith they knew. It’s a radical grace. It meant leaving their traditions behind to be governed by the spirit of the living Christ. No longer would they be guided by the traditions of old or the words of Moses preserved in Scripture, but by faith in Christ. A new community is emerging, and into this new reality they have been set free.
Garrett Vickrey
It was a new suggestion to the Galatians, and they had answered no. The letter we have in the New Testament is Paul’s reply to the Galatians. It’s a plea, an argument and an articulation of a vision for a church that is generous in orthodoxy, compassionate in mission and inclusive in fellowship. Paul writes: “For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”
When life gets messy and the future uncertain, it’s tempting to cling to certainty in the place of faith. Faith means trust; trust demands vulnerability. And too often when the Spirit calls us to be vulnerable, we say, “No.”
This week, the Southern Baptist Convention disfellowshipped Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., and Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., for appointing women to serve in pastoral roles. It gets worse, the convention voted to amend their constitution to say all their churches must affirm, appoint or employ only men as any kind of pastor or elder.
But the news isn’t just out there beyond us; we’ve been drawn into this too.
Other Baptist groups closer to home have been busy. On May 23, during a closed-door session, the Executive Board of the Baptist General Convention of Texas voted to dismiss Woodland along with Second Baptist Lubbock from fellowship.
A staff member of the BGCT called me on May 2 to ask about Woodland’s position on human sexuality. He had heard a rumor that we were an open and affirming church. As I mentioned in my email to you last week, open and affirming churches welcome LGBTQ individuals and affirm their dignity as being made in the image of God, thereby opening up avenues of service and leadership within their congregations. Open and affirming churches open Communion and ordinances to LGBTQ individuals and have typically made a public statement to that end.
The BGCT asked me about Woodland’s position on human sexuality. I told them the truth: We’re not of one mind. We don’t have a statement on human sexuality, but we generally practice inclusion. I let them know that my personal views were not in line with that of the BGCT. Then last week, I received notice that we had been voted out.
A first time
This is the first time the BGCT has disfellowshipped a church that has not made a public statement of inclusion and affirmation of LGBTQ people. It seems clear that someone in the BGCT staff sought to create a list of churches they could bring before the Executive Board to disfellowship. For some in the BGCT (like in the SBC) this is a galvanizing process.
“Immature spirituality relies on shaming others to build up their own righteousness.”
Immature spirituality relies on shaming others to build up their own righteousness. Fundamentalists need someone to be wrong for them to be right. Fundamentalists have no existence outside the fight — so they continually circle the wagons demanding further and further adherence to their ever-tighter creeds.
The BGCT seems to be moving more and more in the direction of the Southern Baptists. They demand that all churches in cooperation with them be in alignment with their version of “biblical sexuality.” So they have articulated a criteria for membership based upon a matter Jesus doesn’t really say anything about. He says a lot about the poor. He is drawn to people on the margins. And he says a lot about religious leaders taking advantage of people.
The problem with setting up this kind of criteria for membership is that once you start mandating that everyone believe the same things, it’s hard to know where to stop. What will be the next non-negotiable point of orthodoxy — wives submitting to husbands, biblical inerrancy, opposition to Critical Race Theory?
It’s like adding a test for membership that is beyond the statement of faith in Jesus Christ as Lord. Which is exactly what Paul is dealing with in Galatians.
What’s happening in Galatians?
Galatians is not a friendly letter. Paul starts most letters with a greeting that uses flowery language meant to convey a feeling of goodwill between the apostle and the church. Not this letter. In Galatians, Paul is angry.
The issue of the day is circumcision. You’re probably thinking, “Well, glad we got over all that a long time ago.” Yet, this is the issue that shapes Paul’s ministry and certainly the letters he writes. And seeing how he manages this hot button social concern is actually quite relevant for us in the 21st century.
Here’s how.
Paul’s argument is this: We are saved by faith in Christ. You do not have to be circumcised, keep kosher and follow all the Levitical laws to be saved. We are saved by faith in Christ — not faith and circumcision or faith and practicing dietary restraint. Paul describes weak Christians as those who cannot fully trust in Jesus but must also fall back on what they have known and practice circumcision (and the law).
