Staff changes   n      Stan (wife Alise) Wyant, new as pastor at Lismore Baptist in Jonesville.   n      Dennis (wife Donna) Campbell, new as pastor at First Baptist in Newellton   n      Billy Edwards, new as pastor at Atlanta Baptist in Atlanta. He comes from First Baptist, Bunkie.   n      Bill Callaway, new as pastor at Amiable Baptist, Glenmora.       Seeking staff   n      Summer intern needed to assist the Minister of Education and Youth in all areas of youth, children, and college ministries at First Baptist Church of Homer, La., for June and July 2007. We are looking for a male, preferably 21 years old. Compensation is $200 per week, furnished appt and meals, as well as ministry expenses. Contact Christina Sebastian at (318)927-3596x21 orchristinasebastian@msn.com.   n      Part-time music minister needed at Cypremort Point Baptist Mission. Call 337-896-3947 or email chadathib@yahoo.com   n      Youth minister for First Baptist, Longville, PO Box 88, Longville LA 70652. Stuart Graves is pastor. n      Churches without pastors in Ouachita Baptist Association: New Era, Sicily Island First Baptist, … [Read more...]

On any given night, someone somewhere in the state of Alabama is guarding the perimeter of a Baptist church to keep from finding it in ashes the next morning. CENTREVILLE, Ala. (BP) – On any given night, someone somewhere in the state of Alabama is guarding the perimeter of a Baptist church to keep from finding it in ashes the next morning.   That’s reality in rural Alabama a year after five small Baptist congregations in BibbCounty awakened to find that arsonists had struck their churches during the night, burning three to the ground and damaging two in February 2006. Several days later, four Baptist congregations in west Alabama found their churches had suffered the same fate.   And while three college-aged men were arrested a month later for the nine fires, sporadic arson attacks on churches of different denominations continued to plague the state. Rocky MountBaptistChurch in TalladegaCounty joined the list of arson victims last October.   Jim Parker, pastor of AshbyBaptistChurch in Brierfield, said a year of sifting through the ashes hasn’t been altogether bad. What seemed like a brutal step backward actually has put his church nearly a decade ahead in its growth process, he told The Alabama … [Read more...]

Having examined various blogs by young pastors whom some might see as angry, Greg Thornbury concluded that the sentiment is more frustration than anger over a lack of answers to the question of what it means to be a Baptist. Third in a series of four.   JACKSON, Tenn. (BP) – Having examined various blogs by young pastors whom some might see as angry, Greg Thornbury concluded that the sentiment is more frustration than anger over a lack of answers to the question of what it means to be a Baptist.   That frustration, said Thornbury, dean of Union University’s school of Christian studies, isn’t limited to a certain segment of Southern Baptist life but encompasses those who bemoan the lack of respect for men in positions of authority, those lamenting the demise of revivalism and the rise of Calvinism, and Calvinists tired of being misrepresented as anti-evangelistic.   Thornbury urged such individuals not to give up on the SBC in speaking on the topic “The ‘Angry Young Men’ of the SBC” at Union’s Baptist Identity Conference Feb. 15-17 in Jackson, Tenn.   “Let us not too quickly abandon the Baptist ship,” Thornbury said. “It may not be the Good Ship Lollipop, but it is the best vessel that we have. Stay on … [Read more...]

Because of a series of events that have challenged my faith beyond the point I thought I could be challenged, I have really come to understand the exhortations from Scripture about praying with confidence and according to God’s will. Emily, on a two-year IMB assignment in Central Asia from TrinityHeights Baptist in Shreveport, wrote the following in her blog, posted on the church’s website: www.trinityheights.org.       Because of a series of events that have challenged my faith beyond the point I thought I could be challenged, I have really come to understand the exhortations from Scripture about praying with confidence and according to God’s will. When I first moved overseas, I understood the idea that prayer was central to the work that we were doing, but my prayers tended to focus on things that were nothing out of the ordinary for God.       For instance, I would ask for things like protection when I was in a taxi, or grace and memory during a language lesson, or a time of conversation with a neighbor. Please don’t hear me saying that these are bad things to ask for, because they are not; but in the last few months I have really begun to ask HIM for things that are … [Read more...]

The chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff has defended the Pentagon’s ban on homosexuals in the military by saying same-sex acts are “immoral” and similar to adultery. WASHINGTON (BP) – The chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff has defended the Pentagon’s ban on homosexuals in the military by saying same-sex acts are “immoral” and similar to adultery.   While many Americans would agree with that assessment by Gen. Peter Pace, representatives of homosexual activist organizations decried it and called for an apology.   In responding to a question in a ‘wide-ranging inteview’ about what is known as the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, Pace told a group of editors and reporters with the Chicago Tribune in a March 12 meeting, “I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts. I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way.   “As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy,” he said, “just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else’s wife, that we would just look the … [Read more...]

