Posted: 10/13/06

Christian sci-fi fans say: ‘The truth is out there’

By Bob Smietana

Religion News Service

NEW YORK (RNS)—In the original Star Trek series, Captain Kirk and the crew of the Starship Enterprise explored strange new worlds, sought out new life and new civilizations and boldly went “where no man has gone before.”

And once in awhile, when advanced technology failed them, they even took a leap of faith.

That’s what gave Star Trek soul—transforming an ordinary television series into something transcendent, according to The Truth is Out There, a new book on science fiction and Christianity.

Often in Star Trek, “phaser beams or warp drives alone couldn’t save the crew of the Enterprise. Instead, something as simple as human compassion came to the rescue,” said Kim Paffenroth, professor of religious studies at Iona College in New York, and co-author of The Truth is Out There.

Paffenroth points to an episode called “Arena” as an example. In it, a human colony is destroyed by aliens known as the Gorn. When the Enterprise pursues the Gorn ship, intent on revenge, Kirk and the Gorn captain are captured by a race called the Metrons. The two are forced to fight to the death for the survival of their crews. At the show’s climax, Kirk refuses to finish off his helpless opponent. Both crews are saved by that act of mercy.

“In that episode, Kirk very manfully and courageously says that he will not kill for someone else’s amusement, or even for his own revenge, and if the aliens wish to kill him for that, then so be it,” Paffenroth said.

Along with Star Trek, Paffenroth and co-author Thomas Bertonneau, professor of English at State University of New York at Oswego, said they’ve found echoes of Christianity in five other classic sci-fi television series: Dr. Who, The Prisoner, The Twilight Zone, The X-Files and Babylon 5.

These sci-fi series employ a trick first perfected by Jonathan Swift in Gulliver’s Travels, Bertonneau asserted. “They take a familiar problem to an unfamiliar setting. The Twilight Zone works that way. You take a familiar problem and displace it into a new context, and you see it in a clearer light,” Bertonneau said.

Bertonneau characterized Rod Serling, creator of The Twilight Zone, and Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, as “cantankerous prophets.” While neither was especially religious, they both had a strong sense of right and wrong, which comes through in their art, he said. They also understood the best way to explore moral issues isn’t for characters to give sermons but instead put them in moral dilemmas where answers are unclear and watch them search for a solution.

That idea resonates with John Scalzi, author of the sci-fi novels Old Man’s War and The Ghost Brigades. “I think it’s true that characters are more interesting when they don’t already have the answers—when what they have to guide them are not hard-and-fast rules, but rather the need to practically apply their own moral and ethical sense,” Scalzi said.

“And I think that it’s resonant when characters, particularly those with a strong moral or religious sense, have that moment of doubt—when they do have to decide to continue on through faith. No matter how fantastic the setting, that’s a fundamentally human event.”‘

The X-Files, in which FBI agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully try to sort out a worldwide conspiracy involving UFOs and other paranormal phenomenon, addresses another important religious reality, Bertonneau said.

“I think that The X-Files makes a really important theological point that revelation isn’t necessarily an event at the end of time—revelation is happening all the time, all around us.”

Because of that, “every ethical person is obligated to discern the signs of the times” and determine what is good in a culture and what needs to be opposed, Bertonneau concluded.

Posted: 10/13/06

Network TV serves strained ‘Veggies’

By Chansin Bird

Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS)—NBC has given the religious Veggie Tales cartoon a prime slot in its Saturday morning lineup, but it is editing many references to God out of the show.

The Parents Television Council and longtime fans of the popular children’s home videos are not pleased.

“NBC is trying to take God and the Bible out of one of the most popular and successful children’s animated series ever,” said Brent Bozell, president of Parents Television Council, in a statement.

The 30-minute episodes that encourage moral behavior based on Christian principles began airing Sept. 9. Bob the Tomato, Larry the Cucumber and their pals got a Nielsen rating of .95 in their first week, which means about a million homes were tuned in.

Despite some viewers’ discontent, VeggieTales creator Phil Vischer takes a more positive outlook on his blog, www.philvischer.com.

“Let’s focus on one thing … kids are meeting Bob and Larry on network television. And that’s really cool,” he wrote.

Vischer said he was not upset NBC wants their kids programming to be free from religious statements. However, he wishes he would have known the extent of the required cuts before agreeing to reformat the shows. He didn’t find out about the need for the cuts until two weeks prior to the first episode.

“I probably would have declined to participate simply because there aren’t enough veggie shows that could be made acceptable to NBC without significantly compromising their message,” he wrote.

All of this follows the recent controversy over NBC’s scheduled November airing of a Madonna special from her “Confessions” tour. In one scene of the tour, she sings while attached to a suspended, mirrored cross, wearing a crown of thorns. After many complaints, NBC reportedly has asked Madonna to cut that scene.

Posted: 10/13/06

Texas Tidbits

BGCT assists Mexican flood victims. The Baptist General Convention of Texas has sent $7,500 to help 75 Mexican Baptist families whose homes recently were flooded. The designated disaster response funds will be channeled through the Rio Grande Valley Baptist Association to purchase 75 mattresses, sheets and blankets. Mexican Baptist churches in Reynosa and Rio Bravo will distribute the supplies.

DBU preview event slated. Dallas Baptist University’s Patriot Weekend event Nov. 11 offers high school students and their parents a preview of college life. Prospective students will eat breakfast with DBU professors, attend mock classes and have the opportunity to interview for scholarships. In addition, DBU will waive the application fee for students who apply for admission during Patriot Weekend. The event also includes seminars for parents on topics such as financial aid, student life and parent services. The weekend event also will include a performance by DBU’s show choir, Legacy. Cost is $25, which includes two meals for both students and parents. For more information about Patriot Weekend, contact the office of undergraduate admissions at (214) 333-5360 or register online at www.dbu.edu/patriotday.

