Paper written by Rev. Hayes K. Minnick
For the following reasons we believe that the above question must be answered with an emphatic negative:
I. There is liberalism in the leadership of the Southern Baptist Convention:
1. The following quotation taken from page 4 of the January, 1947 issue of Christian Frontiers, many hundreds of copies of which were distributed at the Southern Baptist Convention at St. Louis in 1947 The leading editorial of this issue emphasized that Christian Frontiers is a "liberal journal of Baptist life and thoughts." name of Dr. W.O. Carver, Professor Emeritus of Louisville, Kentucky, appeared at the head of the Southern Advisory Council. The quotation is as follows:
"The sovereign God makes His will known to us in Christ A knowledge of Christ comes to us through the Holy Scriptures, the accumulated wisdom of the church and the individualized Christian experience. To make any one of these channels of revelation the final authority is to practice idolatry denying God his unconditional sovereignty. When the church is made the final authority, we worship the church; when the Bible is made the final authority, we worship a book; when individual experience is made the final authority, we worship man."
Comment: This is typical neo-orthodox language. The phrases, "sovereign God," and "unconditional sovereignty" reflect the Barthian concept of a God who will not permit himself to be limited by an objective revelation of himself given in a book, such as that which we have in the Bible. It is clear that the author of this paragraph rejects the full and final authority of the Bible and regards it merely as a channel of revelation along with other channels such as "the accumulated wisdom of the church and the individualized Christian experience." This is liberalism pure and simple. Genuine faith has never regarded the accumulated wisdom of the church or Christian experience as channels of revelation. The Bible, and the Bible alone, is the full, final, authoritative revelation of God to man, and not merely a channel of revelation as the writer supposes. To charge those who believe the Bible to be of final authority with book-worship and idol-worship is typical of liberalism's attack upon fundamentalism. Let us face the fact squarely--there are liberals in high places in the Southern Baptist Convention
2. Dr. Clyde Francisco, formerly Professor of Old Testament Interpretation at the Louisville Seminary; then later accepted the same chair at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Wake Forrest, N.C. His book, Introducing The Old Testament, is published by the Broadman Press of the Baptist Sunday School Board, Nashville, Tennessee. The publishers say that his book is "conservative and constructive in the highest sense, sound scholarship presented in well-organized form." On page 41 he says:
"Modern historians are objective, having as their chief purpose the reporting of facts, whereas the Old Testament writers were subjective, interested primarily in the effects of the facts on the reader.
It was not that they did not seek to report events as true to the fact as possible...."
Comment: Liberals delight in casting aspersion on the accuracy of the Old Testament. This is exactly what Francisco is doing in the above statement. It is downright decent of him not to charge the writers of the Old Testament with deliberate deceit. But he does infer that they were guilty, at least, of unconscious exaggeration at certain points. But see II Timothy 3:16 -- "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God." On page 86 of the same book he says:
"The fundamental principle that undergirded the message of the Old Testament prophets was the necessity of a moral obedience to an ethical God. For them the future was in the hands of God, but was in part determined by the free choice of man. Therefore many details of prophecies are conditional and may never come to pass . . . ."
Comment: What did the Lord Jesus say about the details of prophecy coming to pass? See Luke 24:25, "O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken," See also verse 44 of the same chapter. Francisco accepts the late dates of the higher critics for the Old Testament prophets which is further evidence of his liberalism. Concerning Joel he says:
"The late date (400 B.C.) is the more natural one in view of the evidence." Concerning the third chapter of Joel he says, page 93, "There is no description in chapter 3 that will not fit pro-Exilic times." Concerning Daniel he says, page 168, "The majority of modern scholars believe that the book was not written by Daniel, but during the period of the Maccabees (167 B.C.)."
Comment: The traditional date for Joel is about 800 B.C., and for Daniel the latter part of the 6th. century B.C. Why do the critics reject these dates and insist upon much later dates for these books? For the simple reason that they do not believe the predictive portions of these books to be predictive at all. They believe them to be history, not prophecy. They believe that the events recorded so accurately, for instance, in the book of Daniel concerning Gentile history could have been written down only after these events had occurred, not before. Carried away in their zealous effort to strip the prophetic portions of their supernatural predictive element, they are forced to assume a late date, and in the case of Daniel to deny his authorship of the book that bears his name. But if Daniel didn't write the book who did? Let us see how this Southern Baptist Seminary professor handles this problem. On page 169, he says:
"When the writer of the book spoke in the name of Daniel, he was not regarded as a plagiarist. It was in the spirit of Daniel that he wrote, and his contemporaries were well aware that the work was a recent one."
Comment: The dictionary defines a plagiarist as "a literary thief." Francisco endorses the assumption of the critics that some one else wrote the book and used Daniel's name, and without cracking a smile says that such literary thievery is not plagiarism after all. And the Southern Baptist Sunday School Board has the audacity to call the modernistic tripe in this Seminary professor's book "conservative and constructive in the highest sense." Southern Baptists will have to choose between liberal leaders like Francisco and the Lord Jesus Christ who sets His seal upon Daniel as the author of the book that bears his name. See Matthew 24:15.
3. Dr. Edward A. McDowell, formerly head of the New Testament Department at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; then accepted the same position at the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary at Wake Forest, N.C. This man wrote the lessons for the Adult Quarterly of the Baptist Sunday School Board for the first quarter of 1949. On page 14 of the quarterly, he says:
"The great issue which faced Jesus after his baptism was the question of what sort of Messiah he would be and how he would present the kingdom of God to his people,"
Comment: This is typical of the liberal attack upon the Person of Christ. Here is a Southern Baptist Seminary professor in a Southern Baptist Sunday School Quarterly who would have us to believe that the mind of Christ was subject to uncertainty, equivocation, doubt, hesitancy as to the purpose of His coming to earth! But see Luke 2:49. At the age of twelve, in the temple, He was fully conscious of His mission. To the woman at the well of Samaria He announced Himself as the Messiah, not just some sort of Messiah a la McDowell, but the Messiah whose coming had been promised and whose ministry had been outlined in the Old Testament Scriptures, John 4:25-26, 34; 6:38; Luke 24:25-27, 44. On page 35 of the same quarterly, he says:
"In the light of what these questions suggest as to the background of Jesus' thinking we can better appreciate his dilemma and the significance of his reply to the Syrophoenician woman."
Comment: The dilemma is in the thinking of McDowell, not in the thinking of the Lord Jesus! On page 7 of the same quarterly concerning Paul, he says:
"Though Paul himself was not acquainted with Jesus in the flesh, he was intimately acquainted with the men who knew Jesus, and he made it his business to learn all that he could about Jesus and his earthly ministry..... Paul's letters show that he relied upon the same traditions that were used by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in the compilation of the Gospels ... Paul was very careful in the handling of the material that came to him concerning the life, death, teachings, and resurrection of Jesus. This is seen in what he says about delivering to the Corinthians the tradition concerning the resurrection (I Corinthians 15:3-8) and the tradition concerning the Lord's Supper (I Corinthians 11:23-26).
Comment: And this is Southern Baptist scholarship! The head of the Department of New Testament would do well to read his New Testament instead of spending his time on the liberal views of the critics. See Paul's own testimony, Galatians 1:11 ff, "But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." Paul was raised up to be a separate, independent witness to the Lord Jesus Christ, having seen the risen Christ face to face. This same Southern Baptist professor has written a book called, The Meaning and Message of Revelation. It was published by the Broadman Press of the Baptist Sunday School Board. In it he says:
"By way of conclusion, what shall we say of a practical nature? Again let it be emphasized what John visualized in Revelation 20:4-6, no physical reign of Christ and his saints upon the earth." Page 199, "The one thousand years is a symbol of the Messianic reign, and as such is to be conceived of as beginning when Christ completed his work upon earth and ascended to the right hand of God."
Comment: So The Meaning and Message of Revelation doesn't mean what it says it means. And we've been living in the Millennium all along (according to McDowell) and didn't even know it! All we can say is that if the past two thousand years have been the Millennial, what a millennium!!! How long will Southern Baptists swallow this slop? And pay the bill for its being dished out to its Seminary students? How long?
4. Dr. T.O. Hall, Southern Baptist Seminary, in the September, 1953 issue of The Faith:
"The writers of holy scripture had vital experiences with God. Having come to know Him by experience, they were led to record these experiences. This is not the Word of God. It is the record of it"
Comment: There you have it. A plain denial of the authority of the Bible as the inspired, inerrant Word of God. Yet there are those who say there is no liberalism in Southern Baptist circles!
5. Dr. Frank Stagg, head of the New Testament Department, New Orleans Seminary, in a lecture entitled, The Cross--A Rationale (recorded on tape):
"The major New Testament emphasis is not upon substitution, but sharing .... One simply sublimates his egocentric depravity if he desires that Jesus be punished for ones own sins .... Jesus would not have had to die had men been willing to die--to die to self. A 'come and get it' salvation concerned only for going free at another's expense is not the salvation available in Jesus Christ..."
Comment: Is it of no concern to Southern Baptists that their Seminary professors sneer and scoff at the doctrine of substitutionary blood atonement?
6. Dr. William E. Hull, professor of New Testament Interpretation at Southern Baptist Seminary, in the News Leader, Richmond, Va., February 7, 1961:
"The religion Christians are called to is one which casts itself like a seed into the yawning shadowy chasm called Calvary in the faith that God will somehow vindicate and triumph in apparent tragedy .... There is a reverent agnosticism which is the very soul of biblical religion."
