Posted: 2/15/08

Book Reviews

Before You Plan Your Wedding … Plan Your Marriage by Greg and Erin Smalley (Howard Books)

Little girls dream of wearing flowing white dresses and lovely sheer veils. Brides and grooms, along with their families, spend hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars making the fairy tale ceremony and reception come true. But all too often, they forget that marriage for a lifetime is more important than wedding for a day.

Before You Plan Your Wedding … Plan Your Marriage offers guidance for building a lasting Christlike union. In chapters ranging from “Will You Forgive Me?” to “If Only We Had Known,” psychologists Erin and Greg Smalley share principles for making marriage work. “Couple exercises/homework” conclude each chapter, as the authors suggest activities such as focusing on each other (and not the wedding) 20 minutes a day.

What are you reading that other Texas Baptists would find helpful? Send suggestions and reviews to books@baptiststandard.com.

The Smalleys manage to tackle tough issues and differences in male-female communication and expectations with humor and personal stories. They share that early in their dating, Gary called Erin for a defining-the-relationship talk. Over dinner, he indicated he felt pressured. Erin left the restaurant assuming they had broken up—a suspicion confirmed when he didn’t call for some time. So she started dating another guy, much to Greg’s surprise when he returned from a long trip he forgot to mention to Erin.

Before You Plan Your Wedding … Plan Your Marriage would be a great engagement gift and should be required reading for anyone planning a wedding and a marriage.

Kathy Robinson Hillman, former president

Woman’s Missionary Union of Texas

and Holly Hillman (soon-to-be Smith), Waco

The Scandal of Evangelical Politics by Ronald J. Sider (Baker Books)

Two good reasons propel evangelical Christians into political action: They know political decisions make a difference in people’s lives, and they believe Jesus is Lord. But too often, author Ron Sider insists, evangelical political engagement has lacked both a wise methodology and a solid biblical foundation.

As a proposed remedy to this scandalous failure, he offers a framework for evangelical political activity. That framework begins with an understanding of overarching biblical principles, and it also involves historical perspective and societal analysis. Rather than looking to biblical prooftexts for a detailed political blueprint, Sider challenges evangelicals to develop a political philosophy shaped by the broad themes in the biblical story of creation, fall, salvation and restoration. He deals forthrightly with questions about what kind of laws the state has the right and responsibility to pass and the degree to which evangelicals should try to use the powers of the state to shape a better society.

Ultimately, Sider counsels politically engaged evangelicals to act with humility and integrity—good advice that cuts across all political and religious lines.

Ken Camp, managing editor

Baptist Standard, Dallas

Just Add Water by Joe Loughlin (Infinity Publishing)

We Baptists seem to see church as serious and sometimes dull. Joe Loughlin has been willing to risk opening windows into his ministry to reveal the funny side of church.

God will be smiling as you journey with this pastor through some of his baptisms, weddings, Lord’s Suppers, personal times with members, and even funerals as he exposes the humor he has experienced. Loughlin is able to take the ordinary events involving ordinary church members and unfold the funny side of being a part of the family of God.

You will enjoy this funny side from Just Add Water. Take time to smile as you read. Remember, laughter is a gift from God, and he wants us to enjoy it.

Leo Smith, executive director

Texas Baptist Men, Dallas

Posted: 2/15/08

Baptist Briefs

Fewer forced terminations in SBC churches last year. Forced terminations in the Southern Baptist Convention were down during 2006. The Southern Baptist Church-Minister Relations Association found 680 full-time and bivocational pastors were forced out of their positions in 2006, plus 265 staff members. While the total of 945 is 27 percent lower than the 1,302 reported for 2005, Barney Self, a former pastoral counselor with LifeWay Christian Resources who conducted the survey, pointed out the report lacked input from four state conventions. The omissions mean the actual number of terminations may have been closer to 1,100, he noted. According to the survey, control issues were the top reason for staff dismissals—the same reason that has topped the surveys since they were initiated in 1996.

SBC conducts online survey about youth. Teenagers, their parents, student ministry volunteers and youth ministers in Southern Baptist churches are eligible to participate in an online survey through April 13. Church registration for the survey, at www.sbcstudents.com/annualsurvey, runs through the end of March. After the survey closes, each participating church will be able to download a full report April 15. It will show the responses of their congregation separated into groups without identifying specific individuals who took the survey. All individual input will remain confidential. Free online manuals will be made available to churches to guide them in conducting workshops that bring key parents, youth and leaders to the table to set a new direction based on the information gathered from the survey. State conventions will be able to post statistics from their states on their websites, while SBC entities will have access to national figures to help determine effective directions for student ministry within the convention. Participating churches, meanwhile, will be able to compare their results with statewide and nationwide results.

