Matthew Barrett, a well-known SBC scholar and professor at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, has left the Baptist fold for what he perceives as the greener pastures of Anglicanism. His departure has elicited a range of responses, both positive and negative. My response comes from the trenches of the local church, as someone educated (B.A., M.Div., D. Min., and Ph.D. work in Biblical Theology at MBTS [ABD]) in Southern Baptist educational institutions, and as someone concerned about his departure.

But first, a prediction. This will not be Barrett’s final destination. He’s headed toward Rome.

If it’s liturgy he wants, it is liturgy he will get, along with a multi-layered and overlapping forms of authority. If I’m wrong, so be it. I have been wrong many times. I hope I’m wrong. But I’ve seen this before. He’s headed to the RCC.

Now, where were we? Oh, to my response. Barrett’s departure causes me to humbly recalibrate 2 Timothy 4:10. With no disrespect to the text or Barrett, “Barrett, in love with the Great Tradition more than he is with Scripture alone as the final rule for the faith and practice of the Church, has deserted Sola Scriptura and gone to Anglicanism (then to the RCC).” 

In a stinging aside, Barrett says he left the SBC for three reasons: 1) the supposed non-affirmation by the SBC of the Nicene Creed and the absence of a structure that can police doctrinal uniformity in the churches, 2) the preening arrogant posturing and image-conscious obsession of the SBC that causes it to be blind to error and abuses and, 3) his sudden transformation from credobaptism to paedobaptism based upon his own truncated reading of Acts 2:38, leaving out the fuller text that includes Acts 2:39.

As to his first objection, while the SBC did not adopt the Nicene Creed as an official statement of faith alongside the SBC’s current statement of faith, the Baptist Faith & Message 2000, it did pass a resolution stating that the SBC agrees with a variety of orthodox statements of faith and historical creeds like the Nicene Creed (See 2025 SBC Resolution, “On Honoring the Centennial Anniversary of the Baptist Faith and Message (1925) and Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Baptist Faith and Message (2000)”).

In that Resolution, unanimously adopted by the SBC, the fourth WHEREAS reads as follows, “WHEREAS, From our confessional beginnings, Baptists have identified ourselves with the historic Christian tradition, especially on the doctrines concerning Christ and the Trinity as exemplified, for example, by the Nicene Creed, which was adopted 1,700 years ago this year.”

Many believe that the SBC will eventually adopt the Nicene Creed as a partner statement of faith alongside the Baptist Faith & Message 2000, a goal at this year’s gathering that was rejected not so much on doctrinal grounds as it was on procedural grounds.

As to Barrett’s second reason for leaving, what I have called his accusation against the SBC for its “preening arrogant posturing and image-conscious obsession” (my words, but his intention), we must own part of his accusation. Sadly, he will find the same in Anglicanism. Enough said.

The SBC can boast the six largest seminaries in the world, two of the largest mission sending agencies on the globe (the International Mission Board and the North American Mission Board), a mission-funding mechanism called the Cooperative Program that is the envy of many, and a multileveled Disaster Relief Ministry that rivals any of its kind, just to name of few things the SBC does. 

While our “bigness” can and does lead us to arrogance, it can also be viewed as the product of gospel-loving churches filled with good-hearted, Bible-believing, sacrificial-giving members and leaders who have partnered together for evangelism, missions, and education. Arrogant, yes. God’s blessings, yes. Both can and are true at the same time.

See, there, as a Baptist, I went bragging. Apologies.

As to his final reason for leaving, the rejection of believer’s baptism, Barrett is not only rejecting believer’s baptism, but he will have to eventually rework his concepts of biblical authority, the priesthood of the believer, the regulative principle of worship, the doctrine of justification by faith alone, baptismal regeneration, and the nature of adopting ecclesiastical practices and beliefs that one is hard-pressed to locate in Scripture. 

It appears that Barrett has, in effect, relocated his center of spiritual gravity and authority from Scripture alone to Scripture rightly explained by the Great Tradition. This two-fold system of spiritual authority will eventually lead Barrett to subject Scripture to the authority of the Great Tradition. 

This is why Anglicanism is in trouble globally. They have decoupled themselves from the authority of Scripture and adopted an adherence to the Great Tradition that, while many times affirms what Scripture affirms, will also lead him to affirm many things that are not affirmed in Scripture – same-sex marriage, LBGTQ+ issues, and a whole host of other doctrinal matters that one is hard-pressed to locate in the text. 

To be blunt, if Anglicanism and the Great Tradition, as Barrett understands them, are so great, why has the Great Tradition not kept Anglicanism from Great Error?

So, Why Stay a Baptist?

First, let’s begin with why I’m not a Baptist. 

