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Author: CRV Staff
CR:V has received the following document from Danny De Armas, current Chairman of our North American Mission Board (NAMB) Trustees. As you will see, the document articulates NAMB’s approach to planting churches, complementarianism, and women pastors.
We are thankful for the work of NAMB planting healthy churches as well as their commitment to the clear teaching of Scripture as affirmed in the doctrinal framework that forms the core of Southern Baptist Cooperation, the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. We are also thankful for the way this document represents the kind of meaningful communication between SBC entities and SBC members that is so central to the cooperative work of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Background on NAMB and Church Plant Endorsements
As part of NAMB’s endorsement process, we require each planter to affirm the Baptist Faith & Message 2000, sign a NAMB code of conduct and commit to dedicating at least six percent of their church budget to the Cooperative Program. NAMB will continue to emphasize these commitments in planter assessment, orientation, training and coaching.
NAMB does believe, as the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 says, that “both men and women are gifted for service in the church.” NAMB is grateful for the many ministerial roles women play in the local church, at home, in workplaces and in fulfilling the Great Commission.
NAMB has always and will always only endorse Biblically qualified men as pastors. NAMB is committed to the Baptist Faith & Message 2000, is complementarian by conviction and does not endorse women as pastors.
NAMB is directed to work with all of the SBC’s autonomous churches in fulfilling its mission and ministry assignments, which include assisting all SBC churches, associations, and state conventions to plant new SBC churches. If a sending church, local association or state convention finds a church not to be in cooperation, NAMB has and will continue to respond appropriately.
In a recent review NAMB conducted of its nearly 1,200 currently endorsed church planters, only six listed a woman with a title of pastor in a staff role. Those have been addressed. We individually and appropriately address these situations as they come to our attention. Our goal is always to lovingly help these churches and pastors model sound ecclesiology, in accordance with Southern Baptist’s understanding of Biblical teaching. We want to coach them. We want to correct them. And we want to keep them.
If an occasion occurred in which a church planter insisted on maintaining a woman in a pastor role or title on staff, NAMB will remove its endorsement and funding. The use of such titles and roles can be confusing to the constituencies with whom we partner and who fund our work. But, rather than publicly shame pastors, we find it better to come alongside our brothers and sisters in Christ and lovingly work with them as we pursue together our Great Commission ministry.
Questions about a specific church plant can be emailed to NAMB at fyi@NAMB.net.
A copy of the PDF CR:V received can be downloaded here:
Yesterday we released an article describing concerns over egalitarianism in NAMB church plants. Since then, the most frequent question we’ve received is whether or not these are current NAMB churches.
Each of these churches was verified on the NAMB church plant database prior to publication. Each church was re-verified today and that is documented below. This website information does reveal the names of the churches. We want to again stress that our intention is to seek clarification from NAMB and all our SBC entities, not to interrogate the practices of any individual church.
This post is being provided so that those interested can see the accuracy and timeliness of our concerns. Our previous article stated that one of the five churches has already left NAMB affiliation. If more of these churches have since left NAMB and the SBC, this does not change the substance of our questions. Indeed, if that is the case it raises questions about our assessment process on such a key doctrinal issue.
While how we got to this point would still be concerning, many Southern Baptists would be relieved to see a statement from NAMB clarifying our current church planting practices in regards to egalitarianism.
We want to hear that NAMB does not plant or partner with churches who violate the BF&M2000 by appointing women to the office of pastor. The office of pastor is not arbitrarily limited only to one position in a local church known as a “senior” or “lead” pastor, and this language is found nowhere in the BF&M2000. We would expect that any SBC entity would be eager to affirm such a statement, and to correct any practices found to be in violation of this.
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