Bruce Ashford Finds it Hard to Move on From SEBTS

I included this video because it allows you to verify that J.D. Greear and Bruce Ashford are good friends and roomed together in college. I think it is also useful to display another passionate rant by a celebrity Christian against “discernment bloggers.” Ah yes, it’s old “Ahab” Greear who, when he reads another blog article revealing he has hired a corrupt elder he screeches, “Is that you, you troubler of Israel?” If we could only have unity! Translation – you discernment bloggers need to shut your pie-holes.

But I digress. On to the video:

On August 9, 2021 Dee published an article titled, “Where’s Bruce Ashford? Did They Give Him a Cake?”

In her article Dee documented the fact that Bruce Ashford and J.D. Greear were college roommates and Ashford was an elder at The Summit Church, where the Senior Pastor is J.D. Greear. At some point we believe Ashford was removed from his position and we do not believe there has been an official, public statement released giving the reason for Ashford’s removal. That’s what builds unity, 1 Timothy 5:20 be damned! (“But those elders who are sinning you are to reprove before everyone, so that the others may take warning.”)

Below is a quote taken from Dee’s article:

Here is part of his bio from BruceAshford.net.

I knew that American Christians needed to find ways to witness to Christ not only in private via interpersonal conversations but also in public via education, politics, art, and entertainment. I knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life motivating and equipping Christians to be public witnesses. I sensed that the best way for me to do that was through higher education.

So I enrolled in a Ph.D. program in Theological Studies. In 2003, I completed the Ph.D., defending my dissertation on a philosopher named Ludwig Wittgenstein. I was hired to teach philosophy and History of Ideas for the undergraduate program at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (SEBTS). Today, I remain at SEBTS as Provost and Professor of Theology & Culture.

Except, he hasn’t remained Provost as far as I can tell.


Dee also established the fact that Ashford resigned from his job of Provost at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in the summer of 2020 and was shifted to a full-time professor at the SEBTS. In the middle of Ashford’s first semester of work as a full-time professor (October 2020) Ashford’s employment at SEBTS came to an abrupt end. Again, we can find no official reason given for this, nor does there seem to be an email to the staff claiming another “resignation.”

Danny Aiken, the President of SEBTS, has remained noticeably quiet on the termination of Bruce Ashford.

Here is a screenshot I took from Bruce Ashford’s CV. You will notice that he honestly states the dates of his employment at SEBTS.

I continue to keep an eye on Bruce Ashford and I recently checked his personal blog. I was stunned to see that in his bio he still claims to be the Provost and a professor at SEBTS. I wrote him the email below, and he responded the following day.

Notice that Ashford truthfully answered my question about his employment at SEBTS, but totally ignored my question about what he is currently doing. That’s fine, he owes me no answer, but I do find it telling.

So, Ashford was terminated from all employment at SEBTS in October 2020.  Eighteen months later his blog continues to state he “serves as Provost and Professor of Theology and Culture at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.”  I guess I should cut  Ashford some slack.  As a fellow blogger I realize how difficult it is to delete a sentence from a bio.  I did find it encouraging that Ashford thanked me for the “heads up” and said, on April 15th, that he was “working on it this morning.”

I checked his blog this morning, 5 days after he was working on it, and nothing has changed. Oh well, as they say – Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Comments

Bruce Ashford Finds it Hard to Move on From SEBTS — 54 Comments

  1. “The ‘essential’ thing to me would be the Baptist Faith & Message” (J.D. Greear)

    Which version, Mr. Greear? … the BFM which united Southern Baptists for 150 years or the revision crafted by New Calvinists in 2000 which opened the door for reformed theology to become SBC’s theological default, which put a an authoritarian gulf between pulpit and pew, which stripped a whosoever-will-may-come gospel message from the lips Southern Baptists, which enslaved female believers to the “beauty of complementarity”, and a host of other doctrinal shifts away from Baptist identity.

