William Thornton

I recall one of the moderate candidates, Winifred Moore, back in the day of the original Conservative Resurgence having a campaign that included airport stops with news interviews. The idea was, one supposes, to get on television news or in print. Moore was quite the avuncular preacher with homespun stories but rather unsuited for this type of campaigning. He looked like he'd rather be doing anything but what he was doing but then running against Adrian Rogers and Charles Stanley was an unenviable task. My youthful observations back in that day were that, Adrian Rogers didn't need to … [Read more...] about Is this the most aggressive, most contested SBC presidential contest in history?

Seminary professors Malcolm Yarnell and Keith Whitfield wrote an article put here on February 16, 2019, Addressing Abuse in the SBC: A Proposal. Keith Whitfield is Professor of Systematic Theology at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Malcolm Yarnell is Research Professor of Theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. This is the only concrete proposal I have seen from any in the SBC that goes beyond providing resources and educating SBC pastors and churches. For some time now, SBC seminaries have been requiring students to take some level of training in the area of … [Read more...] about ICYMI, Yarnell and Whitfield proposal for addressing abuse in the SBC

Somewhere it is inscribed in stone, as if by the finger of God, that there must be SBC state conventions and that they must receive the lion's share of Cooperative Program revenues. Such is not inscribed by the finger of the Almighty but by the finger of respected but not omnipotent denominational bureaucrats. Our venerable Cooperative Program is almost a century old. It is not vigorous in it's old age and even though it is rather weak of eye and has been in declining health for generations, still transfers $467 million dollars from church offering plates to a variety of destinations. … [Read more...] about Does the Cooperative Program make state conventions lazy and inefficient?

I’m the guy who will actually bend over and pick up a penny in a parking lot. In a restaurant parking lot at the beach eagle-eye Plodder spotted a bill behind the car parked next to mine. Nope, not an old school Gospel tract fake currency, guaranteed to alienate restaurant servers who think they have a big tip, but a real bill. Guys fold a $100 bill I twice and stick it behind their insurance card. Some dude dropped his. I found it. What should I have done? What should I do? _________ I’m also the guy who has never found anything of value, until now. … [Read more...] about OK, so I found a hundred dollar bill

The average attendance at the main weekly worship service for a cooperating Southern Baptist church is around 100. LifeWay gave me a figure of 70 a few years ago along with a median size of 125. There are different ways to calculate it but, regardless of the method, the Southern Baptist Convention is a convention of small churches.  But only a fraction of churches get the attention, provide the high-profile leadership positions and, for better or worse, provide the public with what an SBC church looks like. Sometimes this is positive. Sometimes it is negative. Average sized SBC … [Read more...] about Lost in the clamor of clergy abuse, CRT/I, and any other controversy: the SBC is and always has been a convention of small churches

I'm at a place where I am free to worship where I wish and I wished yesterday to worship at the church of a friend who is in a new pastorate nearby. The church is quite old and has quite a history, mostly not so good in recent decades. The building is new, courtesy of the Almighty (a lightning strike to the steeple) and the insurance company. It's a traditional looking Southern Baptist church. I make no criticism of the church where I have been a member for a few years and in which I have had modest staff responsibilities. It is new and non-traditional in every way. The pastor is an … [Read more...] about A red brick church, a piano, an organ, hymns, pews, and an old guy preaching behind a real pulpit: Hallelujah!

And, he's getting older. The Barna research on the aging of American pastors is getting a little old itself. The most recent was 2017. It was a typical state-of-the-church handwringer. Pastors are aging, as in the average age of a senior pastor is increasing (54 in that study). Really old pastors are increasing, 6% in 1992, nearly tripled by 2017. Probably significantly higher in 2021. Only one in seven pastors was under 40 in 2017. Half of pastors are over 55. More pastors over 65 than are under 40. (The research is about senior pastors.) So, what about the only … [Read more...] about “Tell me about your pastor.” “Well, he’s an old guy…”

Voices readers sometimes complain about the articles here, generally along the lines of who Voices is for and against. Reader griped about Randy Adams not receiving positive print here. Dude, get educated, then gripe. Adams is one of the four SBC presidential candidates and I've written eight articles that feature Randy Adams in the title and several others where he is prominent in the body of the piece. May I say that Adams give boatloads of fodder for bloggers; thus, the quantity of articles on him. Most of these are linked below. ______________________ Abuser … [Read more...] about So I watched an hour of Randy Adams live last night

Some of the SBC alphabet is under constant internal attack. The ERLC always has critics that are loud, dedicated, tireless, and often senseless. Witness the recent  Executive Committee ERLC Task Force report, generally characterized as a throwaway item, as in 'no action needed,' 'no action taken.' NAMB is a big, red bullseye target. Church planters may feel more valued than ever before in the SBC and church planting may have crossed over from a temp job sought by pastors of limited skills to a cool job that has become increasingly popular among highly motivated, skilled, and bearded … [Read more...] about Our oldest and most important entity, IMB, is doing OK

Ronnie Floyd threw a bunch of tables and graphics at us in his relaunch of the Vision 2025 message to the Executive Committee. You can view the message here. I'm picking a single item, the last one, number five from his list of five strategic actions: Increase annual giving through the Cooperative Program to surpass $500 million by 2025. I would put the graphs here but haven't figured out how to do it. A few items from his address that concern the CP: The CP (total CP, state share and national) has declined from $554 million in 2008 to $467 million in 2020, a decline of … [Read more...] about What about the 40% of SBC churches that gave NOTHING through the Cooperative Program?