Comment: The efforts of the Louisville Seminary to represent itself as fundamental prove vain when one reads a statement such as that given above. See II Timothy 1:10-12. There is no shadowy shroud cast over Calvary in the writings of the apostle Paul! He speaks of "the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought light and immortality to life through the Gospel." Dr. Hull kneels side by side with Bishop James A. Pike as together they worship at the altar of the 'unknown god.'" (Acts 17:22-23). Reverent agnosticism was the religion of ancient Athens centuries ago! Paul's spirit was stirred in him when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry (Acts 17:16). Is the reverent agnosticism of Hull and Pike any less idolatrous today? See II Timothy 1:12. Paul says, "I know whom I have believed..." And in so saying, he repudiates the "reverent agnosticism" of blasphemers like Hull and Pike.
7. Dr. Dale Moody, of the Louisville Seminary, in an address to the preachers at the 1961 Southern Baptist Convention held in St. Louis, according to the news report said:
"We should be neither for segregation nor for integration, we should just preach the gospel of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man without application."
Comment: This Southern Baptist Seminary professor leaves us in no doubt as to what he thinks the gospel is. Does he not know that the universal fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man is the Devil's doctrine emanating from the pit of hell to delude the souls of men and keep them from believing the true Gospel of God's redeeming grace through our Lord Jesus Christ? See John 8:44. Jesus made it very plain that those religious Jews who rejected Him did not belong to the family of God, but to the family of the Devil.
8. Dr. Eric C. Rust, Louisville Seminary, in his book, Nature and Man in Biblical Thought, page 20:
"The Old Testament begins with two myths Of Creation, both of which reflect elements from the pagan mythology of the surrounding peoples..." In the book, The Preacher In A Scientific World, page 2, he says; "The Biblical anthropology may well, and indeed does need correcting..."
Comment: No comment necessary. This Southern Baptist professor clearly does not believe the Bible to be the inspired Word of God. The word "fables" in II Timothy 4:2 is literally, "myths." How accurately the Holy Spirit through Paul predicted the days of apostasy in which we live!
9. Dr. Harold Cooke Philips, visiting professor of Homiletics at Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville, delivered two major addresses at the Annual Meeting of the American Baptist Convention in Philadelphia, May 24-25, 1962. One of these messages was called, The Enduring Gospel, in which he said:
"Perhaps the basic problem of our age is that of accepting the fact that we live in and are citizens of one world. Our iron curtains, our warring ideologies, our 'balance of terror' are the birth pangs of a new world struggling to be born. Will these pangs produce new life, a concept of man's relation to his brother man, or will they end in unproductive death. There is no more relevant or reliable answer to that question than the Christian Gospel. Our Lord regarded the human race as a family, under the universal Fatherhood of God.......We cannot know the Fatherhood of God as long as we deny the brotherhood of man."
Comment: Southern Baptists, wake up! This is not the Christian Gospel! This is the Devil's "gospel" with the "love Russia" routine thrown in.
10. Dr. Ralph Elliott, professor of Old Testament at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, in his notorious book, The Message of Genesis, says with regard to the opening stories of Genesis such as Creation, the Fall, Noah's Ark, the Tower of Babel, etc., page 15:
"...they are profoundly symbolical (though not allegorical) stories, which aren't to be taken as literally true (like the words of a textbook of geology), but which yet bear a meaning that cannot be paraphrased or stated in any other way without losing something of their quality of existential truth."
Comment: The phrase, "existential truth," is a typical Barthian, neo-orthodox expression. It is a term, the meaning of which is so mysterious that none who use it have ever been able to explain it to the satisfaction of the ordinary man. Since the Bible, according to Elliott, is not literally true and does not mean what it says, let every man take out of these stories the meaning he chooses. Whatever he chooses to make it mean is "truth" for him. What happens to the authority of the Bible when such a process of interpretation is used? The Bible is completely stripped of its authority as the Word of God by this Southern Baptist Seminary professor, and Southern Baptist people are paying him to do it. On page 40 he says concerning Eve:
"Another insight is presented by the Priestly writer. Woman is not created after man but along with him."
Comment: His preference to "the Priestly writer" indicates that he rejects the Mosaic authorship of Genesis, and endorses the critical view of composite authorship by unknown writers classified as J,E,P,D. "J" says Eve was created after Adam, Genesis 2:18 -- while the "Priestly writer" says they were created at the same time, Genesis 1:26-27. So runs the critical argument. But any fool with an ounce of common sense would understand that the account in chapter one is a simple statement of the fact, while chapter two explains it in detail. There is no discrepancy as is imagined by the critics. In I Timothy 2:13, Paul says, "Adam was first formed, then Eve." Of course, Elliott and the critics know more about it than Paul, or do they?!?!? On page 58, concerning longevity of life in Genesis he says:
"It is difficult to believe that they actually lived as long as stated...... In all probability the Priestly writer simply exaggerated the ages in order to show the glory of an ancient civilization."
Comment: So there is exaggeration in the Bible! Why should Dr. Elliott find it so difficult to believe they lived as long as stated in Genesis? If God in His Holy Word says they lived that long, they lived that long, and no Seminary professor (even though he be Southern Baptist) has any right to say they didn't, making the Bible appear to be a book of lies. On page 115, concerning Melchizedek, Elliott says:
"It would appear, then that in verse 19 Melchizedek was blessing Abram by the Baal, whom Melchizedek considered to be the highest god of the city state at Salem. Thus, Melchizedek was extending blessing for, and receiving, tithes in behalf of his El Elvon, to be equated with Baal."
Comment: This statement is directly contradictory to Hebrews 7:1-10, which states that Melchizedek was priest of the most high God. Baal was the male element in the loathsome sex worship of that day. If, as Elliott says, Melchizedek was a Baal-worshiper, ponder what this would mean concerning Christ who is "A Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek" (Hebrews 7:21)! Such a suggestion is as thoroughly foul as that of Nels Ferre who says that Jesus might possibly have been the bastard son of Mary by a German mercenary soldier! Concerning the destruction of Sodom, page 135, he says:
"A better suggestion is that which was given by Strabo -- that there probably was a great earthquake accompanied by lighting which brought utter ruin and a terrible conflagration to Sodom and the other communities in the vicinity."
Comment: This Southern Baptist Seminary professor is willing to place his faith in the "probabilities" of Strabo rather than in the certainty of the Bible as the authoritative Word of God. Genesis 19:24 tells us how Sodom was destroyed. What respect can Bible-believing Southern Baptists have for a man of this caliber? On page 136 he says concerning Lot's wife:
"Though theologically factual, may not be historically factual. This has to do with Lot's wife becoming a pillar of salt (19:26). This is probably an interpolation or at least an accretion to the original story."
Comment: How can anything be theologically factual if it is not historically factual? If the incident is not historically true then it cannot possibly have any theological significance to right thinking minds. This statement reflects the false assumption of the Barthian, neo-orthodox theology that something can have religious value even though it may not be historically true. Has Dr. Elliott never read the New Testament? If he has, then he deliberately rejects the statement of Christ as to the historicity of Lot's wife, Luke 17:32, "Remember Lot's wife." On page 145 and 148 he has this to say about Abraham in connection with the sacrifice of Isaac:
"Suddenly, what had been a thought of meditation gripped the inner being of Abraham until he thought he heard it as a clear call from God. 'Go sacrifice Isaac.' ....... Just what Abraham had in mind when he went to sacrifice Isaac it is impossible to know."
Comment: It should be clear by now that this Southern Baptist Seminary professor, in tearing the Old Testament to shreds, has no regard for the authority of the New Testament. Hebrews 11:17-19 tells us what was in the mind of Abraham. The sacrifice of Isaac portrayed the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ some two thousand years later. See John 8:56, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad." Concerning this extremely reprehensible book, professor Elliott has said, "I have dared to place in print an approach to the study of Genesis which can be found in any of our six seminaries." Quite an admission! His liberal views are not limited to himself or his own seminary.
11. The Southern Baptist Sunday School Board, in explanation of their endorsement of Elliott's book, said:
"In accepting the book for publication, Broadman Press recognized that the point of view expressed in the book would not be coincident with the thinking of all Baptists. It was considered, however, to be representative of a segment of Southern Baptist life and thought. Different viewpoints on the book of Genesis, and on other books of the Bible, have been published by Broadman Press...... Broadman Press ministers to the denomination in keeping with the historic Baptist principle of the freedom of the individual to interpret the Bible for himself, to hold a particular theory of inspiration of the Bible which seems most reasonable to him, and to develop his beliefs in accordance with his theory."
Comment: This statement is a bold acknowledgment that there is liberalism in Southern Baptist Circles. The view set forth in Elliott's book is said to be "representative of a segment of Southern Baptist life and thought." So there is a segment of Southern Baptist life and thought which regards the doctrine of inspiration as a matter of viewpoint or theory. Every man to his own opinion, even though, as in Elliott's case, his view of inspiration is that the Bible isn't inspired! The 54-man Baptist Sunday School Board as much as says that a Baptist is at liberty to deny the authority of the Bible and still be a good Baptist. This is not the historic Baptist position.
12. The Maryland Baptist, official Southern Baptist paper for the state of Maryland, in endorsing Elliott's book, quotes Francis A. Davis of Baltimore, a former trustee of both Southern Seminary and New Orleans Seminary:
"This book (The Message of Genesis by Elliott) is a must for every church
library for it is a veritable light for anyone who wants to understand the real meaning of Genesis."
Comment: Endorsement by an official state paper, with the further endorsement by a former trustee of two Seminaries would indicate that sympathy for the liberalism of Elliott's book is more wide-spread than many Southern Baptists would like to believe.
13. Dr. Harold Tribble, president of Wake Forest College, formerly president of one of the leading modernist institutions, Andover-Newton Theological School, was being questioned on the witness stand at Nashville with regard to his belief in the virgin birth. After reading John 1:45, he said:
"Therefore, your Honor, for me to say that He did not have an earthly father would be to take that passage of Scripture and rule it out completely. I think that our doctrine of the virgin birth and this statement in the first chapter of St. John are not necessarily in conflict."