  2. “‘There’s more here, sir,’ says the Inspector over the dead body, ‘than meets the eye.'” (John Galsworthy)

  3. Max:
    “The ‘essential’ thing to me would be the Baptist Faith & Message” (J.D. Greear)

    Which version, Mr. Greear? … the BFM which united Southern Baptists for 150 years or the revision crafted by New Calvinists in 2000 which opened the door for reformed theology to become SBC’s theological default, which put a an authoritarian gulf between pulpit and pew, which stripped a whosoever-will-may-come gospel message from the lips Southern Baptists, which enslaved female believers to the “beauty of complementarity”, and a host of other doctrinal shifts away from Baptist identity.

    I am no longer Southern Baptist, but the 1963 BF&M was not used as a Creed like the 2000 BF&M. The 2000 BF&M has been and I am sure still used as a way to deny someone in the SBC a leadership position. I regret the 44 years I spend as a Southern Baptist.

  4. Tom Parker: I am no longer Southern Baptist, but the 1963 BF&M was not used as a Creed like the 2000 BF&M.

    There has been a long history of aversion to creeds by Baptists. There is no doubt that the BFM2000 revision, among other things, resulted in a trend toward creedalism and Calvinism which supports it. The current SBC would not be considered “Baptist” in its belief and practices.

  5. Tom Parker,

    Same # of years for me, as a member ……….. I regret it, too.
    I went ballistic when I found out that a church deacon had been spending 3 months teaching the BF&M 2000 in a SS class of 15 to 19 year-olds. (It was a mixed gender class, and the girls were not allowed to ask questions.)
    My retort: Yeah. Who needs a Bible when you have the Baptist Faith and Message! Amen?

  6. Max:
    “‘There’s more here, sir,’ says the Inspector over the dead body, ‘than meets the eye.’”(John Galsworthy)

    Indeed there is.

  7. He had to leave his job for some reason which has yet to be revealed. Why do the BFFs of “important persons” in SBC life get a pass when “something’ happens. It’s just like the real world. It depends upon who you know.

  8. Does Greear think that exposing those who cover up sexual abuse is NOT an “essential moral issue?” What happened to his crocodile tears when he endorsed the “Care Well” initiative?

  9. Nancy2(aka Kevlar): Who needs a Bible when you have the Baptist Faith and Message! Amen?

    Spoken like a Mohlerite! 🙂

    Al Mohler was one of the architects of the BFM2000 revision … he was a slick willy in BFM amendments which led to opening the door for Calvinization of the SBC … so slick that millions of mainline non-Calvinist Southern Baptists haven’t figured it out yet after 20+ years!

  10. Andy: Does Greear think that exposing those who cover up sexual abuse is NOT an “essential moral issue?”

    The only thing “essential” to the New Calvinists is ensuring that reformed theology prevails in SBC ranks. All other issues are secondary or tertiary in SBC life.

  11. dee: Why do the BFFs of “important persons” in SBC life get a pass when “something’ happens.

    New Calvinists stand by their man until the potato gets too hot to handle … then they start distancing themselves from bad actors to protect their own skin … instead of covering for their dudebro, it then becomes “Driscoll who?” … “Mahaney who?” … “MacDonald who?” … “Ashford who?” … etc. etc.

  12. It’s also interesting to note the proximity of “mass communications” and “great commission studies” on Bruce’s CV. Marshall McLuhan warned against that combination.

  13. Nancy2(aka Kevlar) on Thu Apr 21, 2022 at 10:37 AM said:

    “(It was a mixed gender class, and the girls were not allowed to ask questions.)”

    Did he ever say why girls are not sposeta’ ask questions?

  14. Michael in UK: “great commission studies”

    There is no Great Commission by SBC’s New Calvinists, as Christianity thinks of that term. The new reformers have replaced that sacred assignment with a Great Mission to Calvinize the SBC as quickly as possible. They don’t plant Gospel churches; they plant reformed theology.

  15. Jeffrey J Chalmers on Thu Apr 21, 2022 at 08:26 PM said:
    Because it makes menfolk look bad when they don’t have the answer??

