I do admit that I rarely criticize a group that I am not part of. As a missionary associated with the Southern Baptists, an Evangelical Protestant Christian Denomination, I feel pretty comfortable critiquing or complaining about missionaries, Southern Baptists, Baptists, Evangelicals, Protestants, and Christians. At least I am more comfortable with critiquing these groups than those outside of these designations. That being said, I do think that the outside critic does have a good purpose.

This sort of struck me when reading a post shared by a friend. The post was a Southern Baptist who “found it interesting” that non-SB Christians were criticizing the Southern Baptists for discussing the possible complete eradication of female pastors or even female pastoral roles within the denomination. That post suggested that those non-SB voices should mind their own denomination and stay out of Southern Baptist concerns.

Today, I was reading about concerns of some SB voices who are trying to promote a more pro-racist, white supremacist agenda where addressing injustices to Blacks (and other racial minorities) by the denomination should be labeled as “racist,” “woke,” and “un-Christian.” Such an agenda is pretty abusive to the Gospel as well as the English language. But looking at the responses, I saw some that essentially felt that the complaints about this happening in the denomination (and yes, I know that some Southern Baptists balk at the term denomination… deal with it) were from “atheists” or outsiders. Again, the message was that outsiders should just keep their mouths shut.

But outside critique is exactly what we need. I like the Water Analogy. If you want to understand water, don’t ask a fish. The fish lives in the water but lacks the perspective to understand it, in contrast to other things. It knows the bottom of the water, perhaps, like in a pond or river, and it may know the surface and what is in between. It does not really know solid ground, or the air, particularly. This insider, or emic perspective, is profound on some levels, but in others is extremely limited… myopic. A cat, on the other hand, knows water in a very different and limited way. Outside of drinking it, it understands water as something it approaches, touches, and avoids. It has an outsider or etic understanding. Both perspectives have value but are limited without the other. The ideal might be a duck. It knows water, but other elements as well. It knows to be on land, in trees, flying in the air, swimming on the surface of the water, and diving underwater. Often, this sort of understanding is available to only a few. In the end, we often need the emic and etic perspectives to be integrated to reduce the blind spots of either.

In other words, we need the outside critic. The Bible is full of instances where God steps in to provide an external perspective, particularly through the prophets, to address the blind spots of the people. At times, God even used outsiders to educate the insider Jews or insider Christians.

Telling outsiders to mind their own business is much like telling insiders that “If they don’t like the way things are, they should just leave.” And I hear that a lot online as well.

Rejecting complaints is a refusal to learn. Even if one listens to the complaints and ultimately decides they are invalid, the process of such reflection is helpful… enriching.

It is hard. I don’t like to hear complaints. I don’t like to hear criticism. Frankly, at 60, I am pretty settled in my ways and perspectives. The last thing I want is someone to come along and tell me that my cherished views and actions… suck. And yes… There are bad-faith critics out there. Trolls. One does ultimately need to be selective. But to automatically attack those who disagree BECAUSE THEY DISAGREE really makes us the trolls.

Personally, I think there are a lot of things wrong with the Southern Baptists right now, and I don’t see evidence that there is much of a move to fix them. For the most part, I do stay out of the battles and will probably continue to do so. But for those who care enough to complain and critique (even the ones whose views I don’t respect), I should find value in the input and process.

I am actually writing a book that negatively critiques a lot of the emphases in Evangelical missions over the last 50 or 60 years. I have wondered whether I should do it. And I have wondered if I should hand it off to my missionary and missiologist friends to critique. I prefer not to complain, and I dislike receiving complaints (as is true with most people). But I do have a passion for missions… a passion that for me is much stronger than I have for denominations. I think I just have to trust the process and hope that my words and the words of others will engender good reflection and discussion, and perhaps some changes… including in myself.