Comment: The expression "son of Joseph" in John 1:45 is a reference to Joseph as the foster father of Jesus, not as the actual earthly father of Jesus, for He had no human father, Dr. Tribble notwithstanding. See Luke 1:34-35; Matthew 1:24-25.
14. Duke McCall, President, Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville, in the Baptist New Mexican, October 11, 1951 (official organ of Southern Baptists in New Mexico), gave endorsement to Nels Ferre's book, Strengthening the Spiritual Life. Ferre is one of the most notorious blasphemers of our day. Said McCall:
"A warm-spirited, practical book. Fresh phrasing of things often said about private and family devotions are coupled with profound new insights in soul development."
Comment: Of all the modernist blasphemers, Ferre' will find a place at the very top. And here is the president of Southern Baptist Seminary giving this rankest of blasphemers a pat on the back! On page 34 of the book endorsed, Ferre' says: "We may pray for different branches of faith--Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Lutheran, Episcopal, Baptist, Mennonite, Brethren, Seventh Day Adventist, Christian Scientist, Moravian, Methodist, Friends, Congregationalist and others." This is the kind of slop McCall says will make for soul development. One of the Textbooks used at Southern Baptist Seminary, for the second term, Summer, 1954, was Ferre's Faith and Reason. Ferre' had lectured at the Seminary in 1947 prior to McCall's coming to the presidency. In 1955 Dr. Robert McCracken, successor to Dr. Fosdick as pastor of the Riverside Drive Church, New York City, lectured at Southern Seminary at the invitation of McCall. Strange, isn't it, that leading liberals should be given such recognition at Louisville! In similar pattern, Dr. George Buttrick, editor of the infamous Interpreter's Bible, whose infidelity is clearly set forth in his book, Christian Fact and Modern Doubt, has been entertained as a lecturer at Southeastern Seminary, Wake Forest. No liberalism in Southern Baptist circles???
15. Dr. J.B. Witherspoon, Professor of preaching, Louisville Seminary, was author of the Sunday School Lesson in the Adult Teacher's Quarterly for Southern Baptists for June, 1955. He wrote:
"As young preachers studying the history of preaching will find one--Spurgeon, MacLaren, Parker, Truett, Brooks, or Fosdick--to be his chief example, so Josiah chose David as a pattern of what a king ought to be."
Comment: Imagine holding up Harry Emerson Fosdick as an ideal for young preachers! For over 25 years he was radio spokesman for the Federal Council of Churches. He has said in writing: "I am a liberal in theology and have been since I was a young man. Of course, I do not believe in the virgin Birth, or in that old fashioned substitutionary doctrine of the atonement; and I do not know of any intelligent Christian minister who does."
16. The following news item is taken from the Daily Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, May 19, 1949, under the heading, "Baptists Bundle a Hot Potato."
"A second-generation Kentucky Baptist minister dropped a verbal bomb on the floor of the Southern Baptist convention here Wednesday afternoon in Municipal auditorium..... Rev. Oscar Gibson, pastor of Eighteenth Street Baptist Church, Louisville, submitted a resolution asking for an investigation of modernism in Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville." A motion was made to submit the resolution to the board of trustees of the seminary. The vote was called for, and the article continues, "there appears to be an almost equal chorus of 'ayes' and 'noes', but Dr. Lee quickly announced. 'The 'ayes' seem to have it!'" Mr. Gibson was questioned by reporters after the resolution was disposed of, and the article continues, "I'm going to stand up for these seminary boys. They come to me crying. They said they needed someone to lead them. I told them to get the evidence and I would lead them.
They got it, and I promised I would bring this fight to the floor.' What is some of this evidence? One professor stood up in class and made these four charges: One-- 'The Bible is no more inspired than a preacher is when he stands up to preach.' Two-- 'If the virgin birth of Christ is ever disproved, don't let it wreck your faith.' Three-- He made light of all the miracles. Four-- 'If you accept the Bible, you are no better than a Catholic. They have a pope. You have a paper pope.'"
Comment: The incident described in this news article is illustrative of the manner in which the issue of modernism and apostasy is completely side-tracked and submerged in the process of ecclesiastical machinery by the denominational leaders whenever a voice of protest is raised. Dr. Robert G. Lee, himself a thorough-going evangelical, and one of the finest preachers that ever lived, presided at this convention. Should it not be a matter of concern to Dr. Lee and others of evangelical persuasion that modernism is being taught in Southern Baptist seminaries? Should they not do their utmost to get to the root of the matter and rid the Southern Baptist Convention of this plague in its own house? Instead, the issue is brushed off as a matter of little or no consequence. Shame on men who know the truth but have so little conviction as to compromise the truth in the interest of denominational liberty!
17. The Baptist Record, the official organ of the Southern Baptist Convention in the state of Mississippi, announced as one of the highlights of the Southern Baptist Convention held in Miami in May of 1955, the appearance of C. Carney Hargroves, president of the American (Northern) Baptist Convention. It is this same Dr. Hargroves who paid a visit to "Father Divine" on January 4 of that year. After receiving "holy communion" by this blaspheming negro god with a white wife, Hargroves spoke to the "Divine" faithful as follows, on behalf of himself and members of his party:
"I am sure that I can speak for the four of us when I say that we have been very conscious this evening too, of a marked expression of love and we could without any question whatever, join in the singing of your song, that we are all the children of God! We count it a privilege to have been with you, Father Divine, and we want to thank you for this opportunity,"
Comment: Now this is downright blasphemy. Yet this same Dr. Hargroves was announced as one of the highlight speakers of the Southern Convention that same year. Fraternization with liberals of the Northern Baptist Convention will do the Southern Baptist Convention no good!
18. The Southern Baptist Convention met in Miami, May 17-20, 1960. One of the main speakers at the pastors' conference was Dr. Herbert Gezork, president of the American (Northern) Baptist Convention. Dr. R.G. Lee spoke at the same conference. Dr. Gerzork was asked to speak before the main convention on Wednesday morning. This is the same Dr. Gerzork who was tried for heresy and forced to leave the Southern Convention back in 1932. Strange that an SBC heretic of 1932 should become an honored SBC speaker of 1960.
19. Dr. Edwin T. Dahlberg is an American Baptist liberal. He was formerly pastor of the First Baptist Church of Syracuse, N.Y. He left that church and became the pastor of a Southern Baptist Convention church, the Delmar Street Baptist Church in St. Louis. As pastor of this Southern Baptist church, he was elected president of the apostate National Council of Churches in December of 1957. The following is a special news dispatch in the New York Times reporting a speech by Dahlberg before the World Baptist Congress in Cleveland, July 1950. The Times' dispatch is dated July 26, 1950.
"In the chief address of the day before the World Baptist Congress Rev. Dr. Edwin Dahlberg, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Syracuse, called for a 'new language' that prospective converts could understand. Such phrases as 'the precious Name of Jesus,' 'coming under the blood' and 'saved by grace,' Dr. Dahlberg said, 'for their profound truth and biblical background' simply do not register in the mind of the average American listener."
Comment: Dr. Dahlberg, an out-spoken liberal and an ardent pacifist, should be a source of embarrassment to Southern Baptists who disclaim relationship to the World Council of Churches. This is an example of the manner in which Northern Baptist liberals have infiltrated the Southern Convention. But is not the Southern Baptist Convention responsible for shutting the door to such liberals? If the Southern Convention has been infiltrated, it is because they have permitted it!
20. E.S. James, editor of the Baptist Standard, official publication of the Southern Baptist Convention, in an issue dated February 9, 1957, wrote concerning the Second Coming of Christ:
"After all, when He does come, He will need no further help from men whatever His plan may be. Why should we get so excited as to create bad feelings over something with which we could not possibly have anything to do." In the March 30, 1957 issue, page 3, he wrote:
"I never did hear the word 'millennium' mentioned until I was 21 years of age ... Somehow I am grateful that I was 30 years of age before I knew men would write words about irrelevancies."
Comment: The doctrine of the Second Coming is the most frequently mentioned doctrine of the Bible and is mentioned at least 318 times in the New Testament alone. Yet Editor James says that there is no reason to get excited over it as it might cause bad feelings among Southern Baptists. He dismisses the literal millennial reign of Christ as an irrelevancy. One of the reasons for his ignorance concerning the premillennial return of Christ is that it is never mentioned in the published Sunday School literature of the Southern Baptist Convention.
21. The Southern Baptists held their 105th annual convention in San Francisco, June 5-8, 1962. Dr. K. Owen White presented two motions, one of which reads as follows:
"We express our abiding and unchanging objections to the dissemination of theological views in any of our seminaries which would undermine such faith in the historical accuracy and doctrinal integrity of the Bible."
Comment: The motion was passed by a ratio of 2--1. It is both significant and shocking that one-third of the Assembly would not stand for the inerrancy of the Scriptures. There should be no place in the Southern Baptist Convention for one single pastor who does not believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God.
22. Jak L. Gritz, editor of the Baptist Messenger, the Oklahoma Baptist state paper, had a page editorial on "Dr. Scofield's Errors." He then said:
"We are sorry the Baptist bookstores sell this book (the Scofield Bible). Because of it many sincere people grow in their misunderstanding of the Bible every day."
