Posted: 5/19/03

DOWN HOME:
Sky impression, faulty opinions

The skies over Texas have been looking like “a communist country” lately.

That's not a political statement. It's a flashback kid's-eye-view-of-social-studies statement.

When I was growing up–way yonder in the Texas Panhandle, where the wind scrubs the sky clean several times a day (except, of course, when it fills it with dirt from parched farmland)–I couldn't imagine smog.

One of my schoolbooks (I can't remember if it was geography or science) had a picture of a layer of gray-brown smog settled nastily amid the skyscrapers and freeways of Los Angeles. “Yeeee-oooow,” I thought. “Who would want to live in stinky ol' California?”

But that wasn't the worst of it.

Seems like every picture I ever saw of the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc satellite puppet-government countries revealed gloomy, cloudy, smoggy skies. Every picture. I don't remember ever seeing a photograph of a sun-dappled landscape anywhere behind the Iron Curtain.

Maybe this was due to slick propaganda by pro-Western editors of social studies textbooks. Maybe it was coincidence. Maybe the textbooks featured plenty of sunshiny communist countries, but I didn't pay attention.

Somehow, I grew up thinking the sun never shone behind the Iron Curtain.

So, in addition to feeling sorry for all the Soviet children being raised by “godless communist” parents, I pitied them our Texas sunshine. Not only was everything “bigger and better” in Texas, it was sunnier, too.

Those memories, long hidden by clouds of years, peeked out lately. The “Mexican smoke” that drifted up from the south has blocked out the sun, the horizon and practically anything more than a mile or so away.

“This looks familiar,” I kept thinking. Later, it hit me. “Communist countries. This looks like a picture of a communist country.”

Imagine my surprise when, as a young father, I traveled to Russia. The pristine skies over St. Petersburg delighted my eyes. The sunshine that flooded the northern countryside delighted my soul.

But that was nothing next to the joy I felt as I met, greeted, hugged and worshipped with fellow Baptist Christians. These were the same children I had pitied, imagining them growing up in homes dominated by atheism and pictures of Lenin.

Well, some of them were raised by parents who didn't believe in God or love Jesus. But many of them grew up in loving Christian homes, and all those years we were praying to the same Lord and Savior, me in Texas and they in Russia.

If I'd known the words in Russian, I would have taught them one of my favorite songs from childhood, “Heavenly Sunshine.”

Posted: 5/19/03

ANOTHER VIEW:
Look below the surface for answers to global problems

I met a man not long ago. He was a Persian. He was from Iran, between Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Persian looked me in the eye and told me something of which I was already aware: Americans know next to nothing about the history and culture of the Middle East.

I agreed with him. Americans, as a whole, are not well versed on anything beyond Hawaii on one side and the Bahamas on the other.

The little world history I studied in Brownwood High School and Howard Payne half a century ago had little to say about the world's cultures or how they got that way.

We have been “exposed” to history, but we have learned little. Comprehending varied cultures (beginning with the Iroquois and Cherokees) never has been an American priority.

As I looked at the Persian, I had to remind myself he was not an Arab. Iran is Persian. Iraq, their neighbor, is Arab. These two distinct peoples have contributed much to the advancement of civilization.

Surveys before the invasion of Iraq said few college kids could find either country on the map. Geography is ignored in schools today.

But Arab and Persian history is making a comeback. The attempts by CNN and the TV network newscasts are appreciated, but they are less help than my old textbooks. In network and cable news programs, the maps are nice, but facts are lacking. In between commercials, more questions are raised than answers.

The West (meaning primarily Europe and the United States) does not have a very good track record in the Middle East.

Before any reader takes pen in hand to proclaim me as an American basher, pause long enough to reconsider the record. The man-made national boundaries in the Middle East were drawn by British and French politicians 80-something years ago.

When World War I began in 1914, the Turkish Ottoman Empire joined with Germany. The only way the British could get Arab help in defeating the Turks was to promise them freedom when it was all over. This was where Lawrence of Arabia came on the scene and helped the Arabs and allies to defeat the Turks. Lawrence was much in favor of the Arabs ruling themselves.

The British and French politicians agreed as long as they could appoint the kings and draw the boundaries–thereby keeping their hands in the oil.

The lands of Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq have lived the nightmare ever since.

Our America has done great and unheard of things in its short time among the nations of the world. But we are still young as far as a world power.

More importantly, we must learn that humility in dealing with others is not a sign of weakness. I think John F. Kennedy said that.

