Baptist Briefs
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Board expands training facility. International Mission Board trustees have approved an immediate $23 million expansion of its Missionary Learning Center in Rockville, Va. Approval for the expansion followed a seventh straight year of record missionary appointments to Southern Baptists' overseas work. Board officials said they would immediately take the funds from the agency's capital reserves. The unusually large expenditure is possible, they said, because stock market surges have multiplied undesignated funds bequeathed to the board.
___ Pioneer communicator dies. C.E. Bryant, a pioneer in Baptist corporate communications, died Jan. 7 in Belleville, Ill. Bryant, 82, served two years as the first director of the Southern Baptist Convention's news service, Baptist Press, after its founding in 1946. He also was first director of communications for the Baptist World Alliance, a job he held 25 years before retiring in 1982.
___ Newspaper folds. The monthly news journal of the Kansas-Nebraska Southern Baptist Convention ceased publication in December after serving Southern Baptists in the Midwest for 46 years. Baptist Digest, with a circulation of 5,300, published its final edition Dec. 23. The paper will be replaced by two new publications. One will target pastors and other church leaders, while the other will be lay-oriented with an emphasis on evangelism and missions.
___ Church forms trust fund for train-crash survivor. A suburban Atlanta church has set up a trust fund for a 5-year-old boy whose family was killed in a Jan. 8 train collision. Will Duffeck, 5, was the lone survivor in a crash that killed his father, Gary Steven Duffeck; his mother, Ruth Ann Duffeck; and his sister, Zodia. Officials at Briarlake Baptist Church in Decatur, Ga., said the family was active in Sunday School at the church. Authorities said the family was killed when their car was struck by a southbound train at an ungated railroad crossing. Will remained in stable condition.
___ Rabbi, Mohler discuss Jews. Southern Baptist efforts to evangelize Jews are not based on anti-Semitism but on a mandate from Jesus Christ, Al Mohler said on CNN's "Larry King Live" show Jan. 12. "Southern Baptists are about what we've always been about, ... sharing the gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ to all persons," said Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. "We believe that the gospel is for all persons, regardless of any kind of ethnic identity." Joining Mohler on the program was Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Hier's main problem with Southern Baptists is their methodology. He claimed Baptists are being deceptive, pointing to the use of Jewish symbols in the "Days of Awe" prayer guide published by the International Mission Board.
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