Third nominee enters SBC president’s race. Frank Cox, pastor of North Metro First Baptist Church in Lawrenceville, Ga., will be nominated for president of the Southern Baptist Convention during the June 10-11 annual meeting in Indianapolis, Alabama evangelist Junior Hill announced. Cox is the third nominee to be announced, joining Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., and Bill Wagner, a former Southern Baptist missionary and seminary professor and current president of Olivet University International in San Francisco. Cox is a former president of the Georgia Baptist Convention and former SBC first vice president. He also served on the SBC Executive Committee nine years and is a member of the convention’s funding study committee. Cox has been North Metro’s pastor more than 27 years. Beginning in 2002, North Metro has been in the top 100 of all SBC churches in total dollars contributed through the Cooperative Program, ranking 44th out of 44,223 congregations in 2006.

Baptists plan world youth conference. The Baptist World Alliance has scheduled its next global youth conference for July 20 to Aug. 3 in Leipzig, Germany. Events at the 2008 conference will include morning worship services, concerts and evening sessions with keynote speakers. Opportunities to participate in mission projects throughout Europe prior to and following the conference also will be available, organizers said. Early registration ends March 31.

Posted: 2/15/08

Posted: 2/15/08

Shared meals at church take on
a different flavor to meet changing needs

By David Briggs

Religion News Service

AKRON, Ohio (RNS)—Andrew Hamilton still can taste the homemade apple, cherry and peach pies that capped off the covered-dish church meals of his youth in Lakeville, Mass.

In those days, children played on their own for hours while adults spent Sunday afternoons in conversation. The church seemed like one big family, said Hamilton, 44, pastor of Akron’s Springfield Church of the Brethren.

Every Thursday night, Hamilton’s church opens its weekly supper to the community, and about a third of those who attend aren’t even church members. It’s all part “of an authentic witness sharing the basic necessities of life with people in the community,” he said.

Still, those leisurely feasts of food and fellowship are few and far between. Today’s church meal is different. It often features a simpler menu—sandwiches and soup or fast food—and has a more complex purpose.

Churches still offer meals to promote the joy of community, but they also hold them to evangelize, serve the needy and encourage people to attend programs.

“The church supper has extended beyond Sunday,” said Psyche Williams-Forson, assistant professor of American studies at the University of Maryland. “Many churches are finding more creative uses for the church supper.”

Ask religious leaders about the church meals of their youth, and they smile and gaze off into the distance. People who grew up in the 1960s or earlier remember a simpler lifestyle before 24/7 superstores, travel soccer tournaments and wall-size televisions with hundreds of cable channels.

Reserving the Lord's Day

At that time, many Christians not only reserved what they considered the Lord’s Day for church, they also stayed after the morning service to share a community meal. In many Baptist and Pentecostal churches, people would stay all day. The noon meal was a bridge between morning and afternoon or evening services.

Then came the rise of Sunday shopping and the movement of women into the workforce in large numbers. Few people were willing to devote entire Sundays to church.

Now in many churches, clergy say, some congregants don’t let the door hit them on the way out to children’s activities, movies, shopping trips or televised sports.

“We allow other things to crowd in. Breaking bread together was a form of fellowship,” said Rodney Maiden of Providence Baptist Church in Cleveland. “I do think something is missing” without the opportunity for table fellowship.

Some congregations have made adjustments to make it easier for members to attend church meals.

A couple of years ago, Westlake United Methodist Church started providing the main dish at its quarterly potluck suppers. That allows young parents to bring an appetizer or dessert, or even come empty-handed.

Since the change, attendance has almost doubled, from 50 to 100 people, with more young families, said Judy Wismar Claycomb, the church’s pastor.

Broadway United Methodist Church in Cleveland offers weekly church suppers after religious-education programs on Wednesday nights. The menu can be as simple as hot dogs and chips.

Last year, the church began a quarterly family dinner after Sunday services. On those days, worship attendance often increases from around 35 people to more than 50.

Like the church suppers of days past, the meals provide time for conversation and a way to get to know one another, Yvonne Conner said.

