(Editor’s note: Neville Callam, general secretary of the Baptist World Alliance, recently spoke to leaders of the North American Baptist Fellowship, one of the BWA’s six regional fellowships, in Dallas. He discussed how one of his goals in discussing the work of BWA’s 216 affiliated national and regional Baptist bodies is explaining the larger theological context for Baptist global cooperation. The following commentary is an excerpt from his speech that has been adapted for brevity and clarity.)
By Neville Callam
The principle of associating rests on the nature of the God in whom we believe.
When 3,000 Baptists from 26 countries gathered in London in 1905 for the inaugural congress of the Baptist World Alliance, they performed one corporate act of worship that was meant to affirm what those who gathered believed — and what they wished to communicate to fellow Christians around the world — about themselves. They stood together and repeated the words of the Apostles’ Creed — a creed structured on the conviction of faith in the Trinitarian nature of God.
Relating is part of God’s nature. When the Father acts, the Son is acting and the Holy Spirit too. When the Son acts, the Father is acting and also the Spirit. When the Spirit acts, the Father and the Son are also at work. Any successful attempt to characterize the relations in the Trinity must necessarily reflect the love that binds Father, Son and Spirit in a relationship that is indivisible.
If the church is the body of Christ, then, we cannot escape the responsibility to reflect the characteristic of the inner life of God. We are a people who belong to each other, who are called to live in love with each other and who have an obligation to enter into partnership with each other.
Associating is central to the very being of the church.
Historically, Baptists have signaled their understanding of the nature of the church by affirming their participation in covenantal relationships. As Baptist people, we regard ourselves as people joined in communion with the living God, and with each other in covenant, sharing in the life God offers us and the mission on which God sends us.
As theologian Paul Fiddes has noted, to enter into covenant as Baptists is not merely to unite in a contractual bond with each other. Covenant-making is not a mere human undertaking. Our covenant is with God, and as each of us enters into that covenant with God, we also thereby enter into covenant with each other.
Nor is covenant-making the prerogative merely of a single Baptist congregation which forms a worshiping community. It is part and parcel of who we all are as Baptists wherever we meet, whether we repeat the words of a covenant or not. The local church is called to share in the covenantal life that believers enjoy in Christ Jesus, through the enabling of the Holy Spirit, according to the will of the Father. This covenantal life is the common possession of all who, by divine grace, have a share in the inheritance of the saints.
In living out this covenantal life, we gather together, we proclaim the gospel, and we participate in the holy communion. One reason we do this is that we know that in Christ there are no Christians who deliberately isolate themselves from all other Christians. Nor are there communities of believers who isolate themselves from others that should expect to enjoy healthy existence in Christ as they treasure their self-sufficient isolation. We are a people who are called together and built up together in Christ Jesus. We are a people who share nurturing and nourishing relationships as an expression of our common life and for the sake of the common task that has been committed to us.
Associating is integral to the missional vocation of the church.
“As the Father has sent me, even so, I am sending you…. Receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:21-22). Mission has its origin in the Father — the God who sends; its model in the Son — the God who serves; and its enabling in the Holy Spirit — the God who empowers.
The God who calls us to be Christ’s body in the world is one who is always working in love to draw people to God. God is a sending God who is always reaching out to others for the sake of their complete liberation. God enters into relationships with people and works through these for the sake of accomplishing the goal of human liberation.
If churches must fulfill their missional vocation after the example clearly revealed in the triune God who calls believers into communion with God, then we have no option but to be always reaching out in ministry together. God calls out a holy people to enter into relationship with God, with others in a local community gathered around the Word, and with others in translocal communities united in one faith — so that we may become the people that God intends to fashion. The church of the triune God is a sign of the divine strategy for the accomplishment of God’s mission: God saving, choosing, gathering and sending out a people called into communion in the life of the triune God for the sake of fellowship and mission.
Associating is integral to the life of the church.
If the Bible makes it clear that it is the Father who sends the Son as the supreme gift given to the world and received by the church, the Bible also teaches that it is the Holy Spirit who gives gifts to the church. But the gifts we receive are not primarily for the sake of personal edification or to enable us to establish pride of place among God’s sanctified people. The gifts we receive are for the sake of service — to build up one another in love and to reach out to the world as ambassadors of Christ bearing the good news of salvation freely offered by God in Christ.
Furthermore, if God has called us as Baptists into one family within the broader household of faith, surely the gifts we have received are given for the benefit of the whole household of faith rather than for the pleasure of each individual member. It is together that we give ourselves to Christ, who works through us to accomplish the divine purpose for which we were called into being. It is together that we will live out the mission God has given to believers who are caught up in the sweep of divine providence and all-embracing grace.
It is by associating with each other that we will live out faithfully the calling we have received, encouraging one another and strengthening one another to the glory of God.