As if one wouldn’t be enough, Louisiana College added a second Christmas spectacular this year. PINEVILLE – As if one wouldn’t be enough, Louisiana College added a second Christmas spectacular this year. Follow the Star, an eight-vignette tableau, was staged Friday and Sunday nights. Christmas Letters from War was a Saturday-only production. Both were written and directed by Debrah “Pete” Richardson, chair of the LC drama department. “Both of these were Dr. Aguillard’s ideas,” Richardson said, referring to Joe Aguillard, LC president. “The rest of us just fleshed them out.” Follow the Star, which made its debut last year, was tweaked for the 2009 showing of eight scenes detailing the story of Christmas, augmented by the performances of several children’s choirs from area Southern Baptist churches, the best hot chocolate in town (courtesy: Aramark, the campus food provider) and thousands and thousands of twinkling white Christmas lights. This year the Mary-and-Elizabeth scene was changed into the Joseph-and-Angel scene, and the prayer-and-evangelism area became the Tale-of-Two-Trees, which compared a multi-colored Christmas tree with a white-lit cross. One tree referred to gifts people give each other; one tree … [Read more...]

How did London become a mixing bowl of nations? EDITOR’S NOTE:  This is part two of London. Please see wwww.baptistmessage.com for part 1. How did London become a mixing bowl of nations? Large groups of south Asians and West Indians arrived from England’s former colonies after World War II to rebuild the city and provide labor for its new industries. Friendly immigration policies and generous social services have attracted many more groups from far-flung places. Countless “asylum seekers” have come seeking safety, sanctuary or economic opportunities. More recently, the European Union’s open-border policies have encouraged hordes of job-seeking citizens from EU member states. “Over the years there’s been a fairly relaxed view of immigration,” a British Baptist pastor says. “When people are in trouble, England has been ready to receive them, so there has been a large refugee population. We have stood very much by human rights.” Some Anglo Londoners love the exploding cultural diversity and see it as an exciting rebirth for the ancient city. Some are indifferent. Others worry about the increases in crime and poverty that have come with massive immigration. They resent the pressure on England’s social services – … [Read more...]

From its northernmost point in Newellton to just south of Vidalia, the Delta Baptist Association stretches for nearly 40 miles along the Mississippi River delta. DELTA BAPTIST ASSOCIATION – From its northernmost point in Newellton to just south of Vidalia, the Delta Baptist Association stretches for nearly 40 miles along the Mississippi River delta. In the rich and fertile soil of Concordia and Tensas parishes, corn, soybeans, rice and cotton are grown, giving the Mississippi River-silt region the reputation of having some of the finest farmland in the world. Recently retired pastor John Williams serves as moderator of the Delta Association. He said he believes that even though it is located in an almost exclusively rural area of Louisiana, the people in the association still have a big heart for the work of the Lord. The Delta Association once was part of the East Central Baptist Association, but in 2007 the association split into three: the Delta, Ouachita and LaSalle Baptist Associations. The Delta Association has 15 churches and a food bank ministry center, Williams said. Westside Baptist Church in Ferriday is the youngest church in the association. It was started in the early 1990s and recently constituted … [Read more...]

In a time when many churches and organizations around the SBC are cutting budgets and staff, there’s at least one evangelist who thinks recent hard financial times provide a great opportunity for the church. DEVILLE (BP) – In a time when many churches and organizations around the SBC are cutting budgets and staff, there’s at least one evangelist who thinks recent hard financial times provide a great opportunity for the church. “I think what this will do, it will bring us to desperation, and desperation is the point at which God sends revival,” says longtime evangelist Bill Stafford, referring to the current economic turmoil. “God is going to teach us a principle of trust and faith and show us a dimension of His sufficiency, where people will hunger to come to church. Not to hear about the doom and gloom, but to hear about the living Christ who is in me and all of His sufficiency is my sufficiency.” Stafford has been preaching for almost 57 years, most of those in full-time evangelism. He quit a career in combustion engineering when he was called to preach at 19. Since then, he’s preached all over the country and even earned the nickname “Wild Bill” in the Southern Baptist Convention for his straightforward preaching … [Read more...]

He’ll be knee-deep in weeds at the Interstate 10 underpass at Franklin Avenue in New Orleans or setting sod at a neighborhood home, but one thing is certain: Robert Claverie, 64, won’t be in one place for long. NEW ORLEANS (BP) – He’ll be knee-deep in weeds at the Interstate 10 underpass at Franklin Avenue in New Orleans or setting sod at a neighborhood home, but one thing is certain: Robert Claverie, 64, won’t be in one place for long. Claverie, who is retired, feeds the homeless at 7 a.m. and directs teams of volunteers in neighborhood clean-up the rest of the day, all financed from personal funds. One of the first to return to his flood-ravaged neighborhood after Hurricane Katrina, Claverie tapped into his insurance money to feed relief workers and start the clean-up process. Staff employees of MissionLab, a ministry of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary that links church mission teams to ministries in New Orleans, spotted him clearing debris from a neighborhood street three months after the storm. “They asked me if I wanted help,” Claverie said. “I said, ‘Sure, if you’re in it for the long run. But it’s hard work and there’s a lot to do.’” MissionLab connects church groups of all ages to mentors like … [Read more...]