The sun shone bright and warm Aug. 19 as a martial anthem glorifying communism and the old Soviet Union echoed across Moscow’s Red Square. MOSCOW – The sun shone bright and warm Aug. 19 as a martial anthem glorifying communism and the old Soviet Union echoed acrossMoscow’s Red Square.   The music, blaring from a dented, Soviet-era loudspeaker set up just outside the square, commemorated the 15th anniversary of a failed hardline coup attempt against reformist Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.   Tanks rolled through Moscow that August day in 1991, but hundreds of thousands of ordinary Russians flooded the streets to protest the coup. Key military units joined the people, the hardliners were arrested and the once-mighty Soviet Union, already crumbling, soon was history.   This year, a tiny group of aging communists gathered in front of the red-brick edifice of the LeninMuseum to mark the anniversary – and to bemoan the end of the Soviet empire. A few elderly true-believers held red flags bearing the communist hammer and sickle, while speakers called for the return of communism.   “Leninism! Stalinism! Death to capitalism!” they chanted at one point. Then they marched around the outside … [Read more...]

n      Field Personnel under appointment (2/5/07) 5,153   n      Career/associates/apprentices 4,119   n      2-yr.  ISC/Journeymen/Masters 1,034   n      Field Personnel appointed 2005: 801   n      Student Volunteers 2005: 6,797   n      Overseas baptisms 2005*: 459,725   n      Overseas churches 2005*: 108,713   n      Overseas church mem’ship 2005*: 7.3 m   n      New churches 2005*: 17,676   n      People  groups engaged*: 1,193   n      People  groups of the Last Frontier*: 5,876   n      Population of the Last Frontier peoples: 1.7 billion   n      World Population 2005: 6.4  billion   n      LMCO  receipts for Christmas 2004: $133.9  m   n      LMCO receipts for Christmas 2005: $137.9 m   n      LMCO goal for Christmas 2006: $150 m   n      IMB budget for 2007: $288.9 million   n      The IMB receives about half its budget from the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering, and 35 percent from the Cooperative Program   *data from 2005 Annual Statistical Report   … [Read more...]

Even before he’s fully awake, “Joshua McFadden” knows he’s not in Louisville, Ky., anymore. Names changed for security reasons SOUTHEAST ASIA (BP) – Even before he’s fully awake, “Joshua McFadden” knows he’s not in Louisville, Ky., anymore. Roosters crowing, babies crying and his neighbors pumping water from the well outside his bedroom window remind the recent college grad that he’s in Cambodia. So do the thatched-roof homes on stilts he passes as he bikes down the red dirt road to a Cambodian-style outdoor diner. Yet, as he wolfs down breakfast and endures teasing by the older village women, he is thankful God brought him to Southeast Asia. “I love my job. I love these people. I love Cambodia. I love my life,” McFadden says. “I know it sounds sappy, but it’s true. When I’m riding my bike through a village and say ‘hi’ to all the kids, it’s a daily revival. How often do you go through a village and everyone speaks to you?” McFadden’s interest in sharing Christ internationally sharpened as a result of trips to Cambodia and China in college, but he can see how God started working on him in fourth grade. That year his Sunday School teacher, a journeyman just back from Kenya, brought carved rhinoceroses and tribal … [Read more...]

At the state level, churches that paid an extra amount last year on property insurance can get it back.   This article is in part a reminder of information David Cranford wrote about in the Jan. 18 issue of the Message. BATON ROUGE – At the state level, churches that paid an extra amount last year on property insurance can get it back. At the federal level, churches can receive federal telephone excise tax refunds. All that needs done for either is to ask for it – with proper documentation. The ‘declaration page’ of the property insurance outlines the amount of the extra charge of property insurance, according to a fact sheet written by Renee Robinson of Cochran, Clark & Robinson. “The form to use is R-620INS,” Robinson wrote. “This one-page form is only for exempt organizations, such as churches. A copy of the declaration page must be attached to the form.” The form is available on the Louisiana Department of Revenue’s website: www.revenue.Louisiana.gov. More information is available on the Revenue Information Bulletin (RIB) 07-006. Background: In December 2006, the Louisiana Legislature authorized a refundable income tax credit for the Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance … [Read more...]

Now more than ever before, New Orleans has become a tale of two cities. The city of contrasts – elegance and decadence, saints and demons, art and blight – has turned into a combat zone. I feel almost schizophrenic and sound downright contradictory when I am trying to describe my community to outsiders.   Now more than ever before, New Orleans has become a tale of two cities. The city of contrasts – elegance and decadence, saints and demons, art and blight – has turned into a combat zone. I feel almost schizophrenic and sound downright contradictory when I am trying to describe my community to outsiders. The great flood and its aftermath have accentuated both ends of the moral spectrum. The good has been even better and the bad has grown worse. Suffering has that effect. Pain amplifies both our virtues and our vices. No contrast in this city is starker than the two sides of Alvar Street in the Upper Ninth Ward. The upriver side is lined with flooded and blighted homes mostly still in limbo. The downriver side features 22 brightly-colored and brand new homes with homeowners hanging out the welcome signs and tending the flowerbeds. The energy and joy at the work site again this week must be … [Read more...]