I. F. B. BACKWARDS: An Explanation by Rick Flanders

“Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences, contrary to the doctrine which ye have received, and avoid them.  For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly: and by good words and fair speeches deceive the simple.”

(Romans 16:17-18)

Dr. Rick Flanders

Have you heard critical references by Christian people to the “I. F. B.”?  In recent years these initials have been used in a negative way to refer to the “Independent Fundamental Baptists.”  Some especially angry folks even call this religious movement “the I. F. B. cult.”  Of course something must be wrong with condemning these people as if they are a single entity when, by definition, each of their churches is “independent.”  Church-goers and would-be church-goers have been misled about the people and the churches classified in this way, and a reasonable explanation of who they are, what they represent,  is in order, and, for some, even overdue.  I am a member of one of these “I. F. B.” churches, and hope I can clear things up so that folks can make more reasonable decisions about us.  The best way to explain the “I. F. B.” churches is for me to look at the letters backwards, and explain them from my own experience.

 

BAPTIST

You might say that my introduction to Christianity began in the church where my parents were members when I was born.  I was christened into the denomination and taken to Sunday school and church year after year.  But that early experience with what I was told was the religion of Christ was a false experience since our denomination had long since departed from the faith of their founders.  I thought I was a Christian because I had been baptized as a baby and joined our church as an adolescent, but nobody becomes a real Christian that way.

Then I finally heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ presented to me in an understandable way, and was drawn by God to receive Jesus Christ personally as my Savior and Lord.  According to the Bible, and my own transformation, I was “born again” and entered into a new life and a real knowledge of the living God.  Then, as I studied my Bible, I began to grow.

A friend soon introduced me to a Baptist church, and I started attending it because I was certainly not going back to the theologically “liberal” church that had kept me in darkness for so long.  I had heard the Gospel through a radio ministry, and now was ready to start attending a Bible-teaching church.  So I thought I might try the Baptists.

I was also reading the Bible every day, and came to see in the book of Matthew that baptism was not the same as I had seen it in church growing up.  They baptized converts in the New Testament after and because they had repented and believed.  Babies haven’t repented and believed in Jesus Christ, and babies were not baptized in the New Testament accounts.  Also it was evident that those baptized in the Bible were not sprinkled with a little water.  They were taken down to the river to be baptized, and went into the water and came up.  It looked to me as if they had been dipped.  So I asked the Baptist preacher to answer some questions for me about baptism, and he came to my house and showed me clearly that those to be baptized are those who had turned to Christ, and that baptism was by immersion in water, representing the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.  By being baptized a new believer was identifying himself with Christ, and confessing Him as Lord and Savior.  So I wanted to do it, and arrangements were made for me to be baptized the Bible way at the Baptist church.  I was the first person I ever saw baptized by dipping!  In this way I became a Baptist, and part of a Baptist church.

Historically, Baptists are Christians who seek to follow the Bible in every way.  The Baptist movement is based on this principle.  Really, every true believer in Jesus should be a Baptist, and every church of Jesus should operate according to what is regarded as the Baptist distinctives, because they are the Biblical practices.  I have no problem with being a Baptist.  The label “Baptist” is defined historically as referring to Christians who follow the practices of the churches in the New Testament.

Look at Matthew 3:1-17, Acts 2:41-47, and Acts 8:35-40, and Romans 6:3-4.

FUNDAMENTAL

The church that nurtured me as a new Christian, the people who baptized me and taught me my first lessons about living the new life, was affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.  I knew nothing about this organization, which was and is the largest non-Catholic denomination in the United States, and had no real opinions for or against it.  But after just a few years of serving in my church, I was disturbed about what was going on in our denomination’s affairs.  First of all, our church and my pastor had no problem with the pastor or the church from which I came.  My old church and denomination were “liberals” theologically, and did not insist that a Christian must believe in the deity of Jesus, His virgin birth, the necessity of the new birth, or even His resurrection as a literal bodily event.  They did not believe that the Bible is always accurate, nor in the miracles of the Bible, and yet my Baptist church regarded them as Christians and their church as preaching the Gospel.  Of course, I knew different.

