Issues of Alarm
I. Issues of Alarm
A. From the very establishment of the Northern Baptist Convention (NBC) on May 16-17, 1907, in Washington, D.C., there were Liberals in its highest places of leadership.
1. At the turn of the twentieth century there was not a single NBC seminary untainted by liberalism.
2. Nevertheless, because there were hundreds of Bible-believing preachers in the denomination, most conservative pastors and laymen failed to recognize the extent to which modernism had permeated their seminaries and agencies.
B. There were a few exceptions, especially in Michigan.
1. During the second decade of the century, fourteen Fundamentalist churches withdrew from the Grand Rapids Northern Baptist Association and were subsequently expelled from the state convention.
2.The Fundamentalists established the Michigan Orthodox Baptist Association (MOBA), which often participated as a voice of dissent at the annual NBC gatherings. a)Eventually the MOBA merged into the Baptist Bible Union (Esther 1923), (1)which became the matrix of the separatist General Association of Regular Baptist Churches.
(2) The most well known early leader of the MOBA was Oliver W. Van Osdel (1846-1935) of the Wealthy Street Baptist Church in Grand Rapids.
C. Only a dramatic series of events finally prompted other Fundamentalists to withdraw from the NBC, a series of battles that raged within the convention from 1919 to 1927.
1. During these years, four general areas of concern surfaced for Northern Baptist Fundamentalists:
(a) increasing denominational control and subsequent loss of local church autonomy;
(b) theological modernism in the schools and agencies;
(c)inclusivism on the mission fields; and (d)the absence of a denominational confession of faith.
2.As early as 1911, the convention established the Ministers and Missionaries Benefit Board (the "M and M" Annuity Fund), which became an effective means of controlling the clergy. a)That was the same year in which the denomination granted voting privileges to its salaried executives, whose votes during the 1920s would persistently swing the balance of power on the convention floor to the liberals.
3.Four specific issues alarmed Fundamentalists that year: a)the General Board of Promotion; b)the New World Movement; c)Harry Emerson Fosdick; and d)The Baptist magazine.
D. The General Board of Promotion.
1.First, the convention created a General Board of Promotion,which most Fundamentalists regarded as a bureaucracy that would threaten local-church autonomy. a)One of its major responsibilities was the preparation of an annual, cooperative, unified budget, which soon became a tangible index of which pastors were loyal and therefore valid candidates for positions on the various boards. b)In 1924, this General Board of Promotion became the "Board of Missionary Cooperation," a name more palatable to most Baptists, but its functions remained the same. c)By 1934, this growing centralization became even more pronounced, as a newly created Council on Finance and Promotion replaced the Board of Missionary Cooperation. d)At that time, the convention established a General Council, which would rule as a powerful executive committee of only a handful of people.
(1) From that point, any resolution involving finances would automatically and without debate pass on to the General Council.
(2) Collection agents would separate the people in the pews from the ministries they supported.
2. The alarms of the Fundamentalists in 1919 had been well founded.
E.The New World Movement 1.A second issue of concern for Fundamentalists in 1919 was the NBC’s New World Movement, a)the Baptist wing of the Interchurch World Movement-a socially oriented, ecumenical, world relief fund for countries suffering in the aftermath of World War I. b)The movement’s goal for American donors was $336,000,000, of which the Baptists were expected to raise $100,000,000 over the next five years. c)Fundamentalists felt that the movement represented the Social Gospel, and many who contributed did so sparingly and grudgingly. After about two years, the convention was compelled to abandon the project.
F. Harry Emerson Fosdick.
1. A third alarming issue for Fundamentalists in 1919 was modernist Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969), who brought the annual convention sermon in Denver.
2. At that time, Fosdick was still preaching at First Presbyterian Church in New York City. In 1925, he went to Park Avenue Baptist Church, where John D. Rockefeller, Jr., had his membership.
3. A favorite story about Fosdick and Rockefeller depicts the two men having a quiet lunch together. Interrupting a long silence, Fosdick wonders aloud if people will mind if "John D." finances his church. "Mind?" quips Rockefeller. "If they can stand Fosdick’s theology, surely they can stand John D.’s money!"
4. In 1930, Rockefeller built a special place for Fosdick: Riverside Church, the beautiful Gothic structure overlooking the Hudson River from Morningside Heights in Upper Manhattan. It was a ten million dollar project. Riverside has never failed to live up to its reputation of being one of the most notoriously liberal churches in the world.
G. The Baptist.
1. The fourth controversial item that surfaced in 1919 was the NBC’s creation of a magazine, The Baptist, to counteract the conservative, independently owned Watchman-Examiner, edited by Curtis Lee Laws.
2. The first issue of The Baptist appeared January 21, 1920