Comment: While we may not agree with every minor detail of the Scofield notes, on the essential doctrines the Scofield Reference Bible has the clearest and most helpful notes of any reference Bible in the world. Is Editor Gritz afraid that Southern Baptists will have their eyes opened to the premillennial return of Christ? Why does he raise no protest against the selling of the New Revised Standard perversion of the Bible, the infamous commentary, The Interpreter's Bible, books by Nels Ferre' and other infidels? These poison-filled books are sold by the same Southern Baptist book stores, but that's all right with Editor Gritz. It is the Scofield Bible with its sound fundamentalist approach that draws his protest.
23. Brooks Hays, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, recently spoke at the Southern Baptist Convention in San Francisco and at the American Baptist Convention in Philadelphia. He is at present assistant to the President, with an office in the executive wing of the White House. He is listed as one of the sponsors of "The Temple of Understanding" which is the latest in mankind's approach to the ecumenical ideal on an interfaith level. Each one of the six major faiths will have a chapel, including Buddhist, Hindu, Confucian, Islamic, Judaic, and Christian religions. It is described as follows:
"The site of this proposed edifice is Washington, D.C.; the purpose is to further, through education in the major religions of the world, man's awareness of his essential brotherhood; the function to be, in effect, a 'spiritual United Nations.'"
Comment: There can be no doubt as to the prominence and popularity of Brooks Hays, left-wing politician for the New Frontier, in Southern Baptist circles. And Southern Baptists certainly are not unaware of his fraternizing with the Northern Convention and his promotion of interfaith brotherhood. Southern Baptists, instead of honoring Mr. Hays, should put him out of the convention. Some of his fellow sponsors of this fantastic religious scheme are the blaspheming Episcopalian Bishop James A. Pike; Dr. Henry Pitt Van Dusen, president of Union Seminary; Dr. Ralph Sockman, chief radio spokesman for the National Council; the Buddhist bishop of San Francisco; and, of course, Mrs. F.D.R. A "spiritual United Nations" is just what is indicated in Revelation 17!
24. The following statement was made by a member of the Bible department of Wake Forest College, and appeared in the school paper:
"The Bible is not infallible in the realm of science and history; nor is all of the religion of the Bible on the same level."
Comment: The Bible is inspired equally in all its parts (II Timothy 3:16) and is thoroughly accurate and without error at every point.
25. The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible (which made its appearance in the Fall of 1952), aptly called the national Council Bible, is a deliberate attack on the Deity of Christ. The Christ in this "perversion" of the Scripture is a Unitarian Christ. Compare, for instance, the changes made in Isaiah 7:14, Jeremiah 31:22, and Micah 5:2. The new RSV was immediately endorsed and promoted by the major denominations of the National Council of Churches, and by the Southern Baptist Convention through its Sunday School Board, the Board's bookstores, and state Baptist publications. Following are examples of such endorsement:
"Devout men have worked tirelessly for years to translate the Scriptures into the language of our times, and I trust the Southern Baptist leaders have helped to bring this Version to fruition."
Comment: "Devout men"? So said Dr. T.L. Holcomb in the Baptist Record. He was then secretary of the Baptist Sunday School Board. The fact of the matter is that with the possible exception of one or two men, the revisers were thorough-going liberals, not "devout men."
"This new version is more accurate than any previous translation, and, because of its clear and readable modern English, more useful and understandable."
Comment: So said the Biblical Recorder (North Carolina) in a lead editorial. The most charitable thing we can say about such an endorsement as regards the accuracy of the translation is that the editor may have done what so many others did at the time, endorsed it before they even had opportunity to read it. The new RSV is not a translation at all at many points, but a loose paraphrase.
"The changes in translation do not change the meaning of the Bible. They clarify them."
Comment: So said the Baptist Record (Mississippi) in an editorial. How about the change from "virgin" to "young woman" in Isaiah 7:14? Does this make no difference in the meaning?
"This new translation of the Old Testament embodies all of the changes in meaning of English words; all of the knowledge derived from the latest discoveries; and all of the teachings and methods for the best translation."
Comment: So said Ralph L. Smith of the Southwestern Seminary, Fort Worth, in the Baptist Standard (Texas). Nauseating, to say the least!
"Just published -- the Bible you'll turn to twice as often! More accurate, easier to read...Only authorized in the language we use today."
Comment: So said the Baptist School Book Store of Oklahoma City in an ad appearing in the Daily Oklahoman. When one considers what this National Council Bible really is, there is nothing quite so sickening in the history of Southern Baptists as all this! To top it off the Baptist Sunday School Board ran advertisements of this National Council Bible on the backs of its Sunday School quarterlies for October - December, 1952.
"We can read this new Bible with the assurance that it gives the most accurate translation from the original languages that has ever been made."
Comment: So said Laurence W. Cleland in Word and Way (Missouri). How about Isaiah 7:34 for accuracy? The Christian Index (Georgia) said that the Baptist Book Store in Atlanta promoted twenty public meetings in Georgia for the publishers, and ordered 5,000 copies for its original shipment. Yet there are some dear Southern Baptists who see no evidence of liberalism in the Southern Convention!!!!!!!
26. The Rev. John R. Peters, pastor of the Cedar Avenue Baptist Church, San Bruno, California, led his church to vote that it "no longer support the cooperative program with any of its money." This vote was taken March 25, 1962. The following statements are excerpts from a letter by pastor Peters to his congregation explaining the reasons for his action:
"Most Southern Baptists do not realize how strong modernism, or liberalism, has become in Southern Baptist life. The Cooperative Program is the life-line supporting liberalism in the convention..... As long as our Southern Baptist Seminaries have money rolling in, they will listen to no one. The only lever the local Bible-believing church has is to cut off the money going to the Cooperative Program. Our loyalty to Jesus Christ demands that we no longer support modernism with our missionary money. Our conscience forbids that we support modernism. The New Testament forbids us to support liberalism..... As a pastor of a Southern Baptist, and a pastor of Southern Baptist churches for over 21 years, and after much soul-searching before God, he finds that he can no longer, under present existing conditions in the Convention, support the Cooperative Program. On taking such a stand he will lose his acceptability with many Southern Baptists who base fellowship on dollar support of the program, rather than on loyalty to the New Testament and Jesus Christ .... No Bible-believer can possibly believe that God is going to use and bless any denomination or church that has gone off into modernism. And modernism, liberalism, has severely infected the Southern Baptist Convention .... William Jewell College, from which this pastor was graduated, is a disgrace, and he would never send any of his young people to that college. While there he saw too many young people turn up with liberalism and evolutionary theories..... Liberalism is so deeply rooted in a program that is so complex, so intertwined, and is growing so rapidly that there is no possibility at this time to support the good without feeding the evil. The Cooperative Program is the financial lifeline that is paying for the progress of liberalism."
Comment: Thank God, there are Southern Baptist ministers who know that there is modernism prevalent in the Convention and are beginning to wake up to their responsibility. We commend this dear pastor for his courageous action. There is one thing further that he should do -- leave the Convention. The giving of money is not the only means of endorsing a liberalist-infiltrated movement. Continued relationship with the Convention involves identification with its inclusive program, even after financial support is withdrawn. God's Word says, "Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing..." (II Corinthians 6:17)
27. Dr. W.A. Criswell, pastor of the largest church in the Convention, with some twelve to thirteen thousand members, speaking to an overflow audience at the opening session of the State Evangelistic Conference in Dallas, Texas, February 1962, said:
"The ground-swell of liberalism has at last reached into the very heart-life of our Southern Baptist people."
Comment: Why should it be so difficult to convince Southern Baptists that there is modernism in the Convention when pastors in their own ranks not only acknowledge it, but state its prevalence as Dr. Criswell does above?
28. Further evidence of liberalism in the Southern Baptist Convention may be seen in its cooperation with National Council of Churches. Though not a member of the Council, it cooperates with the National Council in a number of areas. The American Baptist Convention Crusader, June 1960, records a letter from Dr. Paul K. Shelford, Northern California Council of Churches' office in San Francisco:
"Even the Southern Baptist Convention has appointed individuals to represent the Convention in six of the phases of the work of the National Council -- Home Missions, Stewardship, Social Welfare, United Church Women, United Church Men and Evangelism."
Comment: Up until the present moment, the Southern Convention has refused to enter into an open marriage with the harlot National Council of Churches, but there certainly has been plenty of flirtation! The following is from a letter over the signature of James L. Sullivan, Sunday School Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, May 21, 1957; addressed to Rev. Hoyett Lemmon, Pastor of First Southern Baptist Church, Arkansas City, Kansas:
"Dr. Porter Routh dropped me a note stating that it was your desire to know how much we paid the International Council of Religious Education for the copyright privilege of using the Uniform Lesson Series in our Sunday School publications. During 1957, the cost for the privilege was $10,000. The series is, of course, copyrighted jointly by the National Council of Churches and the International Council of Religious Education and everyone using it must pay them for the privilege of doing so..... Our Board feels that it is well worth this amount for that privilege and has, therefore, made appropriation for it in the budget."
Comment: Ten Thousand dollars a year to the National Council! And the harlot's price has gone up since 1957. In an editorial by E.S. James, Baptist Standard, March 30, 1960:
"The latest report is that the annual cost is now $14,000."
Comment: And who pays the bill for this harlot relationship? Southern Baptist lay people through the cooperative program. The following is an excerpt from a letter written by Dr. Clifton J. Allen, February 21, 1962, to Mr. J.L. Murray, 5368 Waring Road, San Diego 20, California:
"I have been a member of the Committee on the Uniform Series for about twenty years. At present there are six other members of our editorial staff serving on this committee. Membership on the Committee on Uniform Series is not contingent upon a denomination being a member of the National Council of Churches or the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches. Therefore we participate in the work of this Committee freely and without any restriction..... I have found the members of this Committee representing other denominations to be men and women of the highest integrity and of the noblest Christian character. They are also persons of sound Christian faith. I do not agree with them on many matters of theology and doctrine but ..."