Historical Society meets prior to BGCT. The Texas Baptist Historical Society will elect officers, recognize winners of the annual church history writing awards and hear a presentation on “Reclaiming our Independence: Renovating and Remodeling the Texas Baptist Historical Museum” by Alan Lefever, director of the Texas Baptist Historical Collection, at the group’s annual meeting Nov. 13 at the Dallas Convention Center. Cost of the lunch meeting, which begins at 10:45 a.m. in Room D160 on the convention center’s first floor, is $20, and the reservation deadline is Nov. 3. The meeting will adjourn prior to the opening session of the Baptist General Convention of Texas annual meeting. For reservations, call (972) 331-2235 or e-mail autumn.hendon@bgct.org.

UMHB sets Missions Week. Baptist Student Ministries at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor will sponsor its annual Missions Week Oct. 23-27. The theme is “Big World: You are Here.” The emphasis gives students exposure to missions by allowing them to interact with missionaries in the classroom, at meals, in chapel, during Bible studies and in multiple settings on campus.

Youth revivalists to dedicate heritage display. Leaders of the Youth Revival Movement, which spread from Baylor University and impacted a generation of post-World War II students, will reunite in Waco to dedicate a memorial to the event Oct. 19-22. Veterans of the Youth Revival Movement will speak in Baylor and Truett Seminary classes Thursday and Friday, Oct. 19-20, and will participate in Baylor’s homecoming Saturday, Oct. 21. Then they will gather in the Truett Seminary chapel for a worship service that will dedicate a permanent memorial to the movement, to be located at Truett Seminary. The worship-and-dedication service will begin at 10 a.m. Sunday, Oct. 22. Speakers are to include BO Baker, Dick Baker, Frank Boggs, Howard Butt, Buckner and Martha Fanning, Ralph Langley, Jess Moody, Jack Robinson and Charles Wellborn, as well as Baylor President John Lilley and Truett Dean Paul Powell. John Wood is chairman of the reunion steering committee.

Clarification. An article in the Oct. 2 issue of the Baptist Standard stated Iglesia Bautista Manantial de Vida in Penitas applied for a $100,000 loan to the Baptist General Convention of Texas and was turned down. The BGCT loaned the church $50,000 on July 21, 2005. Also, the BGCT Church Starting office has approved $18,000 in program support money to help the church with early payments on the loan.

Posted: 10/13/06

Book alleges faith-based initiatives are bogus

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP)—A new book by a former White House faith official is causing shockwaves—even before its release—with reportedly explosive allegations that President Bush’s aides have been duping religious conservatives for political gain.

MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” program first reported the allegations Oct. 11. They are found, according to the show, in Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction, a new tell-all memoir by former White House official David Kuo, scheduled for release Oct. 16.

From 2001 to 2003, Kuo served as the No. 2 official in Bush’s White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. MSNBC reported the book includes charges that high-ranking White House officials referred to prominent conservative Christian leaders as “nuts” behind their backs, used the faith-based office to organize ostensibly non-political events that in reality were designed to boost Republican candidates in tough elections, and favored religious charities friendly to the administration when doling out grant money.

“National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as ‘ridiculous,’ ‘out of control,’ and just plain ‘goofy,’” Kuo wrote. Top political officials in the office of White House aide Karl Rove referred to the leaders as “the nuts,” he added.

A publicist with Simon & Schuster, the book’s publisher, said Oct. 12 that the book was “embargoed” until its official release date—meaning the firm would not release advance copies to journalists and reviewers, as is often done in the publishing world. However, Olbermann said his show obtained a copy of the book ahead of time.

Among the other Kuo allegations MSNBC quoted are charges that White House senior political operatives gave marching orders to officials in the faith-based office during the 2002 election season.

Kuo asserted Ken Mehlman, then Bush’s director of political affairs, told the faith-based office to hold many of their ostensibly non-partisan conferences in districts where Republican members of Congress faced tough re-election challenges.

Republicans ended up winning 19 out of the 20 races, Kuo said, and the conferences even affected the 2004 presidential campaign—contributing to Bush’s margin of victory over Democratic challenger John Kerry in crucial battleground states like Ohio.

MSNBC also reported that Kuo charged the White House’s own rationale for pushing the faith-based initiative—an effort to make it easier for churches and other sectarian organizations to receive federal social-service funding—was bogus.

Bush and his lieutenants regularly argued that religious groups had been unfairly shut out of many government grant programs because of their faith-based nature. However, Kuo said, that may not have been the case.

“Finding [examples of such discrimination against religious groups] became a huge priority,” he wrote. “If President Bush was making the world a better place for faith-based groups, we had to show it was really a bad place to begin with. But, in fact, it wasn’t that bad at all.”

Kuo also reportedly alleges that Bush officials administering grant programs under the initiative favored faith groups politically friendly to the administration—even going so far as to discriminate against non-Christian groups.

Kuo, who has strong conservative evangelical credentials including past work for Bill Bennett and John Ashcroft, has criticized the administration in recent years for its handling of the faith-based issue. However, his previous criticisms—in congressional testimony and op-ed columns for the religious news website Beliefnet—have been neither as dramatic nor as specific as those contained in the book.

They echo concerns expressed by his former boss. John DiIulio, the first director of the faith-based office, quit abruptly seven months after he started. In his only public interview about the issue, he made headlines by criticizing the administration for playing politics with the initiative to drum up support among conservative Christians but then putting little real muscle behind getting it completed.

DiIulio, reportedly under pressure from the White House, later backed away from those comments. Now a professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania, he has not spoken to the news media about the issue since. By mid-afternoon Eastern time Oct. 13, he had not returned an Associated Baptist Press reporter’s phone calls requesting reaction to Kuo’s book.

