Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) presidential candidate Tom Ascol addressed a room full of messengers during a sold out early breakfast just hours before the election of a new SBC President will take place.
The breakfast was sponsored by Turning Point USA and Liberty University’s Standing for Freedom Center. Turning Point USA’s founder and executive director Charlie Kirk and the Standing for Freedom Center’s Ryan Helfenbein addressed the room before Ascol gave a short speech.
Ascol thanked his supporters for all helping put him in a position to win the SBC presidency in order to “change the direction” of the SBC.
Florida’s Grace Baptist Church senior pastor explained what he means when he says, “Change the direction,” sharing that he wants to see the SBC return to the fear of God.
“There is no fear of God before our eyes in the SBC, and I’m talking about us. I’m not talking about them. I’m talking about us. Just look at what has happened in our conventional churches,” Ascol said. He then said that the SBC has ministers in its midst publicly lying and then practically joking about it.
“The SBC has ministers of the gospel who have committed sexual abuse and ministers who have covered for friends who have committed sexual abuse,” Ascol said. “We have Christians that have stood for this level of godless activities, because they feel justified that their goals are warranted. Brothers and sisters, these things ought not be.”
Ascol used his common phrase, which refers to the Bible, saying, “We have a Book. Our God’s told us how we are to live in this world.”
“We are engaged in a spiritual war,” Ascol said. “We see the enemies of God all throughout our culture, just infiltrating every institution.” Ascol listed critical race theory (CRT), intersectionality, queer theory, and radical feminism as some examples.
The Founders Ministries’ founder said he’s been labeled a conspiracy theorist for saying that these cultural issues are spiritual warfare, to which he responded, “I’m not a conspiracy theorist. I’m a conspiracy realist.”
“The devil is a conspirator. How do you not see that if you read your Bible,” Ascol said.
If Ascol becomes SBC’s new president, he explained that he will continue to do what he has been doing, just with a much larger voice, urging his fellow pastors and brothers that “we can’t continue on the way we’ve been going. This world is going to hell in a hand-basket. We have the only message that redeems sinners from hell.”
“We have the only message that God has given to His world to reconcile evil to Himself. If we don’t preach the gospel, nobody else is. We have been given the Word of God to tell us what that gospel is,” Ascol said. “We are not editors of the Book. We are messengers of the Book. We must take what the Book says and declare it.”