Comment: Well, there it is! An admission of close cooperation by the man appointed by the Southern Baptists to operate in that capacity. In one breath he says these National Council people with whom he works are of sound Christian faith, and in the next he says he does not agree with them in many matters of theology and doctrine. "Can two walk together, except they be agreed?" (Amos 3:3) The obvious answer is no. And if the pursuit of cooperation is persisted in, it is a cooperation of compromise, an obvious departure from sound Southern Baptist Principle.
29. Dr. Dan 0. Via, in The Student, a Wake Forest Publication, February 27, 1958.
"Evolution does not mean that man is descended from the ape--that we know--but that man and present simians had a common ancestor. This means that we can no longer take the early Genesis stories literally as history .... Nor does the story of the fall relate the history of the origin of sin, but with great profundity it tells us the meaning of the sin of every man. Although we must call these stories symbols, parables, or myths and not history, they are no less meaningful, no less authoritative for religion, and no less revelatory. The critical approach to Biblical study, as well as natural science, has shown us that the Bible is not infallible in the realm of science and history; nor is all the religion of the Bible on the same level. There are inaccuracies and contradictions..... no thinking, intellectually honest person can be expected to accept the view that the Bible is verbally inspired and without error."
Comment: This open attack upon the Bible is made in the pages of an official publication of a Southern Baptist supported institution. Elliott isn't the only Bible rejecting professor in Southern Baptist circles!
30. The Arkansas Baptist, April 13, 1961, endorses the New English Bible, calling it "A Modern Miracle," and says:
"We should thank God for the faithful work of the British scholars .... Soon we will be hearing that the New English Bible is ... the work of modernists who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, etc., etc., ad nauseam. Yes, and we'll be given a new opportunity to send our money to these self-styled beacons of light to keep them 'on the air.'"
Comment: The New English Bible is the counterpart of the Revised Standard Version in this country. It substitutes "girl" for "virgin" in Luke. It is currently being advertised on the back cover of the Southern Baptist Sunday School publications in an attempt to brainwash Southern Baptists into believing that this work of modernist scholarship is a trustworthy translation. It is this kind of propaganda that ought to make Southern Baptists sick in the stomach.
31. In August of 1953 a Baptist congregation under the leadership of the Rev. Samuel H.W. Johnston voted 241 to 144 to withdraw from state and denomination-wide organizations of the Southern Baptist Convention. Contrary to the Southern Baptist principle of the autonomy of the local church, the minority sued against the majority to obtain the property and won in court. On the witness stand, Dr. Barnes, historian for the Convention, was cross-examined by Mr. Johnston's attorney on the right of a Baptist church to pull out of the Convention. Dr. Barnes had written a book fourteen years previously in which he clearly stated that a church could pull out; but he claimed he had changed his mind since then. The attorney asked him why he had the book reprinted the previous year then, and the changeable doctor's face got red! At this trial, one of the witnesses for the minority, Mr. G.C. Reid, was examined by Attorney Hughes:
Question: You stated a few minutes ago to Mr. Cooley that you were not aware of any modernism or liberalism in the Southern Baptist Convention, didn't you? Answer: I am not aware of it. Question: Do you know what modernism is? Answer: I can't say that I do. Question: How in the world can you tell him that you are not aware of it if you don't know what it is? Answer: I know we have been going along with the regular Baptist denominations and all its works. Question: I didn't ask you that question, and Mr. Cooley didn't. He asked you were you aware of any modernism and liberalism; if you see it right in front of you, you wouldn't know it, would you? Answer: No, sir. Question: There could be all sorts of modernism and liberalism and you wouldn't know anything about it? Answer: I don't imagine I would.
Comment: The above paragraph is found in the transcript of the trial, pp 144-145. This is doubtless the reason why there is no protest among the rank and file of Southern Baptists. They have been brainwashed for so long they do not know the difference between truth and error. They wouldn't know what modernism is even when confronted with it. They just go "along with the regular Baptist denominations and all its works." They are putting loyalty to denomination above loyalty to the Word of God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Incidentally, during the time that these events were taking place pastor Johnston received five threats upon his life, and his boy could not go to school without being bruised and beaten. We are accustomed to hearing reports of this kind from countries dominated by the ecclesiastical hierarchy of Rome. This is the fruit of hierarchical ecclesiasticism in the Southern Convention, manifesting itself in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, U.S.A.!
32. The Rev. George B. Fletcher left the Southern Baptist Convention, resigning his church in Hampton, Virginia, and with ninety members who came out with him established an independent testimony. His reasons for leaving the Southern Convention are as follows:
"I realized that I could no longer minister the Word of God under such circumstances and resigned as of August 1 (1955) for two reasons: first, a church officially committed to the endorsement of blasphemy; and second, a denomination with creeping tendencies toward apostasy. This latter is evidenced in: (1) the inviting of nationally known liberals to address seminary students at Louisville Baptist Seminary, Louisville, Ky., such as Nels F.S. Ferre', George A. Buttrick, Robert J. McCracken, Emil Brunner; (2) worldliness in Southern Baptist schools; (3) the exalting of the cooperative program above the Word of God, and the utter intolerance of any who did not vigorously promote it without criticism."
Comment: This is what every Bible-believing Southern Baptist pastor should do. "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you." (II Corinthians 6:17) There is a growing movement of separation from the Southern Baptist Convention in obedience to the Word of God. The following announcement appeared in Blu-Print:
"First Baptist Church, Danville, California, withdrew unanimously on September 13 from the Southern Baptist Convention because of alleged liberalism and softness toward communist penetration, according to Pastor Richard Owen."
Comment: Thank God! The following report comes from Mr. Ahn, who from 1955 to 1960 was & member of the executive committee of the Baptist World Alliance, and who told in nearly every meeting of the Communist use of that organization and gave that as the reason for his resignation from it:
"For the same reason, and because of compromising activity with apostasy, the majority of Korean Baptist Churches (about 100 of them) ceased cooperation with the Southern Convention."
Comment: Thank God again! The separation movement is in evidence in areas of the mission field.
33. In the Rocky Mount, North Carolina, case mentioned above the star witness for the Southern Baptist Convention sought to establish that the difference between the Convention and other Baptist organizations is that the Convention is "missionary." Question: How missionary is the Southern Baptist Convention? In the Convention Handbook for 1955, page 78, there are 949 foreign missionaries listed. In the same handbook, page 29, the number of churches in the Convention is listed as 29,899. A simple bit of arithmetic will show that it takes 31 Convention churches to keep one missionary on the field. The progress of apostasy is always accompanied by decline in genuine missionary interest. Many independent testimonies are supporting two, three and often times as high as a couple dozen or more from one local church depending on its relative size.
II. There is worldliness in Southern Baptist Schools and Churches:
1. The Rev. Carl Woodbury, Brookneal, Virginia, in his testimony, "A Modernist Preacher Saved," describes his experience at Wake Forest as follows:
"Wake Forest's apostasy, and the coarse results and fruit of that apostasy, are of course known to newspaper readers not only in North Carolina but throughout the United States and many parts of the world. I saw much of it first-hand. One of the athletic coaches was a violent blasphemer. One summer a dormitory was constructed for football players; the work went on seven days a week, even during church hours -- within hearing distance of the church. Drinking and poker were common. Boys and girls were permitted to smoke in most of the classrooms. There was nearly always a card game going on in the college soda shop. While I was a student at Wake Forest I was "ordained to the ministry" by the First Baptist Church of Morgantown, North Carolina. When I was asked for the time and experience of my conversion I frankly admitted that I had not had a definite experience of conversion. I was then asked, 'How do you know that you will go to Heaven?' I replied: 'I would be willing to go to Hell with what I have.' (Five years later when the Holy Spirit convicted me that I was going to hell, I changed my mind.) I was approved and ordained. I came to the end of my career at Wake Forest -- a lost sinner, 'ordained to the ministry,' confused by mysticism, disgusted with modernism..."
Comment: The faith of young men and women is being undermined and wrecked in the ungodly atmosphere of this Southern Baptist institution, and Southern Baptist money is supporting it! This is sin. And those who love the Lord Jesus and are a part of this soul-damning program ought to have a guilty conscience! Every cent given to the Cooperative Program contributes either directly or indirectly to the support of this type of thing. It is a sorry day in Southern Baptist circles when a young man can pass through one of its institutions, "ordained to the ministry," lost, and on his way to hell! By the grace of God this dear young man got saved later on, but not because of what he learned at Wake Forest!
2. Russell Brantley, director of communications at Wake Forest, has written a novel entitled The Education of Jonathan Beam. In the Roanoke Times, Jean Showalter reviews this book and frankly stated that it was a "sympathetic, gently humorous restatement" of the controversy at Wake Forest about dancing. Following is more of the friendly review of the book by Miss Showalter:
"Mr. Brantley's protagonist (Jonathan Beam) is a naive but likeable and intelligent country boy, the product of a narrow Baptist environment, who enters 'Convention College' as a freshman when the battle over campus dancing is about to reach its peak. Jonathan has been warned by his family and friends against the sinfulness he will find at college. More than that, his preacher has extracted a promise from him to 'do the Lord's work' by furnishing the church with evidence to use in its fight against evil. The boy has no trouble finding the evidence. It piles up on him from the minute he arrives on campus. The students swear and smoke and dance and drink. They speak flippantly of the church and religion. Worst of all, some of the professors even question the truth of things in the Bible. Jonathan is properly shocked. And yet these sinners are kind to him and seem anxious to help him. To add to his confusion, the campus spokesmen for the old-time religion are a dismal bunch, even to a country boy's untutored eye, and he discovers that they are not above telling lies to strengthen their case against the wicked. In his mental bewilderment, Jonathan breaks all his own rules. He falls for a girl who teaches him to dance; then feeling guilty and mixed-up he tries to forget his problems by going on a bender. Naturally, since he is a novice at this sort of thing, he gets arrested by the campus police and is called up before the dean. Expecting to be thrown out of college, he meets instead with understanding sympathy and fatherly advice. Meanwhile, the intellectual excitement of learning has touched Jonathan's mind. When the crises comes with his scandalized family, he is ready for it, and we leave him at the end of the book well on the way to independence and maturity."