    Nah, more likely it has to do with Paul’s writings about women keeping silent in church.
    For them, Paul’s writings are like a kind of new ‘Torah’, in which every jot and tittle must be adhered to

  16. Muff Potter: women keeping silent in church

    “The” i.e those women is emphatic demonstrative in the Greek. Roman marriage was competitive and it wasn’t good form for spouses to converse at home, e.g on the basics of faith, hence the communal address had to be continually interrupted by elementary questions.

    https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/07/new-study-shows-losing-male-gamers-attack-female-counterparts.html

    Yes and to the class of vocal religious “leaders” what they are doing to us is gaming / manoeuvring; we the mere pieces, the losers; the zero digits / sums; sins plus nothing.

  17. Michael in UK: I’m trying to figure out what Wittgenstein has done for him, or institutions in

    I would definitely like to read Bruce Ashford’s Ph.D. dissertation. Wittgenstein was an eccentric philosopher who was gay. Seems a bit of an odd selection for a Seminarian to spend three years of intensive study on.

    Wittgenstein and Homosexuality
    By W.W. Bartley, III

    “In my book I had mentioned Wittgenstein’s homosexuality only very briefly on about four or five pages. The information given there was, as I stated, based on confidential reports from some of his friends. Even before the book was published, however, as page proofs were circulating, these reports were vehemently challenged and denied by other of his friends. Since that time, Wittgenstein’s homosexuality has been corroborated by his own written statements in his coded diaries.

    And there is thus no longer any ground for controversy about the fact of his active homosexuality. Yet it continues to be denied, and the controversy continues.

    …First, as to bluff. The documents confirming Wittgenstein’s homosexuality – his own coded diaries – have been in the possession of the Wittgenstein literary estate all along. During the height of their attack, the Wittgenstein literary executors had coded notebooks, in
    Wittgenstein’s own hand – written in a very simple cipher and long since decoded and transcribed – corroborating my statements about his homosexuality. There is also an allusion to his homosexuality in a letter from Wittgenstein to his sister Mining written as early as his days as an engineering student at the University of Manchester (1908-11).
    Only two of the coded notebooks appear to have been preserved. It is known that several of his notebooks were destroyed, by Wittgenstein’s own order, in 1950, and these appear to include the
    notebooks for the period 1918-28, the period with which my own book was chiefly concerned.” At any rate, they are missing. Of the two books that are preserved, the first dates from the period of the First World War, ending prior to 1918. In it Wittgenstein explicitly discusses his homosexual wishes and longings, recurrences of “sensuality”, and the way in which he is tormented by them. But there is as yet no unequivocal evidence of homosexual activity, and thus one cannot judge with certainty whether Wittgenstein’s relationship with his friend David Pinsent.

    Any reader of its first chapter will be able to confirm that I do not claim or imply that Wittgenstein’s sexual partners were prostitutes or that he despised them. What I do say is:

    By walking for ten minutes to the east he could quickly reach the parkland meadows of the Prater, where rough young men were ready to cater to him sexually. Once he had discovered this place,
    Wittgenstein found to his horror that he could scarcely keep away from it . . . Wittgenstein found he much preferred the sort of rough blunt homosexual youth that he could find strolling in the paths and alleys of the Prater to those ostensibly more refined young men who frequented the Sirk Ecke in the Kärtnerstrasse and the neighboring bars at the edge of the inner city.”

    https://www.jstor.org/stable/40547569

  18. I owe apologies; Ashford’s effective CV seems fragmented and scattered among his own pages, the Kirby Laing pages, and Philpapers.

    The following piece by him I found a cut above the usual TGC level:

    https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/the-jewish-intellectual-who-predicted-americas-social-collapse/

    The extract Todd displayed is part of a far longer listing on the Kirby Laing site:

    https://kirbylaingcentre.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Bruce-Riley-Ashford_CV_2021.pdf

    Ashford had taught English in an especially multi-cultural region of Russia.

    Ashford’s dissertation seems to be an internal SEBTS one. I wish I could read it because that will probably explain everything. Up till now I’ve only encountered philosophers’ reviews of Wittgenstein, not theologians’. Do any of you know how one can read such dissertations?