Mary Mercer brings new meaning to the word “hardbody.” WINNFIELD/ALEXANDRIA – Mary Mercer brings new meaning to the word “hardbody.” Fourteen teenagers were in First Baptist Winnfield’s bus driven by Mercer, and on their way to the Monday evening session of the Youth Evangelism Conference when a bullet smashed through the glass door and glanced off Mercer’s right side. “I was driving along and I heard something and felt something and at first I thought one of the kids had popped a balloon,” Mercer said in her recall of the Nov. 24 scare. “I looked over and there was a bullet hole in the door, and the glass was shattered from top to bottom. “When I realized it was a shot, and I knew I had felt something, I thought, ‘Am I bleeding? Am I going to live long enough to get these kids to safety?’” She pulled over when she felt she was far enough from the shooter for the teens – including her daughter Kaitlyn – to be safe. The 15-passenger bus she was driving was the first in a caravan of four vehicles on its way from the Hampton Inn north of Pineville to the Alexandria Coliseum. The shot rang out as she passed two houses and a trailer no more than two minutes from the hotel, Mercer said. When she pulled over, so did the … [Read more...]

‘Tis the season… ‘Tis the season… Much of the talk heard on television, radio, at the mall, in the elevator, most anywhere this time of year centers on giving.  More specifically, Christmas giving.   Commercials, billboards, store banners and signs all tout the “perfect gift for that special someone.” Giving is a wonderful thing.  The long- standing tradition of our culture is to give gifts to our friends and loved ones in honor of Jesus’ birth. There are many illustrations shown to us through scripture that exhibit the pure spirit of giving. There is the familiar story of the Good Samaritan in Luke chapter 10 where the man of Samaria gave his first aid kit, his ride (a donkey) and his financial resources to help a stranger who had been attacked and left for dead.  In 2 Corinthians 8, Paul writes of Macedonian Christians giving from their poverty to help other believers.  And, of course, there are the gifts brought to Jesus by the wise men. But the greatest gift of all is the reason we celebrate Christmas: God’s gift of His Son, Jesus, to be the Savior of all.  As we celebrate the birth of the Messiah, the Promised One, let’s remember to give from a heart of grace so that His name can be made known to all … [Read more...]

For many years now homosexual-rights activists have claimed they merely seek tolerance for their lifestyle. Tell that to Phyllis Burgess. For many years now homosexual-rights activists have claimed they merely seek tolerance for their lifestyle. Tell that to Phyllis Burgess. In the wake of Californians’ adoption of Proposition 8, which establishes yet again that marriage is only between one man and one woman, homosexual activists have ravaged the Golden State with extreme protests, seeking to intimidate those who used the democratic process to set aright the state’s marriage law in response to four judges who created the “right” to marry for homosexuals in that state. Consider the following from a Nov. 15 article in The Washington Post: “In Sacramento, a high-profile theater director resigned from his job of 25 years after a boycott threat over his $1,000 donation in support of [Proposition 8]. In Los Angeles, a Mexican restaurant owner, a Mormon who donated $100, was reduced to tears and left town after hundreds of protesters confronted her at work, by phone and on the Internet.” Arnoldo Archilla, an employee at the El Coyote restaurant told the Post, “You express your beliefs and your have to be punished for it? This … [Read more...]

Jesus’ plan from the beginning was that his disciples would evangelize the world. The method He employed was to get them in a vital relationship with God and show them how He worked, before He gave them the responsibility. Jesus’ plan from the beginning was that his disciples would evangelize the world. The method He employed was to get them in a vital relationship with God and show them how He worked, before He gave them the responsibility. For the first six articles in this series on developing disciples the way Jesus did, go towww.baptistmessage.com and search for “evangelism.” “[I]t is rather startling to observe in the Gospels that these early disciples really did not do much more than watch Jesus work for a year or more,” Robert Coleman wrote in Chapter 6 – Delegation – of The Master Plan of Evangelism. And when He did send them out, he gave them clear instruction. “In effect, the disciples were told to concentrate their time on the most promising individuals in each town who would thereby be able to follow up their work after they had gone,” Coleman wrote. “This was to receive priority over everything else.” The disciples were told to expect hardship, because “his way was contrary to the accepted pattern of … [Read more...]

First Baptist Church here gave an enthusiastic “Hoo-rah” when asked in early November to provide Thanksgiving dinner for the Wounded Soldiers group at Fort Polk. LEESVILLE – First Baptist Church here gave an enthusiastic “Hoo-rah” when asked in early November to provide Thanksgiving dinner for the Wounded Soldiers group at Fort Polk. “Our folks love the GIs and love the post and were willing to sacrifice for them,” said Jerry Penfield, pastor. The church would be glad to provide the requested 100 meals, he told the woman from Wounded Soldiers, which organized during the last year. “A couple of days later she called back and said the number had grown to about 200, and I told her we could handle that, but just barely,” the pastor said. “She called again two days before the dinner and said there’d be 500 people, and this dinner was set for the day after our big church Thanksgiving dinner.” Suddenly the church’s willingness to help became a God-sized challenge, and God came through, the pastor said. Women of the church arrived early in the morning of Nov. 20 to make dressing and the other ‘fixin’s’ of a holiday feast – corn, sweet potato casserole, and ham, plus many members brought all kinds of desserts for the Wounded … [Read more...]