DiIulio’s successor in the White House faith-based office, Jim Towey, said Kuo’s reported allegations were seriously off base. Towey, who is now president of St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pa., said Oct. 13 he has not seen a copy of the book, but has heard about the excerpted sections.

“The White House that he describes is not the White House that I worked four years in,” Towey said, in a telephone interview. “There was enormous respect for religion—for religious leaders of all denominations and faiths. And, whether he found some low-level employees cracking jokes or whatever, I have to leave that to him and God. But, at the level I worked, that simply did not happen. President Bush would not have tolerated it.”

Reported allegations regarding politicization of the faith-based office’s conferences were baseless, he said.

“I visited more Democrat districts than I did Republican ones; I had more events with Democrat officials than Republican ones. I went where I was invited and where the need was greatest,” he said.

Towey pointed to meetings his office held at the invitation Democratic incumbents—like Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu and Tennessee Rep. Harold Ford, Jr.—locked in tight races with Republicans.

“I just think that he [Kuo] is entitled to his opinion, but he did not make the decisions; I did,” Towey said. “I made the decisions focusing on the poor and not politics.”

Towey’s successor in the White House, Jay Hein, did not return a phone call requesting comment on Kuo’s allegations.

But White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, asked about them during his regular Oct. 13 daily press briefing, said the Kuo who wrote the book sounded very different than the Kuo who left the White House in 2003.

Snow quoted “a very warm letter” that Kuo wrote Bush upon leaving the White House expressing pride in the accomplishments of the faith-based initiatives office.

Snow also said Rove had denied referring to conservative Christian leaders with derisive terminology. “These are people who are friends. You don’t talk about friends that way,” he said.

White House officials had not yet seen a copy of the book, Snow added. “I think we are going to need the benefit of being able to take a look specifically at what he says and how he frames it up, and all that, before we can give you detailed answers.”

A spokesperson at Focus on the Family said James Dobson and many of the organization’s media-relations officials were unavailable for comment Oct. 12 and 13. She pointed to a statement the group released Oct. 13 attacking Kuo’s book—and the media—for the allegations and their timing.

“The release of this book criticizing the Bush administration’s handling of its faith-based initiative program seems to represent little more than a mix of sour grapes and political timing,” said the statement from Carrie Gordon Earll, the group’s director of issue analysis.

Earll said the book excerpts “paint the picture of a dissatisfied federal employee taking shots at the White House effort to connect faith-based nonprofit groups with legitimate societal needs.”

She also attacked the “big media,” who “ will no doubt play this story to the hilt in the next several weeks, because it allows them to take aim at two of their favorite targets: President Bush and socially conservative Christians. Sadly, Kuo’s characterization of his former colleagues, bosses and mission—mischaracterizations, really—will be fed to the public as truth.”

Posted: 10/13/06

UMHB Student finds a calling in Ethiopia

By Jennifer Sicking

University of Mary Hardin-Baylor

BELTON—When the Baptist General Convention of Texas assigned Jeff Sutton to summer mission work in Ethiopia, he wasn’t where he wanted to go. But after two trips, he’s convinced he could spend a lifetime ministering there.

“Last year, I really got interested in unreached people groups,” said Sutton, a senior at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor, majoring in religious studies.

In 2005, Sutton had applied to go to Egypt for summer missions. Instead, he was assigned to Ethiopia. The country and teaching English-as-a-Second-Language were a location and an activity he had not considered.

“Through prayer, I realized God has a reason for this,” he said. “I went and fell in love with the place.”

The region is known for its continued famine and poverty, with an average family income equaling $150 for a year. Religiously, people usually follow either a folk-type of Islam or a cultural attraction to Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity—a faith considerably different than the evangelical gospel Sutton hoped to share.

“So much was added to it, they couldn’t understand what we meant by Christian,” he said. “I couldn’t say I was a Christian because that would say I was Orthodox. I would say I was a follower of Jesus Christ.”

During the three summer months of 2005, Sutton lived in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. There he worked with missionaries mapping the city—plotting the churches and mosques, as well as residential areas. He spent hours playing soccer with boys.

“We started with four, and it grew to 40,” he said about the soccer program. “After playing for a few hours, we’d take a break and I’d tell a story from Luke.”

He worked with a native believer who spoke Amharic, the most common of the 80 languages spoken in Ethiopia.

“He and I would work together to answer those deep driving questions,” he said. “We would answer what we believe as Christians.”

Sutton also taught English.

This past summer, Sutton returned to Ethiopia with five other college students—three from Texas Tech and two from Dallas Baptist University. They taught conversational English to 30 women who were attending the university on scholarship. They used the English class to build relationships with the students to learn about their culture and to share the gospel with them.

It was a trip Sutton almost didn’t make.

First, the team’s passports, which had been sent to the Ethiopian embassy in Washington D.C. were lost in the mail. During that delay of a week, Sutton became sick and during a stay in the hospital, doctors diagnosed him with an infection in his colon.

“I was told I could not go overseas, which devastated me,” he said.

The day before the team was supposed to leave for Ethiopia, he visited a gastroenterologist, who prescribed heavy doses of medication. The doctor told him he could go for two weeks, but if he wasn’t feeling better at the end of that time he had to return to the United States.

“I felt better, then I got something there—a funky bacterial infection,” he said.

Forty pounds lighter and weeks later, Sutton said he is moving through the final stages of that infection.

Sutton, who has been involved in mission trips since he was 13 years old, plans to make missions his life work.

“It scares me to say I’m going back. If I go back, I’d probably stay,” said Sutton, who expects to graduate in May. “I plan on going overseas to work. If God leads me to Ethiopia, I would be more than happy.”

Sutton said college students are fortunate to have two to three months where they can make a difference in others lives.

“My biggest desire is for people to know what is happening in the world, to know the needs in the states, to know the needs of the world,” he said. “Missions is not only about going. It’s about giving, prayer, finances, everything.”

Posted: 10/13/06

Arizona Baptist Foundation executives sentenced

By Robert Marus

Associated Baptist Press

PHOENIX (ABP)—Two former executives of the Baptist Foundation of Arizona were sentenced to jail and told to pay millions in restitution Sept. 29 in what may be the nation’s largest case of faith-based financial fraud.

Maricopa County, Ariz., Superior Court Judge Kenneth Fields sentenced former foundation President William Crotts and Thomas Grabinski, the group’s former top lawyer, to prison time and fines. Fields gave Crotts, 61, eight years in prison and Grabinski, 46, six years. Each was ordered to pay $159 million in restitution to the victims of a fraudulent scheme that came to light seven years ago.

In July, a jury convicted each man on three counts of defrauding investors and one count of knowingly operating an illegal operation. However, the jury also acquitted two of 23 counts of theft. Jurors reportedly determined that Crotts and Grabinski did not personally gain financially from the scheme.

The sentencing marks the end of a 10-month trial that came nearly seven years after the foundation collapsed and the fraud allegations first came to light, shocking the non-profit world.

The foundation, controlled by the Arizona Southern Baptist Convention, declared bankruptcy in 1999 after state regulators ordered it to stop selling securities. About 11,000 investors—many of them elderly members of Baptist churches—lost more than $550 million.

Prosecutors said Crotts, Grabinski and other foundation employees marketed the charitable fund to individuals interested in investing in a fund to support Baptist and other Christian ministries. Foundation representatives claimed the investments would deliver above-average returns while helping support the Lord’s work.

However, the prosecutors said, the foundation’s investments were actually losing money. The executives created “off-the-books” corporations to hide the losses while touting strong returns to sell the foundation to new investors to cover those losses—essentially creating a non-profit pyramid scheme in a ploy to keep the foundation afloat.

During the sentencing phase, according to news reports, dozens of victims of the scheme, as well as friends and family members of the pair, appeared before Fields to ask, alternately, for heavy sentences or for leniency. Some victims and family members asked Fields to have mercy on the pair because the money belonged to God anyway.

But Fields said the argument was moot, according to the Arizona Republic. “This is not a church, it’s a court of law,” he said.

Six other foundation officials have already pleaded guilty in the case and are awaiting sentencing.

Posted: 10/13/06

Bill rescinds chaplain guidelines

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP)—Congressional negotiators nixed an effort to create a right for military chaplains to offer sectarian prayers in settings where soldiers of many faiths may be present.

However, the last-minute compromise Sept. 29 between House and Senate leaders on the provision, tucked into a military-spending bill, also rescinds chaplain guidelines created in the past year by two branches of the armed services. Air Force and Navy officials had released the guidelines in the wake of accusations that some evangelical Protestant chaplains and officers at military institutions engaged in proselytizing and religious harassment.

The issue held up the National Defense Authorization Act for weeks, with House and Senate negotiators at an impasse over the provision.

In May, the House added language to the bill saying chaplains “shall have the prerogative to pray according to the dictates of the chaplain’s own conscience, except as must be limited by military necessity, with any such limitation being imposed in the least restrictive manner feasible.”

There is no such provision in the version of the bill that passed the Senate.

Conservative Republicans, led by Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina, pushed the amendment that made the House version, as did conservative evangelical groups like Focus on the Family.

However, the Pentagon and many religious groups—including the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, the National Association of Evangelicals and the Anti-Defamation League—opposed the effort, saying it would cause unnecessary sectarian division in the military.

The measure would have explicitly overridden the new Air Force and Navy chaplain guidelines. Those rules—written in the wake of charges of religious harassment against non-evangelicals at the Air Force Academy in Colorado—instructed chaplains to offer “non-sectarian” prayers at events where those of multiple faiths would be present.

Military chaplains are allowed already to pray the way they choose in the chapel services they conduct or other settings where soldiers of different faiths are not compelled to be present. But Jones and his allies assert that the new rules violate the consciences of evangelical chaplains who feel compelled to invoke Christ’s name when offering public prayers.

The Air Force and Navy guidelines rescinded under the Sept. 29 compromise were designed to prevent the kind of allegations that divided the campus of the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo., last year.

In April 2005, the director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State wrote a letter to Pentagon officials complaining that there was a pervasive and systematic bias in favor of evangelical Christians at the government-run school. The letter detailed incidents in which administrators, faculty and upper-class cadets at the academy allegedly promoted evangelical forms of Christianity or harassed cadets of minority faiths.

An outspoken parent of two Jewish cadets and a Lutheran chaplain at the school soon echoed the complaints lodged by Americans United.

A Pentagon study of the Air Force’s religious atmosphere resulted in the new guidelines for that branch. The Navy guidelines were similar.

But some conservatives, led by Jones, continued to oppose the changes. The Sept. 29 compromise asks Air Force and Navy officials to rescind them.

Meanwhile, Jones and others have promised to revive their effort to allow explicitly sectarian prayers at multi-faith events when the 110th Congress convenes in January.

Posted: 10/13/06

Diploma program has adult
students shouting, ‘Hosanna'

By George Henson

Staff Writer

POTEET—Vanessa stood before family and friends as class valedictorian.

“I have tried many things, but I have always failed,” she said, trying unsuccessfully to choke back tears. “I have always quit.”

Her sobbing halted her speech at that moment and all was quiet until her father from his seat in the audience filled the silence. “Not this time, chica,” he said, comforting and affirming her with a term of endearment.

That moment sums up the way the high school diploma program at Hosanna Baptist Church in Poteet changes lives, Pastor Juan Florez said.

Pastor Juan Florez (right) of Hosanna Baptist Church in Poteet and Sam Shore, leader in the church's adult education program, work with student Alice Alvarado.

Now in its fifth year, 50 adults now have high school diplomas. Each year, the class has grown—from seven initially to 19 this year.

Originally, Florez wanted to plant a church, not a school. Seeking the right place to plant a church, he asked the Baptist General Convention of Texas staff to prepare a demographic study of the area.

One statistic in the study struck Florez. Statewide, 12 percent of adults do not have a high school education, but in Poteet, 47 percent of the adult population lacked a diploma.

Florez still was trying to decide what his congregation of 160 could do about the problem when he mentioned the statistic at church and discovered more than a few members fit into that demographic.

Church members and retired educators Sam and Kathy Shore developed a curriculum, and adult education classes began meeting. All seven of the students that first year were from Hosanna.

The study body has included women who quit school after becoming pregnant while in high school, derailing their education and their lives, and men who had advanced up to a certain point in their jobs but could go no farther without a high school diploma.

One man was motivated to join the class after he did not qualify for a job posting because he had a GED, but not a high school diploma. Without the diploma, he could not even apply for the position, and had to continue to load trucks.

After he earned his diploma at Hosanna, the position opened again. This time, he applied and was given the position. The man now is manager of that department, Florez said.

After three years, the Shores decided writing and administering the curriculum was too much for them, and they set about finding an alternative.

A representative of the company that provides the school’s current curriculum noted the completion rate nationally for students trying to complete their course of study through correspondence is about 30 percent. At Hosanna, it is 100 percent.

The Shores recalled a man who during almost every class would get frustrated and say “I can’t do this; I can’t do this.” Mrs. Shore repeatedly took him aside and talked to him. He came back to her saying, “I can do this; I can do this.” And he did.

Students are proud when they accomplish this feat most thought beyond their reach, and they celebrate with style—cap and gown, photographs and a graduation ceremony for family and friends.

The Shores now function as consultants. The class in now taught by Tom and Ann Brooks of First Baptist Church in Poteet and Garnett Hiner of First Baptist Church in Charlotte, but it still is housed at Hosanna.

After seeing the success of the students at Hosanna, the Cowboy Church of Atacosa County in Pleasanton has started its own school with eight students in this its first year.

The school has done more than provide students with a high school diploma, Florez said. It also has opened their minds and hearts to spiritual things.

“First it was to meet the needs of people in our church, but then we saw it as a means to meet needs outside the church,” he said.

Bible study and prayer time meet spiritual needs. And the spiritual emphasis has made a difference. Mrs. Shore recalled an evening when two sisters in the class had a loud and heated argument.

“One sister said: ‘She says I’m committing adultery, but I’m not. I’ve been with him seven years.’ The other sister fired back, ‘I know she is because I’m doing the same thing she is, and I know I’m committing adultery,’” Mrs. Shore recalled.

She sat them down, and they looked together at what the Bible had to say about the subject.

“They have these live-in boyfriends, and after a while they come to realize, ‘Hey, we’re sinning,’” she continued.

“It’s interesting, when you go from being Mr. Shore and Mrs. Shore to Brother Shore and Sister Shore with them, the prayer requests really start coming in,” Shore added.

Despite the church’s relatively small size, Frio River Baptist Association Director of Missions Jimmy Smith said it is not out of character for the congregation to see a need and meet it.

“It’s not surprising, because they are known as a church that really ministers to the community,” he said. Hosanna also helps people pay utility bills and with food through its Angel Food ministries.

The school complements those efforts, Florez noted.

“It has been a tool for us to show people in the community that we don’t just want them to come to our church; we want to enrich their lives,” he said. “It opens a door for ministry for us, and it opens a door for them to get right with the Lord.”

Posted: 10/13/06

Association links UMHB
students to real-world ministry

By Jennifer Sicking

University of Mary Hardin-Baylor

BELTON—Twice a week, two University of Mary Hardin-Baylor counseling students put what they have learned in classrooms into practice in real-world situations as volunteer interns at Churches Touching Lives for Christ—a faith-based social services agency in Temple.

At the agency, the interns provide formal and informal counseling, said Ty Leonard, UMHB Community Life Center director. Formal counseling involves two people sitting in a room sitting together talking, and the informal involves the intern being a listening, caring presence among the agency’s clients.

“They’re making emotional connections out there with some people who sometimes don’t get that caring gesture,” Leonard said.

Bell Baptist Association made the connection possible by bringing together the agency and the university. The association also has approached the counseling center to provide services to all its churches—a project remains in the beginning stages, with a meeting planned soon to assess needs of churches.

“We will have a frank discussion of how we can coordinate our services and what we can do,” he said. “Some of what they can do could involve classes on parenting, school issues and grief.”

Both avenues of outreach—to the community and the churches—meet the community life center criteria.

“We are seeking to give back to the community. The community has always been supportive of UMHB and the center,” Leonard said. “By working with the Bell Baptist Association, we get a strong sense of what the community actually needs. The pastors and the churches are the front line.”

The opportunities also provide the students with a richer counseling experience, he added.

“It gives our students a true flavor of what it means to be a community counselor,” he said.

For Tom Henderson, director missions in Bell Baptist Association and adjunct professor at UMHB, Christianity in the real world is what both the university and association try to accomplish. It’s a relationship that goes both ways, providing education, training and opportunities.

Students gain practical experience in churches and local ministries. University professors provide training seminars and workshops for pastors and laity. Past seminar topics have included preaching and how to minister to the grieving, with an ethics and integrity seminar planned for February.

“There’s a synergy image of two working together can do more than apart,” Henderson said. “We provide students the opportunity and background to accomplish a common goal—expand the kingdom of God.”

Bill Muske, UMHB director of church relations, agrees.

“Both the university and the association should see themselves as only components to the larger picture. Both should have a kingdom approach rather than each being an end unto itself,” he said. “Our ultimate goal is to advance the kingdom of God in our Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth. By working together, we can draw upon the resources of each other and strengthen the work of both.”

Each brings different valuable tools to the table to further that goal, working “hand in glove,” Henderson said. The university provides education, training and equipping for ministry, and the association offers students opportunities to live out Christianity in the world.

“We desire to produce and provide qualified individuals to fill ministry positions where needed,” Muske added. “We also desire to help those currently serving to improve themselves in areas of ministry.”

Posted: 10/12/06

BaptistWay Bible Series for October 22

God’s goodness is worthy of praise

• Psalms 100, 103

By David Wilkinson

Broadway Baptist Church, Fort Worth

Whenever I’m the husband I ought to be, I praise my wife. Out of a heart of gratitude, I give thanks for who Melanie is and for what she does. These twin expressions of her unique personhood are inseparably intertwined. I love her for what she does. And I love her for who she is.

In a similar way, when we gather for worship, we offer our praise to God, giving thanks for who God is and for all God does. Psalms 100 and 103 are liturgical psalms—songs of gratitude and praise—that give voice to our worship. When we read them and repeat them, meditate on them and sing them, we join the mighty chorus of God’s people who have gone before us in worship.

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Psalm 100

Psalm 100 has been among the church’s most popular psalms, often used as a morning prayer in monastic communities and as a call to worship in the church. It was written and used as a joyful processional song recited by worshippers as they moved through the gates and into the courts of the temple to enter into God’s presence. In four poetic lines of three measures each, worshippers offer their praise and thanksgiving to God. The heading or superscription—“A Psalm of Thanksgiving”—suggests the psalm was intended for the todah, a Hebrew word that incorporates both a thank offering or sacrifice and an act of praise. In worship, the two are closely related.

Through its litany of verbs, Psalm 100 reminds us that worship is both an attitude and an act. It calls us to enter, worship, praise, sing, thank and bless (vv. 1, 2 and 4). Worship involves purposeful intent; it is something we do.

Worship also is a reminder of who God is, who we are and who we are in relationship to God. The worshippers in procession proclaim that “the Lord is God” (v. 3), an allusion to God’s gift of God’s name to Moses (Exodus 3:14-15), often rendered, “I Am Who I Am.” Both “I Am Who I Am” and its related form, Yahweh, are derived from the Hebrew verb “to be.”

In worship, we acknowledge or confess that the Lord (Yahweh) is God, the one God who is creator of all and sovereign Lord over all. God made us, and we belong to God (v. 3). An alternate reading of this second measure of line 2 (v. 3)—“It is he that made us and not we ourselves” (NRSV)—suggests that the emphasis in both measures is on who God is. The attitude of worship is grounded in the humble confession that God is the Creator, and we are God’s creation.

Finally, the third measure of line 2 affirms our relationship to God. We know to whom we belong: We are God’s people; we are sheep tended, guided and protected by the Great Shepherd (v. 3).

The psalm ends (v. 5) with praise for the qualities of God’s divine nature that are repeated time after time in the Hebrew Scriptures: God’s eternal goodness, steadfast love (hesed) and faithfulness (‘emunah). We come to God in worship with the confident assurance that God’s goodness, mercy and love will never end; they will “endure forever … to all generations.” Worship always invites God’s people to “taste and see that the Lord is good!” (Psalm 34:8).

Psalm 103

This praise for a God whose steadfast mercy and love are never ending is repeated and expanded in Psalm 103, another of the most beloved hymns of worship. In many ways, Psalm 103 is like a hymn based clearly on a worship text and sermon, picking up and elaborating on their theological themes.

The psalm also expands on the theme of praise grounded in the character of God and our relationship to God. Like Psalm 100, this psalm resounds with praise for a God who acts. Again, the verbs trumpet God’s actions in salvation history (“He made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the people of Israel,” v. 7) and lead the worshippers to sing their praise.

In worship, we celebrate with gratitude all God has done and continues to do. We praise the God who forgives, heals, redeems, crowns, satisfies, and works vindication and justice (vv. 3-6).

The flip side of God’s character, the psalmist declares, is seen in what God out of mercy and love chooses not to do—namely, to “deal with us according to our sins” and “repay us according to our iniquities” (v. 10). Instead, like a father who loves his children, God has compassion on the children he has created (v. 13), offering immeasurable mercy, love and forgiveness (vv. 11-12).

Like Psalm 100, the praise of Psalm 103 also emerges from the relationship between Creator and creation—a relationship made possible only out of God’s everlasting love and mercy. Worship is a covenant act by a covenant people that leads us from the sanctuary into the world to live as God’s children in obedience to God’s commandments (vv. 17-18).

Finally, the praise of worship is both private and public and personal and corporate in nature. It is a spiritual act that wells up from the soul (vv. 1 and 22 that serve like bookends for the psalm). Yet the soul’s praise always is echoed in the worship of the community as seen in the psalmist’s repeated use of the inclusive word “all” (five times in the first six verses and four times in the last four).

So, we sing: “Now thank we all our God, With heart and hands and voices, Who wondrous things hath done, In whom his world rejoices.”

Discussion questions

• Identify (from memory or by scanning a hymnal) hymns that celebrate both who God is and what God does. In what other ways do these hymns reflect the themes of Psalms 100 and 103?

• In what ways is our praise lived (Psalm 103:20-21) as well as spoken and sung?

Posted: 10/12/06

Bible Studies for Life Series for October 22

We are most useful when firmly in his hands

• 2 Timothy 2:14-26

By Kenneth Lyle

Logsdon School of Theology, Abilene

Whenever the subject of usefulness comes up, I remember Jesus’ parable of the lost coin. The familiar story tells of a woman who has lost one-tenth of her income. She searches diligently for the lost coin, and when she finds it, she invites friends and family to come and celebrate—to celebrate a found coin, a renewed resource.