Comment: This book is a brazen parody of fundamentalism and the old-fashioned faith and godly convictions of Bible-believing people. The "good guys" are the liberals. The "bad guys" are the fundamentalists. Cursing and swearing, including the taking of the Lord's name in vain, is found from cover to cover. The heroine smokes, dances and laughs at her Bible-believing Baptist preacher father whom she refers to as "my crazy crocky old daddy." Sin, vulgarity, profanity is glorified, and all that is holy and decent is ridiculed. It presents the social gospel as more desirable and admirable than purity of Bible doctrine, which social gospel becomes the philosophy of the book's hero. If there is one thing that this book reveals it is this -- the attempt to undermine the faith of young men and women who attend such institutions is not at all accidental. It is deliberate. When a Southern Baptist College professor can sneer at the Bible and all that is sacred there is something wrong with Southern Baptists who continue to support this diabolic plot to destroy the faith and morals of its own young people. It was at this same institution that the entire student body jitterbugged out of a chapel service to the tune of "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing." This is the institution which turned over its beautiful campus (dedicated by Baptist tithe money) to the Hollywood crowd to be the locale of one of Twentieth Century Fox's "top-budgeted" pictures of 1960, starring Bing Crosby, Rock'n'Roller Fabian and Carol Lindley. This was eventually called off by the cinema crowd, much to the "disappointment" of the president, Dr. Harold Tribble, who publicly offered his "expressions of regret." This is the institution in which one of the student papers carried an ad of a strip-tease woman encouraging the students to go down to the "burlesque" show. Read Psalm 106:37. If Southern Baptists want to send their sons and daughters to hell in a hurry, let them continue their support of Cooperative Program. Those who love the Lord should stop their support by separating themselves from the Convention in obedience to the Word of God.
3. In the Old Gold and Black, October 16, 1961, (Wake Forest student newspaper) the following front-page, 3-column announcement appeared:
"Home-Coming Dance -- Vibe King Will Play -- By Walt Pettit, Staff Writer. The Student Union has announced that Lionel Hampton and his International Orchestra and Revue will be the main attraction of the Homecoming activities, October 27-28 .... The 'King of the Vibes,' as Lionel Hampton is known, got his start on the vibra-harp at the Cotton Club in Chicago, backing up Louis Armstrong."
4. In the same issue (as above) the following appears:
"The College compels its students to attend a bi-weekly chapel service. The result: the student cheerfully absorbs himself in his daily newspaper at least two hours a week and Wait Chapel has in the past gained a reputation for having a most inattentive audience at 10 o'clock each Tuesday and Thursday morning."
Comment: No respect for chapel services on the part of students! Whose fault is it?
5. In the Old Gold and Black, October 16, 1961, this news note appeared:
"Business Frat Holds Smoker. Twenty-four guests were present for the fall semester smoker for the Gamma Nu chapter of Delta Sigma Pi. The smoker was held last Wednesday night."
Comment: Fraternities and smokers in a Christian college!
6. In the October 23, 1961, issue of the Old Gold and Black was this announcement:
"Campus Movie: The Student Union movie for this weekend will be 'Don't Go Near the Water' starring Glenn Ford, Gia Scala, Earl Holliman, Anne Francis, Keenan Wynn, and Eva Gabor. The movie begins at 8 o'clock in room 14 of Salem Hall Friday and Saturday nights. Weekend movies are sponsored by the Student Union." The November I issue announced the movie, "Anastasia" with Yul Brenner and Ingrid Bergman.
Comment: A Christian college!
7. Dr. Robert Gray, Jr., Pastor of Trinity Baptist Church, Jacksonville, Florida, in his testimony concerning Stetson University, Deland, Florida, of which he was a graduate:
"I simply believe that a Christian school ought not to employ teachers who do not believe that the Bible is the verbally inspired Word of God. Stetson University has faculty members who do not believe this fundamental of the faith and never have. Even a back-slider has enough discernment to know that there can't be very much spirituality in a so-called Christian university whose home-coming festivities are 'climaxed' by a dance." Following is part of a letter announcing the dance:
"Dear Alums: It's that time of the year again -- Stetson Home-coming; a time when you and I and all our fellow alumni can hail old friends, visit with our former profs and rekindle the fire of Stetson loyalty and spirit. This Home-coming promises to be a real corker. The theme is 'The Roaring 20's,' and the students are going all out to take us back to the days when the Charleston was king and bath tubs were in style. So if you can find a raccoon coat and an old derby, you'll be set for Home-coming '61. And if you're one of our 'dancing' alums, by all means bring along some vintage clothes for the big dance on Saturday night."
Comment: Wake Forest isn't the only institution supported by Southern Baptists characterized by worldliness!
8. Famous Rock 'n' Roll star, Tommy Sands, wrote an article entitled, "I Try to Live My Prayers." It appeared, of all places, on the front page of a bulletin published by one of the largest Baptist churches in one of Louisiana's leading cities. Here is part of it:
"Each person has to pray in his own way, and I believe with all my heart that all prayer and all religions are wonderful for their sincere followers..... It struck me one morning that praying the way I had been, I wasn't going along with God. A familiar, but too often overlooked passage from the Bible came to me, 'God helps those who help themselves.'
Comment: It is clear to any one possessed of spiritual discernment that Mr. Sands is a terribly mixed up young man spiritually. He gives a pat on the back to all prayer and all religions. He is evidently not at all aware of the fact that religion, whatever name it may bear, apart from personal faith in the shed blood of Christ will send its followers to hell. Incidentally. I haven't been able to locate the chapter and verse of his Bible Quotation. Can you? No, for the simple reason that there is no such verse in the Bible. Now it's pathetic enough that Mr. Sands is so mixed up (we would expect him to be with his rocking and rolling), but what about the Southern Baptist Church that used his "testimony"? It is indicative of the worldly trend in denominational circles toward the popular "faith" of prestige-laden Hollywood stars who think they are helping God out and doing Him a favor by expressing their "faith" in a popular way. But the God of the Bible doesn't need and doesn't want any help from Hollywood!
III. There is an affinity to socialism and Communism among prominent Southern Baptist leaders:
1. Dr. Louie D. Newton was elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention in Miami, Florida, 1946. Shortly after his election he made a visit to Russia. Time magazine for August, 1946, reports Dr. Newton as follows:
"The Baptists stand for the same thing as the Russian Government -- renouncement of, and resistance to, coercion in matters of belief .... the future of religion is as bright in Russia as anywhere in the world. Religiously, we should regard Russia as our great ally. It is a virgin field for freedom... because Russia never knew freedom of religion until the present regime. When the USSR was first formed, religion was contraband, but now the Government has discovered that religion cannot be destroyed, so it has invited the church to come in the front door."
Comment: Think of it! The president of the Southern Baptist Convention suggesting that anti-God, atheistic Russia be regarded as our religious ally! There is no religious freedom behind the Iron Curtain. The Moscow Baptist Church is simply a showcase for the purpose of giving the impression of religious freedom. Religion in Russia is controlled by Soviet secret agents according to testimony given under oath before our Congressional committees. Dr. Newton wrote a pamphlet describing his trip to Russia under the title, "An American Churchman in the Soviet Union." And who did the president of the Southern Baptist Convention prevail upon to write the introduction to his pamphlet? None other than Methodist G. Bromley Oxnam, rank modernist, replete with Communist front record, and one time secretary to Harry F. Ward, an identified Communist party member serving as a professor in Union Theological Seminary, New York City, one of the most liberal, radical seminaries in the country. His pamphlet was published by the Communist-front organization known as The American Russian Institute, 58 Park Avenue, New York 16, New York. According to the Time report:
"The visitor had two nice visits with onetime seminarian Joseph Stalin, to whom he gave a leather-bound copy of the New Testament and two pipes..... Before he was through, his hosts had even persuaded the alcohol-hating Baptist to try a sip of vodka."
Comment: A good combination -- New Testament, pipes, and vodka!?!? Dr. Newton was re-elected president of the Southern Convention in May, 1947, in St. Louis. The April-May issue of The Protestant, 1947, a radical magazine, had on page 5 an editorial which reads as follows:
"It is the purpose, the mission of The Protestant to build bridges between Communism and Christendom.....Communism is a child of Christendom. Jewish and Christian values are seeds of Communism. They enter into its texture and condition its growth. Without them the Communistic dream might well become a nightmare. So also Communism is a long suppressed and betrayed element in Christian and Jewish church life. With the exception of a thin red line of Christian Communist groups, which reaches from the days of Jesus to the days of the Anabaptists and even to certain present-day sects, the Christian Church, having entered into an alliance with the powers of this world, has forced itself to forget that Jesus and his disciples preached what today we would call Judeo-Bolshevism and that the members of the early New Testament churches had all things in common."
Comment: Hogwash! Imagine godless, atheistic Communism being referred to as Judeo-Bolshevism, a product of Christianity! It is adherence to the "social gospel" that causes liberals to have so strong a sympathy for the completely unscriptural and unChristian system of Communism. On the first page of this issue of The Protestant, in which the above words appear, is a list of the magazine's editorial advisors. In the second column, second from the bottom, is the name: Louie D. Newton. The magazine itself was labeled a "Communist Publication" by the California Committee on Un-American Activities. Dr. Newton was also a member of the Committee of Welcome for the Very Reverend Hewlett Johnson, better known as the Red Dean of Canterbury.
