Piling On…

August 20th, 2007 | Posted in » Baptist Issues

Last Friday, when Micah announced he was pulling out of SBC Outpost, there was quite a bit of discussion about the state of Outpost, the tone of blogging discussions, and the like. The bulk of discussion really simply amounted to a “piling on” of sorts, expressing regret about Outpost’s tone or congratulating Micah (as well as Darren Casper and me, albeit to lesser extents) for taking a stand against such. While issues may exist, I’m not certain what happened Friday (and over the weekend) was all that productive.

Of course, Sunday I posted my rationale for leaving Outpost. Looking back at what I had written, I see I didn’t do much better.

To the Outpost contributors that remain, I must apologize publicly. While I tried to be gracious in posting my reasons for withdrawing, I’m afraid I did all of you a disservice… my words, while well-intentioned, appear now to me to look as if I were simply piling blame on you guys. I did not clearly communicate that, while the tone of some of the things written on SBC Outpost did indeed bother me, the response from Outpost detractors seeking to discredit the site was just as instrumental in my departure as anything written by Outpost contributors. I had to distance myself from that, not only because I anticipate my church commitments increasing as we enter uncertain times, but also for the sake of my sanity… the controversy and conflict we Baptist seem to thrive on is simply maddening sometimes.

Anyway, this is the last I’ll write on the subject. I hope and pray that all involved in blogging discussions will do so in the future in as Christlike a manner possible.