So, your church is without a pastor and you have been elected to the pastor search committee. In addition to the usual questions about salvation experience, theology, family, and other things, should you be specific and pointed in questioning candidates about Calvinistic beliefs and practices?
In today's SBC climate you would be irresponsible not to.
A couple of years ago there was some reaction to a document circulating about how to smoke out a calvinistic pastor. Tom Ascol blogged about it speaking of that particular set of documents as "wickedness and ignorance."
Seems the attitude has changed a bit towards such things.
A panel of SBC luminaries (Frank Page, Herschel York, Steve Lemke, and David Dockery) that included both Calvinists and non-Calvinists met last week, Baptist Press reported on it, and part of the panel discussion included advice to search committees.
Lemke said that committees should ask candidates "Are they committed to missions and evangelism," and, "Do they talk more about Calvin than about Jesus?"
Good advice, although some candidates might be offended by the latter question.
While both sides declare fidelity to the concept of honesty and openness in the search process, our search process sometimes doesn't foster a climate where both the church and the candidate is completely forthcoming.
I've never been on a pastor search committee and doubt I will ever be on one. I have been in the position of offering advice and would be more pointed today about advising such a group to be specific and clear about Calvinism.
The best indicator of a prospective pastor's future behavior is his past practices. It is sometimes difficult to achieve but a committee has to find a good way to obtain a reliable third party estimation of the pastor's behavior in his present church.
An associational missionary is sometimes a good source for this but not always. The old search process usually included attending the pastor's present church and hearing him preach but I understand that many pastors today would rather not have a committee show up at their present church.
Our pastor search system has always been messy. In today's denominational atmosphere committees must be better informed and prepared on the issue of Calvinism in the same way that it was necessary for them to be informed about charismatic matters forty years ago or about theological liberalism thirty years ago.
They cannot afford not to be prepared.
In today's SBC climate you would be irresponsible not to.
A couple of years ago there was some reaction to a document circulating about how to smoke out a calvinistic pastor. Tom Ascol blogged about it speaking of that particular set of documents as "wickedness and ignorance."
Seems the attitude has changed a bit towards such things.
A panel of SBC luminaries (Frank Page, Herschel York, Steve Lemke, and David Dockery) that included both Calvinists and non-Calvinists met last week, Baptist Press reported on it, and part of the panel discussion included advice to search committees.
Lemke said that committees should ask candidates "Are they committed to missions and evangelism," and, "Do they talk more about Calvin than about Jesus?"
Good advice, although some candidates might be offended by the latter question.
While both sides declare fidelity to the concept of honesty and openness in the search process, our search process sometimes doesn't foster a climate where both the church and the candidate is completely forthcoming.
I've never been on a pastor search committee and doubt I will ever be on one. I have been in the position of offering advice and would be more pointed today about advising such a group to be specific and clear about Calvinism.
The best indicator of a prospective pastor's future behavior is his past practices. It is sometimes difficult to achieve but a committee has to find a good way to obtain a reliable third party estimation of the pastor's behavior in his present church.
An associational missionary is sometimes a good source for this but not always. The old search process usually included attending the pastor's present church and hearing him preach but I understand that many pastors today would rather not have a committee show up at their present church.
Our pastor search system has always been messy. In today's denominational atmosphere committees must be better informed and prepared on the issue of Calvinism in the same way that it was necessary for them to be informed about charismatic matters forty years ago or about theological liberalism thirty years ago.
They cannot afford not to be prepared.
