In 1964, Addie Davis was ordained to the gospel ministry by Watts Street Baptist Church, Durham, N.C., becoming the first female ordained by a congregation affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. A new generation of female ordinands soon followed, not…
The Southern Baptists left me
Last week in its annual meeting held in New Orleans, messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention voted to uphold the denomination’s Credentials and Executive Committees in expelling Saddleback Church in California and Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville Ky. The…
The best way to protest the SBC is to carry on and preach louder
Last week, the Southern Baptist Convention’s overwhelming number of messengers voted to kick out Saddleback Church and Fern Creek Baptist due to their inclusion of female leadership. I support the credentialing of female pastors as not only legitimate in our time, but also…
Baptists, football and women who changed the game
Baptists love football. How many college and pro football illustrations did I hear in sermons preached in my childhood Southern Baptist church? How many Baptists are just as likely to don college colors and spend Saturdays watching the game as…
Picking up the pieces of the SBC
An email pen pal wrote me this weekend to point out the irony of the Southern Baptist Convention’s actions last week against women in church leadership: “Do we realize a 20-year-old boy in college can pastor a Baptist church? But…
Anti-egalitarian forces make clean sweep at SBC annual meeting
Anti-egalitarian forces in the Southern Baptist Convention made a clean sweep of their agenda to exclude women from serving as pastors of any kind in SBC churches. In the process, they affirmed the expulsion of the denomination’s largest church and…
The Southern Baptist Convention is wrong
Baptist Women in Ministry is grieved by the actions of the 2023 Southern Baptist Convention. Today, the vote was announced in which the SBC upheld its Executive Committee’s decision to disfellowship Fern Creek Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., where Linda…
Barber easily wins re-election as SBC president
Faced with an unprecedented opponent in his quest for a second term as president of the Southern Baptist Convention, Texas pastor Bart Barber handily won reelection Tuesday, June 13. The congenial pastor-farmer who was a late entry into the race…
Saddleback and Fern Creek churches face off against Al Mohler at SBC meeting
By appearances, the deck was stacked against Linda Barnes Popham and Rick Warren before they ever took the microphone at the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting Tuesday, June 13. Just an hour or so before, the nearly 13,000 messengers to…