“This is what people really respond to,” she said. “And we have good food.”

Open to the community

What separates many church suppers today from meals offered in past generations is that they are open to the community. In Cleveland, St. Luke’s Episcopal Church invites members and neighbors to its family night every Wednesday.

David Bargetzi, rector of St. Luke’s, sees this combination church supper-neighborhood outreach program as an expression of Christian community that dates to ancient times.

About one-third or more of the 100 to 120 weekly diners are among the 60 to 80 people who worship on Sundays. The homeless, working poor and other neighborhood folks also come for meals, such as roast pork.

Bargetzi stands at the door greeting people by name, while “prayer waitresses” walk around asking people for prayer requests.

A 63-year-old man on Social Security who lives up the street and worships at St. Luke’s said he enjoys leaving the house and seeing people he knows at the suppers.

“Everybody’s real friendly,” said Lee, who declined to give his last name. “Some churches you go to, they treat you like you’re a piece of dirt. Here, they treat everybody the same.”

David Briggs writes for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland.

Posted: 2/15/08

2nd Opinion:
Touch others: Healing & helping

By Jerry Hopkins

Educators learn a great deal about people—their views, virtues, vices and other things. The aim of most teachers and educational administrators is to help people. A central theme for educators is to be helpful, constructive and positive.

This also is one of the important themes of Jesus’ life. In the historical book known as Acts, author/historian Luke describes this: “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit, and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him” (Acts 10:38). Doing good and healing should characterize anyone’s life who works with people.

The central theme of our lives should be to serve others like Jesus did—offering healing, loving, helpful touches. Jesus went about doing good, lifting and loving, rather than hurting and hindering; blessing and building, rather than blighting and condemning. We need to do an audit of our lives, our attitudes and actions. Are we doing good, helping and healing?

Some people are not concerned by the damage they cause. They can hurt people with acts and words without taking a second thought or having conscience pains. They seem cut off from conscience or sane humanity. We need to learn how to manage in a world that doesn’t seem to care about others—whether they survive or not, succeed or not. Jesus demonstrated three traits in his relationship to other human beings that should be reflected in our relationships too.

First, Jesus listened to people and paid attention to their difficulties. He didn’t dismiss them or discourage them, except in regard to evil and wickedness. Jesus didn’t encourage wrong in anyone’s life, because he knew the damage and deadliness of evil.

Second, Jesus loved people enough to heal them. He didn’t heal everyone, but he did demonstrate care. We need to have the same compassion and concern for others and bring healing—healing to physical bodies, healing to relationships, healing to groups.

Third, Jesus helped people, and he commands those who follow him to do the same.

It takes time to touch people’s lives in a healing and helpful way. It takes time to get to know people and then to walk with them and talk with them.

Few people are willing to invest that most precious commodity—time.

Several years ago, I lived in England, studied at Regent’s Park College at Oxford and served a church as minister. A poem in a newsletter for Trinity Baptist-Congregational Church of Huntingdon, England, spoke to me about this very subject of touching people. It states:

My life shall touch a dozen lives

Before this day is done;

Leave countless marks for good or ill

Ere sets the evening sun,

So this the wish I always wish,

The prayer I always pray;

“Lord, may my life help other lives

It touches by the way.”

Jerry Hopkins is professor of history at East Texas Baptist University and pastor of Clever Creek Baptist Church in Center.

Posted: 2/15/08

DOWN HOME:
A part of my heart now beats in Europe

The last I saw of Molly was just a tiny glimpse of her luscious blonde hair.

Even after we finished our hugs and kisses and waves goodbye, Joanna and I stood like statues outside airport security. We waited until we could see our youngest daughter no more.

Somewhere between “We’ll miss you,” and “I’ll be praying for you every day,” and “You’ll have a great time; I’m so jealous,” and “We’ll be in touch through IM and Skype,” and “Always travel in groups, and don’t stay anyplace where you don’t feel safe,” Jo and I realized saying goodbye to our kid was harder than we reckoned.

Of course, sending Molly abroad for a semester isn’t like shipping a child off to war or waving farewell to a daughter or son bound for missions in the Congo. But this was hard enough. This is our child, and she was about to be so far gone.

Truth be told, Jo and I have gotten comfortable in our “empty nest.” I never believed we would. The greatest, most amazing thing I’ve ever done is be a daddy. So, I agonized a full year before Lindsay, our oldest, left for college. I just couldn’t imagine life without girls under our roof—meeting me at the end of the day, laughing around the dinnertable, doing homework and watching TV. Making our place a home.