Humility is a sign of strength. I said that.

But, back to my Persian friend: He thought I was visiting with him just to convert him to Christianity. Even when I assured him I would be glad if he became a Christian but I was not in the proselytizing business, he found it difficult to believe. When a person is of another religion, I respect that.

Once the 19th century evangelist Dwight L. Moody and a friend were walking down a city street late at night. The friend noticed a drunk clinging to a lamppost and commented to Moody, “Isn't that one of your converts?” Moody replied, “He must be one of mine; God's converts don't look like that.”

So when I left the straight-talking Persian, I was determined to do a number of things.

Here is my to-do list:

Look below the surface and the politicians' spin.

Learn some basics about the people of Islam, the culture of Arabs, Persians and Kurds. Learn how they got to where they are today.

Try to walk in their shoes and discover the merit in their views.

I am convinced if the Western Christian experience is to be meaningful to people of the Middle East and the rest of the world, it will be because of our actions, not our words.

Britt Towery of San Angelo is a retired Southern Baptist missionary

Posted: 5/19/03

CYBERCOLUMN:
Amish Baptists

By Brett Younger

My parents, my church and most of my friends called them selves Baptist, but in reality we were, in most of the ways that mattered to a teenager, Amish. We not only didn't drink or sleep around; we didn't personally know anyone who did. We saw those people. They went to the grocery store that sold beer. Everyone at our church went to the store that didn't sell beer. We knew where the pool hall was, where most of the drinking reportedly took place, but no one in my youth group had ever been there.

Not only had alcohol never passed my lips I had never seen it pass anyone else's lips either. We knew that there were seventeen-year-olds who slept around, but we didn't know any of them–though I tended to imagine such girls. I imagined those women wore bright red dresses or tight-fitting blue jeans. They had long painted fingernails and were always looking for young Baptist/Amish victims to lure into depravity. (The Amish kids may have been less sheltered than I was.)

Before I went to Baylor a deacon who was concerned that I was going some place more worldly than Bob Jones University pulled me aside and said,”When you get to college, you will face temptations that you have never imagined. There will be hard drinking, loose living women. You need to decide right now that you will have nothing to do with them, because if the devil gets hold of you she doesn't let go.”

As a freshman I was constantly on the lookout out for wild women with drinking problems, but I couldn't find any. After a while I let my guard down. While taking Introduction to New Testament I was distracted by a Lutheran pastor's daughter who sat right in front of me. Yvonne was attractive enough to frighten me, but she seemed like a nice person. After a couple of weeks she said “hi” and I said “hi” I was thrilled that we were hitting it off. After a few more weeks of waiting for her to say”hi" again I finally asked if she would like to go out to eat and to a G-rated movie. We went to a nice family friendly Mexican restaurant. We talked about our churches and how wonderful it is to be a preacher's kid, but when our food came, she said, and I'll never forget this, and for a long time I tried,”Isn't it strange to have Mexican food without beer?" I tried to keep breathing but couldn't. She might as well have said,”Isn't it strange to eat enchiladas without crack cocaine sprinkled on top?" or”Isn't it strange to have tacos without small children as an appetizer?

I realized who she was. She was temptation. The devil had finally arrived and she was wearing blue jeans. She was a hard drinking, loose living woman planning to lure me into the depravity that I had been warned about.

I spent the rest of the evening terrified, but apparently she recognized my spiritual strength, and the invisible armor of God I was wearing, and to my disappointment, made no further attempts to steal my soul.

What I've learned since then, also to my disappointment, is that for most ministers most of the time temptation doesn't wear a red dress or tight-fitting blue jeans. Temptation is not usually flashy, frightening or obvious. The temptations that are most likely to steal ministerial souls are quiet and boring. They are the temptations to be dull and apathetic, and they are more dangerous than Lutherans.

Brett Younger is pastor of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth

Posted: 5/23/03

CYBERCOLUMN:
Pastors & Mavericks

By John Duncan

I am sitting here under the old oak tree, pondering the powerful playoff run of the Dallas Mavericks and the precipice upon which pastors stand.

Do basketball and pastors coincide? Like coaches in today's society, pastors live on the edge of a precipice, ready to step into the glorious promised land, or they gingerly step toward the not-so-ready dangerous fall into oblivion. Pastors possess the joy of a higher calling, but for many, pressures mount.