The radio ministry that had led me to Christ identified itself as not only Christian but also as “Fundamentalist.” As a result I had plenty of Fundamentalist influence throughout my Christian experience, even though I did not really understand it at first.  The Fundamentalist movement began in the early twentieth century as a grass-roots reaction against the infiltration and influence of liberal theology and liberal ministers in the great evangelical (Gospel-preaching) denominations of America. Liberals and liberalism preached a “social gospel” and sought to redeem society rather than individuals, and allowed that some of the cherished doctrines of our Faith might not be true.  The name Fundamentalist conveys the fact that Fundamentalists insist that Christianity be defined by certain cardinal (and fundamental or essential) doctrines.  It doesn’t allow that a viewpoint represents true Christianity just because it reflects the “spirit of Jesus” or holds to the ethical teachings of Christ.  Christianity is based on the Gospel of Christ, the Fundamentalists say, and that Gospel does and always has taught certain great truths, which are fundamental to it: that the scripture is the written Word of God, infallible and without error; that Jesus is the Son of God and God the Son; that He died as an atonement for our sins; that He arose bodily from the dead; and that sinners are saved only by faith in Him.  There are many more truths in the Bible, but without believing the fundamentals of the Gospel, one is not truly a Christian.  Fundamentalism is the right way to look at Christianity, and forms the basis of the right way to deal with heretics in the church: expel them or separate from churches that won’t.  A series of experiences showed me that the Southern Baptist churches were not distinguishing the truth of the Gospel from false doctrine and false teachers.  I was not only a Baptist but also a Fundamentalist.  Gospel truth is not only to be believed and preached; it is to be cherished as the foundation of Christianity.  I must insist that only those who stood for the fundamentals are Christians.

Look at Romans 16:17-20, First Corinthians 15:1-4, Second Corinthians 11:1-15, Titus 3:9-11, and Jude 3.

INDEPENDENT

It didn’t take long for me to investigate and find that unbelieving liberals were employed by many of our Southern Baptist Convention agencies, and that my tithes and offerings were being used to support them.  So now the issue of affiliation with my beloved local church came to the fore.  I spoke with my pastor respectfully about these problems, and when he offered no solution, I began to look for a Fundamentalist church in our town that did not affiliate, support, or acknowledge as sound ministries, churches, and preachers who did not acknowledge the Bible as the Word of God.  Soon the Lord led me to such a congregation, and I joined it.  This church in North Carolina was the first of a series over the of Independent Fundamental Baptist Churches to which I have happily belonged.

Look at Second Corinthians 6:14-18, Ephesians 4:11-16, and Ephesians 5:8-11.

The letters “I. F. B.,” to anyone who knows what he is talking about, do not refer to a denomination, cult, or association.  They stand for important New Testament principles that should be followed by every child of God, and by every Biblical church.

 

Media coverage of certain scandals at particular fundamentalist churches spread the practice of broad-brushing conservative churches in general with the smell of corruption by the use of the term “I. F. B.”  Critics of fundamentalism picked up this practice and have slandered good people and some of the best churches by using the label with such invalid implications.  The fact of church scandals cannot be denied, in Baptist (both affiliated and independent) churches, as in Catholic institutions and other church organizations.  But it isn’t fair to say that the thousands of Independent Fundament Baptist churches across the nation are all, mostly, or largely corrupt.  Nor can the other charges against the “I. F. B.” that are widely disseminated on the internet or the grapevine be validated.  Some wrongdoing in some of the I. F. B. churches does not say that all of them are guilty.  Saying so is using the old “guilt by association” method of slander.