But Lindsay left for college, and then Molly followed. After that, Lindsay and Aaron moved to Florida. Each time, we adjusted.

Jo and I discovered we love each other even more than we did when babies started enlivening our home. Not only that, we’re still best friends, and we can have fun that doesn’t involve going someplace with a gaggle of girls.

Still, seeing one of them off to Europe for a semester was just plain hard. I think the Atlantic Ocean made the difference. Something about flying hours and hours across water makes the separation seem more, well, overwhelming.

But thank God for the Internet. Between IMing (instant messaging), looking at pictures Molly posts on Facebook and visiting through Skype (beats me how it works, but we talk through our computers), we’ve adjusted again.

Well, we still have to account for a seven-hour time difference. But what’s a little lost sleep when your kid’s far, far away?

Like the other times we’ve adjusted to separation, I’ve been coping by thinking about what a difference this trip is making in my daughter’s life. I’ve got 30 years on her, but her world is growing far beyond mine. If we couldn’t let her get up and go, we would diminish her possibilities.

Besides, if God didn’t intend for kids to see the world, God wouldn’t have invented suitcases and passports and jet airplanes.

And if God didn’t intend for parents to let them go, God wouldn’t have invented photos of those kids in exotic places and instant messaging. And prayer, lots of prayer.

–Marv Knox

Posted: 2/15/08

EDITORIAL:
Candles alight for new Baptist unity

Would you rather light a candle or curse the darkness?

At least 10,000 candles glowed in Atlanta, pushing back the cursed darkness of racism that enshrouded Baptists in this hemisphere for more than 160 years.

Those “candles” actually were people—Baptists who defied nay-sayers and doom-forecasters to attend the New Baptist Covenant convocation. They brightened the bleak midwinter. They cast light toward a new spring, a time for thawing frozen feelings; a time for planting seeds of reconciliation, collaboration and infinite hope; a time for leaning into awkward trust, unproven optimism and untested love.

Nay-sayers did their best to dampen those candlewicks so they’d never light. Doom-forecasters projected darkness for Atlanta, predicting polarization. They said the whole thing was cooked up by Jimmy Carter to promote a liberal Democratic agenda. They said the politicians would pollute the well of naive goodwill with partisanship. They said white attendance would be appalling and set racial reconciliation back five generations. They said Southern Baptist Convention-haters would leverage the platform to bash the SBC. They said Bill Clinton would campaign for his wife. In sum, they declared disaster.

They were wrong.

Yes, high-profile Democrats out-numbered high-profile Republicans, in part because Republicans declined to show. Sternly warned by Carter and caught up in the reconciliation spirit, the politicians behaved. The SBC is a non-issue for most of the participants, so it remained primarily in the background. Baptists of many races attended. And Clinton, whose only allusion to his wife was his role as an “unpaid campaign worker,” advocated understanding for and reconciliation with people of other perspectives.

Pilgrims to Atlanta testified this was the best Baptist meeting they ever attended. What could go wrong with preaching that gripped hearts, music that sent souls soaring, laughter and fellowship that warmed spirits, and breakout sessions that challenged and stimulated minds? One participant explained the positive nature of the convocation by noting a negative: “We never voted on anything. So, we never debated or argued. We just focused on fellowship, on healing our relationships and on serving others the way Jesus taught us.”

The Atlanta meeting was “political” in that participants focused on great public issues—poverty, racism, hunger, AIDS, illiteracy, justice, education, crime. But rather than fight over what or how much government should do, they focused on what Christians must do to serve “the least of these” in society. By those standards, Jesus was the most potent political power of all time.

The Atlanta crowd headed home with a common question on each mind: Now what? President Carter has called a mid-March meeting to attempt an answer.

As wonderful as Atlanta was for the participants, it was like the Mount of Transfiguration—a vision of the possible, but not a place to build a temple. Maybe these Baptists will reconvene by the thousands again, but that should be the lowest priority.

The best mechanism for implementing the spirit of Atlanta is through the North American Baptist Fellowship, which already encompasses the 30 groups represented at the convocation, including Canadian and Mexican Baptists and the broadest range of U.S. Baptist conventions.