    It seems to me Wittgenstein was fatally hampered by Frege’s cut down view of both semiotics and inference. (But was Wittgenstein an ironist in the Nietzsche mould: rebellion by caricature?)

    The man in the video clip, apparently Greear, seems too talkative and his allusions careless. Is he a people-pleaser by temperament? Does he see Christianity as solely a sociological manoeuvre?

    Were the theologians concerned taking Wittgenstein and Frege too literally? Is this why we think the fundamentalists are merely lampoon artists?

    My hunch is that Ashford thinks he believes the same as Greear and he thinks he doesn’t, at the same time, and has deliberately requested that customary notices of “resignations” or “differences” be omitted while he puzzles it all out.

  19. Todd Wilhelm,

    I wonder if Wittgenstein’s “philosophy” is just autobiography. Was he sending himself up? And are those theologians projecting his sensual mental state as the image of God? And is this sensual and punch-pulling theocracy the only remedy they can think of for our ills (that they second-guess)? (Like several of my portfolio of colourful movements.)

    We don’t know how much Ashford is criticising them – some of them might be alive, some might be / have been his colleagues. It’s not the done thing for Bruce to admit any insights he has! Are Greear’s remarks aimed against him and not us?

    This also reminds me of the hordes of theologians who rush to model themselves after the nihilist Heidegger.

  20. Todd Wilhelm: I would definitely like to read Bruce Ashford’s Ph.D. dissertation. Wittgenstein was an eccentric philosopher who was gay. Seems a bit of an odd selection for a Seminarian to spend three years of intensive study on.

    I tried reading it when they published it. Dissertations are boring. They about treated Ashford like the second coming when they made him a professor, but as a guy who was the same age as me, I wasn’t all that impressed.

    I have heard some rumors that Ashford’s disagreements with SEBTS actually have more to do with being threatening to the powers that be. And his interest in missions is contrary to the New Cals predetermined direction of consolidating all power into NAMB. In other words, they blackballed him so he wouldn’t become the new pope. Some of my missionary friends said there was a push to make him the head of IMB because he was viewed as being more reasonable to the missionaries while being liked by a lot of pastors that he taught.

  21. Andy: Does Greear think that exposing those who cover up sexual abuse is NOT an “essential moral issue?”

    Well. it doesn’t have anything to do with Saving Souls(TM).
    Or Stopping the HOMOSEXUALISTS(TM) like The Anointed Putin.

  22. ishy,

    That’s optimistic. Bruce would be a bit more talkative if that was the case. And they wouldn’t have let him go mid semester.

  23. Max: it then becomes “Driscoll who?” … “Mahaney who?” … “MacDonald who?” … “Ashford who?” … etc. etc.

    As of now, They Never Existed.
    doubleplusunpersons.

  24. dee,

    Dee, whatever it is, it’s huge. Has anyone ran a background check on him? Perhaps he was arrested for something. He wouldn’t be the first SEBTS professor since Akin took office.

  25. John:
    dee,
    Has anyone ran a background check on him? Perhaps he was arrested for something. He wouldn’t be the first SEBTS professor since Akin took office.

    Yes, I ran a background check. No criminal record.

  26. Todd Wilhelm,

    What really “gets to me” in all of these situations is that if they would just be more “tranparent”, these situtation would not amply like they do… And, given that these “religious leaders” claim the moral “high ground”, and live off pew peons donations, there is a level of “transparancy” that we all expect of them.. why can’t they “learn”??

  27. Jeffrey J Chalmers: What really “gets to me” in all of these situations is that if they would just be more “tranparent”, these situtation would not amply like they do…

    IMO, they choose to protect the church, the institution, or the mission because they are living the good life, making bank, and not working very hard. They have likely jettisoned their principles long ago, so their choice is an easy one – be honest and find a new job, or attempt to keep things hushed up.

    Consider how many guys that have been shown to be corrupt and lose their jobs as pastors come back a short time later in the same occupation? They love the limelight, love “being the boss of you,” and love the money. Driscoll, MacDonald, Armstrong, Tullian Tchividjian, Andy Savage, and Todd Wagner to name just a few.

