First Baptist Church won't be recognized at convention

By LINDA REDEFFER

Southeast Missourian

When thousands of Baptists affiliated with the Missouri Baptist Convention gather at Southeast Missouri State University's Show Me Center Monday through Wednesday for the 172nd annual meeting, messengers from Cape Girardeau's First Baptist Church will not be recognized.

Messengers are Baptists who are eligible to vote on issues brought before the convention, said First Baptist Church's pastor, the Rev. Mike Shupert.

First Baptist is among 18 Baptist churches in Missouri that will be welcome to attend the convention, but will not be recognized and allowed to vote on issues before the assembly.

Shupert said that First Baptist's congregation had not planned to send messengers anyway, but says he is dismayed that the convention's action has caused a rift among Missouri Baptists and Southern Baptists.

'Single alignment'

At last year's Missouri Baptist Convention messengers voted to support "single alignment," Shupert said. Individual churches are discouraged from designating financial support to another denomination or another Baptist group the convention disagrees with, he said.

In a letter the convention sent to First Baptist Church, the Credentials Committee reminded First Baptist of its history with the convention and encouraged the church to disassociate itself from the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and other groups, and "take the necessary steps to protect your single alignment status."

The congregation responded that its history goes back to 1834, prior to the Southern Baptist Convention and the Missouri Baptist Convention, and upholds the Baptist tradition of partnering with other Christians toward a common mission goal.

First Baptist has also come under scrutiny and lost members, Shupert said, because of its willingness to ordain women as deacons and ministers. The church allows members to choose where they want to send the national portion of their mission donations.

It also supports the "priesthood of the believer" -- which Shupert said encourages individuals to read and interpret the Scripture and not accept only what the pastor or other leader interprets as truth -- and advocates religious freedom.

Shupert says these beliefs are not new among Baptists; what's new is the "single alignment" demand.

As stated in the church's response to the convention, "sadly and regrettably, the days are long past when the Southern Baptist Convention... modeled for the world mission and outreach programs in which Baptists of all persuasions found unity and purpose in a common faith in the Lordship of Christ, which surely takes precedence over all other matters."

"It's become more and more about control and conformity," Shupert said.

Conservative by nature

Baptists, Shupert said, are conservative by nature, but First Baptist members feel dismayed that the convention is becoming more of a "fundamental" conservative.

On the agenda at the upcoming convention is an address from Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, about Missouri's cloning controversy and other moral issues.

"We don't stand in the pulpit and tell people how to vote," Shupert said. "In a priesthood of believers, people should make up their minds for themselves. In the current climate of the MBC, the trend has been to become a 'pulpit bloc.'"

The MBC has in recent years supported a resolution against Disney because it allowed homosexuals free access to its theme parks, Shupert noted, and it has publicly supported home schooling over public education.

"Southern Baptists would never have done this in years past, " Shupert said.

In the church's letter to the convention, the congregation wrote, "It is quite evident from your letter that we no longer have a place at the family table of the new convention. The doctrine of single alignment has drawn a smaller parameter for Baptists in Missouri, and the First Baptist Church of Cape Girardeau serves God's greater kingdom which extends outside of those lines."

lredeffer@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 160