Why the FBFI?

We enjoyed tremendous services and other sessions at our recent annual meeting, held at Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Greenville, SC. You can find audio and video for our sessions here (not all sessions recorded in video). One of our afternoon panel discussions featured a worthy question for our panelists, “Why join the FBFI?”

Our panelists gave good answers, focusing on benefits of belonging to our Fellowship. Not having been on the panel (and not lobbying for the next one, really!!!), I thought I would offer another reason for membership. I am sure there are other good reasons and might be able to entice some of our other members to offer theirs. For now, though, I’d like to offer at least one more reason.

Why the FBFI? For me, the most important reason to belong is that the FBFI gives me an opportunity to serve the wider church in the gospel ministry without ecclesiastical compromise.

That’s the short answer. Let me expand on that.

Serving the wider church

In the FBFI, we celebrate the fact that we are a fellowship of individuals, not churches. We resist taking steps that would entangle our churches in any kind of denominational structure.

Our history looks back with regrets to Baptist denominationalism. The first members of the Fundamental Fellowship, as it was then known, were members, with their churches, of the Northern Baptist Convention (since 1972, called the American Baptist Churches USA). The Fundamental Fellowship began as an effort to purge liberalism from the denomination. When that effort failed, many of the men in the Fundamental Fellowship left the NBC to form a new denomination, the Conservative Baptist Association (since about 2004 called the Venture Church Network). I can’t rehash all the history here, but even the CBA proved to entangle its churches in unacceptable ecclesiastical connections, so the leaders of the Fundamental Fellowship pulled out, instead perpetuating their fellowship through what is now known as the Foundations Baptist Fellowship International.

Why bother having a fellowship like this at all? Well, the reason conventions and denominations exist is that history shows that a broader coalition of leaders can also serve a wider group of churches through cooperation. Typically, that cooperation took place in denominations. Yet the men of our fellowship had enough of denominations and their entanglements, so sought to do something “collectively” (“serve the wider church” in my terminology) through a fellowship of individuals.

While we can’t do everything the churches need in this way, we can do some things. Our most prominent activities are organizing and promoting fellowship meetings, sponsoring chaplaincies in the military, police, and hospitals, publishing FrontLine, and, for the last decade, right here at Proclaim & Defend.

As a local pastor, I have an opportunity to also serve other churches through the FBFI.

Serving in the gospel ministry without ecclesiastical compromise

In the old days of denominationalism, conservative (and even fundamentalist) pastors found themselves engaged in wider church efforts while entangled with theological liberalism or weak evangelicalism that would not maintain a distance from theological liberalism. One reads of the vexations of pastors and churches as they tried to rid their denominations of unbelief and the “inclusive” approach. The need for a way to serve without compromise became increasingly imperative over time.

As a member of a group of likeminded individuals, I find that I can give myself wholeheartedly to this ministry without the concern that my cohorts will have a negative effect on the kind of ministry I am promoting in my local church. Their philosophy matches my philosophy, their doctrine (in the essentials) matches my doctrine. Their connections are my connections.

When I network with these likeminded pastors in our fellowship meetings, I find that I can get behind the independent mission boards, publishers, and other “wider church” ministries because we share the same ideals.

You can serve too

There are many avenues of service available among us. In the regional fellowships, many hands will make light work as we encourage one another in our regional meetings. There is opportunity to support the work through the magazine, both in its production and its dissemination. There is opportunity to support our military and other chaplains in various ways. There is opportunity for helping increase the online impact of Proclaim & Defend.

In our dark days, just showing up and encouraging one another may be the best way to support the wider effort, but you might well be able to serve in some specific capacity as well.

Seek out our regional and national fellowship meetings. Get to know us. Subscribe to the magazine. Look for ways you can serve.

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Don Johnson is the pastor of Grace Baptist Church of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada.