Baptist Briefs

Posted: 11/10/06

Baptist Briefs

Arkansas Baptist philanthropist dies. John Heflin Jr., an Arkansas businessman and philanthropist, died Oct. 26. Heflin, who died from cancer at age 61, was a major donor to Baptist causes, including the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Arkansas and Ouachita Baptist University at Arkadelphia, where he attended college. Heflin also represented the Religious Liberty Council on the Baptist Joint Committee board. In 2004, he was named Philanthropist of the Year by the Association of Professional Fundraisers. He was a member of Second Baptist Church in Little Rock.

Nevada Baptist meeting includes commissioning. The Nevada Baptist Convention included a commissioning service for 20 Southern Baptist International Mission Board short-term missionaries during its annual meeting in Reno. During the business meeting, Nevada Baptists approved a $2.57 million budget for 2007—a 3.5 percent increase over the current year.

Seminary prof sees young-earth belief as crucial. Kurt Wise, professor and director of the Center for Theology and Science at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, insists that unless Christians believe the earth was created by God 6,000 to 7,000 years ago, many of the foundational doctrines of the Bible crumble. The same data that leads geoscientists to conclude the earth is billions of years old also indicate fossils range from thousands to billions of years in age, he noted. “This includes such things as human fossils hundreds of thousands to millions of years old and such things as disease and suffering of animals hundreds of millions of years older than that,” Wise said. “If humans really date back that far and Adam lived far enough in the past to be their ancestor, then the genealogical record of Genesis 5 is wrong and thus the Bible and its author, God, are wrong. In this case, Adam’s sin could not be passed on to all humans, and such things as agriculture, religion, marriage and even human death would have preceded Adam and Adam’s sin.”

Arkansas Baptists approve task force report. Messengers to the 153rd annual meeting of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention approved a ministry task force report that includes recommendations to regionalize Executive Board ministries, increase the percentage of Cooperative Program funds forwarded to Southern Baptist Convention causes, and explore bringing the Arkansas Baptist News, currently a convention agency, under the Arkansas convention Executive Board. Each recommendation will be referred to other Arkansas convention committees or boards for further deliberation. The 837 messengers also authorized the Arkansas convention Executive Board and its officers to build a Baptist building in a new location if the existing building in downtown Little Rock sells. The potential relocation results from the donation of five acres in west Little Rock by an anonymous Baptist deacon and hinges upon the start of construction as soon as possible. The land was appraised at just under $1 million.

Mississippi Baptists approve record budget. Messengers from the Mississippi Baptist Convention’s 2,114 churches approved without opposition a record Cooperative Program budget of more than $33 million during their annual meeting. The $33,188,934 budget for 2007 represents an almost 6 percent increase over the current budget and will result in $11,616,127 going to Southern Baptist Convention causes. Messengers also voted to permanently close the convention’s multi-million-dollar Gulfshore Baptist Assembly near Pass Christian and sell the property. It was destroyed completely by Hurricane Katrina. Larry Otis, chairman of the committee charged with evaluating the facility, told messengers that rebuilding estimates of more than $46 million, strict new building codes, and post-Katrina insurance rates of more than $1 million per year helped convince the committee to not restore the Gulfshore facilities.