JACKSON, Tenn. — Feb. 7, 2018 — Former 51社区 President David S. Dockery spoke on the relationship between Southern Baptists and evangelicals at the second annual Dockery Lectures on Baptist Thought and Heritage at Union Feb. 5.
The lecture series, named in Dockery鈥檚 honor, was established in 2016 with former Union professor James Patterson delivering the 2017 lectures. Dockery served as Union鈥檚 president from 1996-2014 and now serves as president of Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois.
Dockery鈥檚 afternoon lecture, titled 鈥淪outhern Baptists and Evangelicals: Why Southern Baptists Need Evangelicals,鈥� focused on the relationship between those two groups, specifically in the conservative resurgence of the second half of the 20th century. When conservative Southern Baptists sought to uphold the inerrancy of the Bible at the 1979 convention, they found few within their denomination who would defend it.
鈥淭hey looked down the long bench of theologians to see who could represent them in this debate,鈥� Dockery said. 鈥淭hey generally had to look beyond the teaching theologians of the SBC for guidance. These Southern Baptist leaders in the late 1970s and early 1980s turned to鈥oices across the broader evangelical world.鈥�
Dockery said theologians such as Carl F. H. Henry, J. I. Packer and Francis Schaeffer provided the defense of Scripture Southern Baptists were looking for.
鈥淪outhern Baptists needed to turn to the evangelical world to find help and guidance in order to reform the Southern Baptist Convention and to reclaim the convictions that had been largely present throughout the 19th century,鈥� Dockery said.
He said while Southern Baptists continue to struggle with various issues within the convention, the issue of the authority and inerrancy of Scripture has been clearly decided.
In addition to the afternoon lecture, Dockery gave an evening lecture addressing the other side of the relationship between these groups titled 鈥淓vangelicals and Southern Baptists: Why Evangelicals Need Southern Baptists.鈥