From its tall white steeple and red-brick front to its Sunday services filled with rousing gospel music and evangelical lectures, the First Baptist Church of Alexandria, Virginia, embodies many of the basic characteristics of a Southern Baptist congregation.
On a recent Sunday, Kim Eskridge, the pastor for women and children, encouraged members to invite friends and neighbors to an upcoming vacation Bible school, a traditional Baptist activity, to help “reach families in the community with the gospel.”
Related posts
However, First Baptist’s tenure in the Southern Baptist Convention may be coming to an end because that pastor is a woman.
At the SBC’s annual meeting in Indianapolis on June 11–12, representatives will vote on whether to change the denomination’s constitution to effectively exclude congregations with any female pastors—nnot just in the top position. Last year, a preliminary vote yielded overwhelming support for the plan.
First Baptist Church leaders, who have contributed millions to Southern Baptist charities since the convention’s founding in the nineteenth century, are ready for potential expulsion.
“We are saddened by the direction the SBC has taken,” the church said in a statement.
And it’s not the only one.
According to some estimates, the planned prohibition might affect hundreds of congregations, with a disproportionate impact on mostly black churches.
The vote is partially the result of events that began two years ago.
That’s when a Virginia pastor contacted SBC officials, claiming that First Baptist and four surrounding churches were “out of step” with denominational orthodoxy, which states that only men can be pastors. The SBC Credentials Committee opened a formal investigation in April.
Southern Baptists dispute which ministry this doctrine pertains to. Some think it’s merely the senior pastor, while others define a pastor as anyone who preaches and wields spiritual authority.
And, in a Baptist tradition that values local church autonomy, critics argue that the convention should not legislate a constitutional provision based on one interpretation of its non-binding doctrinal statement.
According to some estimates, women serve as pastors in hundreds of SBC-affiliated congregations, accounting for only a small portion of the denomination’s almost 47,000 members.
However, detractors argue that the amendment will further restrict the nation’s largest Protestant denomination, which has been progressively moving to the right in recent decades.
They also question whether the SBC has better things to accomplish.
It has struggled to address sexual abuse allegations in its churches. In May, a Southern Baptist seminary in Texas indicted a former professor on charges of fabricating a record of alleged sexual abuse by a student to obstruct a federal investigation into sexual misbehavior within the convention.
SBC membership has dropped below 13 million, marking a nearly half-century low. Baptismal rates have been steadily declining over time.
The amendment, if passed, would not result in an immediate purge. However, it might keep the denomination’s leaders busy for years, investigating and removing churches.
Many predominantly black churches have men as lead pastors but give women pastor titles in other areas, such as worship and children’s ministry.
“To disfellowship like-minded churches… based on a local-church governance decision dishonors the spirit of cooperation and the guiding tenets of our denomination,” wrote Pastor Gregory Perkins, head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s National African American Fellowship, to denominational leaders.
The debate affects the predominantly white denomination’s already difficult efforts to diversify and overcome its past of slavery and segregation.
Proponents of the amendment argue that the convention should reinforce its theological statement, the Baptist Faith and Message, which states that the pastorate is “limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”
“If we won’t stand on this issue and be unapologetically biblical, then we won’t stand on anything,” said Arlington Baptist Church pastor Mike Law.
Because Baptist congregations are self-governing, the convention cannot advise on what to do or who to designate as pastors.
However, the convention has the power to determine which churches are welcome and which are not. Even without a formal change, the Executive Committee has begun notifying churches with female pastors that they are leaving. One of its largest congregations, the Saddleback Church of California, was included.
When Saddleback and a small Kentucky church appealed to the annual conference in 2023, delegates unanimously declined to reinstate them.
The amendment would strengthen such enforcement efforts.
Some churches with female pastors resigned on their own last year. They range from Elevation Church, a North Carolina megachurch, to First Baptist of Richmond, Virginia, which has had close SBC ties since the convention’s inception.
According to Law, the problem has served as a “canary in the coalmine” for liberal denominations, with several beginning to ordain women and then LGBTQ+ individuals.
He declared in a video on a pro-amendment website that “Southern Baptists are facing a decisive moment.” “Here’s the trajectory of doing nothing: Soon, Southern Baptist churches will start openly supporting homosexual clergy, same-sex marriage, and eventually transgenderism.”
Others point out that Pentecostals and other faiths have had female pastors for generations while being theologically conservative.
Some SBC congregations with female pastors are very connected with the convention, while others have few contacts and identify more with historically black or other progressive faiths.
Furthermore, some SBC churches believe that the 2000 faith statement only applies to senior pastors. They claim that as long as the church leader is male, women can serve in other pastoral duties.
Such churches may leave if SBC leaders interfere with congregations following “their conscience, biblical convictions, and values by recognizing women can receive a pastoral gift from God in partnership with male leadership,” according to Dwight McKissic, an Arlington, Texas pastor, on the social media platform X.
Other churches argue that women can hold any position, including senior pastor, and that congregations can agree to disagree if they support the majority of the SBC core statement.
That group includes the First Baptist Church of Alexandria. Though its present senior pastor is a male, the church acknowledges “God’s calling to ordain any qualified individual, male or female, for pastoral ministry,” according to a statement.
First Baptist leaders rejected interviews, but the organization has extensively discussed the problem on its website.
Although it plans to send representatives to the SBC annual meeting, it has received advice to anticipate a resolution that would deny them voting rights.
“I do believe we need to be heard and represented,” Senior Pastor Robert Stephens stated during a video-recorded meeting.
The SBC’s senior administrative body opposes the change. In a Baptist Press column, Jeff Iorg, president of the SBC Executive Committee, stated that investigating congregations’ compliance would occupy an excessive amount of time and energy on something that should not be a litmus test for fellowship.
Baptist Women in Ministry, which started in the SBC in the 1980s but today serves different Baptist denominations, has taken notice. According to Rev. Meredith Stone, its executive director, some women pastors inside the SBC had sought assistance.
On the eve of the SBC meeting, the group plans to premiere “Midwives of a Movement,” a documentary commemorating 20th-century trailblazers for women in Baptist ministry.
“As they are saying women have less value to God than men in the church, we want to make sure that women know they do have equal value and that there are no limits to how they follow Christ in the work of the church,” Stone stated.
