Jared Moore is a Man Singularly Dedicated to King Jesus
I hated Jared Moore the first time I laid eyes on him.
Wait a minute. This article is supposed to explain why I support him for SBC President and why I think you should, too. So allow me to explain. Knowing this bit of history is important for understanding why you should believe what I write in the rest of the piece.
Way back in the day, Jared and I were on opposing basketball teams, each representing our two small elementary schools. If I recall correctly, this was fifth grade. So far, my Hobbit genetics had not derailed my basketball ambitions, and I thought I was pretty good. But I heard that the other team had a kid who was a good ball handler, pretty quick, and played tough defense. When I connected Jared’s face to that report, I was instantly hostile. All these years later, I do not remember who won the game (he does), but I remember that visceral reaction.
Middle school changed nothing, mostly because we were in different modular groupings. However, in high school, our social circles started overlapping. For several years, Jared was just around; we often found ourselves in the same place at the same time, but our interactions were limited. By that time, I was active in a local church. If you had asked me at the time about Jared’s religious commitments, I would have told you I didn’t think the church was his thing but didn’t really know one way or another.
Serving King Jesus
That changed at a lock-in my church held in our (don’t hold me to this) sophomore summer. After the guest speaker issued an altar call, Jared went down front. Apparently, he asked our youth minister if he could speak because Jared was onstage and addressing the group shortly thereafter. While I legitimately can’t remember if Jared professed faith for the first time that night or was in a season of deep repentance, I can tell you that was when Jared and I became friends.
Most importantly, here’s what I can tell about Jared from that moment forward—and this is why you should vote for Jared in the upcoming election for the next SBC President: Jared is defined by his absolute loyalty to King Jesus.
I want to be clear on what I am not saying. I am not saying that ever since that evening altar call, Jared has lived without failure before Christ. Far from it. We were teenagers at the same time, in the same small town. I am saying that as we have aged, the defining feature of Jared’s character has been loyalty to King Jesus. Sometimes, it was expressed in repentance, sometimes in active obedience, preventing the need for repentance. But for Jared, the phrase “Jesus is Lord” has been and still is the immovable foundation of his life.
At this point, you may be thinking, “So what? That’s true of many people and certainly of all of his fellow presidential candidates.”
While I am glad to believe the other candidates are sincere believers and have made costly choices for Christ, Jared’s life and ministry bear out his singular commitment to Christ. Let me be more specific.
Jared’s Humble and Uncompromising Service to the Church
Jared has never been a clout chaser, platform seeker, or prestige hunter. In fact, in my observation, he appears to be completely immune to the fear of man. Look at the churches he has served; you will see he isn’t a ladder climber. His churches have consistently been in out-of-the-way places. It isn’t much of a career plan, but it is what you do when King Jesus teaches you that people in unfashionable places need good pastors.
Consider Jared’s scholarly career. When most evangelicalism was under the sway of Revoice and its destructive push to normalize sexual sin and immorality, Jared dedicated his doctoral work to exposing and ending the dangers of Revoice’s aberrant doctrine. To put it another way, while high-profile Southern Baptists were practicing pronoun hospitality and figuring out how to make sinful desires not “sinful,” Jared was a veritable lone voice in the wilderness, taking on a fight no one else wanted.
Jared’s work as an author is much the same. His book, The Lust of the Flesh, is among the most important books written in the last decade. Despite the decline of Revoice’s influence as a conference, their theology is still very much in vogue among fashionable evangelicals and institutions. Certainly, the cultural winds in the West have never been more positive about what the Bible identifies as destructive sexual sin. Few authors have shown themselves willing to bring clear Biblical truth and faithful application of God’s Word to bear on this spiritual crisis publicly and without a hint of compromise in the face of this most coddled and fashionable sin.
Jared and his friends Rosaria Butterfield and Michael Clary represent the vanguard of a burgeoning renewal of embracing God’s design for humans and human sexuality. Jared’s writing is not the kind that lends itself to profitably high book sales. It is not the kind that opens the doors to the evangelical institutions that provide a comfortable teaching career. It is not the kind that brings invitations to fashionable conferences.
But it is the kind that honors Jesus and brings real help from His Word to the lives of people roiled by their sins.
The unique brand of allegiance to Christ that Jared brings to the table—his willingness to serve in unfashionable and forgotten areas and to take on the giant of the very fashionable and respectable LGBT+ compromise industrial complex in the church—displays his rock-solid biblical convictions and very real humility. Having been his friend for decades, I can testify that I have rarely (if ever) seen Jared approach an opportunity with his own benefit in mind. Rather, I have seen a man who knows that something needs doing, often something costly, and applying himself to the work required.
Jared preaches and pastors faithfully in a rural area, away from the SBC spotlight, but in the exact context representing your average Southern Baptist church. I should note that I know many pastors, but none visit hospitals and homes as often as my friend Jared. Jared also writes faithfully, even when his writing costs him—all because Jared knows Jesus is Lord.
Conclusion: Jared Moore is a Man who Stands with God’s Word Against the World
You may have seen a clip of Jared’s recent appearance on Preston Sprinkle’s podcast. Sprinkle, a Revoice board member, asked Jared what his pronouns were. If you had seen the clip, you would have probably been as delighted as I was when Jared responded with a belly laugh. That is the kind of response produced by saturation in Scripture, loyalty to Christ, and joy in the Lord when presented with the popular foolishness of our cultural moment.
My friend Jared knows that the world is watching Southern Baptists, and he knows they need to see a people unashamed of Scripture, actively serving their neighbors with the love of Christ and loyal to Christ above all.
Jared’s character is unimpeachable. His heart for the church is unquestionable. And his vision for the SBC is the best platform among the various candidates. You can listen to it in more detail here and learn more about why he is running for SBC president here, but in summary, Jared Moore:
- Enthusiastically supports the immediate passage and implementation of the Law Amendment;
- Completely supports the passage of Rhett Burn’s financial transparency (990) amendment and calls on the Executive Committee to bring it out for a vote in Indianapolis;
- Supports the abolition of abortion;
- Opposes the LGBTQ+ heresy infiltrating the SBC;
- Supports reaching rural communities that have been neglected;
- Is committed to only appointing theologically qualified and biblically faithful Southern Baptists who subscribe to the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 to key committee positions.
Jared Moore loves and serves King Jesus. He wants to see Southern Baptists do the same. So, I hope you will join me in voting for him to be the next President of the Southern Baptist Convention.