 

It is also charged by some that the I. F. B. churches have an authoritarian leadership style, for example, but this cannot truthfully be said either, across the board.  When the most authoritarian fundamental churches of the past taught others to adopt their policies, they were strongly rebuked and opposed by many other I. F. B. preachers and publications.  It is said that I. F. B. churches enforce unreasonable and unscriptural standards of life on their members.  Although this charge may be supported against some churches, the truth is that independent churches everywhere teach and support every imaginable level, high or low, of Christian living, both to their credit and to their shame, and it is impossible correctly to generalize about this.  Although some have and do rise up to influence and give leadership to preachers and churches in the absence of ecclesiastical hierarchy (this is natural), it cannot be proven or effectively argued that there is an “I. F. B. cult.”  Some unaffiliated churches and preachers over the years have been influenced by prominent preachers, churches, and institutions to which they have had no binding connection.  We are independent because that we believe Jesus to be Head of each local congregation, and because we refuse to be part of major denominations that have betrayed the Faith.  We are fundamental because we stand for the doctrines that make up the Faith.  We are Baptists because we try to follow Biblical practices as well as Bible doctrines.  We are not I. F. B. because we joined any cult or network.  The Lord and the Bible make us what we are in regard to these important issues.

 

Let every Christian man or woman, and every Christian family, give attention to sound doctrine, and avoid those who depart from it, and let us gather in churches that stand for the truth.  Let us not be influenced by the Enemy to do or say things that are wrong, based on bitterness over problems we faced in the past in a Bible-preaching church.  Let us follow our Lord into a new era of being witnesses to His Person and His Word as His Light in this dark and needy world.

 

 

Dr. Rick Flanders

Revival Ministries

Things Held in Common by Islam and Liberalism by Clay Nuttall, D. Min.

If you have not read the November, 2016, Shepherd’s Staff, What If You Are Wrong About Islam? please do that before trying to read the following.  If you need a copy of the November issue, ask for one by email.

 

The use of the term “Islam” in this article is meant to include the majority of those people in that movement who are obligated to obey the letter of the law in the Quran on the penalty of death. The use of the term “liberalism” is meant to include all those who hold a mindset that is based on lies and error.  That way of thinking pretends to be intellectual and factual, but in practice it invents answers and protects them with vicious attacks on anyone who disagrees.

 

One way to tell if a movement has no intellectual or spiritual power is to observe what they do with those who disagree with them.  In Islam, if you do not agree with them, you die.  In liberalism, if you disagree you are said to be anti-intellectual, ignorant, stupid, and lacking any credibility.  Liberalism allows dissenters no place in society, government, education, or discussion in the public arena.

 

These two movements share methods.  They operate and defend by use of hate, intimidation, threats, and violence.  They assign negative qualities to those who don’t agree with them by using the very things they are guilty of.  Islam identifies anyone who does not agree with them as infidels who are to be killed.  It complains that it is being persecuted when the facts demonstrate that this movement is responsible for the most brutal acts of persecution worldwide.  Liberalism does the same thing.  Those who disagree with them are subjected to vulgar language and are called racists, xenophobes, homophobic, Islamophobic, and facists. Liberalism turns truth into lies and lies into truth.

 

AND THERE IS MUCH MORE

 

Both movements have a callous attitude toward human life.  The murder, mayhem, beheading, burning, drowning, torture, and genocide by Islam is without debate.  This destruction of human life is justified by simply changing the category of some humans to “infidels.”  Liberalism has done the same thing with the murder of unborn children.  The abortion holocaust stands as the worst destruction of humans in the history of mankind.  They did this by simply changing the category of the unborn, saying that they really are not humans.  This is extremely similar to the tragic page in American history when black people were made slaves by simply changing their category.  In Islam, there is no safety in age or place in society.  Babies, children, women, the elderly - all are irrelevant; kill them all with no mercy.  One can only wonder where the wicked mentality of liberalism will go.  Anyone who would cruelly dismember a baby will have no trouble destroying old folks and anyone who disagrees with them.

