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STUDENTS RETURN to Wedgwood Baptist Church to pray the day after the shootings.
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'99 was a year of regrouping,
change & spiritual challenges
___By Mark Wingfield
___Managing Editor
___It wasn't just the last year of a decade, but the last year of a century and, depending on how you count, the last year of a millennium.
___And that triple combination wasn't the only thing that made 1999 noteworthy for Texas Baptists. From January to December, it was a year of profound change, regrouping and spiritual challenge.
___The No. 1 topic of letters to the editor of the Baptist Standard concerned worship styles. Hardly a week passed without readers attempting to sway one another toward contemporary worship or toward traditional worship, toward acceptance of praise choruses or toward appreciation for hymns.
___While churches across the state struggled with finding new ways to reach an alphabet soup of Generations X, Y and Z, the cooperative mission efforts of Texas Baptists stretched and strained as well.
___This was the first full year of operation for a breakaway state convention formed by
conservatives who believe the Baptist General Convention of Texas is not loyal enough to the new direction of the Southern Baptist Convention. And it was a year when the BGCT worked overtime to define itself apart from the SBC's progressively rightward march and defend itself against criticisms of affiliating with "liberals."
___Three of the most visible signs of these shifting relationships were the SBC's appointment of a committee to thoroughly review and possibly revise the Baptist Faith &
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GOV. GEORGE BUSH joins the masses of people raising their hands at a memorial rally for victims of the Wedgwood tragedy to indicate they'll "let their light shine."
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Message doctrinal statement, the BGCT's reaffirmation of the 1963 Baptist Faith & Message without the SBC's controversial 1998 amendment on the family, and the announcement that historic First Baptist Church of Dallas would become dually aligned with the newly formed state convention for conservatives.
___These dramas played out amid the backdrop of changing leadership in the BGCT, which proved to be an unfolding drama in itself. After Executive Director Bill Pinson announced his retirement, a search committee narrowed its list to two prominent pastors. The committee first nominated Sugar Land pastor Phil Lineberger, who shortly thereafter withdrew his nomination. The committee then nominated Arlington pastor Charles Wade, who accepted the nomination and was elected to the post with only 12 dissenting votes out of more than 200 Executive Board members.
___Meanwhile, the eyes of Southern Baptists nationwide focused on Texas as the BGCT proved to be one of the few state conventions to define itself distinctively from the SBC. Attention focused particularly on how Texas Baptists will continue to fund SBC agencies and institutions. That subject also became the focus of two ad hoc study committees that will report back to the BGCT this year.
___Attention also focused on proposed creation of a non-geographic association that could open a door for churches outside Texas to affiliate with the BGCT.
___Elsewhere, the Georgia Baptist Convention ousted two churches they believed were too
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CHARLES AND ROSEMARY WADE celebrate his election as Texas Baptist executive director.
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friendly toward homosexuality. And an attempt at shared leadership between moderates and conservatives in North Carolina failed, dashing hopes of those who still believed the diverse churches once happily united under the SBC umbrella could be kept together.
___In Texas, a loosely organized group of pastors continued their quest for reconciliation through regional meetings called a Reconciliation Forum. By year's end, the forum's work increasingly focused on reconciliation among individuals rather than between the disparate groups within the BGCT.
___Theological education also remained an evolving issue during the year. Texas Baptists' two newest theology schools--Truett Theological Seminary at Baylor University and Logsdon School of Theology at Hardin-Simmons University--grew in enrollment and influence. Baylor University also launched its new master's degree program in social work, creating a new training ground for missionaries and church social ministers.
___Five years after the firing of Russell Dilday as president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Texas Baptists continued their longstanding relationship with the SBC-owned school. Though generally free of controversy, this relationship was strained at year-end as three ethics professors were required to distribute to their classes controversial literature highly critical of the BGCT.
___To the north, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary experienced a year of intense turmoil, culminating in a called meeting of trustees at which President Mark Coppenger was dismissed for "misappropriation of anger."
___Despite the changes and challenges, the year also proved to be one of record advances in Texas missions.
___Texas Baptist churches baptized more new believers than in any period for 43 years. Missions giving reached record levels, as did missions going. The number of participants in Texas Partnerships projects doubled, and the number of student summer missionaries
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A YOUNG ALBANIAN BOY kisses his mother's cheek at a refugee camp in macedonia.
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sent out by Texas Baptists set an all-time high.
___Yet again, these advances occurred amid deeply spiritual challenges that threatened to shake the fabric of American life. It was the year of the Columbine High School massacre. And it was the year a lone gunman walked into a youth rally at Wedgwood Baptist Church in Fort Worth and brought Texas Baptists face to face with random violence.
___Christians and legislators nationwide continued to debate a variety of solutions to the nation's perceived moral crisis, with attention to issues such as posting the Ten Commandments in courtrooms, schools and other public places, as well as legislative solutions such as a proposed Religious Freedom Act.
___In Texas, the Legislature handed evangelical Christians two key victories, approving a state version of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and a bill requiring parental notification before a minor can receive an abortion.
___A Houston church won a key Supreme Court case guaranteeing protection of tithes and offerings from bankruptcy proceedings. The Supreme Court also agreed to hear another Texas case, reviewing a ruling of the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals that school-sponsored prayers before high school football games are unconstitutional.
___Yet 1999 also was the year conservative political veterans Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson shook the Religious Right by writing a book contending the political efforts of conservative Christians have been misguided and ineffective.
___The Christian Coalition, once a powerhouse of political action for the Religious Right, nearly folded in 1999, facing severe financial and staff turmoil. And the Promise Keepers movement that had filled football stadiums with men seeking God faded into the background as well, canceling plans for New Year's Eve rallies on the steps of every state capitol.
___Whatever challenges Baptists faced in Texas and the United States paled in comparison to the struggle of believers around the world, though. Religious persecution and martyrdom grabbed national headlines throughout the year, even causing Congress to create a new national entity to monitor persecution.
___Texas Baptists led the way in reaching out to many of these world hot spots through disaster relief ministries in Kosovo, Albania, Macedonia and beyond.
___Texans also responded to the missions call by serving as career and short-term missionaries around the globe, including increasing efforts to reach World A--that part of the world where oppressive political and religious cultures have prevented millions from ever hearing the name of Jesus. Further demonstrating the connection between Texas Baptists and front-line missions, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship opened its new World
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KOSOVAR BAPTIST PASTOR BEKIM BEKA carries an elderly refugee across the boder into Albania and safety.
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A Link Office in the Metroplex.
___Overall, mission efforts worldwide thrived in 1999, in many cases blooming amid persecution or other kinds of hardship. The number of believers worldwide surpassed the 2 billion mark, while the world population surpassed the 6 billion mark.
___Although the number of missionaries appointed by the SBC's International Mission Board continued to swell, grief also struck during the year, with the tragic drowning of four missionaries in Mexico.
___The Fellowship also faced changes in its missions enterprise during the year, as veteran mission coordinator Keith Parks retired. The Fellowship set a new marker by naming amissionary couple--Houston natives Gary and Barbara Baldridge--to share the leadership role.
___At home, Texas Baptists continued to strengthen mission work by and for Hispanics. Albert Reyes was elected president of Hispanic Baptist Theological School in San Antonio, bringing a gust of youthful enthusiasm that reverberated through the Hispanic Baptist community.
___Also, Dallas pastor Rudy Sanchez became the first Hispanic ever elected chairman of the BGCT Executive Board. That fit the pattern of the year.
___Although the end of a decade and a century were at hand, the events of 1999 proved to be more springboards to the future than reminders of the past.
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