You might be thinking, what’s the matter here? What does it hurt if some practice the law of Moses alongside their faith and others do not? Well, it’s fine unless those who practice the law of Moses exclude those who do not. If you’re demanding new church members be circumcised before baptism, that might raise some alarms. If you’re demanding dietary fidelity to Levitical laws, then you’re placing unnecessary obstacles in the way of new believers. And then where is your faith — in Christ or religious regulation?
Paul is arguing that this exclusion is hurting the witness of the church. The weak Christians who rely on following the letter of the law in the Galatian church are putting up barriers to people entering the church — barriers Christ does not demand. Why are you submitting to a yoke of slavery when you have been set free? You who want to be justified by the law have cut yourselves off from Christ.
“Paul interprets one Scripture against others in order to make sense of what the Spirit is doing in the church of his day.”
Paul interprets one Scripture against others in order to make sense of what the Spirit is doing in the church of his day. Remember, his argument of salvation through faith relies on pre-Moses narrative — before the law. He goes back to Abraham to say Abraham was justified through faith, not through the law of Moses. So, Paul’s argument is essentially a biblical argument for faith in Christ, not faith in Scripture’s ability to save us.
The authority of Christ as revealed in community is placed above the authority of the Bible. Of course, Scripture is critical for faith and practice — and helps us to discern the movement of the Spirit in our day. But make no mistake. Paul picks and chooses some verses of his Bible over others to create an inclusive narrative for the sake of the Gentiles. He reads the Bible in light of his personal experience with the Holy Spirit and the way he has seen the Spirit move in the church. This should be instructive for us.
Baptists and creeds
Baptists have no binding creed. That freedom in the Spirit opens us to follow the living Christ in the world today. It encourages us not just to look backward but to look through the Scriptures upon our world today. The hope is that we would find the fruits of the Spirit thriving around us.
Baptists believe it is the relationship to Jesus Christ, not some rational scheme, that puts one right with God. Yes, that is a really subjective foundation, but it’s all we’ve got. And we’ve seen the pitfalls of so-called objective foundations like creeds and state-sponsored churches.
“These false foundations place human institutions in the place of Spirit-led faith.”
These false foundations place human institutions in the place of Spirit-led faith. They replace faith with the kind of slavery Paul was talking about in Galatians. Because they seek to provide a kind of certainty Christ never promised. He did not promise power over others, he promised the power of his presence — a presence we can trust.
It’s that presence that binds the church and makes something more of us than we can be apart.
But it’s not that presence Baptists have been known for. We’ve been known for saying, ‘No.’ We’ve been known for our focus on a negative theology that envisions a judgmental God and Pharisaical church practices.
Not that kind of Baptist
During our congregational conversations over the past few weeks, a few of you have noted that when you tell people you’re a member of a Baptist church you follow up by saying, “Not that kind of Baptist.” I’m told when Woodland first opened, we had an outreach campaign with the tagline, “Not your grandmother’s Baptist church.”
Nora Lozano sent me a flyer that her daughter Andrea and her husband had received in the mail from a Baptist church. The flyer is one this church sends to every new homeowner. It has a picture of a burning American city meant to look like New York City and a cross that covers a flaming expanse over what looks like Ancient Rome, but I think it’s supposed to be the New Jerusalem. Underneath the picture is a quote from Psalm 91 — “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.”
Andrea told her mom, “I’m so glad your church isn’t that kind of Baptist.”
“The grandfather didn’t want to do the wedding because he worried the bride wasn’t saved enough.”
Two weeks ago, I officiated the wedding of a young woman who grew up in our neighborhood. She was marrying a man whose grandfather has been the pastor of a Baptist church for the last 40 years. But I was doing the service. The groom’s father wasn’t there. And the grandfather didn’t want to do the wedding because he worried the bride wasn’t saved enough — didn’t grow up in his kind of Baptist church.
A dear friend officiated a wedding recently for a young woman in his church. The bride grew up in a pretty conservative home, and throughout college and grad school she discovered a new way to be Christian, a deeper faith that’s not afraid of questions and doubt. Because of this, she did not have the full support and understanding of her family.
But she’s now an active Sanctuary Choir member. So the reception and wedding was handled entirely by the Sanctuary Choir. My friend said watching the church women figure out how to host a vegan reception for the hip young bride is one of his favorite images of church in recent memory.