Not long ago after a draining playoff game, Dallas Mavericks coach Don Nelson talked of Los Angeles Lakers' coach Phil Jackson, who had a medical procedure after heart trouble. Pastors work with people who have heart troubles of numerous kinds.

Nelson remarked that on a scale of 1 to 10, the job of a coach is a 10 on the stress meter. Nelson followed his remark with a telling statement: “It's not just the pressure you put on yourself, although that's the most of it. It's the whole environment, the competition, the press, the radio talk shows-for nine months of the year, everybody's killing you. And if they're not, you're killing yourself.”

I have pastored only three churches, which may not completely qualify me to stake my claim, but pastors today face pressures like coaches in a playoff run. I remember and appreciate with fondness the churches that I have been privileged to pastor–the country church of my college days, my first full time church and the growing church I now pastor, a church where God amazes me daily by his grace.

I also think of the precious people–Merle Taylor, who taught this city boy the difference between sheep and goats; Earl and Emma, who defended their 19-year-old peachfuzz preacher as not some “little preacher boy” but “our preacher” and served me pecan pie; Mack, with his winsome spirit of encouragement that carried me on low days; Cooter, who laughed and forgave me the day in which I plowed over a water pipe while mowing the church yard; Elsie, who appreciated my trips to the nursing home; an unnamed East Texas lady, who once served up these words: “You young! The Laud done gone and sent you out early”; the Lees and the Smiths, who invited us over for games and fun; Sam, who allows me to be myself whether good or bad; and a host of other unnamed saints at Lakeside Baptist Church, who have helped me hold on to Jesus in the joyous roller coaster ride of 16 years here at Lakeside in Granbury.

The struggles, the mostly highs, and the joys of 16 years in the same place and two other churches still cause me to appreciate God's work, his call, and pastors on the edge of a precipice in the pressure.

I remember through the years numerous pressures and a few not-so-precious saints–a couple of anonymous letters; the guy who once declared, “You'll never make it as a preacher”; church financial pressures; people and personality pressures; growing pains and the pressures of growth; lectures from my parishioners; saints worried about bathroom toilet paper supplies and worship temperatures (Too hot! Too cold! All on the same Sunday!); crowded parking lots; watching the sails rip off of families falling apart; families in other crises like job layoffs; and the ever present joys of music and worship in this complex 21st century, to name only a few. I learned the pastor's greatest challenge–knowing what to accept as truth and what to ignore or dump into the File 13 of life. Satan often comes cloaked with shining wings.

I often ask, “What is the greatest pressure pastors face?” Is it sneaky spiritual warfare, which aims to destroy? Is it crises like death and marital straits, which aim to rip the sails off marital lifeboats? Is it people who stir trouble in the church? Is it a lack of experience or a lack of knowledge about a church's particular history? Is it a lack of Bible knowledge or spiritual discipline? Is it not enough of Emma's pecan pie?

Or do pastors get beat up by incipient competition between churches? After all, Eugene Peterson once quipped of the dangers of always wishing for “something bigger,” or, in his own words, that eternal quest for the perfectly desirable church of the pastor's imagination, “a tall steeple church with a cheese cake congregation.”

I think Don Nelson must have been preaching at a pastors' conference. Preachers, pastors and staffers sometimes get beat down, but if the truth be known, most spend a lot of time beating up on themselves.

For all this talk about coaches and preachers and playoff run by the Dallas Mavericks, two things must happen in the boiling pressures of ministry. Eugene Peterson himself admits: “Hang around (the church) long enough, and sure enough there are gossips who won't shut up, furnaces that malfunction, sermons that misfire, disciples who quit, choirs who go flat-and worse. Every congregation is a congregation of sinners. And if that weren't bad enough, they all have sinners for pastors.” Peterson calls for God's servants and his people, albeit all sinners, to develop two things–holiness in relationship with God and a passion for his calling. These two essentials appear to be missing among pastors and people today amid life pressures.

So here is to all pastors whose sermons have misfired and whose ministry passion has fizzled: Develop holiness in relationship to God again. Ask Christ to renew his joy in you. Beg for his Spirit to rekindle the flame of his passion and calling in spite of the pressures.

So here is to all the people of churches all over the globe: Trust God in your own pressures. Recognize the pressures your pastor faces, even amid the beating up of the inner self. Encourage your pastor today. And, by all means, stop looking for cheesecake congregations. Invite your pastor over for pecan pie. It will do you wonders, and it sure will bless your pastor. I sure miss Emma and Earl and that piece of pecan pie of shared fellowship in Christ.

