I’m a Christian. I am also a Baptist. Truthfully, I’m not very good at being either of them, but one of those statements is more important than the other. (Which one is, in certain circles, open to debate.)
That said, historically, it was tough being a Baptist. Everyone hated us. It seems like the only thing the Pope and the Protestants could agree on was that beating, jailing, drowning, burning, or at the very least mocking the “Dippers” was a good idea. I’m surprised we don’t have more examples from church history of heresy trials involving the defendant saying something like, “Well, at least I’m not a Baptist.”
Eventually, sanity prevailed, and most of the various branches of Christianity woke up to the fact that killing people that disagreed with you was probably not the best way to honor Jesus. That made it much safer to be a Baptist, but it was still a great way to get people to look down their noses at you. In many American communities, for example, you could bet that the rich people were Catholic, the important people were Presbyterian, and the ditch-diggers were Baptist.
This less-than-rigorous and way-too-short historical review has a point: is it any wonder, given our history, that Baptists got a bit proud of our status as outsiders? That the constant pressure from without led to a tendency to puff out our chests and put up our dukes at the slightest provocation?
Baptists have a reputation for fighting others, and one another, is what I am trying to say. We take what we get, turn right around, give it back, turn halfway around, and give it again.
But what if that’s a feature, not a bug?
I never thought so before. I have frequently lamented my circle’s seemingly infinite ability to see a mosquito and break out a machine gun, or get invited to a pillow fight and show up with a sawed-off.
But then, while reading Roland Allen’s classic Missionary Methods, I was struck by the following quote:
“St. Paul…must have foreseen strife and division. He must have deliberately preferred strife and division, heart-burnings, and distresses, and failures, to laying down a law. He saw that it was better that his converts should win their way to security by many falls than that he should try to make a short cut for them. He valued a single act of willing self-surrender, for the sake of the Gospel, above the external peace of a sullen or unintelligent acceptance of a rule.”
Allen wasn’t talking about Baptists, but he might as well have been: “strife…division…distresses…failures.” But he lands someplace surprising: these are still better than superficial “peace.”
Undoubtedly, there is a vast difference between fighting over whether or not Jesus is God and fighting over whether or not the carpet should be blue or brown. One matters and one doesn’t.
But is it possible that having fought over the color of the carpet (and having repented of our foolishness), we are more prepared to go to the mat when it counts? Is not the faith that is tried through repeated trials, even those caused by our sinfulness, stronger than the faith never tested?
You bet.
Now, for the wisdom to know the difference between carpet and Christ…
Of Shepherds and Sheep 