Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Confidence in Christ
A sermon delivered by Howard Batson, Pastor, First Baptist Church, Amarillo, Tx., on May 13, 2012. Acts 4:31 The Apostle Paul writes in Romans: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for...
Love Is Sharing Your French Fries
A sermon delivered by Robert Browning, Pastor, First Baptist Church, Frankfort, Ky., on May 13, 2012. John 15:9-17 Recently, several four to eight year old children were asked what love is. They replied with some very...
What Does It Mean to Be Jesus’ Friend?
Anyone who has ever been in church is familiar with the hymn, "What a Friend We Have in Jesus." It was written by a son to comfort his mother whom he had left behind in Ireland when he came to the United States in the...
Poll: Only 1 in 5 Jews View Christian Right Favorably
The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), alongside Gallup and Pew and other polling agencies, scored big this month. Right in the midst of the treated-as-cosmic discussion of "same-sex" marriage, a not-unnoticed...
Gun Violence Claims Too Many Young Victims
The e-mail message was direct and devastating: "Davius Boyd, a 4th grader in Mrs. Enos' class, died at approximately 5:45 this afternoon," wrote my principal. "The coroner informed of his death about 40 minutes ago. He...
Gullible’s travels
First it was the cheap electric heaters in little wooden cabinets supposedly built by real Amish craftsmen, then a less successful "ArticPro" air conditioner, and a couple of other gimmicky products that weren't as...
Western Nations Practice Selective Justice
We should welcome Charles Taylor's recent conviction by a U.N. war crimes tribunal. While president of Liberia, Taylor fomented violent uprisings in neighboring countries with the aid of brutal militias in order to...
Can We Discern and Evaluate Without Being Judgmental?
It was a childhood game that we played – good guys and bad guys in several versions: cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, reflecting the characters from the city crime shows and western shoot-em-ups of the early TV...
Legacy Continues of Baptist Who Helped End Slave Trade
A courageous Jamaican Baptist who played a crucial role in initiating the end of the slave trade is set to deepen understanding of black and ethnic minority Baptist Christians, nearly 200 years after his death. Sam...
Lottie Moon Defied Male-Dominated Southern Baptists
For almost a century, Lottie Moon has been a major icon for fundraising for bold mission efforts by the Southern Baptist Convention. She is hailed as a late 19th- and early 20th-century pioneer for efforts on the...
5 Changes That Have Influenced Church Staffing
In going through some files recently, I came across a church newsletter from April 1976. It provided an interesting snapshot of this particular church at that time. This county seat Baptist church in a southern state...
Extremist Rhetoric Overwhelms Public Square, Church Sanctuaries
Heartland Institute put up an inflammatory ad on a digital billboard in Chicago that associated those who believe in climate change with mass murderers. "The most prominent advocates of global warming aren't...
Stupid
By John Pierce Vanderbilt University’s new non-discrimination policy for student organizations is stupid. A school of such intellectual prominence should be able to see more clearly. On the surface, a...
Old dogs and new tricks
This is not about my dog, who is not yet old, nor particularly interested in tricks. And I'm not really old, but old enough to get a bit stuck in long-term habits, including the mostly conservative and rather boring...
Israel and Palestine: Is Peaceful Coexistence Possible?
May is a time of celebration in the modern nation of Israel. On May 15, Israel will celebrate its 64th birthday, as the establishment of the State of Israel took place on that day in 1948. Previously, in October 1946,...
Do Talk-Radio Standards Justify Land’s Plagiarism?
Are standards different between journalism and talk radio when it comes to plagiarism? An ad hoc committee investigating the plagiarism of a Southern Baptist Convention official Richard Land seemed to suggest so....
Should Churches Tell Others How to Vote?
On May 8, North Carolinians were given the opportunity to vote on the following amendment to their state constitution: "Marriage between one man and one woman is the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or...
What words for you?
Graduation season is upon us once again. I still have a hard time getting into "graduation" ceremonies for preschools and elementary school, but completing one's high school, college, or graduate school studies really...
Fear “ The Cheapest Room to Live in the House
The Sufi poet Hafiz said: "Fear is the cheapest room in the house/I would like to see you living/In better conditions. ... God wants to see/More love and playfulness in your eyes/For that is your greatest witness to...
“The Avengers”
I saw "The Avengers" twice over the weekend. I have two sons, one in college and one at home. I went with one son on Friday and one son on Sunday. At the showing on Sunday, we sat in front of a boy about 9 years old....
A Lesson in Encouragement from the Fishing Hole
When I was about 4, my grandfather took me fishing. He had a secret fishing hole that was a backwater off Murder Creek in East Brewton. Remind me to tell you the story sometime of how Murder Creek got its name. The...