But the truest answer to “Now what?” will be revealed in villages and cities across the continent. We will know the New Baptist Covenant abides when it unites Baptists across all colors in their own communities. We will know it lasts when Baptists of all tongues become voices for love and harmony and service. We will know it is real when we don’t need a special occasion to sing and pray and worship and serve together. As one Baptist family.

Marv Knox is editor of the Baptist Standard.

Posted: 2/15/08

Board to honor Wade, vote on
Everett for Executive Director

By Ken Camp

Managing Editor

DALLAS—The Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board will honor a recently retired executive director Feb. 25 and vote on a nominee for his replacement the next morning.

Executive director nominee Randel Everett and his wife, Sheila, will be available to meet directors of the board individually throughout the day Feb. 25. At a retirement dinner that evening, directors will recognize Charles Wade for his eight years of service as executive director. Wade retired Jan. 31.

The next morning, the executive director search committee will present Everett to the full board with their recommendation he be considered for the post. Everett is scheduled to address the board, share his Christian testimony and respond to questions.

In other business, the Executive Board is expected to:

• Receive both internal and external audit reports.

• Act on several recommendations from its administration support committee.

• Consider proposals from its institutional relations committee.

The agenda for the Feb. 26 board meeting will not be finalized until after committees meet Feb. 25.

In a mailing to the Executive Board, Search Committee Chairman Ken Hugghins outlined key reasons his committee recommended Everett for executive director.

“Dr. Everett is visionary, creative, and entrepreneurial,” Hugghins wrote. “He is also collaborative in his leadership style. With the help of BGCT staff, the Executive Board, and our varied churches, he will explore new approaches and affirm successful initiatives in ministry among the churches. He is open to, and appreciated by, younger pastors and leaders. He is comfortable and conversant with new technologies and approaches to organization and methodology. He is culturally aware.”

Varied experience

Hugghins also pointed to Everett’s varied experience in ministry.

“He served on the staff of one of the original megachurches; he has pastored a variety of churches in Texas, Arkansas, Florida and Virginia; he has served in denominational leadership in state conventions, institutions and global organizations; he has initiated and led to accreditation a theological school,” he wrote. “He can relate across the board to the various sizes of churches and our institutional leadership. The different churches in which he has served have sought him for his visionary leadership.”

Everett “thrives on diversity,” Hugghins added. Everett “has experience with varieties of cultures and affinity groups through the language missions of the churches he has pastored, through the initiation of a theological school in multi-cultural Washington, D.C., and through his international work with the Baptist World Alliance,” he said.

Everett possesses “the conservative theological and spiritual convictions that resonate with Texas Baptists,” Hugghins noted.

At the same time, Everett’s convictions “are rooted in the Baptist principles that allow us to work together while respecting each other’s varied opinions on other issues,” Hugghins wrote. “His table is wide, but it rests on solid theological convictions. He recognizes that such wideness and freedom must work in both directions along the breadth of Texas Baptists.”

Other endorsements

The board also received endorsements from other search committee members, as well as selected individuals both inside and outside Texas.

Michael Bell, a past president of the BGCT and search committee member, said Everett possesses “energy, enthusiasm, breadth of experience and promise critical to helping Texas Baptists transition to the next level of cooperative partnerships.”

Statements of endorsement also came from members of churches where he served, ranging from author Chuck Colson to retired seminary professors Leon McBeth and Roy Fish.

Colson described Everett as “a man not only of spiritual depth but of great character.”

Fish characterized him as “superlative in his Christian walk and as a minister of the gospel.” McBeth fondly recalled his sermons as “solid, biblical—and fairly short.”

Previous service

Everett, 58, is pastor of First Baptist Church in Newport News, Va.

He served as founding president of the John Leland Center for Theological Studies in Arlington, Va. Under his leadership, the center received accreditation from the Association of Theological Schools. The last half of his tenure at the Leland Center overlapped the beginning of his four-year pastorate in Newport News.

Everett served five years at Columbia Baptist Church in Falls Church, Va., a 3,000-member congregation in suburban Washington, D.C.

Other pastorates were First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Fla.; University Baptist Church in Fort Worth; First Baptist Church in Benton, Ark.; Inglewood Baptist Church in Grand Prairie; and First Baptist Church in Gonzales.

Everett earned his doctorate and master’s degrees from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and his bachelor’s degree from Ouachita Baptist University.

He and his wife, the former Sheila King, have been married 35 years. They have two children—Jeremy, 32, who works as a community ministries director with Baptist Child & Family Services in San Antonio; and Rachel Froom, 28, of Ramrod Key, Fla. They have two grandsons.

