June 11, 2001
Pastors urged to evangelize 'until He comes'
___By Charlie Warren
___Arkansas Baptist Newsmagazine
___NEW ORLEANS--"It is amazing what God can do with one visionary person who is not at all interested in Harris or Gallup polls, who is not interested in being popular, who is interested only in being faithful," Jerry Falwell told the Southern Baptist Pastors' Conference June 11.
___Falwell, the former independent pastor who led his Virginia church to affiliate with the Southern Baptist Convention in recent years, urged his fellow pastors to become anointedvisionaries who will "ask God to double our denomination."
JERRY FALWELL
___The only way to change the world is through vision, "the difference between mediocrity and brilliance," Falwell said.
___He explained that his vision in founding Thomas Road Baptist Church was based on claiming Lynchburg, Va., for Christ.
___"Claim your city for Christ and spend your life going out to capture it for Him," Falwell urged the pastors. "Ask him for the whole city. Ask him for everybody in it. Ask him for the counties around it."
___Falwell's message on vision fit the overarching theme of the June 10-11 Pastors' Conference. Every speaker addressed the urgency of evangelism. The conference theme was "Until He Comes, Go."
___Evangelist Bailey Smith warned the crowd that even Southern Baptist churches are full of people who never have had a genuine saving encounter with Jesus Christ. Preaching from Matthew 13, Smith spoke of Jesus' parable of the tares among the wheat.
___It is possible even for pastors to be unsaved without realizing it, he warned.
___Being a church member in no way assures that a person is a Christian, Smith said, noting he has encountered many who made decisions as young children but who didn't truly receive Christ as Lord and Savior. Pastors should make sure people in their churches are truly saved through their own trust in Jesus rather than relying on the faith of their parents or grandparents, he said.
___Smith closed with an invitation urging those in the Pastors' Conference audience to ask the Holy Spirit to convict them if they never had truly professed faith in Christ. About 30 people responded to the invitation.
___In addition to Falwell and Smith, the Pastors' Conference featured a number of lesser-known preachers from across the nation, including several younger pastors and evangelists.
___One of those was Dan Spencer, pastor of First Baptist Church in Thomasville, Ga., and son of Pastors' Conference President Jerry Spencer.
___"God is calling out people today to have the boldness of John the Baptist," Spencer said as he preached from the third chapter of Luke.
___John the Baptist's threefold preaching ministry, he said, included a message that people should get ready for change, a message of baptism of remission from sin and a message of how to change from being hell-bound to being heaven-bound.
___"Don't stop preaching about hell, pastor. Bold preaching is needed because the audacity of our culture demands it."
___Spencer also warned attendees not to rely too heavily on old methods to reach a lost world undergoing rapid changes. "We are not going to reach the digital generation using Morse Code methods," he said.
___Charles Roesel, pastor of First Baptist Church of Leesburg, Fla., exhorted pastors to avail themselves of God's spiritual power.
___"We must first 'be' something if people are going to listen when we say something," Roesel said. "The world will listen to us when we live what we talk. The world is not impressed by our buildings. They are turned off by our budgets. They could care less how many people we baptize. But if they see us helping hurting people in love and compassion, they … know we are showing care and compassion," he said.
___Roesel, whose church has been considered a model for merging ministry and evangelism, reminded the crowd that Jesus expects his followers to be fishers of men.
___"Witnessing is not voluntary" for followers of Christ, he stressed. "We have forgotten our No. 1 calling--to bring a lost world to Christ. … We are guilty of giving our first-class loyalties to third-class causes."
___Tennessee pastor Bob Pitman observed that Christians not only have a responsibility to "go" until Christ returns, they have a responsibility to go joyfully.
___"We're on the winning side," said Pitman, pastor of Kirby Woods Baptist Church in Memphis. "There is joy in walking with God. There is joy in witnessing for God. The joy comes in telling the story and witnessing in the power of God."
___Yet "the Christian life is not a playground; it is a battleground," he said. "There is an urgency about serving the Lord."
___The urgency of reaching people with the gospel is a sacred trust given by Christ in Acts 1 before he ascended into heaven, noted Frank Cox, pastor of North Metro First Baptist Church of Lawrenceville, Ga.
___The disciples, he said, wanted restoration of the kingdom of Israel because they were thinking of worldly things. "But Jesus was thinking in the spiritual realm.
___"Jesus was concerned about the millions who would never see the kingdom unless they were born again. We should be passionate about what Jesus was passionate for."
___Randall Jones, pastor of Langston Baptist Church of Conway, S.C., spoke on going in love, using Psalm 126:6 as his text.
___"If I'm ever to lead souls to the altar, I must love them there," Jones said. "Love is what drives us to go and win souls to Jesus.
___"Your love for Jesus will drive you into the world," he said. "Love brings a burden to us. It drives us to tell people about Jesus."
