SBC Issues

I realize Voices published a post on this several years ago, but I thought it would be interesting to discuss this topic again. This week on his blog Thom Rainer published the list of best-selling Bible translations as of 2020. This list came from the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association. Rankings as January 2020 (numbers in parentheses are 2011 rankings)  New International Version (NIV) (1) King James Version (KJV) (2) New Living Translation (NLT) (4) English Standard Version (ESV) (5) New King James Version (NKJV) (3) Christian Standard Bible (CSB) (6) Reina … [Read more...] about Bible translations [Mark Terry]

The Mike Stone reign at the Executive Committee has come to an end. That is a very good thing for Southern Baptists. His time as chairman of the Executive Committee has been a disaster in numerous very public ways. His fumbling of the sexual abuse issue was a huge embarrassment for our convention of churches. Yesterday it was revealed that he is a part of the steering council for the Conservative Baptist Network. You'll notice that he's not the only member of the EC that is a part of this group. I count six. Two of them are officers. It's interesting, but not surprising, that Paige … [Read more...] about More Executive Committee transparency, please

It has always sounded so sensible and proper: Bible believing Christians should organize and work to elect likeminded political leaders who will implement, or preserve, our values and vision for our secular society. One major expression of that has been that ‘our’ president would nominate and the Senate would confirm Supreme Court justices who would make the ‘right’ decisions. I’m a retired SBC pastor who bought into this with the Reagan tide of 1980. At a modest level I put out voter guides, preached an occasional sermon that might address the latest outrage du jour, and engaged in a bit … [Read more...] about The Almighty’s hearty laugh at the American political church

I'm taking a stroll, golf cart ride actually, through our small town. The route always takes me through our historic cemetery. By an odd coincidence, call it providential if you want to be spiritual, I was called to pastor the Baptist church in this town where a couple of relatives of mine had married (the second marriage for one, third and fourth for another), lived a short while, died and were buried. The picture is of the grave of my great-great-grandfather. The color accent is the Confederate flag. The first year the flag appeared was a surprise. I quickly discerned that it had to do … [Read more...] about The strange war on statues and monuments

I have posted several times over the past three months, sharing how our church has coped during the pandemic. I this post I’ll share what we’ve done in regard to reopening the church. We began holding in person worship services on May 24th. This was in accordance with the recommendations of our state government (Texas) and state Baptist convention. We taped off every other pew and encouraged our folks to distance themselves on the occupied pews. We left most of the interior doors open. We did not pass the offering plates, and we did not have a greeting time. We placed Palm+ hand sanitizer … [Read more...] about COVID-19 Church Update [By Mark Terry]

There would be a lot of sweating going on, profuse by some of the more portly Reverends. There would surely be protests, multiple protests I believe. The abuse victims and advocates would be there (with both JDG and Cedarville featured on their placards and signs; the latter, BTW, I recall having a major exhibit hall presence the last year or two). BLM would be there. Will there ever be an SBC annual meeting without protests? The usual backslapping everywhere, an indication in most cases of genuine joy over seeing old friends. Watch the eyes though. If the look is over your shoulder … [Read more...] about If we were meeting in Orlando this week this is what would be happening

Right before our non-convention comes the release of the SBC Annual Statistical Report. For some years it has been lamentable; thus, my personal descriptor of it as the "annual SBC statistical weepfest." General reaction from denominational leaders usually ranges from despair to depression and calls for SBCers to do better are noised about widely, the thought being if we just worked harder, prayed more, witnessed more, and had more money and programs we would be seeing mid-twentieth century rocket ship numbers. Baptist Press story: Southern Baptist Convention continues statistical decline, … [Read more...] about Here it is. The annual SBC statistical weepfest…and Ronnie Floyd is right

A couple of evenings ago, I decided to zip over to Sam’s club about a half-hour before it was scheduled to close to pick up a couple of things we needed. They were closed and the parking lot was abandoned. I wasn’t sure what had happened until a couple of hours later when my wife told me about a Facebook post from a lady in our church who had been there when they suddenly made an announcement asking people to clear the building quickly. Walmart, a block away, also closed up. Evidently, there are busloads of folks going from town to town in the Heartland, stirring things up, and the rumor … [Read more...] about Racism, Riots, and the Future