Deitz Memorial votes to leave TBA

By Lynn Hotaling

Deitz Memorial Baptist is the most recent to pull out of the 173-year-old Tuckaseigee Baptist Association after its July executive committee decision to endorse the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message, which limits the office of pastor to men. The vote was unanimous, said the Rev. Robert Blanton, pastor.

Established in East Fork community about 1956, Deitz Memorial has 66 members.

His congregation severed ties with the association because church members don't subscribe to the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message and due to the fact they felt the autonomy of their church was being threatened, said Blanton, a former TBA moderator.

A third reason is a shift in the association's focus, he said.

"We're not aligned with that focus. In the past we've worked for unity of purpose to do the things together that we could not do separately," Blanton said." Now (the association is) more interested in fussing than in doing Kingdom work, and we want to separate ourselves from the fussing."

Other Baptist churches who have withdrawn since July are Cullowhee, Sylva First, Tuckasegee, Black Mountain and East Sylva.

Efforts of some Southern Baptists to bar women from the pulpit spread to Jackson County after Cullowhee Baptist, Jackson County's oldest congregation, called a woman as co-pastor, prompting the association's Pastor's Conference to refer Cullowhee to its credentials committee.

Controversy flared in April after a recommendation from that committee not to seat Cullowhee's delegates at the TBA annual meeting in October. Matters came to a head in July with the executive committee's closed session affirmation of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message and subsequent decision to seek the removal of Cullowhee and Sylva First from the TBA.

The Rev. Matt Ledbetter, pastor of Hamburg Baptist and president of the Pastor's Conference, defended the decision to adopt the Southern Baptist platform as an effort to "get back to the roots" of the Tuckaseigee Baptist Association.

Ledbetter bases that contention on information found in the chapter on religion in "The History of Jackson County," which states that founding principles of the TBA were a belief in the Trinity and a belief in the "authority of scripture as the word of God and the only rule of faith and practice," he said.

"The issue is not women preachers or women deacons," Ledbetter said. "The issue is the statement by First Baptist where they said Jesus rather than the Bible is the only rule of faith and practice. The real issue is the authority of the scripture.

"We never said you can't have a woman pastor," said Ledbetter. "We said if you have a woman pastor it's a breach of scripture and you can't be part of the association."

Ledbetter was referring to an April resolution Sylva First passed after the recommendation not to seat Cullowhee's delegates in October. In that document, members of Sylva First stated "Jesus Christ, rather than the Bible, is the final authority on all matters of faith and practice."

The resolution also states that Sylva First values its relationship with Cullowhee Baptist more than its "relationship to an association which would deprive Cullowhee Baptist church of its local autonomy."

Again citing the history book, Ledbetter said Cullowhee Baptist had used "scriptural authority" to exclude some 71 from church fellowship during the church's early years.

Turning to a history of the Tuckaseigee Baptist Association written in 1929 for the organization's centennial, Ledbetter said the document lists the Bible as "the sole rule of faith and practice" of the early organization.

"We believe that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the word of God, and the only rule of Faith and Practice, states Chapter II, Article 2 of the TBA history. Ledbetter said that passage proves early TBA leaders believed the Bible, not Jesus, was the final authority.

Ledbetter also differs with the departed congregations on the issue of church autonomy.

"You can only take church autonomy so far," he said. "There is no such thing as autonomy doctrine in the Baptist realm."

Ledbetter's last point concerned the scriptural references that he said show women should be excluded from the pulpit.

"You can't separate Jesus from the Bible," he said. "The only way we know what Jesus said is from His word."

In I Timothy 3:2 it is written that a bishop should be "the husband of one wife," Ledbetter said, which proves the office of pastor should be limited to men. "Having a woman pastor is a symptom of not believing in scriptural authority," Ledbetter said.

"The Bible is not 'politically correct,'" Ledbetter said. "Jesus said, 'I'm the same yesterday, today and forever' - the scriptures never change."

Ledbetter went on to say that women are important in the Baptist church.

"If it weren't for women, the Baptist church wouldn't exist," Ledbetter said. "Women carry a major load in our church."

With regard to the six churches that have left the TBA, Ledbetter said it's "sad it had to come to that.

"No one is happy over this - no one takes pleasure in what has happened," he said.

"But what has happened is best for all churches," Ledbetter said. "The association is going to be stronger than ever now with a three-way focus on evangelism, missions and prayers."

Finances are not a concern, he said, despite published reports that contributions from the departed churches totaled more than 30 percent of the TBA budget during the past five years.

"My church has boosted giving, and, as a matter of fact, from talking to other pastors I think that this year we'll probably take in more than we ever have before," Ledbetter said.

Speaking from the vantage point of one who has been a Southern Baptist for 60 years, Reverend. Blanton, disagreed with Ledbetter's assessment of the TBA's roots. "I would not agree that (the association's actions) are a return to its roots, though that's a common thing that is said across the (Southern Baptist) convention since (the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message) was adopted," Blanton said. "But it is not our opinion. I doubt seriously if many churches have ever adopted a statement of faith adopted by the convention."

With regard to Baptist hierarchy, Blanton described his denomination as a "grass-roots organization"- one that's governed from the bottom up.

"That's historical," he said. "As to the autonomy, each individual church has always been a self-governing church and never looked to any ecclesiastical order. They cooperated where they could but did not where they couldn't or didn't agree.

"It appears that there is a breakdown of that understanding among Baptist people," said Blanton, who compared his view of the ties that bind Baptist churches to a "rope of sand," a topic he said he preached on this past Sunday.

"In some writings it has been described as a 'rope of sand,' and some who are not Baptist marvel at the kinds of things we have been able to accomplish with the system we have," Blanton said.

Blanton did not see the relevance of Cullowhee's dismissing members 100 years ago based on scriptural authority.

"Nearly all of our old churches expelled members for misconduct," he said. "But I never heard of an association expelling a church for incorrect doctrine."

Blanton also takes a different view of the scriptural passages Ledbetter cited. While he agrees that I Timothy says "husband of one wife," Blanton's opinion is that the passage is an admonition against polygamy rather than a basis for only men in the pulpit.

"Polygamy was a great problem in the Middle East, and Christianity was very definitely against polygamy," Blanton said.

If the passage is interpreted literally, then the apostle Paul would not qualify to preach because he didn't have a wife, Blanton said.

Citing Romans 16:1, Blanton says Phoebe is called a deacon, though she is referred to as a servant in the King James translation.

"The two words are exactly the same in Greek, and most commentaries say she was a deacon," Blanton said.

Blanton dismissed Ledbetter's contention that the churches leaving the association are placing Jesus over the scripture.

"That is a ploy they've used since the controversy began - that we don't believe the Bible," Blanton said. "The truth is we do what we do because we do believe the Bible. We interpret it a little different, that's true.

"I'm not exactly a literalist, but I'm mighty close to it," he said.

"We try to be informed by the scripture and impressed by the Holy Spirit," Blanton said. "We do not bow to any ecclesiastical authority higher than our local church."

Back to Archive: 10/03/02.