Updated and enlarged November 15, 2004 (first published November 2, 2004) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The International Baptist Network (IBN) held its inaugural public meeting September 27-29 at Highland Park Baptist Church, Chattanooga, Tennessee, the home of Tennessee Temple University.

The new organization has the objective of “networking” and unifying fundamental Baptist churches. The goal is not an actual merger but a closer relationship between the associations and between unaffiliated independent Baptist churches. Bill Monroe, president of the BBFI, says: “It is not meant to replace any of the groups, but rather to unify independent Baptists, who, though they share common doctrine, have been separated for over 50 years by disagreements from the past” (Baptist Bible Tribune, July 15, 2003).

The brochure announcing the inaugural meeting featured in large letters the words “THAT THE WORLD MAY BELIEVE” from John 17:21, the favorite verse (taken out of context and misused) of the ecumenical crowd.

The main participants at this point are the Baptist Bible Fellowship International, Southwide Baptist Fellowship, and World Baptist Fellowship, but these were joined by representatives of the Southern Baptist Convention and the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches (GARBC). Speakers and organizers included Lee Roberson, Jerry Vines (SBC), Randy Ray, Rick Austin, Tim Lee, Bill Monroe (president of the BBFI), David Bouler, Jerry Prevo, David Bryant, Bo Moore, David Bryant, Wendell Kempton, Tom Messer, Dino Pedrone, and Wayne Martin. Paul Dixon, Chancellor of Cedarville College, which recently was approved by the SBC, attended and announced the meeting at Cedarville’s web site. John Rawlings of the BBFI has been pushing for the formation of the IBN for the last couple of years.

Southwide Baptist Fellowship voted 215 to 58 in favor of joining the IBN. Calvary Contender for Nov. 2004 reported that two of Dr. Rice’s sons-in-law spoke from the floor in favor of the majority.

Bill Monroe says, “The IBN is the umbrella group that will seek to bring together the BBFI, Southwide Baptists, World Baptists, and other interested independent Baptists to work together to more effectively fulfill the Great Commission” (Baptist Bible Tribune, June-July 2003).

The new organization calls itself the “Face of 21st Century Baptists.”

One thing that unites most of the participants of the International Baptist Network is the shared conviction that things such as music, Bible versions, associations, and dress standards are largely non-issues that should not divide. They further hold the conviction that those who make issues of such things are hurtful to the cause of Christ today. Many of the men at the forefront of this new movement are supportive of the contemporary or “progressive” churches, including Bo Moore, Jerry Vines, Tim Lee, and Jerry Prevo.

For example, as long ago as 1984 Jerry Prevo led his church, Anchorage Baptist Temple, in Anchorage, Alaska, to participate in a Billy Graham crusade. When a fellow independent Baptist preacher questioned the wisdom of this, Prevo replied that “he thought much of the criticism given to Billy Graham by fundamentalists over the years was unwarranted” (The Flaming Torch, July-August 1984). In fact, a man who has turned tens of thousands of seekers over to Roman Catholic and modernistic Protestant churches cannot be criticized too much. Prevo is associated with the Baptist Bible Fellowship and was prominent in Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority. In Christianity Today, Feb. 21, 1986, Falwell stated that Catholics made up the largest constituency (30%) in the Moral Majority. In his autobiography Strength for the Journey, Falwell referred to the “Catholic brothers and sisters in the Moral Majority” (p. 371). Jerry Prevo, who is perfectly at home with the International Baptist Network, represents the rapidly growing New Evangelical element within the independent Baptist movement.

Jerry Vines, pastor of First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, was elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1988 and again in 1989. When first elected he said he hoped no “moderates” would leave the convention because they felt disenfranchised (Baptist Press, June 16, 1988). Southern Baptist “moderates” include those who hold heretical neo-orthodox theology and deny the inerrancy of Scripture. Toward the end of his first term Vines said, “To my view, we have settled the debate over the nature of Scripture” (Baptist Press, May 12, 1989). This is pure nonsense. The battle for the Bible is far from won even today in the Southern Baptist Convention. There are many men at the state level (even one would be too many, Galatians 5:9) who deny the inerrancy of Scripture, and many of the colleges and universities are modernistic. For example, R. Kirby Godsey, president of Mercer University in Georgia since 1979, published a book entitled When We Talk about God ... Let’s Be Honest (Smyth & Helwys, 1996) which denies that the Bible is infallible. In fact, Godsey claims “the notion that God is the all powerful, the high and mighty principal of heaven and earth should be laid aside.” That is wicked heresy of the highest degree, and it is welcome in the Southern Baptist Convention at the state level in some parts of the country.