Posted: 2/15/08

Faith Digest

Lost bird helps raise funds for English church. A tiny bird blown across the Atlantic Ocean from North America on winter winds is helping raise funds to repair the roof of an ancient church in the tiny English village where it landed. The white-crowned North American sparrow, a rare visitor to Britain’s shores, has become an attraction for “twitchers”—birdwatchers—in the Norfolk village of Cley-next-the-Sea, and a fund-raiser for the settlement’s Church of St. Margaret of Antioch. The twitcher tourists turning up in their thousands to view the seven-inch sparrow already have chipped in more than $6,000 in donations—with possibly more to come—that will be used to mend the east England church’s 13th century roof.

A minister walks into a bar … . Chuck Kish, 44, pastor at Bethel Assembly of God in Carlisle, Pa., is launching a program at a local pub to put chaplains in bars. They’ll offer help to people who might have ended up there for reasons other than relaxing and socializing. Kish said he and the chaplains he trains will not be there to preach against “the evils of drinking” or to make converts. Chaplains will work in teams, one male and one female. “Some people may think this would be a strange place to find a chaplain. But we need to go where the people are,” Kish said.

Mormons name new president. Thomas Monson was elected the 16th president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Monson, 80, was the longest-serving member of the church’s top leadership body. He succeeds Gordon Hinckley, who died Jan. 27 at age 97, as leader of the world’s 13 million Mormons. Monson chose Henry Eyring, 74, as first counselor, the church’s No. 2 position. Dieter Uchtdorf, 67, was named second counselor—the third man in the church’s triumvirate.

Pope defends Catholic uniqueness. Pope Benedict XVI has defended a controversial Vatican statement on the uniqueness of the Catholic church, saying it would enhance, not derail, ecumenical dialogue. The pope made his remarks in a meeting with members of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the church’s highest doctrinal body. The pope commended the body on a document it published last July, which reaffirms the teaching that the “one Church of Christ … subsists in the Catholic Church” alone. The document describes non-Catholic Christian churches as defective, and it says Protestant denominations are not even churches “in the proper sense.”

Egyptian court OKs conversions. Egypt’s Supreme Civil Court has permitted 12 Coptic Christians who had converted to Islam to revert to their original faith, the second such recent victory for religious minorities in the predominantly Muslim nation. The ruling, which overturns an April decision by a lower court, allows the 12 Christians to carry government identity papers indicating their religious choice. The National ID cards are required for education, employment, financial transactions and other purposes.

Posted: 2/15/08

Family Place helps mother leave fear behind

By Analiz González

Buckner International

MIDLAND—Ambra Riley spent the night in her daughters’ room holding her baby tightly in her arms. She put something over the doorknob so she’d know if her husband tried to enter.

Her husband may have stolen her self-esteem and robbed her family of happiness, but he would not take her son, she reasoned.

“He probably wanted him because he was a boy,” Riley said. “He was verbally abusive to my oldest daughter, always telling her she was fat and to get off the trampoline because she’d break it.”

Riley spent two years hiding in her daughters’ bedroom before she finally left the abusive household. And when she did, her world changed.

“I don’t know why I didn’t do it earlier,” she said. “I guess I was trying to keep the family together. After I left (my husband) the first time, he told me I was going to hell for breaking up the family. I felt powerless, so I took him back.

“When we’d come back from church and turn the corner to come to our trailer home, the kids would be waiting to see if his truck was there. If it wasn’t, there would be this sigh of relief. If he was, they would zip their mouths and go straight to their bedrooms.”

After leaving the abusive situation, she sought help at Buckner Family Place in Midland. Family Place is a self-sufficiency program where single parents who are going to school can live with their children under a rental cost based on their family income.

Since Riley came to Family Place, she’s been inspired to pass on the blessing she’s received.

“I want to help people,” she said. “I don’t know what, but something amazing… .”

“They’ve really helped me out a lot. This is a wonderful program. If you want it to work out for you, it definitely will. The means are there. I never had a bed so pretty. I had a mattress that I slept on the floor before this. They furnished the apartment, and if we graduate, we get to take it with us. When I found Buckner, I was overwhelmed that I’d finally come to something that was going to help me.

Anxiety attacks

“My oldest daughter used to have anxiety attacks because she thought my husband was going to kill me. She’s having fewer breakdowns, and they all feel good that Mommy isn’t stressed all the time.”