  28. John,

    I am familiar with some of the imbroglios at seminaries. We believe there is something more due to the information we were given. However, that individual remains anonymous and is uncomfortable saying what he knows personally. I commented on this post in the post that I am writing tonight. The secrecy of pastors and seminary leaders contributes to many of us having trust issues with the church.

  29. researcher: Thank you for the link, Wild Honey. The article was interesting.

    It would be interesting to see if similar dynamics occur in reverse when a man enters a traditionally female realm. Won’t lie, I think there’s often an assumption of ignorance or inexperience, until proved otherwise. But I wonder if it turns into blame shifting, as well.

  30. Muff Potter:
    Nancy2(aka Kevlar) on Thu Apr 21, 2022 at 10:37 AM said:

    Did he ever say why girls are not sposeta’ ask questions?

    Yep, cuz they’re girls. Girls have cooties. Paul said so.

  31. John,

    But Bruce if anyone, will know that if they just fall back on the playbook, it just looks like “another row”.

    Jesus (anyone remember Him?) would think there is something at stake in the discussion.

    We mustn’t forget that most academic establishments in all fields are increasingly slapdash and faction oriented.

    It takes a lot of stamina to not only articulate the issues, but to track down anyone that would see them also. (I haven’t seen any of his substantial articles yet, but there is a fleeting allusion by him in a 2017 Collin Hansen (ed.) anthology to the need for adroit bodily engagement wedded to reason and for church as a place of cultivating virtue.)

    If Bruce thought south east baptist means exactly that BEFORE it meant new cal, and if those who promoted him were doing so for the sake of a “balanced” image, now is the ideal time for him to think out the situation with care.

    Wittgenstein who had certain flashes of insights already forgotten by most others, but couldn’t back his engineering instinct with visual thinking, and who came from a troubled family, has a longish and useful Wikipedia entry.

    Here is a tour de force on many of the related issues (I think you will all get something out of this):

    https://ecommons.udayton.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1074&context=rel_fac_pub

    A member of no community? by Brad Kallenberg

    (i.e not a faction advocate)

    This deals with incarnating our meaning; and senses of analogy and heuristics now forgotten even by engineers.

  32. ishy: I have heard some rumors that Ashford’s disagreements with SEBTS actually have more to do with being threatening to the powers that be … contrary to the New Cals predetermined direction … they blackballed him … viewed as being more reasonable to the missionaries … liked by a lot of pastors

    So Ashford is really a good guy?! Being threatening to the powers that be could be a good thing, considering the powers that be have made a mess of the SBC. But, is it possible that any of the New Calvinists could be good guys? … No, not one.

  33. There could be an NDA behind the rigid silence on both sides about why he left SEBTS mid-semester. If so, the next question is whether SEBTS routinely uses NDAs to silence former employees or whether he was singled out. If he was singled out, why was he singled out?

    Existence of an NDA obviously doesn’t explain why he doesn’t update his bios and lets it appear that he still works there, nor does it explain why he wouldn’t answer Todd’s question about what he is doing now. But it could explain the absolute silence.

  34. Wild Honey: It would be interesting to see if similar dynamics occur in reverse when a man enters a traditionally female realm….I think there’s often an assumption of ignorance or inexperience, until proved otherwise….I [suspect] it turns into blame-shifting, as well.

    That.

  35. Todd Wilhelm,
    Jeffrey J Chalmers,

    New Cals / fundamentalists, along with the “public relations” wing of other denominations / tendencies, tend to embrace “naive realism” which makes them materialists like Marx and Engels, hence their stock in making some kind of “push” among the public, rather than the transcendental or methodical kind, explained or implied by best thinkers of all periods.

    Namely that there is something out there, and in here (in our heads) at the same time, and that we get from out there to in here and back again, by infinite degrees of inference by each one of us continually, and that depends on background knowledge.