The coin represents something of value. The lost coin still has value, but it has lost its usefulness. No greater truth exists than God’s love for us. To God, we are incredibly valuable, yet many in church today have lost their usefulness. This lesson bids all Christians to “take hold of usefulness.”

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When we maintain genuine Pauline authorship of the pastorals, 2 Timothy represents the Apostle Paul’s last known letter. Paul pens this letter at a time near the end of his life. In addition to its inclusion in the pastoral epistles, 2 Timothy also represents a prison epistle. Paul faces his final incarceration and impending death, and he betrays a somber mood in parts of the letter.

The final verses of the letter (4:9-22) reflect an interesting combination of optimism blended with irritation. Paul looks forward to a hoped for visit from Timothy, and the return of his cloak and some treasured books (4:9-13). By contrast, Paul writes harsh words about some individuals who have done him great harm (4:14-15).

The overall feel of the letter suggests a hopeful resignation on Paul’s part to his earthly fate but an overwhelming confidence in God’s provision and care for both Paul personally and for the church.

Paul begins 2 Timothy with the expected salutation and greeting. The address follows the typical format of sender to recipient: “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus … To Timothy, my dear son” (1:1-2); however, Paul modifies slightly his anticipated greeting and wish for grace and peace to include the element of mercy “… from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord” (1:2).

The letter continues with a thanksgiving section where Paul presents himself as an example to Timothy. Paul provides personal details about his own situation, and he reminds Timothy of the Christian tradition in which they both stand (1:13-14).

The focal passage, 2:14-26, comes in the midst of Paul’s parenesis or exhortation to Timothy which continues to 4:8. Some scholars suggest this section of 2 Timothy bears the marks of a testament—a last word near the end of Paul’s life and ministry from the older Paul to the younger Timothy.

In this section, Paul takes up several of the themes we find in First Timothy—strength, endurance, hard work and struggle. Paul’s initial admonition to “… be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (v. 1), echoes Paul’s assertion “… Christ Jesus our Lord … has given me strength …” (1 Timothy 1:12). Paul encourages Timothy to pass on correct teaching, and to endure hardship (vv. 2-3).

Paul employs the familiar metaphors of soldier, athlete and farmer to encourage Timothy to endure and to work hard (vv. 4-7). Finally, just prior to the focal passage, Paul reminds Timothy of the gospel for which he is “… suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal” (v. 9). Paul’s citation of a “trustworthy saying” emphasizes the importance of dying, living, and enduring with Christ (vv. 10-13).

The exhortation continues in the focal passages where Paul distinguishes between two types of workers—those approved by God and those not approved by God. The key difference between approved workers and ashamed workers centers on how these workers “handle the word of truth” (v. 15).

Paul again warns Timothy about “godless chatter” and incorrect teaching, here putting a face on the opposition by naming Hymenaeus and Philetus (vv. 16-18). These two “false teachers” lead people astray and “destroy the faith of some” (v. 18). The personal contrast with Timothy could not be clearer: While Timothy continues to take hold of usefulness, the teaching of these “who have wandered away from the truth” takes hold of individuals like gangrene takes hold of an injured leg (v. 17).

After distinguishing between two types of workers, Paul continues his exhortation to Timothy by distinguishing two types of vessels—“some are for noble purposes and some for ignoble” (v. 20). Paul draws on imagery from the household, where some items are intended for open, public and noble purposes, while other items are intended for private and more base purposes.

Imagine your own house where there are certainly things that you proudly display and use openly—furniture, appliances and other furnishings; however, no doubt there are other items that you keep hidden—mops, buckets, cleaning supplies. To put it bluntly, Paul contrasts the usefulness of living room furniture with the usefulness of an outhouse seat. Paul admonishes Timothy to cultivate a usefulness that reflects instruments of noble purpose.

Paul completes his triad of contrasts by distinguishing between the wise and the foolish. Paul once again depicts the Christian life as one of pursuit: “Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace” (v. 22). Paul describes the foolish life in no uncertain terms and exhorts Timothy to avoid “… foolish and stupid arguments” (v. 23). In contrast, Timothy must “be kind to everyone, able to teach, and not resentful” instructing those who oppose him “in the hope that God will grant them repentance, leading them to a knowledge of the truth” (v. 25). Timothy must take hold of usefulness by choosing wisdom over foolishness.

As Christians, we have value to God, but we must choose to take hold of usefulness. We need to be workers who are approved, not ashamed. We need to be vessels that are noble, not ignoble. We need to be people who pursue wisdom not foolishness. We can be a valuable but useless resource like a lost coin sitting in the dark, dusty corner of life, or we can choose to be a valuable and useful resource worthy of celebration.

Discussion questions

• If you were writing a letter to your child or someone younger that you have a close relationship with, what advice would you give them?

• Paul wrote these words to Timothy. Do they still hold value for the people who read them today? What can be learned from them? What will you try to put into play this week?

Posted: 10/12/06

Explore the Bible Series for October 22

Christ provides our access to the Father

• Hebrews 8:1-2, 6-10; 9:22-28

By Howard Anderson

Diversified Spiritual Associates, San Antonio

As our High Priest, Jesus is the link between God and us. As High Priest, he holds us. Our safety does not depend on our grip, but on his. The truth is, Christianity’s superiority over all other religions is based on Jesus’ superior ministry, covenant and sacrifice.

Superior ministry (Hebrews 8:1-6)

Jesus Christ is our High Priest and was exalted at God’s right hand. Christ is the minister of realities of which the law was a shadow. He is the mediator of the new covenant and the only and true sacrifice. Christ is the source of all blessings: mercy, remission of sins, good things to come, eternal redemption, eternal inheritance, victory over our enemies, sanctification, perfection, forgetting of sins and access to God.

