Journal: Journal for Baptist Theology & Ministry
Volume: JBTM 22:1 (Spring 2025)
Article: Lee Rutland Scarborough’s Triangular Doctrine Of Cooperation: A Biblical, Theological, And Historical Evaluation
Author: Tony Wolfe

Lee Rutland Scarborough’s Triangular Doctrine Of Cooperation: A Biblical, Theological, And Historical Evaluation

Tony Wolfe

Tony Wolfe serves as Executive Director-Treasurer of the South Carolina Baptist Convention.

In 1925, Southern Baptists confessed a doctrine of cooperation in their Baptist Faith and Message. Some historians suggest its inclusion was more of an organizational compulsion, or a denominational powerplay, than a legitimate biblical doctrine.1 However, Lee Rutland Scarborough was unambiguous in his belief that the doctrine of cooperation was biblically established and theologically sound. Cooperation is “one of the major doctrines” of the Christian faith and, as such, is “binding on a Baptist church.”2 Scarborough understood the doctrine of cooperation to be three-fold, like three sides of a triangle: God’s side, the church member’s side, and the local church’s side. Is Scarborough’s triangular doctrine of cooperation biblically grounded, theologically sound, and historically evidenced? This paper evaluates each side of the triangular doctrine, as well as the whole, by interacting with relevant biblical texts, corresponding theological concepts, and historic and contemporary theologians.

God’s Side

In Endued to Win (1922), and later in Products of Pentecost (1934), Scarborough labels the first leg of the triangle “The Divine side,” while in “Is Cooperation a New Testament Doctrine,” he labels it

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“God’s side.” Either way, the concept is as clear as its titular expression. God in three persons perfectly works together to accomplish his perfect will: “God co-operates with Himself in His three-fold expression of His personality—Father, Son and Spirit;” or, “The three persons in the Godhead work together with one another in proposing, proffering and promoting God’s world-program of redemption.”3 The gold standard of cooperation is on exhibition in God’s own triunity from the first page of the biblical canon to the last. In creation, the three persons worked as one, in concert with both triune consubstantiality and functional cooperation through common yet distinguishable activity.4

Thomas Grantham, in his 1678 book Christianismus Primitivus, references Gen. 1:1–3, Jn. 1:1–3, and Heb. 1:2 to demonstrate the cooperative activity of the Father, Son, and Spirit in creati...