    The world and church also forget the metaphorical nature of grammar. Greear falls back on slogans like “gospel” and “core agreement” but, for all his chatter has missed mentioning constant prayer by all for everyone and everything (like Paul and James and, ahem Jesus, called for).

    Have churches omitted to teach us that our main work is prayer? Have they actually taught us that our main work is not prayer? Is Greear’s God brass with feet of clay, or wood? Do we ever honestly see God eat or is it his clergy and “laics” doing it for Him?

    Have they misled themselves with their motto “already not yet”? Designer outlet religion is foreordained, down to every detail of their obligatory scandals, due to it having to be presented by video or “communique”, denying the objective agency and gifts of each man, woman and child in each congregation.

    This is where we’ll see the wonder and potential in how “we see in part”, which we are meant to pool.

  36. Jerome:
    Bizarre video from several years ago, “Dr. Akin on Dr. Ashford”, a gag?

    Good night! This is truly strange. What in the world was he getting at? Ashford was struggling, and then God put Lauren in his life? Struggling with what? Ashford needed Akin’s book?
    I think it is possible that Akin was sending a message to Ashford. He wasn’t smiling, and his demeanor seemed serious to me? What do you think?

    Given a piece of info that Todd and I cannot share at this time, I wonder if Akin might have been aware of this concern.

    This thing is getting suriouser and curiouser.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uMKcqk-wmk

  37. Jerome: Bizarre video from several years ago, “Dr. Akin on Dr. Ashford”, a gag?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uMKcqk-wmk

    Akin always gave me the creeps; this video is no different. I guess single preacher-boys “struggle” with sex until they “know” their wives. And what is the dark secret about Ashford’s sudden departure from SEBTS? Yep, these New Calvinist leaders are a bunch of creepos. With such folks at the helm, SBC is sunk.

  38. J.D. Greear and Bruce Ashford are good friends and roomed together in college.

    Another Dodeka or “Little Playgroup”?

  39. Max: I guess single preacher-boys “struggle” with sex until they “know” their wives.

    Not just their wives.
    Maybe with workarounds like Douggie ESQUIRE so it isn’t REALLY “knowing that woman in the Biblical sense”.
    And as long as it isn’t HOMOSEXUAL(TM).
    Privilege of Pastoral Rank, you know.

    P.S. You know they can’t be Fundagelical preachers unless they’re already married.
    Single clergy is ROMISH (NO POPERY! WHOSE SIDE ARE YOU ON?) and Salvation is by Marriage Alone.

    P.S.

  40. Eyewitness: Existence of an NDA obviously doesn’t explain why he doesn’t update his bios and lets it appear that he still works there, nor does it explain why he wouldn’t answer Todd’s question about what he is doing now. But it could explain the absolute silence.

    But being Erased from existence (like Ukraine in Russian media and the new Russian schoolboooks) does.

  41. Todd Wilhelm: Consider how many guys that have been shown to be corrupt and lose their jobs as pastors come back a short time later in the same occupation? They love the limelight, love “being the boss of you,” and love the money. Driscoll, MacDonald, Armstrong, Tullian Tchividjian, Andy Savage, and Todd Wagner to name just a few.

    The Heresy of Clericalism.

    Where only Clergy matter in the sight of God, the Laity can all go to Hell, and their Priestly Betters keep their boots on their necks by Divine Right.

    “WE THANK THEE, LOOOOOOOORD THAT WE ARE NOTHING LIKE THOSE FILTHY ROMISH PRIESTS OVER THERE…..”

  42. dee: Struggling with what? Ashford needed Akin’s book?

    From the Introduction to Akin’s book “God on Sex: The Creator’s Ideas about Love, Intimacy, and Marriage” …

    “Sex was God’s idea. Yes, I know it is hard to believe, but God is the one who came up with this fantastic idea, and I believe He was having a really good day when He did!” (Danny Akin)

    Whew! God was having a really good day?!! These guys creep me out big time! (please wake me up when the New Calvinist nightmare is over)

  43. he screeches, “Is that you, you troubler of Israel?” If we could only have unity!

    “UNITY! WE MUST HAVE UNITY, COMRADES!”