The independent Baptists who are willing to yoke together with Southern Baptist conservatives today ignore the fact that the SBC is a mixed multitude and that its tent is wide enough for theological moderates. SBC conservatives are committed New Evangelicals who are opposed to strict biblical separation. For the past 40 years the independent Baptist movement has been theologically pure as far as modernism goes. To my knowledge there has not been even one independent Baptist preacher or professor who has held to modernistic or neo-orthodox views of the Bible. That will change quickly if we adopt the SBC’s “big tent” “don’t be so strict” philosophy.

I know little about the World Baptist Fellowship, but Southwide and BBFI are a mixed multitude. These associations are beating the drum that they have not changed even while many of their churches are pursuing the New Evangelical Bill Hybels-Rick Warren church growth philosophy, throwing away their dress standards, adopting rock & roll worship, softening the preaching (not much hell fire, more of a positive emphasis), avoiding doctrinal controversy, joining hands with ecumenical ventures such as Promise Keepers, misusing ecumenical verses such as Matthew 7:1, etc.

Worldliness is just as destructive to God’s holy work as doctrinal error. When men yoke together, it is because they are in agreement. “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” (Amos 3:3). Or it is because of some overriding interest such as money and prestige or even a sincere fervor for evangelism. The latter is the reason that Billy Graham has always given for his great spiritual compromises.

The lines are being drawn ever more sharply on both sides between independent Baptists who want to hold to the old paths and those who are casting their lot in the contemporary direction.

When I was a student at Tennessee Temple in the mid-1970s, sacred music, conservative dress standards, ecumenical associations, and the King James Bible were considered important issues by the majority of men in the Southwide Baptist Fellowship, the BBFI, and the World Baptist Fellowship. Those who held convictions on these issues were not considered legalistic or divisive. They were the mainstream of fundamental Baptists in that day. The Dean of the Bible School at Tennessee Temple in the 1970s, Bruce Lackey, stood for the King James Bible by conviction.

How times have changed! But my convictions on these issues came from the Bible 30 years ago and I see no reason to change and to adopt a softer, more neutral, more pacifistic philosophy today in order to appease the unity crowd.

Organizations such as the International Baptist Network are unscriptural. Every man involved in this venture will claim that he believes in the autonomy of the local church. Why, even Southern Baptists make this claim. But it is a hollow boast when they go about to build associations beyond the church that have no authority in the Word of God and when they seek to create a “unity” that requires some lowest common denominator of doctrine. Paul’s instruction to Timothy was to allow “no other doctrine” (1 Tim. 1:3) than that which he had been taught by the apostles. That is God’s commission to every preacher, and it is impossible to accept some sort of unity based on “five fundamentals” or “the great fundamentals” or any other doctrinal platform that does not include every doctrine of the New Testament faith. We simply don’t need an association that is not defined in Scripture. The Scripture gives us our work, the Great Commission, and it describes the channel for that work, the New Testament assembly. That is what we see in the book of Acts and throughout the epistles. And in the Scripture we have everything we need. It is able to make the man of God “perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). What else could we possibly add to perfection? How vain men are when they think that they can devise something better than God’s original plan!

The following is an excerpt from the sermon “The Voice of the Independent Baptist Movement,” which Dr. Harold B. Sightler preached in 1979 at a missions conference at Highland Park Baptist Church in Chattanooga. In that sermon he gave six suggestions for why God has raised up the independent Baptist movement. The sixth is as follows:

“Maybe God raised us up as a voice for the autonomy of the local church, and I do believe in the autonomy and the freedom of the local church. When I was a younger preacher, I wondered why all of the independent fellowships could not get together into one great fellowship in America. I could envision the day when Bible Baptist and World Baptist and Southwide Baptist would unite together in a big fellowship, but I have given that up. I've come to the conviction that it is not God's will. The truth of the matter is that I wouldn't join it if it were to be born. No, sir. I wouldn't join any kind of a convention. I think the independent Baptist movement is demonstrating that it is the will of God that every local church stand on its own autonomy, on its own freedom, on its own authority. 'Oh, but we can do more if we are united together,' they say. Well, that sounds good but if you will examine that you will find that sometimes it's not the case. God gave you two legs, but if you start using a crutch the first thing you know you will be depending on that crutch. The best thing you can do is to throw that crutch away and use the two legs that God gave you. I don't think the local church needs to lean on anybody. A local church can handle of its own affairs, build its own mission program, build its own buildings, call its own pastors. I believe in the autonomy, the freedom of the local church. Maybe God raised us up as a voice for the autonomy of the local church.”

We don’t need an International Baptist Network. What we need are some prophets of God to stand up and plainly rebuke the compromise and worldliness, the man-centeredness, the pragmatism, the lack of spiritual consistency, the pride of worldly success, and the incredibly shallow evangelistic methodologies that are rampant in fundamental Baptist circles.