Finally, to Don Nelson, I say, “Go Dallas Mavericks!”

John Duncan is pastor of Lakeside Baptist Church in Granbury, Texas, and the writer of numerous articles in various journals and magazines

Posted: 5/30/03

Panhandle church steers
toward a witness with car show

By George Henson

Staff Writer

AMARILLO–Pastor Dana Moore's driving passion for the gospel of Jesus Christ recently steered his congregation to sponsor a car show in the church parking lot.

"It's that age-old idea of how do we get the gospel to people who won't come to church," he said.

About a dozen members of Pleasant Valley Baptist Church in Amarillo helped the pastor put on the car show that wheeled in 40 entries in its second year.

“We wanted to provide something for our community,” Moore explained. “A lot of people around here like to look at old cars, and this was a way to reach out to them and the people who own the cars too.”

Moore owns a 1963 Thunderbird.

“I've had this one about two years, but my first car was a 1963 T-Bird,” he explained. “My uncle turned me on to T-Birds early in life, and 1963 is my birth year, so that makes it special for me.”

Moore admits his baby blue T-Bird with white ragtop was completely restored when he bought it. “I'm no handyman,” he said. “My kids are impressed when I change a light bulb.”

Even greater than his interest in cars, however, is Moore's interest in bringing people into the church.

“We probably had 200 come through, and a lot of people came to our church parking lot on Saturday who probably never thought they'd be standing in a church parking lot.”

To widen the appeal, the church, which averages about 300 in Sunday morning worship, not only had the cars but offered food and an inflatable house for children.

Prizes were awarded in conjunction with the car show. All the money raised from entry fees and food sales was donated to the Pleasant Valley Elementary School across the street from the church.

Moore has been pastor of the Amarillo church nine years.

“These are just wonderful people in this church,” he explained. “They are open to trying innovative things like this to spread the gospel.”

Posted: 5/30/03

Campolo, Campbell to headline CBF meeting

ATLANTA–Tony Campolo, Kate Campbell and Marjorie Thompson will lead worship and prayer sessions at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship's general assembly June 26-28 in Charlotte, N.C.

Campolo, professor emeritus of sociology at Eastern College in St. David's, Pa., and a prolific author and speaker, will speak during the assembly's opening session.

Campbell, a Nashville recording artist and daughter of a Baptist pastor, will provide music for the sessions. Thompson, an author on Christian spiritual formation, will lead guided prayer times.

The assembly also will feature a commissioning service for CBF global missions personnel and more than 100 ministry workshops.

Other highlights of the assembly include:

CBF Coordinator Daniel Vestal will bring a message on “CBF Being the Presence of Christ in the World.”

Church growth expert and author Brian McLaren will lead the CBF Congregational Leadership Institute.

CBF-endorsed chaplains and pastoral counselors will be recognized.

A business session will include election of Coordinating Council members and adoption of CBF's 2003-04 budget.

Jubilate!, a youth choir from CBF churches in Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee, will perform Thursday.

Alabama pastor Sarah Jackson Shelton will preach Friday evening.

Retired North Carolina pastor Jack Causey will lead a time of communion and commissioning on Saturday morning.

More details and pre-registration information may be accessed online at www.cbfonline.org.

Posted: 5/30/03

Team charts new missions territory in rural China

Editor's note: The names of the Baptist mission workers in this story have been changed for security reasons.

RURAL CHINA (BP)–Wearing the same pair of socks for a week, dining on soupy Chinese noodles and veggies for breakfast, shampooing in a creek and snacking on energy bars are only a few of the many unique aspects of hiking through China's countryside.

Doug McTavish and Stephen Faulkner know this first-hand.

McTavish, 24, and Faulkner, 30, are not on an expedition but a two-year assignment to share the gospel of Christ. They are part of a team of six backpackers who trek cattle paths looking for the isolated villages of the people group among whom they work.

The team pinpoints locations on handheld global positioning systems, takes pictures, counts houses and draws maps of communities. All the information eventually gets coordinated into trekking routes and compiled into notebooks for use by future prayerwalking, evangelism and ministry teams.

“What they do is so important,” says the worker who supervises them and coordinates strategy. “I feel it is my responsibility that these people have a chance to hear the gospel in a way they can understand it. I thought, 'How are we going to do that?' The people are so spread out. The task appears overwhelming, but we decided that if we knew where they were, we could reach them with the gospel.”