There are too many Christians (and especially Baptists) using faith as a leverage for division. That’s not who we want to be. We have good news to tell people. This is a place where you can be known, be loved and belong.
Called to inclusion
I urge us to be inclusive. Why? Because in the end, I would rather be found liable for including rather than excluding those God meant to include. I would rather err on the side of love than err on the side of condemnation. We see through a mirror dimly. But what we see in Scripture is the way people are set free through mercy — and the way God is faithful even when we are not. And how God seems always to be expanding the boundaries of who is included: the gentiles, Samaritans, Moabites, those caught in transgression, even eunuchs from the ends of the earth.
Paul Baxley, head of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, wrote this week in response to all that’s happening in Baptist life: “As a Baptist denominational community, our calling is not to police the actions of congregations; instead we strive to be a fellowship in which congregations and their leaders learn from each other, encourage one another and become instruments of God’s grace to each other as a real priesthood of all believers.”
I think this could be said of our calling as a church. Baptist churches should be places where we learn from each other, encourage one another and become instruments of God’s grace to each other as a priesthood of all believers.
That’s the kind of Baptist church we can be. A “team of rivals” kind of community. That’s the kind of diverse mutuality that fends off the echo chamber mentality — the diverse interconnectivity that encourages and challenges. That interconnectivity witnesses to the importance of every member.
“We’re each made in the image of God, each made with a brain. And we don’t have to check that brain at the door.”
The relational significance is a reminder that we’re each made in the image of God, each made with a brain. And we don’t have to check that brain at the door. Just as at Pentecost the Spirit descended and the people began speaking in different languages, there’s so much of God to express and articulate no community can hold the fulness of the Holy One. We grasp a thimble full of an ocean of grace. I think our Baptist founders might say we each have our own story to tell about Jesus. Each story adds to the witness of the whole.
Woodland has been a Baptist community that treasures the witness of each of our experiences with Christ. This collective witness is a patchwork narrative of intimate encounters that creates a transcendent vision. And the after-effect is a joy-filled community able to persevere through pandemics, denominational politics and culture wars.
But the only way to cling to that vision is stepping forward in faith, trusting the mercy we receive is equal to the mercy we give.
Ernest Hemingway once told the story of a Spanish father and his teenage son whose relationship became strained as the boy grew older and more independent, more rebellious and reckless. Finally the relationship was broken. The rebellious son — whose name was Paco, which was the most common boy’s name in Spain at that time — ran away from home. This crushed his father, who began a long, exhaustive search to find him, going everywhere, asking everyone, doing everything he could think to do, until finally, the desperate father placed an ad in a Madrid newspaper, hoping his son might see it and respond.
The ad read: “Dear Paco, Meet me at Hotel Montana. Noon Tuesday. All is forgiven. Papa.”
The father prayed the boy would see the ad and make it to the hotel. And as Hemingway tells it, Tuesday around noon, the father went to the Hotel Montana and he couldn’t believe his eyes. There was a mass of people and a police squadron trying to control the crowd, as 800 young men named Paco had come to the Hotel Montana, hoping to meet their father.
“Why would we place obstacles in the way of people joining sacred community?”
There’s a spiritual hunger out there. And the need is not being met by narrow-minded churches. Baptists have been fighting so long, dividing so long, we’ve lost touch with how desperate people are to find a place they belong — and how transformative that belonging can be.
Meet here. Now. All is forgiven. What else needs to be said? There’s a loneliness epidemic. People are desperate for meaning. Looking for a place to serve. Why would we place obstacles in the way of people joining sacred community?
The BGCT has put the notice out there. They’ve let it be known this is a place people are welcomed home. They’ve let it be known this is a place that trusts a truly good God. We have good news to share. And it’s news people are longing to hear.
Church is where the invisible becomes visible. Where faith has faces. Where we get to name grace, tell people they are loved, and create a sacred community of belonging shaped by the Spirit of Christ. That’s what church can be, if we make it that.
Garrett Vickrey serves as senior pastor at Woodland Baptist Church in San Antonio, Texas. He earned the master of divinity degree from Wake Forest University School of Divinity. A native of Dallas, he grew up at Royal Lane Baptist Church, where his father was the longtime pastor.
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