Riley credits God with giving her the strength to leave her husband and for guiding her to Family Place. Before she left the abusive situation, she met a friend who was going to church. She contacted the pastor and attended that Sunday.

When the service ended, the pastor’s daughter asked Riley her name. When she told her, she asked if she had a sister named Ashley.

“Apparently, the pastor’s daughter had babysat for my sister, and my sister had asked her to pray for me,” Riley said. “She told me she’d been praying for me for years.”

Since then, the Riley children learned a lot about God’s concern for them and how God will fill the hole where their father used to be.

When Riley’s middle child was celebrating her birthday, she was scheduled to attend a supervised visit with her father. But she didn’t want to see him.

Power of prayer

“She was crying, so we got on our knees and prayed together,” Riley said. “We asked God to find a way for her to not have to see him on her birthday. Then we drove there and she started crying when we pulled into the parking lot. Right when I parked the car, we got a call from the building and the visit was canceled. She started screaming. She turned to me and said, ‘Mama, God really does hear my prayers, huh?’

“That same day, the pastor’s daughter threw her a big birthday party with a theme of Disney princess. The whole wall was filled with presents. I could not have done that for her. God did that for her.”

Her son, now 3, used to feel bad that he didn’t have a father. But not anymore, she said, straightening up in her chair.

“Just because we don’t have a dad doesn’t mean we’re crippled. For Father’s Day, my son made me all this stuff and said, ‘I am so thankful that you are my Mom and my Daddy, too.’”

And Riley has grown a lot since she and her husband parted.

No more fear

“I don’t fear him anymore,” she said. “I don’t fear. If he wants to do something to me, I’m ready for him. … God has healed my mind. Now I know that I’m smart. I can learn. I can do this. I can take care of these kids. I don’t need a man in my life. … I can wear whatever I want. I can come and go as I please. I can go to church all I want. My oldest daughter doesn’t have to worry about the way she looks. I tell her every day that she’s beautiful.

“Sometimes we’ll drag my mattress out, and we’ll all have a campout in the living room. All of us sleep together sometimes like we used to when I was with my husband. Back then we did it out of fear. Now, we do it because we want to.”

Posted: 2/15/08

In Between:
New Reformation: Shared ministry

The great Reformation of Luther and Calvin left unfinished business. What the Christian world has not taken seriously is the ministry of all believers, whether lay or ordained, male or female. The Apostle Paul described it as “equipping all believers for ministry” (Ephesians 4:12).

Greg Ogden writes in his book, The New Reformation: Returning the Ministry to the People of God: “Serious signs of strain have become visible in traditional American church life. Overworked and stressed pastors and staff worry about large numbers of inactive and passive members who look to the church during times of need, but who often give very little in the form of regular committed service. Fast-growing churches and younger denominations are growing because they have found ways to entrust ministries to nonordained people.”

One Texas pastor agrees and said it this way to me just a few days ago: “I am overwhelmed, while laypersons in my church are totally underwhelmed and unchallenged because they see their primary task is to pay and pray for the staff to do everything. I was even told, ‘Preacher, you’re trained and paid, so it is up to you to get ministry done the best way you can.’”

In between Charles Wade’s and the BGCT’s next executive director, I have the wonderful privilege of listening to the concerns, questions and prayer requests of Texas Baptists—both inside and outside the convention staff. I plan to share some of those relevant matters with you during these next few weeks.

Let me give you some really good news. I am finding more and more congregations that want to be engaged with really important rather than urgent concerns. Folks keep saying to me, “We must make the first thing the first thing.” That is to call women and men and girls and boys to faith in Christ Jesus. Therefore, it appears to me that placing evangelism, disciple-building and missions above all else is a must.

Why do we spend so much time growing church and committee members, instead of growing disciples, in all of our efforts? One answer is for pastors, staff and for lay leaders to be more intentional in their work together of disciple-building rather than church-building.

One of our congregations in North Texas has been incredibly successful at this because of the way staff and elected lay leaders work together. One of their primary ministries is helping folks, as they like to say, “with hurts, hang-ups and habits.” Bible study also is central to the equation. Along with this is a concentrated focus on life groups. Instead of bickering, fussing and disagreeing as to how the church will grow disciples, these leaders concentrate on the call to be faithful to Christ, and not about turf or control. And they are finding results that give glory to God instead of their own egos.