The process of locating villages often provides humorous antidotes to strenuous travel. For instance, McTavish recalled the time they were invited to eat with one family.

“Dude, she pulled out a hog's head–everything from the ears forward–and put it on the fire, turned to us and asked, 'Can you stay for supper?' We figured a way to gracefully get out of that one.”

The people they encounter are traditionally animistic–worshipping trees, rivers and mountains–but openness to the gospel continues to grow.

When they enter a community, McTavish and Faulkner regularly have their own followers as children gather in their wakes. Spontaneous games of soccer or basketball often endear the two to villagers. Both are mildly conversant in the Mandarin language.

“We take very seriously the idea of being salt and light wherever we go,” Faulkner said. “We know others will be coming behind us with the gospel.”

Faulkner felt compelled to build God's kingdom instead of his own by anonymously preparing the way for the gospel. He felt that God said, “You don't need Mountain Dew and Papa John's to survive.”

Circumstances during their travels have forced these young men to lean on God for guidance. Once, they literally asked God for direction when they were faced with a fork on their trail.

“Out of nowhere these guys came out of the fields and told us which direction the village was and that we were almost there,” Faulkner said.

“All this changes your perspective,” McTavish said. “When we come to an isolated village and I pray for some guy who is 80 years old, and then I know that I am probably the first Christian to ever pray for him, that is a pretty awesome thought.”

A byproduct of surviving the smell of five-day-old socks also has been an immense friendship.

“We are with each other 24/7,” Faulkner said. “We even hang out together when we don't have to. Our interests are so similar that–from the very start–we got along well.”

McTavish and Faulkner recount the story of how God might be preparing a man to profess faith in Christ.

“This guy on a tractor was pulling a trailer with a bunch of logs on it, but they'd all fallen off down a slope,” McTavish recalled. “We dropped our packs and helped him load them all back on his trailer.

“He went on ahead, but later we caught up to him. He was trying to get up a muddy slope but couldn't because of the weight of the logs. We unloaded all the logs, carried them up the hill, then loaded them back on the trailer.”

The grunt work garnered an invitation to dinner and a place to stay that night.

“That guy's wife hooked us up with some serious good food that night,” McTavish continued. “He also told us we had a place to stay any time we came back.”

McTavish and Faulkner only hope the next time they go back that dinner will precede a worship service with that family.

Posted: 5/30/03

Ministers offered free counseling

DALLAS (BP)–Too often, Christian leaders have personal problems but feel they have no place to turn, Mac Brunson says.

But the pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas has helped put together a ministry to some of those hurting leaders. This year's Southern Baptist Convention Pastors' Conference, headed by Brunson, will join with Focus on the Family and Hope for the Heart to offer free Christian counseling to pastors, staff members, missionaries and their families Sunday and Monday, June 15-16.

To ensure anonymity, the counseling will take place away from the Phoenix Civic Plaza. Focus on the Family's H.B. London Jr. and Hope for the Heart's June Hunt will lead a team of counselors.

Confidential appointments can be made by calling Hope for the Heart at (800) 488-HOPE (4673) between 8:30 a.m. and 10 p.m. Central time. Names are not required; registration numbers will be assigned. Appointments will be made in the order they are received.

The ministry adds to what was already a family-oriented event. The theme of the conference will be “Building Kingdom Families,” and the first-ever Kingdom Family Rally will take place Monday night, June 16.

“It adds a dimension that I've never known the convention to have before,” Brunson said.

Both Hunt and London say Christian leaders are dealing with a variety of problems. London said the key issues fall into five categories: marital issues; family issues; contention in the local church; the balance between ministry and home life; and addictive personalities and perversions (Internet addiction, television addiction, etc.).

Posted: 5/30/03

Case of state's grant for religious
education goes to Supreme Court

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP)–The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that may decide whether the government is required to fund religious organizations in some circumstances.

The high court agreed May 19 to hear arguments in Locke vs. Davey, a case that originated in Washington state but could have nationwide consequences for church-state relations.

In the case, Joshua Davey applied under a state program that provides scholarships to disadvantaged Washington students who want to attend in-state colleges. The scholarships may be spent at any accredited school, including religious ones.

Davey, who qualified under the program's rules, elected to spend his scholarship at Northwest College, a Seattle-area Bible school affiliated with the Assemblies of God. However, the state revoked the scholarship when officials found out Davey planned to major in theology and business management.

