More on Stetzer and Driscoll

On Saturday, I noted that the North American Mission Board refused to allow Ed Stetzer to be interviewed for a Christianity Today article about controversial pastor Mark Driscoll. Today, the Baptist Press reported about a conference at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary over the weekend that featured both Stetzer and Driscoll (the BP articles are here and here). Both men are leaders in the Acts 29 movement and have been attacked by Roger Moran and his followers. Glad to see that Southeastern was willing to open up discussion about the emerging church by inviting these two men (and I guess we should be surprised that NAMB let Stetzer speak along with Driscoll). There has been a lot of misinformation put out about the emerging church movement and so it is good to see that some are willing to take a closer look.

After reading the comments by the two men in the articles it should be obvious that--even if you do not agree with everything they say--their focus is to share the love of Jesus with all peoples. As Stetzer put it:

If we are going to reach men and women from every tongue, tribe and nation, it is going to take all kinds of scripturally sound churches to reach all kinds of people.

... Whether conventional, traditional, emerging, Calvinist or a little less so, just get on mission and be faithful to the Gospel.

Amen! For people who have only listened to the attacks of Moran and others, Driscoll's comments will come as quite a surprise. Not only does he make it quite clear that he stands for traditional Christian beliefs, but he also made some quite harsh remarks about some emerging church leaders.

Perhaps the most telling moment came in the second article when Stetzer said he considered leaving denominational leadership six months ago because he was frustrated by "some people who just want to keep bombing the rubble." Fortunately, he hung in and did not allow Moran's attacks to claim another victim.