Dr. Chitwood's Remarks on Cutting Room Floor

What a great meeting in Louisville!

I've felt for the last several years that too much energy in SBC life has been spent in often bitter arguments over trivial stuff. People have wasted too much time trying to marginalize their opponents and to beat them down in a duel of theological one-up-manship. In past years, the center of gravity of this type of activity in SBC life seemed to me to be in the BoT of the IMB.

I watched most of the SBC annual meeting "real time" via streaming video from my distant outpost here in Oklahoma. I had my green eyeshades on looking for any sign of a return of civility in the operation of the IMB BoT. As a result of what I saw on the streaming-video feed, I can now confirm that the military secret that the IMB BoT is now running on all cylinders can be confirmed, not only by those in the SBC who are "well connected", by even by "guys in the pew" -- like me -- out here in the hinterland.

The good news was contained in the brief remarks make by Dr. Paul Chitwood in his introduction of Dr. Rankin during Tuesday evening's report by the IMB. To my knowledge, Dr. Chitwood's remarks are the first time that any public statement has been made by anyone at the IMB that confirms rumors that cooperation and comity have been restored amongst members of the Board of Trustees as well as between the Board of Trustees and Management of the IMB.

I'd like to be able to extract quotes from Dr. Chitwood's remarks and include them. However, for some reason, the video podcast of the IMB report does not contain the first few minutes when Dr. Chitwood spoke.

Thanks, Dr. Chitwood and BoT for this good news! Even more important, thanks for moving forward together so that this "good news" report is possible.