2. The Woman's Missionary Union of the Southern Baptist Convention publishes an annual brochure, "The World in Books." In the 1955-56 publication there is a list of books by the leading radicals of the day including John C. Bennett, Phillip S. Bernstein, Truman Douglass, Shirley Graham, Eleanor Frances Lattimore, Henry Smith Leiper, Eleanor Roosevelt, Gene Weltfish, etc. On the inside of the cover page is the following:
"All books and magazines suggested in this catalog may be ordered from your Baptist Book Store."
Comment: The brochure was published by the Sunday School Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, and all the Baptist book stores are owned by the Sunday School Board. Does the average Southern Baptist know that the Convention's book stores are outlets for such radical propaganda as is represented in the writings of the above mentioned names? The W.M.U. also publishes a pamphlet, "WMS Round Table Booklist." On page 4 of the 1955-56 issues is listed a book by John Roy Carlson. This man is the author of the book, Under Cover, which was proven to be a compilation of falsehood from beginning to end. Carlson and his publishers were sued for libel in Federal Court in 1946. Under cross examination, Carlson admitted that he was a liar; that he worked for the notorious L.M. Birkhead of the so-called Friends of Democracy (Communist Front organization); that he is an alien by birth; that his real name is Avedis Derounian, the name he uses when writing for outright Communist publications such as Soviet Russia Today; that he travels under a number of aliases including John Roy Carlson, Donald Brady, George Alexander, Thomas Decker, Henry Renard, John Correa, Rudolph Elbert and George Paganelli. Federal Judge John P. Barnes said in open court:
"I think this book was written by a wholly irresponsible person who would write anything for a dollar ... I wouldn't believe this author if he was under oath, and I think he and the publishers are as guilty as anyone who ever was found guilty in this court before."
Comment: Yet a book by this character finds an outlet through the W.M.U. and Southern Baptist Book Stores! "YWA Book Clubs" is another annual pamphlet published by the W.M.U. On page 6 of the 1955-56 issue is a book listed by Langston Hughes. In the House Report No. 1115, 80th Congress, first Session, under the title, "Report on Civil Rights Congress as a Communist Front Organization," p. 15, appears the following:
"Langston Hughes, sponsor of Civil Rights Congress; member Communist Party, USA; signer of statement in behalf of Communists George Dimitrov, William Z. Foster, Don West, Benjamin J. Davis, Jr.; contributor to Communist press." This is the same Langston Hughes who wrote one of the most blasphemous poems ever written against Christ:
"Goodbye Christ: Listen, Christ, You did all right in your day, I reckon---But that day's gone now. They ghosted you up a swell story too, Called it Bible --- But it's dead now. The popes and preachers 've made too much money from it --- You ain't no good no more. They’ve pawned you until you've done worn out. Goodbye, Christ Jesus Lord God Jehovah, Beat it on away from here now. Make way for a new guy with no religion at all --A real guy named Marx Communist Lenin Peasant Stalin Worker ME --- I said, ME! Go ahead on now .... And step on the gas, Christ! The world is mine from now on --- Move! Don't be so slow about movin'! And nobody's gonna sell ME to a king, or a general, or a millionaire."
Comment: Where is the justification for the recommendation of any book by this blaspheming son of Satan through the Southern Baptist Woman's Missionary Union?
3. Five Russian Baptists came to the United States in the Spring of 1956 as the guest of the Southern Baptist Convention, The American Baptist Convention, The National Baptist Convention, and the World Baptist Alliance. Included in this company were Jakov Zidkov, president of the All-Union Council of Evangelical Christian Baptist, and Alexander Karev, the general secretary. In Moscow, a city of eight million people, there is only one Baptist Church. It is, in fact, the only Protestant Church in the city. Zidov and Karev use this as their headquarters. Yuri Rastvorov, testifying before the Senate Internal Security Sub-committee, April 12, 1956, stated that every delegation leaving Russia has in it at least one member of the secret police. Miss Martha Johnson, in her book, Where the War has Been Going On, published in 1944, reports the activities of Karev and identifies him as the chief GPU agent who has caused many believers to go to jail. On May 5, 1959, Peter S. Deriabian, a major in the NKVD, serving from 1944-1954, testified before the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee. He stated that about 1936 or 1937 when the State found they could not crush the religious feelings of the people by closing the churches, they recruited and trained priests through whom they could control the churches. Following is Deriabian's testimony under questioning by Mr. Sourwine of the committee:
"Mr. Sourwine: So that, for more than 20 years now, under the policy of the state police in the Soviet Union, to be a priest one has to be an agent? Mr. Deriabian: That is right. Mr. Sourwine: So that there are no priests who serve the church first -they are only agents of the state police serving as priests? Mr. Deriabian: You are right....Mr. Sourwine: In order to serve the Soviet state policy, they have to give allegiance first to the state, to the principles of the Soviet which includes atheism? Mr. Deriabian: Yes. Mr. Sourwine: So they have to pledge their allegiance to atheism before they can serve God? Mr. Deriabian: That is right. Well, some priests there believe in God. There is no other way to do it. They have to serve the KGB. Mr. Sourwine: You mean doing the best they can within the limitations of the state police? Mr. Deriabian: That is right. Mr. Sourwine: The state police owns the churches, as you say. Mr. Deriabian: You are right."
Comment: These Soviet agents received a cordial welcome among Baptists all over the country including Southern Baptists. A year later, in 1957, in recognition of the 40th anniversary of the Soviet Revolution, Karev and Zidkov signed the official greeting of the All-Russian Council of Evangelical Christian Baptists to the Soviet government.
Following is part of that official greeting:
"Through this warmly written greeting the All-Russian Council of Evangelical Christian Baptists allies itself with the millions of Soviet citizens in greeting the Soviet government on the greatest day of contemporary history -- the 40th anniversary of that great October. The Evangelical Christian Baptists, as well as all other Christians of the Soviet Union, are thankful and praise God that the Soviet government during the course of the past 40 years has acted according to the high ideals precious to Christianity, for these are also the ideals inherent in the Gospel and taught by Jesus Christ. While the Christian Western world speaks much of its Christian civilization and about the ideals of Christianity, yet in practice acts quite contrary to these ideals, a fellowship is daily built up in the USSR which in all areas of life is recreating the righteousness of the Kingdom of God. Step by step the Soviet Union is translating into practice the eternal truths; no exploitation of man by man; daily concern for the needs of the ordinary man and for the welfare of the whole nation, in very fact for the whole nation, and not only for the upper class of 10,000 -- as we see it in the capitalistic countries -- and what is particularly important in a day when the danger of a nuclear world war is still hanging over the peoples of the whole world, the Soviet Union is not relaxing for a minute in its battle for world peace...May God overshadow our renowned Soviet homeland with His divine protection during the course of many future decades,"
Comment: This should sicken the soul of every true Christian and turn the stomach of every American patriot. These Soviet agents posing as pastors were warmly received by Baptists, including Southern Baptists, all over this country, and welcomed as "evangelical brethren." Imagine such a tribute to Russia praising her through 40 years of her history for acting "according to the high ideals precious to Christianity!" The truth is that the Soviet government has sent thousands upon thousands of political prisoners to death in the most cruel forms through the history of its existence. Dr. Robert G. Lee in the Baptist Journal, "Christ For the World" June, 1960 tells the true story:
"The churches in Russia were burned or turned into amusement centers or museums and hundreds of thousands of churches liquidated until Russia was literally turned into a human slaughter house. There, Christians were dragged from their beds and sliced to pieces bit by bit or branded with hot irons, even poking out their eyes to produce untold pain. Others were placed in boxes with their heads and hands and legs sticking out. Then hungry rats would be placed in the boxes to gnaw upon their bodies. Many were tied to horses and dragged through the streets of the city, while the mob pommeled them with rocks and kicked them to death. Pregnant Christian women were chained to trees and their unborn babies cut out of them. Many Christians were forced to dig their graves and then were slowly buried alive."
Comment: High ideals precious to Christianity! According to Karev and Zidkov! In spite of the evidence that these men are Soviet secret agents, Zidkov was cordially received and warmly welcomed at the Baptist World Alliance meeting at Rio de Janeiro in 1960. The Maryland Baptist featured a large picture of the procession across the platform with the Russian flag first and the American flag second, and the flags of other countries following. The pastor of the First Baptist Church, Tulsa, Oklahoma, showed slides of his trip to Rio de Janeiro on several successive Sunday evenings. One who was present reported as follows:
"Last night he completed the series, and several slides showed the presentation of the Russian flag. Also there was a picture of the Russian leader himself. The pastor himself made the statement, what a wonderful Christian man this Russian churchman was... Perhaps the thought which struck my mind was the pastor's explanation of why the Russian flag received such an applause. He suggested the reason was that the World Baptists were glad of the fact that Russia had permitted these Russian church leaders to come to the convention in Brazil."
Comment: It is a sad and sorry day when Southern Baptists can be deceived so completely by Russian propaganda into receiving and honoring Soviet agents as wonderful Christian brethren!
4. Brooks Hays, former Congressman from Arkansas, while president of the Southern Baptist Convention greatly aided the Communist "peace" drive after a brief visit to Moscow in company with the president of the American (Northern) Baptist Convention, Mr. Paul Ward, Washington Bureau correspondent for the Baltimore Sun, reported the president of the Southern Baptist Convention as saying:
"That during his four-day visit he had found signs of 'a religious revival' in Russia and although most of the Russians attending the Baptist service he witnessed in Moscow were both elderly and female -- 'a growing number of the young are taking an interest.'"