 

The duality of both movements is also found in the matter of morality.  From day to day, it is hard anymore to tell what is moral.  The rules are changed at will, normally to benefit the elite or, in Islam, the male gender.  Sexual slavery, rape, genital mutilation, multiple wives, and the animalization of women stand as unquestionable evidence.  Driven by a preoccupation of sex in this world and the next, morality is adjustable.  Liberalism capitalizes on the same thing, driven by what they call “freedom” when in fact it makes people slaves, not free.  The celebration of sodomy and the invention of same-sex marriage are only examples of the moral freefall.  The creation of things that do not exist and that are lies includes the transgender movement. Suddenly perversion has become popular in this “anything goes” society that benefits some elite, but enslaves many.  In both movements, any protest of this growing degradation is met with a violent response.

 

AND THERE IS STILL VERY MUCH MORE

 

Liberalism cannot tolerate the true record of history.  It must be adjusted to fit their propensity to have all things their way, and this is why liberalism has worked to destroy the Constitution.  In its original form, it opposes everything liberalism stands for; therefore, it has been rewritten by them, deliberately and systematically.  A true and honest record of history has been changed in print and in the classroom because liberalism cannot abide the truth.  The same is true of Islam. World history and that of this movement has been changed to alter the respectability of a movement that is much more than a religion.

 

Every day there is a new report of how Islam is invading education with its precepts and goals. In true form, it is demanding new “rights” in every area, but at the same time is denying the same freedoms to others.  The issue of clothing is only one way to soften up the opposition.  The demand for Sharia law is much more egregious.  This new legal system stands in direct contradiction to the US Constitution.  To use it is actually treason.  Education, however, is the major victory for liberalism.  It deliberately moved from one-room schools to community schools to regional schools to state schools to federal schools.  With each step, liberalism moved to ownership and created its own factory to press the liberal mindset on the populous.  The lie of “public education” allowed them to drain the finances of the people, leaving them with no power to stop the moral and mental train wreck.  All one has to do is to watch the news every day to see the kind of degraded society it has produced.  Pseudo-science has produced a plethora of cruel lies - the Big Bang, evolution, global warming, etc., - and all the mind-numbed robots simply repeat what they have been told to believe.

 

THE WORST IS YET TO COME

 

One would think that people who call themselves Christians would know enough about God and the Word of God not to be caught up in these lies.  Liberalism, however, has badgered and controlled even Christian education so that it follows like a lap dog, letting the enemies of God set the false standard like the people of God did when they chose Saul as king because they wanted to be like the rest of the nations.

 

Almost everyone you know has been influenced by the liberal mindset so that they now think like liberals.  We are all victims of the liberal success in education.  I live in the world of theology.  Not one day goes by that I don’t read or hear of people who handle the Bible like liberals do.  Knowing my days are numbered, I press on to finish two books that deal with this problem.  From theological articles to Facebook, I see the same thing.  There is a mad rush to make the Bible say what people want it to say.  The theological error of the month simply proves that our crowd has been taught to think like liberals.  I know this is bold and pointed, but then these articles have one purpose - to make people think.


Shepherd's Staff is prepared by Clay Nuttall, D. Min.

SHEPHERD'S STAFF – December, 2016

 

A communication service of Shepherd's Basic Care, for those committed to the authority and sufficiency of the Bible.  Shepherd's Basic Care is a ministry of information and encouragement to pastors, missionaries, and churches.  Write for information using the e-mail address shepherdstaff2@juno.com or Shepherd's Staff.

SOMEONE TELL ME, Clay Nuttall, D. Min.

These long days of illness have given me a good opportunity to triple my reading time. It has been very profitable, and I am reading more widely than ever. While it assists me in my research, I keep coming back to questions that are not found in any written text. Having spent a lifetime in ministry, education, and missions, my mind is full of questions. Some answers are clear; others are not. As you read my questions, you may have some wisdom to share. If so, I ask you to pass it on to me.

