Southern Baptist Presidential Nominee Says “Cool” Pastors Hurt Church

Luke 17:28-30 “Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built” but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.

Ronnie Floyd, one of three men in the running for the presidency of the Southern Baptist Convention, said that the denomination has seen a decline in baptisms because of “cool pastors” who are more concerned with fitting into the world’s way of life than having a focus on glorifying God.

“Some of us have a heart to be so real with people that we just think if we’re cool enough, we’re going to get [the numbers],” said Floyd. “We’re never going to be cool enough to win our towns, our rural settings, to win our cities, to win the nation, to win the world, to win the nations. We’re never going to be cool enough; the only thing that’s going to bring that is a binding movement of the spirit of God that comes only when we are going up to be with God.”

Floyd, senior pastor of Cross Church in northwest Arkansas, cited statistics that showed 60 percent of SBC churches did not have a single baptism of anyone between 12 and 17 years old.  A full 25 percent of churches overall reported that no one had accepted Christ and was baptized in their churches in the last year.

Floyd told the pastors in attendance at the 2014 SBC Pastor’s Conference that it was more important to spend time with God and to be right with Him than it was to be pleasing to the people and to “fit in” with society.

“The future of our leadership, the future of our church and the future of the Southern Baptist Convention will be discovered by one thing and one thing alone – us going up to be with God,” Floyd said.

2 thoughts on “Southern Baptist Presidential Nominee Says “Cool” Pastors Hurt Church

  1. Having left a “cool church” because the message had followed the same path as the absolutely horrible music, I agree with this man. A woman actually came down to the front of that church, and stood there for at least five minutes while the elders and pastor gazed at the ceiling, looking “holy.” We had all been told “the elders” would pray with whoever came forward, and no amount of waving I could do got their attention. When the lady turned to go at the end of what passed as an invitation hymn, one of the worship team went after her. I don’t know if they were able to find her. And they wonder why they’re losing people.

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