November 7 is a very significant date in my life. November 7 was my paternal grandmother’s birthday. I asked Leslie to be my wife around 10:30pm on November 7, 1990, and she said yes. But perhaps the greatest association is that on November 7, 1984, I was born again.
Growing up in a Southern Baptist preacher’s home with a godly mother and father who sensed a life’s calling to make sure their children were rightly reared, I was brought to church from the day I was born. As a Southern Baptist kid, I’ve experienced the full range of SBC life- RA’s, meals, Baptist summer camp, VBS, Training Union, Sunday School, revivals, meals, church visitation, more meals, Bible drill, Jot the Dot, and even SBC annual meetings (which for a kid was like playing trick-or-treat for all the booth give-aways and, if you were good, a few comics purchased from the Baptist Book Store). Ahhh, the good ol’ days.
I remember learning about church and about God early in life, and like many kids, I walked an aisle to be saved and baptized at age 6. My father was precautious of my juvenile resolution, so before I was baptized I had to complete a Billy Graham basic bible study course by mail and received a little gold certificate for completion. And so, with my baptism I had become a full-fledge member of a Southern Baptist church with all of the voting and arguing rights inherent therein. But from the age of 6 to 16, I struggled with what my “decision” really was. I’m certainly not against childhood decisions; matter of fact, my own children accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior early in their lives as well. I just knew during my preteens and early teenage years that I could not sense a real relationship with a living God. Over the years, I’ve come to understand that many youth have the same struggle after an early childhood decision. I felt empty and lost.
Fast forward a few years to that particular Autumn night in 1984. As a freshman in college, I was sitting on the end of middle row number 6 at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, listening to Jerry Johnston preach a message entitled, “The Marks of a Christian.” It seemed as if his sermon points were an outline of my life’s struggle to maintain my outward Christian appearance and church membership, while I knew the inside was hollow. The deathblow to my self-image came with his words, “If you’ve convinced yourself that you are a Christian because of some words you’ve said somewhere to someone, and yet your perpetual sin remains unchastised by God, chances are you’re not saved.” He went on to explain that God spanks his children when they willingly live in sin, but he said that God doesn’t chastise those who are not His own. I felt the Holy Spirit convict my very heart, and I walked forward to receive Christ as my complete Savior and Lord. I knew more about the sinner’s prayer than the fellow that counseled me in the counseling room, but that night the specific order of words in a prayer didn’t matter. God had touched my heart, and I responded in faith and confessed my sin before him. I asked him to be my Savior, once and for all, and to be my Lord, to rule me for the rest of my life. Some folks may say I gained the assurance of my salvation that night; God knows the full story. All I know is I once was lost, but now I’m not. And yes, I have rejoiced in the spanking hand of God in my life since then.
I called Mama and Daddy that night to tell them the news. I was scared to death that they would be upset or offended that my actions that evening might cast a negative light on their spiritual leadership. But on the contrary, they were ecstatic and supportive. I was re-baptized on the following Sunday at Thomas Road by co-pastor Rev. Jim Moon. I didn’t publish that much back home, because I didn’t know how folks would take my being re-baptized in an independent Baptist church, let alone being baptized by a Rev. Moon. But that week marked the beginning of my new walk toward spiritual maturity, a journey I’m still on and will find its last step at death to be the most complete. A couple of years later, I transferred my membership to East Griffin Baptist Church, where I began to develop as a Southern Baptist youth minister. And the rest is history. Or so I thought.
A few years ago, I received a call from a church clerk in the Southern Baptist church I was a member prior to attending college. The dialogue went something like this:
Clerk: “Brother Buck, we were going over our church roles, and we noticed that we still have your letter.”
Buck: “Oh (chuckle), that’s funny. That’s because I got saved after I went to college, so I got a new letter when I was baptized at Thomas Road Baptist Church.”
Clerk: (Silence) “I don’t understand. Your family moved their letters when they joined East Griffin Baptist Church; did you not join there too?”
Buck: “Yes, I did. But I transferred my letter from Thomas Road.”
Clerk: “Well, what about your letter here?”
Buck: “Well, I wasn’t saved when I was a member there.”
Clerk: “So what your letter?”
Buck: “I guess it’s invalid, because I am saying I got saved later.”
Clerk: “Well, this is awkward. What do I do with your letter?”
Buck: “What do we normally do with letters of unsaved church members?” (Oops, I thought, bad wording).
Clerk: (Silence) “Nothing. Their names stay on the roles.”
Buck: “Well, it looks to me like we have two options: I could stay on your roles as an unsaved church member with the right to drop in at the next business meeting and vote; or you could just throw the letter away.”
Clerk: “I guess it would be best to just get rid of your membership. We’ll vote to remove you as a member.”
Buck: “Thank you. And I love ya’ll very much.”
There really should never have to be a choice between church membership status-quo and right spiritual standing before God, but sometimes the line that is drawn in the sand is one that Jesus draws. Like W.A. Criswell, former pastor of FBC Dallas, once said, “Saved church members make better church members.” Sometimes hard choices have to be made when a Southern Baptist gets saved.
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