State officials cited a provision in Washington's constitution that prohibits the state from spending any money on religious instruction. Davey sued the state with the help of the American Center for Law and Justice, a legal-advocacy group founded by Pat Robertson that often opposes a strict interpretation of church-state separation.

Davey won in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, generally considered one of the nation's most liberal federal appeals courts. A three-judge panel of that court ruled 2-1 that the Washington constitutional provision, as well as a similar state statute, violated Davey's freedom of religious expression under the U.S. Constitution. Washington Gov. Gary Locke appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court.

Washington's provision is similar to clauses in several other state constitutions, sometimes collectively referred to as “Blaine amendments” by supporters of public money for religious education.

These amendments were modeled after a 19th-century amendment proposed to the U.S. Constitution by former Maine Sen. James Blaine. While critics of the Blaine amendments say the provisions had their origins in anti-Catholic bias rampant at the time, opponents of government funding for religious instruction say that argument is an oversimplification and that bad motivations don't necessarily make for bad laws.

The state Blaine amendments are seen by both sides as the last major legal obstacle to government funding for religious schools.

“Blaine amendments are the Jim Crow laws of our time,” said Becket Fund President Kevin Hasson in a press release. The Becket Fund is an organization that supports government funding for private religious schools and runs a special website dedicated to opposing Blaine-type amendments. “This case presents an opportunity for the Supreme Court to follow through … and complete the task of banning anti-religious discrimination in education in all its forms.”

But supporters of strict church-state separation decried the attempt.

“People who want to enter the ministry should pay their own way, not hand the bill to the taxpayer,” said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. “For more than 200 years, religion in America has been funded with voluntary contributions. Many states want to keep it that way and should have the right to shield people from paying the equivalent of a church tax.”

The Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, a Washington religious-liberty watchdog group, has opposed school vouchers in the past. BJC General Counsel Holly Hollman said the group has not yet decided to take Washington state's side in the Locke case, but that the suit has the potential to push the school-voucher debate to a significant new level.

“What this case really does is present the issue of whether the free-exercise clause actually requires funding” of religious groups, Hollman said. “So, historically, the establishment clause has prohibited funding, and then in the Zelman case, five members of the Supreme Court were willing to say that the federal constitution at least allows some funding schemes.”

But, Hollman added, “you have to say whether or not it is a substantial burden on an individual's free exercise of religion to have the government refuse to pay for his religious education.”

Hollman said a ruling against Washington in the case could potentially nullify Blaine-type amendments in state constitutions–perhaps in as many as 37 states.

Justices will not get to hear the case in the court's current session, which is scheduled to end in June. Oral arguments in the case will be held next fall, with a decision likely to follow in the late spring or early summer.

The state of Washington revoked a scholarship when officials found out Joshua Davey planned to major in theology and business management.

Posted: 5/30/03

Discovery opens eyes to America and hearts to God

By George Henson

Staff Writer

COLLEGE STATION–For 35 years, women from around the world have found a place to gather, learn skills and gain an introduction to Christianity at a College Station ministry.

Currently, women from every continent except Australia are involved in Discovery, said the ministry's director, Melinda Hallmark.

Meetings are held at First Baptist Church of College Station, but volunteers and financial support also come from First Baptist Church and Central Baptist Church in Bryan, as well as other churches.

The women start each Wednesday with refreshments and conversation, followed by a reading of Scripture. Then they split up into a number of classes designed to help them not only learn a new skill but have a good time as well.

Classes include basic English, conversational Bible study, cooking, gardening and a variety of craft classes such as cross stitch, crochet, quilting, sewing and T-shirt painting. Another class teaches the women how to properly apply make-up.

The ministry has evolved over the decades as the needs of the women have changed, Hallmark said.

When pastors of the two First Baptist churches initially conceived of the idea, the major need was English classes. International women in Central Texas in those days primarily were the wives of students or professors and came from countries where the education of women was not common.

That's not the case anymore.

“It is rare for the women to not speak at least a little bit of English,” Hallmark said. “Now a lot of the women are college educated or have advanced degrees. Those who don't speak English as well are usually the parents of students who have immigrated with their children.”

Hallmark has worked in the ministry for more than 20 years and has been director 18 years.

“I just love being here,” she said. “It's so much fun to meet ladies from different countries and to learn about their cultures.”

In some ways, women are alike, no matter where they come from, Hallmark said. “They love their families. They love learning new things. And they love getting together with friends.”