First, I am not a Baptist because I am unaware of the Great Traditions of the faith. Barrett seems to imply that if only a Baptist were more aware of church history, he could not, would not stay a Baptist. In other words, Baptists are Baptists only because they are ignorant of the Great Tradition.

Barrett is wrong in his calculation. While I’m sure there are plenty of Baptists who do not know their history (just as there are in the RCC, EO, and Anglican churches), there are many who ARE aware of church history and still remain a Baptist, not in spite of but because of that history. I had great teachers along the way who taught me about the Great Tradition and Baptists’ place within that history. I still read “the church fathers” to this day.

Personally, I not only affirm the five great solas of the Church – Scripture alone, Christ alone, grace alone, faith alone, for God’s glory alone – but I affirm man’s total inability to save himself, God’s unconditional election by grace of a people for His own, God’s definite atonement for the sins of all who will believe, God’s ability to overcome our resistance to His grace, and His preserving, keeping power of all who believe. 

These truths make me a happy, mission-minded, evangelistic, cooperating pastor because I believe that God doesn’t just “possibly save people,” I believe He “will save sinners.” While not all Baptists believe all these doctrinal affirmations in the same way and to the same degree that I do, my hunch is that having been a Baptist all my life, most Baptists have more in common with these affirmations than we do differences because they are located in the text of Scripture. Scripture always checks the Great Tradition, not vice versa.

Second, I am not a Baptist because I believe Baptists always get it right. We do not. Baptists can be arrogant and narrow-minded. 

Third, I am not a Baptist because I believe we have cornered the market on every doctrinal matter. We have not. 

Finally, I am not a Baptist who believes there are no regenerate people in other church traditions. In fact, I believe there are believers in other denominations, if you will, some of which (in the case of the RCC) are saved not because of but in spite of that tradition. Likewise, there are many who are on the SBC rolls that are not regenerate. 

SBC churches have been and always will be works in progress. We are churches that are “semper reformanda” and “ecclesia reformata,” if you will, the church reformed, but always being reformed. But we are always reforming in relation to the Bible.

Baptists and the Bible

I have been attending the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting off and on since 1979. I lived through the “conservative resurgence” of the SBC, whereby churches and seminaries were reclaimed from doctrinal drift. What I have seen year in and year out is that, more often than not, the rank-and-file members and leaders of SBC churches have landed on the right side of most doctrinal issues set before them. My confidence in Baptists to land in the right place is due solely to their commitment to God’s Word. 

Yes, there have been times we have erred. But why have SBC churches and seminaries tended to stay the course and affirm doctrinal soundness? It has been because of their avowed commitment to Scripture being the sole authority for the faith and practice of all that we do. This is why it might be good at this point to rehearse “Article I: The Scriptures” in the Baptist Faith & Message 2000: 

“The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man. It is a perfect treasure of divine instruction. It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter. Therefore, all Scripture is totally true and trustworthy. It reveals the principles by which God judges us, and therefore is, and will remain to the end of the world, the true center of Christian union, and the supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds, and religious opinions should be tried. All Scripture is a testimony to Christ, who is Himself the focus of divine revelation.”

You might disagree with this statement, but it won’t be due to a lack of clarity.

Now to the positive. I am a Baptist because of one central issue: Biblical authority. The Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative Word of God. The perspicuity (clarity) of Scripture is not accidental, but Spirit-inspired. Because of its nature and clarity, it is the norm that norms all norms. 

Baptists, historically, have made every effort to keep Scripture at the center of their doctrinal affirmations. Yes, we believe in believer’s baptism, the doctrine of the Trinity (yes, Nicaean in substance), the doctrine of justification by faith alone in Christ alone, and a whole host of other doctrinal affirmations, along with a basic congregational form of polity, coupled with a cooperative spirit that partners us with 40,000+ other churches of like-mindedness and faith. 

I will add that Baptists have and will continue to appreciate, learn from, agree with, and wholly affirm truth claims located in the Great Tradition to the degree they align with and submit to the supreme authority of God’s written Word.

But why do Baptists hold to these dear doctrines, and why do we reject others? Because Baptists have, by spiritual disposition and doctrinal affirmation, placed Scripture above the Great Tradition, personal opinion or preference, and individual inclination. 

And while Baptists do not always “get it right,” the degree to which we evaluate all we doctrinally affirm by the standard of God’s Word alone is the degree to which we come closer to being the kind of people God wants us to be, with the right kind of doctrinal affirmations He calls for us to claim. Anything else opens a person to other forms of authority that are often in conflict with God’s Word itself. 

Farewell, Dr. Barrett. I pray you hold to the faith once for all delivered to the saints, even as you move further away from Scripture as the supreme authority for both Christian belief and practice.