___ Bobby Moore, pastor of Broadway Baptist Church of Southaven, Miss., told the pastors of the need to keep on going. He noted that 95 percent of Southern Baptists have never attempted to win anyone to Christ and that those who have been followers of Christ for a long time tend to stop witnessing.
___He suggested five motivations for witnessing--the indwelling presence of Christ, the spiritual need of the lost, one's devotional life, the nearness of the second coming and an understanding of the glory of God.
___"The longer you are a Christian, the more you forget what it is like to be without God in your life," he said. "Believing in the imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ drives us to win the world to Christ."
___Evangelism is best done as Christians work together, said evangelist Rick Gage.
___"I've seen with my own eyes the unlimited potential we have for winning the world for Christ. Yet our greatest need is for us to go together, with a broken heart and a passion to reach those who do not have a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ."
___He expressed his deep concern for the teenagers of America and urged Southern Baptists to develop a strategy for reaching them.
___"Where is the game plan?" he asked. "Where is the strategy to reach the 28 million lost teenagers in America? What is the strategy for reaching the 200 million lost people in America?
___"I hold in my hand the infallible, inerrant, inspired word of God. It holds the game plan for winning the world to Christ," he said. "Ask God to give you a burden for your community. Let's all come together and work together to reach our communities for Jesus Christ."
___ Philip Robertson, pastor of Philadelphia Baptist Church in Deville, La., urged the pastors to go with authority. He said the authority for believers is the presence of Christ and the authority of God's word.
___He criticized the church growth movement that he said advocates meeting the perceived needs of people and preaching what people want to hear.
___"Without the presence of Jesus, we are powerless," Robertson said. "Jesus never compromised the preaching of the Word of God. … I believe you can preach the word and people will come. … Worship ought to be about what pleases God and not about what pleases men."
___Pastors and others lose their power when they adopt the resentful, religious spirit of the Pharisees, warned Ken Whitten, pastor of Idlewild Baptist Church in Tampa, Fla. Basing his remarks on the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15, Whitten focused on the older brother, who resented his father's gracious spirit and refused to celebrate when the lost one returned.
___Whitten spoke of those who criticize various aspects of emotional, contemporary worship as an example of people who have a resentful and rule-bound religious spirit that destroys their happiness and makes them useless.
___That kind of spirit grows from an "inflated virtue," Whitten said, noting how the older brother overestimated his own righteousness. A virtue problem leads to a vision problem and a value problem that prevents people from seeing or appreciating the needs of the lost, he said.
___Whitten said the cure for a resentful and religious spirit is to trust in God's abidingpresence, abundant provision and achieved purpose.
EARNEST EASLEY
___Ernest Easley, pastor of First Baptist Church of Odessa, Texas, told the pastors to "go courageously."
___He compared his own battle with cancer to the Old Testament king Hezekiah's illness and near death.
___Like Hezekiah, he has learned to maximize his time to honor God, Easley said.
___Easley had cancer of the tonsils that had moved to his lymph nodes. Through 44 radiation treatments, he lost about 50 pounds because he could not swallow due to ulcers on his tongue. He was tube fed. He also lost his ability to taste, almost lost his voice and experienced some nerve damage.
___Now, however, his voice is now restored and he has been declared cancer free.
___"God taught me the greatest opportunity for bringing glory to God is during the crises of life," Easley said. "When the storms come, you praise God from whom all blessings flow."
___He asked what Southern Baptists would do if God said only 15 years remained. "Would our priority be winning souls?" he asked. "We have become an issue-driven convention rather than a soul winning convention while people are dying by the thousands without Christ."
___"What about making the next issue we face reaching the lost souls of men, women and children in this generation," he suggested. "Whether God gives us 15 more decades, 15 more years, 15 months or 15 days, let's get back to the main business, winning souls."
___Other speakers at the 2001 Pastors' Conference were Bobby Welch, pastor of First Baptist Church of Daytona Beach, Fla.; Phil Hoskins, pastor of Higher Ground Baptist Church in Kingsport, Tenn.; and Evangelist Sam Cathey of Edmond, Okla.
___Ken Whitten, pastor of Idlewild Baptist Church in Tampa, Fla., was elected as president of the Pastors' Conference by acclamation. Whitten was nominated by Jerry Vines, pastor of First Baptist Church of Jacksonville, Fla., and former president of both the Pastors' Conference and the SBC. Michael Claunch, pastor of First Baptist Church in Slidell, La., was elected vice president. Charles West, pastor of First Baptist Church of Bethalto, Ill., was elected secretary.
___Tony Cartledge, William Perkins and Lonnie Wilkey contributed to this story
Get printer-friendly version of this story
Send this story to a friend
News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Texas Baptist churches, in the BGCT, the Southern Baptist Convention ( SBC ) and around the world.
Contents/ Masthead / Why We're Here / Links / Archive / E-mail us/ SUBSCRIBE!
