A former Baptist Student Union president from my earliest days in campus ministry — more than 20 years ago — contacted me recently to discuss a concern. After visiting for several months and getting acquainted with the ministers and membership, he and his family joined a growing Baptist church in their community.

Not surprising, this thoughtful and committed layman was soon asked to teach Sunday school. But to his surprise, he was presented with a dilemma — a “covenant to sign as well as an application that asks doctrinal as well as personal questions.”

He had not encountered such scrutiny in other churches where he had faithfully served, so he wanted my advice. While I was honored, I could tell that he was doing a fine job of figuring out this one on his own.

“I don’t particularly like the idea,” he confessed to me. “Maybe it just reminds me too much of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message deal with the missionaries.”

My first thought was to quickly cry: “Run!” Then I considered it a bit longer and offered this advice:

Make an appointment with your pastor to discuss the purpose of the documents. If he simply wants to know that you take Bible study seriously, will set aside time to prepare the lesson, and will be faithful in showing up or getting a good substitute, then make that commitment to him verbally.

Also, remind him that a covenant is an agreement between two parties. So offer to work with him on an agreement with which you both have input and are comfortable. Then, I added, be very, very careful if your offer does not satisfy him.

My former student dutifully wasted his time by following my idealistic advice.

He told his new pastor of being uncomfortable signing a promise to tithe although he was deeply committed to supporting the church financially. He also expressed concern about the selectivity of Old Testament laws to be followed. Their conversation, my friend said, was pleasant.

However, the following Sunday’s sermon seemed well targeted toward this Baptist engineer and Sunday school teacher recruit who had graciously and privately discussed his concerns with his pastor.

“He spent a significant part of (the sermon) talking about how being faithful meant tithing to the church,” my friend reported back to me. The sermon concluded with a strong case for the authority of both the Old and New Testaments.

The evening service, he added, focused on the need for “covenants.”

I confessed that my own experience with church covenants was limited to occasionally reading the one glued in the front of the hymnals in my home church. As a child I wondered what they would do to any member who did not “avoid tattling, backbiting and excessive anger” or “abstain from the sale and use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage.”

We might have even read the “covenant” aloud, but I certainly never recall anyone being told to sign it or stop teaching Sunday school.

I commended my friend for being so gracious in relating to his pastor and in dealing with his concerns in such an appropriate matter. (What else was I going to do -- admit I had given him lousy advice?)

However, my sense was that this pastor was not looking for a mutually respectful agreement. I suggested to my friend that his pastor obviously prefers coercion over motivation when it comes to tithing and other acts of Christian faithfulness.

Again, I suppressed the word “Run!” and recommended a second conciliatory act. Go see your pastor once again, I suggested. Ask him if those sermons were directed toward you or just coincidentally followed your private conversation.

Then remind him that you came to him confidentially and respectfully to discuss this matter, I suggested, and that you expect the same consideration from him.

I never felt it was my place to encourage my friend to find another church where his Christian confession and years of faithful service will be enough. He is “wise as a serpent and gentle as a dove,” and will work out that for himself.

And he is also well humored enough to learn from this experience and move on to something better, for he concluded his report to me with these words:

“I’m not exactly sure what to do now. Anyway, I feel blessed. If this had been 400 years ago, I might have been burned at the stake.”

Sadly that history lesson has not been learned by all Baptists today.