Egos leave the room, credit is seldom mentioned, and God is glorified. Think of it—staff and laypersons glorifying God, reaching a very lost Texas and agreeing that ministry belongs to all of us. What a wonderful idea.

Jan Daehnert is interim executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board.

Posted: 2/15/08

Texas Baptist Forum

Hypocrites everywhere

You do not have to do a survey, but have you noticed how many hypocrites we have at ballgames, malls, movie theaters, driving down the highways, lecturing/teaching in our schools, colleges, universities, seminaries and the Congress? 

• Jump to online-only letters below

Letters are welcomed. Send them to marvknox@baptiststandard.com; 250 words maximum.

“What do I do? Do I go up to them and say, ‘Can I see your documents before I give you free spaghetti?’ It negates Matthew 25, where Jesus says, ‘What you do for the least of these, you do for me.’” Dave Lewis Pastor in Shawnee, Okla., about a new state law, which makes it a felony to knowingly shelter or transport illegal immigrants (Presbyterian Outlook/RNS) “In spite of their best efforts to steer people to another candidate … they failed. Why? Because the people said: ‘I don’t care who you think I should vote for. I’m going to vote for who I want to vote for.’” Richard Cizik Vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals, speaking about religious right leaders’ political influence (RNS) “Far too often, religious services in the USA are of the adults, by the adults and for the adults. And don’t think young people aren’t noticing.” Stephen Prothero Chair of Boston University’s religion department (USA Today/RNS)

You bet, we have hypocrites in the church—I’m probably one of them. 

But I am thankful I have a church that gives me the opportunity to continue “working out” my salvation.

Jack R. Peters

Tuttle, Okla.

Unfit article

The Baptist Standard never fails to surprise me in printing politically correct secular worldviews.

The report on Foreign Policy magazine’s article by Graham Fuller, a former CIA official, creates a fairy tale world in which Islam wasn’t born (Feb. 4). The imaginary scenario is of how “Islam wouldn’t be a convenient scapegoat, which is easier than exploring the impact of the massive global footprint of the world’s sole super power” (that eee-vil America). With CIA officials like that, who needs Che Guevara?

The article is not fit to be in a serious newspaper, especially one that claims to bring Jesus Christ to an atheistic secular humanist world. Any serious investigation of Islam in the real world knows that Muhammad organized a disarrayed society into an aggressively violent campaign to conquer the world, which has cycled throughout history. Europe, even though being inhabited by sinful humans, endured over 300 years of attacks and encroachments before initiating an offensive that was flawed with human characteristics.

The Christian worldview has no need to fantasize in order to defend Islam and divert the blame of evil mainly on Europe and America. I am very surprised Fuller didn’t manage to put some blame on the Jews too. I am not surprised Fuller lives in leftist British Columbia, nor that he is a propagandist at Simon Fraser University. I am very glad to know that he is no longer in a government agency, especially the CIA.

Darell A. Clem

Humble

Suspect connection

I have been a pastor of a Baptist General Convention of Texas church since 1988. Recently, I was impressed to know the names of the executive director search committee. I was curious as to the convention associations of the members. With limited but accurate research, I discovered that the majority of the members of the committee are affiliated by church or personal association with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

Understandably a person or church can affiliate with whomever they wish. I do not know the search committee personally but do find it puzzling that the majority of the members who are looking for a BGCT executive director are connected to the CBF. It is apparent that their CBF affiliation was important in order for them to be on the committee. This is very disheartening to the majority of us in Texas who still understand the need to be in partnership with the fallible Southern Baptist Convention.

Did we forget that the overwhelming majority of BGCT churches are affiliated with the SBC? Have we become so out of touch with our churches in Texas to think that this does not matter anymore? Maybe I am the one who is out of touch with the “new” BGCT?

My sense is that many of us who remained with the BGCT believed that things could be turned around. Unfortunately, the continued actions of our leaders convey a much different outlook.

Joe Worley

Groves

False prophets

The TV preachers who preach a prosperity gospel and who solicit huge amounts of money over the airwaves and then use the money for their own self-gratification are scam artists or false prophets. 

A true prophet is a spokesperson for God. God does not speak through preachers who run a scam. I find it amazing so many people in America fall for the false prophets’ pitches.  

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley is right in his attempt to expose the preachers who hide behind the First Amendment to practice fraud.

Paul Whiteley Sr.

Louisville, Ky.