Let’s get this thing started. Since it’s supposed to be (among other things) a place for Fellowship people to discuss things, let’s discuss.
What’s a “CBF” anyway?
We all know the oft romanticized story of CBF’s beginnings. Moderate Baptists pulled out of the Southern Baptist Convention after more than 15 years of struggling against a political takeover couched as a “conservative resurgence.”
That was 17 years ago. And CBF, like every other 17 year old in the world, has to begin answering the question, “Who are we going to be?” This question is different from the one the leadership is asking right now, which I’d describe as the “what are we going to do,” question. The “who are we going to be” question has more to do with how we continue to organize ourselves and operate as a “Fellowship.”
Right now, I’d say we are between two different paths. One, I’ll call the path of increasing institutional structure. On this path, CBF the organization grows, and exists primarily to do more things for churches and individuals.
The institutional path is, or course, our legacy. We sprung off from a very large institution, and for the first few years just assumed institutional thinking. It’s no wonder. Institutions were what we knew. Institutions with lots of agencies and arms, do lots of things; they’re very strong and recognizable. And if we say CBF exists to serve Christians and Churches as they discover and fulfill their God-given mission, the institutional path makes a lot of sense.
At the end of that path…. denominationhood ? (did I just make up a word?)
The other path I’ll call (for lack of a better way of phrasing it) increasing movement mentality. If the institutional mindset makes CBF an organization that does things for churches and individuals, the movement mindset makes CBF an organization that does things with churches and individuals. On this path the organizational part of CBF may or may not grow. We may get new offices, new staff, new agencies—we may not. Either way, the organization exists only to bring churches and people together around work—to do things with churches and individuals.
Movement thinking is all the rage right now. Movements are free in ways institutions aren’t. They’re free to respond and adapt to changes in society quickly. Since no one is “in charge” of a movement there’s less worry about people usurping power for their own agendas. For those of who us are tired and suspect of any institutions, movement thinking is very attractive.
We all like to think of CBF as a movement. But here are a few unresolved questions about the movement mentality path:
How do we articulate our essence aside from saying “we’re not X,Y or Z?” When people ask you what CBF is, what do you say?
What lies at the end of this path? Does this path have an end? Are movements destined to either fizzle out or become a rigid institution?
Thoughts? Feel free to respond to anyone of the above questions. I’m particularly interested in what you say when people ask, “What’s a CBF?”
Join the conversation and invite your friends.
I really hope that we are more about being a apart of the movement of God rather than building a denomination or an institution. One of the tricks will be determining that line that we have to live on between enough institution to facilitate connections and movement and to much institution, which hinders connection and movement.
I think there is a fine line between a movement and an institution. I remember very well the initial movement that led to CBF. But we have gradually taken on more and more of the necessary structures to do what we set out to do. The structure tends to make us more rigid. I am all for guarding against too much structure so that we can retain the fire, excitement and flexibility inherent in a movement.
I think the reason that we are having this conversation about institution vs. movement is because the younger generation doesn’t remember much if anything about the “conservative resurgence.” I was eleven years old when CBF was founded. I remember some of the tensions created in Texas but I didn’t really understand what was going on. It wasn’t until I came to CBF about a year ago that I started to put all the pieces together. I think that the institution part of our organization is in place because that’s all that we knew at that time and it was the only place we could start. I’m excited about the whisperings of movement within our organization but hope that we honor the road we have been down and the courage that went into the beginnings of CBF. I think the younger and older generations need to be intentional about learning from and with each other as we grow together. Maybe the answer isn’t one or the other but a healthy balance of both.
It is my hope we are more of a movement than an institution. It seems to me that the downfall of institutions, particularly religious ones, is that the institutional structure develops into an idol of worship. Unfortunately, I think that we go back and forth between an institution based organization and a movement of Christ-followers. I think we must be a movement in order to survive
The fellowship movement was breathed life within a very institutionalized denominational existence. CBF was birthed in and lives in the fellowship movement. CBF is an organization that derives its energy and purpose from the existence of the fellowship movement. The concern in institutionalizing CBF is that institutions begin to spend great energy and resources to sustain their own existence which depletes the resources and energy left to continue to fulfill their purpose. While organizating can certainly lead to institutionalizing, it does not have to do so. I think one of the keys in keeping us on the movement path is in leadership.
How does the leadership in a movement differ from the leadership in an institution?
Joel McLendon wrote:
((What lies at the end of this path? Does this path have an end? Are movements destined to either fizzle out or become a rigid institution?))
At age 71 I’ve had the benefit of watching a lot of denominational evolution over time. Concurrently, I’ve watched long-standing, traditional churches and start-up churches during several evolutionary eras. Also, concurrently in the secular world, I’ve watched numerous “leading entities” be uprooted and surpassed by start-up entities. Globally, today, 42 countries have longer life-expectancies than the US whereas 15 years ago there were only 11. Change happens.
While our “spiritual” beings are very different from our more “wordly” beings, neither function in an absolute vacum.
One aspect of anything new replacing something that precedes it is that over time the latter accumulates lots of cumbersome baggage. It is often more efficient for something to start fresh than to re-balance. Additionally, the “new” rarely has much room to be wrong and stay wrong for long.
So there is an aspect of a CBF that is primarily the fresh replacing the stale. That fact is not very uplifting as there is a clear implication that what’s fresh today may become stale tomorrow.
One version of “freshness” is the Emergent movement that likes to think they are not as vulnerable to such natural progressions. A CBF likes to think it is more “emergent” than “from whence it came.”
However, there is a facet of becoming “missional” that may trump cyclic progressions and regressions over time. That is, as individuals become directly involved in the lives of others (folks they encounter in non-traditional settings) what makes them credible is the Holy Spirit working through them, personally. Most of us are scared silly to trust somebodies early encounter with the Holy and Eternal to anything within ourselves. We quickly look for a team-mate of some sort rather than trusting whatever measure of the Holy Spirit we reflect. But sometimes while we are “being missional” we are all that is viewable of God in a circumstance. To the extent that happens, the freshness of it will never grow stale.
So a CBF could be the Holy Spirit un-muzzled. And, that would be different.
Gene Prescott
Greenville, NC