Some weeks ago, I had lunch with a dear friend who is the president of a well-known seminary in another country. We were considering the impact, or lack thereof, of theological education on every level. I could easily spend a month recording the positive effects of training on the lives of so many who have served the Lord so well. Many of these folks have gone on to their reward, and we are grateful for having known them. On the negative side, though, it has been painful to see men and women who appeared to have been well-trained but who have slid, or jumped, into theological systems and questionable moral practices of which they now seem to be proud. This type of errant direction was unusual in the past, but it has now become a rush with men and women who ought to know better. So my question to you is this: “Why has this departure from truth become so popular?”

ONE THING I AM SURE OF

There is no question in my mind that the American model of education is responsible for adding fuel to this fire. The liberal mind-set has always been a part of that system. It is flawed and tends to hide behind intellectualism, philosophy, and so-called “science.” It is intellectually cruel with the capacity to turn truth into a lie, deluding people into thinking that it is indeed the truth. As time has passed, this “liberal mind-set” has become the majority and has now created a mental dictatorship.

The admission that something is a lie comes when you have to force others to think like you do. Ultimately, you are punished if you don’t think (or believe) like they do. If truth doesn’t stand on its own two feet, then it is a lie. This is exactly where our world is at this moment.

The liberal mind-set makes much to-do about “critical and analytical thinking,” the truth is that their approach forbids such serious consideration. The American educational model is really just indoctrination and brainwashing. If you don’t support the fairy tales of evolution, global warming (even they know that was dumb), and moral degradation such as sodomy or transgenderism, you are a danger - an enemy. You are not allowed to either think or speak on the subject.

THE RESULT OF THIS PLAGUE

Almost everyone we know today has been raised to think with a liberal mind-set. It might be understandable that this could happen in an academic world run by intellectual pagans. It is understandable that the present plight of this nation came about because the liberal mind-set is now the only one that is tolerated.

What troubles me is that this mind-set has become the standard for most so-called Christian institutions. Our crowd “longed for the leeks and garlic of Egypt [Numbers 11:5].” They wanted to be like the “big boys” in education. Like all departures from error, some of that error was carried along. Such is the sad story of Luther and Calvin.

That is not to say that some institutions are not battling to pass on a biblical mind-set. Of course most of them would say that they do “think biblically,” but where is the proof? They have bought into the world of “form” rather than the imperative of “content and meaning.” A good education will cover a lot of ground and disciplines, but it will never bow to human reason as the final authority. Everything ought to begin and end with the authority of the Word of God.

OBSERVING THE FAITHFUL

So how can it be that some who were trained with a high biblical standard, with professors or pastors who were loved and respected, could then move to flawed theology? At this point, I am thinking of men who were educated beside me or in front of me. Some of this has to do with our own circle of education, where indoctrination or brain-washing was used. They were not taught critical and analytical thinking, and the truth as it was presented never became their own.

Pick up the catalog of an institution, any institution, and start asking questions about individual courses or sections. Where is that clear effort to lead the student in owning the theological truth? Course after course is full of good information, our truth. We even give them exams so that we can know they remembered our truth. Where is the emphasis of God’s truth as it is displayed in the text, in that the student knows how to own what he gleaned from that text?

Those who have moved on to theological error and the liberal mind-set didn’t get it. They have joined the great movement of “adding to the Bible” whatever they want it to say. Intellectual pride makes that so easy. Young men in particular are lured by theologians with twisted minds who a have made rewriting the Bible into an art form.

So here we are back at the beginning. The fact is that not all students will get it, but I would be satisfied if most of them did. I have a short list in front of me; how did these men get drawn into a historical theology that reads like “Alice in Wonderland???” 

 

Shepherd’s Staff is prepared by Clay Nuttall, D. Min.

SHEPHERD’S STAFF – July, 2016

A communication service of Shepherd’s Basic Care, for those committed to the authority and sufficiency of the Bible. Shepherd’s Basic Care is a ministry of information and encouragement to pastors, missionaries, and churches. Write for information using the e-mail address shepherdstaff2@juno.com or at ShepherdStaff.