Comment: The president of the Southern Baptist Convention taken in by Moscow showcase! How anyone in a brief visit of four days could give testimony of a religious revival in Russia is beyond our comprehension. Mr. Hays' statement served the purpose of promoting Communist propaganda to create such an impression.
5. In the Baptist Standard, June 29, 1960, an article appeared by William Greenlee, Southwestern Seminary, under the title, "Christians and Communists -- How to Tell Them Apart." The following excerpts are from this article:
"The Communist label is more and more being applied to men commonly regarded as Christians. Why?.....Why, without significant evidence, are blanket renunciations made against the National Council of Churches, the translators of the Revised Standard Version, and even Southern Baptist leaders? There are several factors involved..... genuine Christians are sometimes called Communists because those who pass out labels fail to realize that there are many similarities between Christianity and Communism (Communism also being a religion). The similarity does not exist because Christians have been corrupted by Communism, but because Communists 'borrowed' much from Christian teaching. William Temple aptly described Communism as a Christian heresy because Communism is not the antithesis but a perversion of Christianity. Karl Marx incorporated many Christian truths into his system."
Comment: Name just one of these "Christian truths," Mr. Greenlee, just one! The system of revealed truth set forth in the Word of God called Christianity has absolutely nothing in common with godless Communism! But why does this Southern Baptist Seminary professor see so many similarities between Christianity and Communism? Why does he regard Communism as a Christian heresy into which many Christian truths have been incorporated? For the simple reason that the "social gospel" upon which he places so great an emphasis is the bed-fellow of Communism. It is the "social gospel" that is similar to Communism, not the true Gospel of Jesus Christ. Please observe Mr. Greenlee's defense of the National Council, Southern Baptists are supposed to be against the National Council, but this Southern Baptist seminary professor is defending it and actually uses a National Council leader (William Temple) in support of his argument.
6. Dr. T.B. Maston, in Sunday School Adults, Southern Baptist Series, September 14, 1958:
"In what area of our society is there the least evidence of the Christian spirit? Many people believe that it is in the economic. They contend that the ruthless struggle for survival still goes on in many aspects of economic life. Whether or not this is entirely correct, certainly the Christian spirit needs to be applied more consistently and completely to this area of our lives.....It is interesting that there is little, if any, defense of the right of private property in the Bible. Such rights are assumed rather than defended..... Property, personal or real, is not to be used without proper regard for the welfare of others. The owner should recognize that his property belongs, in a sense, to the entire community."
Comment: When Southern Baptists have a graduate of Yale Divinity School writing their Sunday School literature, the liberals and left-wingers have won a major victory in their drive to shift the Southern Baptist Convention into the ecumenical movement. The author has been teaching in Southwestern Seminary since 1922, where he is professor of Christian ethics. What he offers in this Sunday School lesson is the "social gospel" pure and simple. It is typical of the assault made by the socialists upon the American system of free enterprise and free government. What place is there for a lesson of this kind in Sunday School literature of the Southern Baptist Convention?
7. Dr. W.C. Vaught, Jr., in The Adult Teacher, page 8-9, July, 1958:
"As the nations of earth strain upward, reaching for new liberty and light, doors of missionary opportunity swing open to us around the world..... Rising higher and higher economically, we must increasingly share our wealth and natural resources with those economically underprivileged ... As the traveler approaches New York City either by plane, train, automobile, or ship, he is impressed with the massive structure where men of many nations sit down together in the United Nations to talk of peace and justice in the world. In a small prayer room in this structure, from time to time men and women of many nations and of many colors kneel for meditation and prayer. Let us join with them in fervent, earnest, daily prayer that men may learn how to live together in peace. By increasing our interest in world government we can intelligently pray for divine guidance in the solution of the problems that confront our world. Here we can share with others our dreams and our hopes; here we can hear from others their ambitions and desires for justice for all men. Let us prayerfully follow the events of the United Nations, asking God to give divine direction to every nation, large or small,"
Comment: Shades of Karl Marx! Here is a Southern Baptist pastor (Immanuel Baptist Church, Little Rock, Arkansas) in an official publication of the Southern Baptist Convention equating missionary opportunity with a share-the-wealth scheme for the nations of the world, plugging for the United Nations and its diabolic program for one world government. Read Psalm 2; Isaiah 9:6-7. The author of this lesson is evidently unaware of the fact that the UN is the modern tower of Babel, and Babel signifies confusion. It is an insult to God to pray for world peace when the nations of the earth are in rebellion against God and His Christ! When peace comes to the earth it will be brought in, not by the UN, but by the return of God's own Son, the Prince of Peace, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. What the United Nations, in the political sphere, and the World Council of Churches, in the religions sphere, are building today will eventually become the one-world totalitarian government of the Antichrist. And Southern Baptists who identify themselves with the program outlined in this Sunday School lesson are helping to build it! What drivel to suggest praying divine guidance fur every nation, including Russia, a nation that is completely anti-God! Read Ezekiel 38-39 and see what God is going to do to Russia.
8. Clifton J. Allen, in the Baptist Young People, a Southern Baptist Young People's Union Quarterly July - August--September, 1961, under lesson for August 20, 1961, entitled, "Polish Baptist Witness":
"What do you know about fellow Baptists in Poland? How would you adjust to your nation's laws if you were a Christian citizen of Poland?..... Recent years have brought brighter prospects for Baptists in Poland. Politically, the nation is, of course, Communist; it is under the control of the Polish Workers Party. But church groups are free to carry on their work. Polish Baptists do not feel that being true to their Christian convictions involves them in conflict with their nation's laws. Therefore, they can be members of the Polish Workers Party -- as some of them are -- while remaining active members of Baptist churches."
Comment: So, Baptists can he Communists and still be considered Christians with "Christian convictions"! This is exactly the line of thinking that the Communists are seeking to promote, the idea that a person can be a Christian and a Communist at the same time. And Mr. Allen through Southern Baptist Sunday School literature in helping them to promote it! One of the books listed as reference is John C. Bennett's Christianity and Communism Today, in which he calls for "peaceful coexistence" with Communism. Bennett is a prominent National and World Council leader. In the same lesson, Mr. Allen asks and answers a very significant question:
"What can we do for and with our Polish Baptist Brethren in genuine acts of Christian fellowship?...We can offer financial assistance in ways consistent with the church's Cooperative Program gifts."
Comment: Enough said. Support of these Polish Baptist Communists is to be encouraged through the use of Cooperative Program money.
9. John B. Isom, in Christian Frontiers magazine, January, 1947, "A Journal of Baptist Life and Thought";
"We fought the Second World War to keep from being enslaved by some of the outlaws that got out of control. It is not difficult to imagine what would have become of us, if the people of Russia had not done most of the fighting and dying for us. We forget so quickly."
Comment: It is Mr. Isom's memory that is bad. Has he forgotten that in 1939 Russia signed a pact with Hitler before the German armies marches into Poland? Has he forgotten that the only reason Russia fought the Germans was because Hitler broke the pact and invaded Russia? Mr. Isom continues:
"I have found for myself, convincing evidence to make me say, with no little conviction, that we ought to thank God for the progress toward a better world that has been made in tho Soviet Union; that in the new born freedoms in the USSR there is a mighty challenge to mankind; that Communism is not our enemy, but that our fear of it is; that our troubles are to be found within, in the injustice of our practices, and in the moral unsoundness of some of our attitudes and assumptions..."
Comment: Communism not our enemy! New freedoms in Russia! If this article is not pure pro-Russian propaganda, I do not know what is! The "Southwide Advisory Council" listed in this magazine was headed by Dr. W.O. Carver, Louisville, Kentucky. Hundreds of copies were distributed at the Southern Baptist Convention in St. Louis that year. Isom was a Southern Baptist pastor in Spartanburg, South Carolina, at that time, and the article wis published by prominent Southern Baptist ministers.
10. Dr. Duke McCall, president of Southern Baptist Seminary, Louisville, visited Cuba on his return from the Baptist World Alliance meeting in Rio in June, 1960, and said:
"The majority of evangelicals such as Baptists in Cuba strongly support the Castro revolution."
Comment: This constitutes a serious indictment of Baptist Foreign mission work in the island in recent years. A year and half later, December 2, 1961, according to UPI, Castro came out with the acknowledgment, "I've always been a communist." This is what Fundamentalists and those of the "extreme" right had been saying all along.
CONCLUSION: The above evidence is but a small part of the picture. Yet it should be sufficient to indicate the direction in which the Southern Baptist Convention is going. And the situation will get worse, not better. The responsibility of those who love the Lord Jesus is clearly outlined in the Word of God:
II Corinthians 6:17, "Come out. ... be ye separate ... touch not the unclean thing!"
Ephesians 5:11, "Have no fellowship..... reprove."
Romans 16:17-18, "Mark them.... avoid them."
II Timothy 3:1-5, "from such turn away!"
I Timothy 6:3-5, "from such withdraw thyself!"
II Thessalonians 3:6, "withdraw yourselves!"
Hebrews 13:12-13, "Let us go .... without the camp!"
II John 10-11, "receive him not ... neither bid him God speed!"
God's command through His holy Word is to separate, not stay in and "clean it up." Read Jeremiah 5:30-31. What is this amazing and horrible thing committed in the land? it is bad enough that the prophets prophesy falsely, but the amazing, the horrible part of the whole thing is that they are supported by those who profess to love the Lord! ".....my people love to have it so." Then the significant question, "and what will ye do in the end thereof?" Those who love the Lord must obey His Word. There is no neutral ground. Compromise is sin, serious sin in the sight of God.
"COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM, AND BE YE SEPARATE ....!"
(II Corinthians 6:17)