No suspense about why the SEC is the leading college football conference: money. The lowest paid head coach in the conference still makes more than $2 million annually. Some SEC assistant coaches make that much. My team, Georgia, will have no less than four assistant coaches making over one million dollars for the year if […]
Questions from the Voices Distinguished Chair of SBC Realism
By the grace of God and the tolerance of Dave Miller, I occupy the lofty heights of the SBC Voices Distinguished Chair of SBC Realism. Alas the chair is not endowed but I’m receptive to any offers. Here are a few questions for the SBC hoi polloi: Revitalization Church revitalization has been a buzzword and […]
Pastor, be neither bullied nor shamed in your preaching
There is nothing profound about this. You have a church and a pulpit. Use it to God’s glory. Sometimes events occur that demand your attention from the pulpit. The congregation looks to their pastor and church for a word from God in the midst of such events. I’m reading how every pulpit in the nation […]
In the span of 15 months implosions of both Traditionalists and Calvinists
My first writings here on SBC Voices was a matched pair of articles on Calvinists in the SBC: What I like about Calvinists and Why I’m wary of Calvinists. Those were in the summer of 2011 and, as I recall, each had hundreds of comments. What made me wary then was (1) Calvinists can be, […]
“We don’t have a pastor, just a preacher”
With that succinct sentence a church member issued a severe indictment of the man who was their pastor and preacher. I’d heard it before. The line is a standard complaint of some church members who aren’t enamored with their current pastor. I may signify something more serious, that members have arrived at the conclusion that […]
Finally, a formal statement about the Founder’s debacle
Tom Ascol has a statement, here. Here’s a word not in the statement: “apologize” Here’s another word not in the statement: “sorry” Here’s a word, used once, in the statement: “regret” We regret the pain and confusion we caused by this unwise alignment of image and idea. Not exactly a profile in courage or confession […]
The supreme irony of the year: Tom Ascol calls on the SBC for “deep seated repentance”
You can’t make this stuff up. I’m not going to link it. We had the Militant Trads, but they self-destructed. We’ve had the Rabid Cals for years, Ascol was a pretty decent spokesman for that segment of SBC life. Now, hopefully, the Rabid Cals have self-immolated. It’s Wagnerian, brethren/sistren: Gotterdammerung. You might have to change […]
My first sermon, being overpaid, and a peculiar racial church situation
I came to seminary from a secular job and volunteer positions in my large church with no preaching experience. Soon, I was offered an opportunity to preach in a small town in the Mississippi Delta, the ‘Fust’ Baptist church thereof. With some effort I cobbled together a sermon of a sort on Isaiah 40, I […]
SBC entities should voluntarily, annually disclose CEO compensation
Morris Chapman, former SBC president and Executive Committee CEO, made a motion last month in Birmingham: A motion by Morris Chapman of Triune Baptist Church in Arrington, Tenn., to request that the Executive Committee amend the SBC’s Business and Financial Plan where necessary to strengthen the fiscal accountability of the SBC’s entities to the convention. […]
People change churches easily and often and I was totally unprepared for this
If Dave Miller can bare his soul by reflecting on his ministry I can at least empty my mind on one aspect of my own: I was totally uprepared for how folks move so easily and often among churches. It was my own fault, or at least a lack of preparation caused by never having been […]
The sorry state of SBC evangelism and ye old time gospel beans
Pictured above are my magnificent gospel beans, heirloom pole beans handed down in my wife’s family for generations. These beans made the trek in a wagon down the eastern seaboard and across Georgia and Alabama to northeast Mississippi. The family story is told that in the 19th century one ancestor, a woman, traveled through Indian […]
A pastor looks at immigration and immigration policy
My friend and colleague Alan Cross is an expert on immigration and immigration policy. Your humble, happy, semi-retired hacker and plodder SBC pastor is not. But I know what I am seeing and reading. While on a vigorous four mile walk yesterday morning (vigorous to me, approaching my eigth decade, is about 18 minutes per […]