Be an army of one in ministry, McBride urges_111703

Posted: 11/14/03

Be an army of one in ministry, McBride urges

By Mark Wingfield

Managing Editor

LUBBOCK--Texas Baptists should be an army of one, moving out as the presence of Christ in a lost world, Paul McBride urged.

image_pdfimage_print

Posted: 11/14/03

Be an army of one in ministry, McBride urges

By Mark Wingfield

Managing Editor

LUBBOCK–Texas Baptists should be an army of one, moving out as the presence of Christ in a lost world, Paul McBride urged.

McBride, pastor of Friendship Baptist Church in The Colony, delivered the convention sermon during the Baptist General Convention of Texas annual session Nov. 11. Speaking on Veteran's Day, McBride recalled his own service in the United States Army. Although moving on different fronts, the Army marched in coordination with the Air Force, Marines and Navy, he insisted.

Paul McBride

“We were all one army for one nation, and we were serving to the glory of God,” McBride said. “I don't know where your church may be, but we're not separate and apart. We may be ministering in a different area, but when we come together, we are one family working to the glory of God.”

He urged Texas Baptists to unite within the BGCT as “the best thing going.” He added: “God … has called us out that we may do a work together.”

McBride preached from the Book of Acts, where the Apostle Paul answered God's call to take the gospel into Macedonia. He specifically referenced the account of a woman named Lydia, whom Paul found in Macedonia, praying to know more about God.

Texas Baptists should be like Paul and Lydia, he urged.

More than 160 million people in America don't profess to have any religious attachment, he noted. “Do we ever think where they're going to spend eternity?”

He urged Baptists to see the world as God sees it. “Do you see the lost and hurting who are dying?” he asked. “What value do we put in a soul?”

Texas Baptists should be willing to go and then shouldn't waste time getting where God sends them, McBride declared.

That may require letting go of the past, he added. “The future is now, but the past is still yet. We're still grasping on to much of the past. Somehow, Paul says, we've got to forget those things that are behind us and go forward to those things that are ahead of us.

“Go back to where you came from,” he urged. “Tell them about the presence of Christ.”

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.


We seek to connect God’s story and God’s people around the world. To learn more about God’s story, click here.

Send comments and feedback to Eric Black, our editor. For comments to be published, please specify “letter to the editor.” Maximum length for publication is 300 words.

More from Baptist Standard