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Jesus Christ is the public servant who carries on the business of the whole human race with God. We all have common rights in his work and service. He is the minister of the heavenly things pertaining to our redemption and destiny.

Jesus Christ’s ministry is termed “more excellent.” Our High Priest is a present reality, a reality we need to grasp and know. Because Christ lives as our High Priest, we too have guaranteed access to God. In failure, we can claim the promised mercy. Under the daily pressures of our lives, we can claim the help of a Savior who knows our every need and who knows, as well, the path of victory. Jesus has a superior ministry.

Superior covenant (Hebrews 8:6-9:10)

The change in priesthood indicated a change in other elements of the Old Testament system. One was a change in covenant—a change in the nature of the promises God has made to us that define how he relates to us as his people.

The Old Testament promised that one day the old covenant of Mosaic Law would be replaced, because it was inadequate. The Hebrews’ yearning for the old ways was doubly unwise. The new covenant is better for us because in Jesus Christ we have a better High Priest.

God’s change in the system is a simple one. He takes the laws that express righteousness and puts them on the inner tablets of mind and heart, and not in external commandments. We must know what God’s righteous standards are and how to translate them into personal experience. The law can tell us what the standards are, but only a changed heart will enable us to live by those standards.

It is through the Holy Bible that we come to understand the will of God. It is here we find the principles that show us how to live a righteous life. The transformed heart will move us to righteousness by responding to God and his word. Professor Steve Lyons said, “A sermon lived is better than two sermons preached.” Our faith walk bears a better witness than our faith talk.

The Mosaic Law does deal with righteousness. The shadow it casts across the Old Testament showed that God, its giver, is righteous. The shadow shows us something of what righteous behavior is. The shadow shows us God really cares about seeing righteousness in us. The commandment law was only a shadow; it could not produce righteousness. It dealt with externals and did not touch the heart.

Then Jesus came, and his human personality was the full righteousness of commandment law expressed as living truth. In Jesus’ death and resurrection, he snatched us up and, calling us brothers and sisters, brought us into the divine family. In making us sons and daughters, God planted deep within us something of Jesus’ own personality. When Jesus entered our lives he brought righteousness with him. That which was expressed in external commands now is expressed in our hearts and minds. That very element of the old system that broke down (the human element) now has been changed.

The outer commandment law of the old has become an inner law through the new. Because of Jesus Christ, the door to God is always open, and so we always have hope. The doorkeepers, the Aaronic priests, are gone. Jesus has come, and he not only has thrown open the door, but he stands in it to welcome us personally when we turn to him (John 10:7, 9).

Superior sacrifice (Hebrews 9:11-28)

The superior sacrifice opens the way to God. Religion is access to God, and its function is to bring humankind into God’s presence. The function of all worship is to bring men and women into contact with the eternal realities. There can be no religion without sacrifice. Jesus Christ is the only High Priest who brings a sacrifice that can open the way to God and that sacrifice is himself.

The writer to the Hebrews tells of the sacrifice of bullocks and of goats on the Day of Atonement. The High Priest offered the bullock for his own sins and the scapegoat was led away to the wilderness bearing the sins of the people (Leviticus 16: 15, 21 and 22). He declares the sacrifice Jesus brings is far greater and far more effective.

This new tabernacle that brought humankind into the very presence of God was nothing else than the body of Jesus. The worship of the ancient tabernacle was designed to bring people into the presence of God. It could only do that in the most shadowy and imperfect way. The coming of Jesus really brought men and women into the presence of God, because in him, God entered this world of space and time in a human form, and to see Jesus is to see what God is like (John 14:9).

The superior sacrifice in Jesus cleanses our soul and takes the load of guilt from our conscience. The animal sacrifices of the old covenant could leave a person in estrangement from God; however, the sacrifice of Jesus shows us a God whose arms are always outstretched and in whose heart is only love.

The superior sacrifice of Jesus brought eternal redemption. The idea was that men and women were under the dominion of sin; and just as the purchase price had to be paid to free a person from slavery, so the purchase price had to be paid to free a man or woman from sin.

The superior sacrifice of Christ enabled humankind to leave the deeds of death and to become the servant of the living God. Jesus not only won forgiveness for humanity’s past sin, but also enabled them in the future to live a godly life. The superior sacrifice of Jesus was not only the paying of a debt—it was the giving of a victory. What Jesus did puts us right with God and what he does enables humankind to stay right with God.

The act of the cross brings to humanity the love of God in a way that takes our terror of him away. The presence of the living Christ brings to us the power of God so we can win a daily victory over sin.

The superior sacrifice of Jesus gains forgiveness for past sins. We should be punished for what we have done and shut out from God. Because of what Jesus did, the debt is wiped out, the breach is forgiven, the barrier is taken away.

The superior sacrifice of Jesus opens a new life for the future. It opens the way to fellowship with God. The God whom our sins had made a stranger, the sacrifice of Christ has made a friend. Because of what he did, the burden of the past is rolled away and life becomes life with God.

The work and superior sacrifice of Christ are supreme. Christ entered into no man-made Holy Place. He entered into the presence of God. We should think of Christianity not in terms of church membership but in terms of intimate fellowship with God. Christ entered into the presence of God not only for his own sake, but also for ours. It was to open the way for us and plead our cause.

The superior sacrifice of Christ never needs to be made again. Year after year, the ritual of the Day of Atonement had to go on and the things that blocked the road to God had to be atoned for. Through Christ’s superior sacrifice, the road to God is forever open.

Discussion questions

• Are you aware of the ministry of Christ on a daily basis? How can you go about becoming more aware of Christ’s ministry to you?

• What purpose does the Old Testament serve today?

• What are you willing to do to make sure that Christ’s sacrifice is brought to the awareness of others?