Running the program requires more than 50 volunteers each week to register participants, teach classes, transport women and care for their children. Some of volunteers have worked in the ministry for more than two decades themselves.

“The women who last as volunteers in Discovery … are very loving, very able and very patient, so they are very able to look past any difficulties that sometimes come with working with women from other cultures,” Hallmark explained.

The number of volunteers needed has expanded over the years as the number of participants has grown. When the ministry began in 1967, it served about 30 international women. Today it serves about 250 each year.

In celebration of Discovery's 35th anniversary, a barbecue recently was held for the women and their families, complete with a bluegrass band and a gospel quartet. A cookbook with recipes from around the world also was compiled.

And, as always, the gospel was shared.

“A lot of women from China and some of the other countries too don't believe in God, but we read Scripture each week, and we see ourselves as planting a lot of seeds,” Hallmark said.

Posted: 5/30/03

James Dobson changes roles

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (RNS)–James Dobson, longtime president of Focus on the Family, will expand his role as chairman of the conservative Christian group but pass on the presidency to a successor.

Don Hodel, former president of the Christian Coalition and a Cabinet member in the Reagan administration, began serving as president and CEO May 15.

“This redefined responsibility will assure Dr. Dobson's continued leadership of the organization but without the burden of day-to-day management,” the ministry announced. “It will allow him to spend more time on ministry objectives that only he can accomplish.”

Dobson, who founded the ministry in 1977, will continue his role as host of the ministry's radio program, also called “Focus on the Family.”

Hodel was the Christian Coalition's president from 1997 to 1999 and was energy secretary and interior secretary during Reagan's presidency. He has served on Focus on the Family's board of directors since 1995.

In another transition in the organization, John Paulk, an outspoken member of the “ex-gay” movement, left the organization May 6. Since 1998, he has managed the ministry's homosexuality and gender department and spoken from personal experience to say homosexuality is a lifestyle that can be left behind.

Paulk is moving with his wife and children to the Pacific Northwest to be closer to extended family.

Posted: 5/30/03

DOWN HOME:
A dog-gone tale and a broken fence

Now I know the cost of our dog, Betsy: 85¢.

That's how much I spent to replace the broken plank in the fence, where she escaped into the wide, wild world.

Betsy got out on Friday night, and I could kick myself for not fixing the fence earlier.

We arrived home from dinner, and I noticed the broken board lying in the driveway. I walked over, picked it up and wedged it into place, hooking it on a nail still embedded into the fence frame. “I need to run over to the hardware store and get another board. I'll do that after I change clothes,” I thought.

Then I went into the house, got busy with other things and promptly forgot all about it.

I remembered in a flash, about 10 that night, when Joanna asked, “Has anybody seen Betsy in awhile?”

We all ran out into the backyard, hollering our 11-year-old dog's name. No answer. Moonlight shown through the hole in our fence.

Lindsay got a flashlight and tracked the alley, hollering, “Betsy … Betsy!” Jo and Molly walked up and down our street, calling for our dog. I jumped in the car and spent an hour and a half driving down every street and up every alley in four subdivisions.

Betsy, who never had strayed more than one house away, left us.

The next morning, I pulled on an old pair of boots and walked the full length of the drainage ditch that snakes behind our house, worried I'd find her body. Later, Jo distributed flyers to every house in our subdivision, and I took them to every home on both sides of the street on the other side of the drainage ditch.

As I walked, I couldn't help but remember great times with our old dog: The little ball of fur we brought home for the girls' 8th and 5th birthdays. How high she could jump when she was younger. The time she learned to ring the bell by the back door to tell us she wanted to go outside. How she loved to cuddle with us on the couch in the evenings.

A couple of times, I started to choke up as I asked people to look out for a small brown-and-black-and-gray Yorkshire terrier/poodle.

Finally, I taped flyers to every lightpost in two other subdivisions. At dinner, through our tears, we prayed Betsy would come home.

Of course, losing a dog isn't a huge tragedy compared to friends fighting cancer, a young friend recuperting from a severe accident, others looking for jobs. A dog is a dog.

But a dog is a blessing, too. I still got a kick out of Betsy greeting me at the garage door in the afternoon. I loved carrying her around the house early in the morning, when she and I were the only ones awake. Many times, I've thanked God for Betsy.

On Sunday afternoon, I thanked God when a woman who lives about a quarter-mile away called to say, “I think we found your dog.”

Betsy's home again. Blessed reunion.