Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Social Capital: Medical Apartment Ministry
The future of the church is in serious jeopardy. At least that's the opinion of researchers who have been tracking the decline of participation in church activities over the last 10 to 20 years. While the causes for...
Our Need to be Right Undercuts Theological Process
While my Greek and Latin skills are now rusty from a lack of daily use, I remain fascinated with how root meanings of words, as well as prefixes and suffixes, reflect subtleties of meaning that add richness to our...
Skype Interview: David Hull on Death and Dying (Part 1)
William Hull, noted Baptist pastor, author and scholar, died at 83 in December 2013 after battling Lou Gehrig's disease since 2008. A posthumous book by Hull, who wrote or contributed to dozens of books, awaits...
Social Capital: Congregations Investing in Their Communities
The local church is critiqued consistently. Whether arising from within or voiced from without, some of it is deserved. Nevertheless, the positive impact of the local church is overlooked or buried under a mountain of...
Old Testament’s Deuteronomy Puts Women on Equal Footing
Most scholars believe that Deuteronomy was the book of the law found during the reparations of the temple at the time Josiah was king of Judah (2 Kings 22). When the prophetess, Huldah, confirmed the book's...
Survey: Hispanic Americans Leaving Roman Catholic Church
Hispanic Americans' religious affiliation is changing. Though Hispanics are still predominantly Catholic, 24 percent have now converted from Catholicism, according to a new Pew Research report. While Pew noted a shift...
Pig-Farming Project Helps Ugandan Villages Heal
In a country ravaged by violence less than a decade ago, the people in one Ugandan city are regaining their sense of community, independence and financial stability, thanks to BMS World Mission worker Alex Vickers and...
When Burnout Threatens Your Life, It’s OK to Say “No”
A friend of mine lives right down the street from her mother. They have a good relationship, and they've become closer since the woman's father passed away a few years ago. Without him around anymore, though, the...
A Definition of Worship to Guide Your Life
I was introduced to a profound statement by William Temple many a year ago that has guided my reflections on worship. "Both for perplexity and dulled conscience the remedy is the same: sincere and spiritual worship....
Islamic, Baptist Leaders Discussed Boko Haram Crisis Before Schoolgirl Abduction
Before Boko Haram abducted some 300 Nigerian schoolgirls, drawing global condemnation, Baptist and Islamic colleagues met in Washington, D.C., in October 2012 to explore a collaborative response to this Islamic...
May 12, 2014
White S.C. Baptist Church Opens Doors to Black Congregation (Sacramento Bee) Cincinnati Catholic School Teacher with Gay Son Quits in Protest (USA Today) Catholic School Teachers at Diocese of Oakland Required to Sign...
Revising the offering envelope
By John Pierce How is faithfulness defined or measured? Can one’s commitments be counted? If so, which ones? Some churchgoers of a particular generation or two remember the six-point offering envelopes that called one...
Sour pineapples
You've heard of sour grapes, I suppose. It's an expression that grew from Aesop's fable about a hungry fox who couldn't quite reach a bunch of grapes, and went away grousing that they were probably sour anyway. Over...
How Your Church Can Effectively Use Social Media
Before you blame social media for rotting the minds of young people everywhere, causing traffic accidents, inciting bizarre and useless flash mobs and pretty much ruining the future of all humanity, consider the fact...
Photography Was Fundraising Boon for Early Missionaries
Several dozen scholars of religion met at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom from April 23-25 to discuss the global history of evangelicalism in the 19th and 20th centuries. The conference--organized...
Spiritual, Physical Dangers Await You When You Hurry
We hurry too much, pure and simple. As Henri Nouwen describes it, "One of the most obvious characteristics of our daily lives is that we are busy. We experience our days as filled with things to do, people to meet,...
May 9, 2014
Pastor Jeffres to Lawmakers: God Already Decided LGBT Issues, No Need to Debate Them (Raw Story) HGTV Drops Reality Show Starring Anti-Gay-Marriage Christian Activist (LA Times) Alliance of Baptists Addresses Racial...
What Were You Expecting
A sermon by Jim Somerville, Pastor, First Baptist Church, Richmond, Va. May 4, 2014 The Third Sunday of Easter Luke 24:13-35 Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles...
Strangers in th Night
A sermon by Robert Browning, Pastor, First Baptist Church, Frankfort, Ky. May 4, 2011 Communion Devotion Luke 24:13-35 This morning our attention is drawn to a resurrection appearance of Jesus found only in the gospel...
An Imperishable Love
A sermon by, Keith Herron, Pastor, Holmeswood Baptist Church, Kansas City, Mo. The Third Sunday of Easter I Peter 1:17-23 May 4, 2014 Psalm 116:1-4, 12-19; Luke 24:13-35; Acts 2:14a, 36-41 When Jesus preached the...
Spreading God’s Love Through “Kleenex and Casseroles”
A trip across town to Target sealed the deal. The deal it sealed was that I became a fan of Mumford and Sons. The trip across town was for the purchase of their CD, "Sigh No More." As I headed back to the office, I...