2006 Archives
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Georgia minister produces movie as tool for ministry
Posted: 9/15/06
Alex Kendrick, a minister at an Albany, Ga., church, plays Coach Grant Taylor in Facing the Giants, a movie he and his brother, Stephen, produced with a cast of volunteers in his community. (RNS photo courtesy of Sherwood Pictures) Georgia minister produces
movie as tool for ministryBy Adelle Banks
Religion News Service
ALBANY, Ga. (RNS)—When Alex Kendrick thinks about sharing his faith, he thinks about movie screens, not evangelistic tracts.
Kendrick, associate pastor of media ministries at Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga., has co-produced Facing the Giants with the help of hundreds of volunteers—on screen and behind the scenes—from his Southern Baptist congregation and local community.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Program offers training for Rio Grande Valley families
Posted: 9/15/06
Children paint a banner at their parents’ graduation ceremony to mark completion of Families for a Future training. (Photos by Craig Bird) Program offers training for
Rio Grande Valley familiesBy Craig Bird
Baptist Child & Family Services
DEL RIO—Many parents say raising children is the toughest job you can get with zero experience, skills, know-how or good role models. But it’s getting easier for parents along the Rio Grande, thanks to Families for a Future.
Convinced that the key to reducing drug/ alcohol use, teen suicide, juvenile delinquency, gang involvement, child abuse and domestic violence is strengthening families, Baptist Child & Family Services launched the pilot program last March in five counties surrounding Del Rio.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Texas Baptist Forum
Posted: 9/15/06
Texas Baptist Forum
Losing focus
I am responding to the Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board action to cut three positions from the missions, evangelism and ministry area (Sept. 4). It seems these positions would be the last to be cut, since they have an intentional focus on the community outside the church.
Letters are welcomed. Send them to marvknox@baptiststandard.com; or by mail to P.O. Box 660267, Dallas 75266-0267; 250 words maximum. 
“One of our biggest challenges as Christians living in the 21st century is to learn how to talk about the things that are important to us, like prayer and hearing from God, without scaring our neighbors. Not that we have to backpedal what we believe; we just have to learn how to communicate better.”Berry Simpson
Baptist Standard cybercolumnist“What struck me most is when one of them said to me: ‘You know we’re really no different than your society. We’re just honest about our affairs, and we take care of our babies and our girlfriends.’”
Loraine Sundquist
Recalling a conversation with a wife of polygamist Warren Jeffs, the prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ (Washington Post / RNS)“If you're not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin.”
Katherine Harris
Republican candidate for U.S. Senate from Florida, describing separation of church and state as “so wrong, because God is the one who chooses our rulers” (Florida Baptist Witness)It does not seem OK just to reassign their duties to other people, such as the congregational strategists, because their focus is not the community outside the established church. With only a small percentage of people in Texas attending church on any given Sunday, we ought to double the positions that focus outside the church. We as Texas Baptists have been very critical of others who have tended to run the same course.
I hope the BGCT in its new reorganization is not losing its focus on the people outside the church who need love and mercy from those who will intentionally seek them out.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Who’s Who in Islam: major groups
Posted: 9/15/06
Who’s Who in Islam: major groups
By Ken Camp
Managing Editor
DALLAS—For American Christians who don’t know a Shiite from a Sunni or an Alawi from a Wahhabi, divisions within Islam can be daunting to decipher.
Here’s a simple Who’s Who of a few major groups—either religious or political—that claim the Islamic label.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Christian presence in Holy Land small and getting smaller
Posted: 9/15/06
Christian presence in Holy
Land small and getting smallerBy Steve Chambers
Religion News Service
BETHLEHEM, West Bank—Nakla Qaber, whose Greek Orthodox roots stretch back generations in a West Bank Christian enclave, runs a successful restaurant at a time when most Palestinians are struggling.
But when it came time for his son and three daughters to make their own way in the world, they went off to college in the United States and Canada and never came back.
Muslims Abu Iyad (left) and Abuzayed Odeh watch the news on Al-Jazeera at their Christian friends’ auto body store in Bethlehem. “We share all our life, the good times and bad times,” Iyad said. (RNS photo by Andrew Mills/The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.) 09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Poll shows some prejudice against Muslims
Posted: 9/15/06
In the Muslim village of Jalah,Egypt, the local imam, Haliz Muhammed Fazar (center), and village leaders gather on a porch to meet visitors and discuss the Quran. (BP photo courtesy of IMB)
9/11 Five Years Later
• For American Muslims, everything changed on 9/11
• Differentiate 'Muslim' from 'terrorist' scholars say
• No sweeping revival, but impact of 9/11 still felt in churches
• Negative perceptions of Muslims persist, panel says
• Who's Who in Islam: major groups
• Christian presence in Holy Land small and getting smaller
• Islam built on five pillars of worship & five pillars of faith
• Poll shows some prejudice against Muslims
• Children of Abraham: Muslims view God, church & state through different lensesPoll shows some
prejudice against MuslimsBy Adelle M. Banks
Religion News Service
WASHINGTON (RNS)—Four Americans out of 10 acknowledge having some prejudice against Muslims, but those with Muslim acquaintances are more likely to show favorable attitudes, a recent USA Today/Gallup Poll shows.
Thirty-nine percent of Americans asked to honestly assess themselves said they have at least some feelings of prejudice against Muslims while 59 percent said they did not.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Group critiques prosperity gospel
Posted: 9/15/06
Group critiques prosperity gospel
By Hannah Elliott
Associated Baptist Press
DALLAS (ABP)— Media promotion of a so-called prosperity gospel is deluging modern-day churches—and driving them into error, former Southern Baptist Convention President Jimmy Allen told the nation’s largest African-American Baptist group.
“Prosperity gospel is now a problem because we’ve learned to study the market, and now the marketplace is dictating the message,” said Allen, who led in the formation of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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National Baptist leader asserts nation, church abandoning ideals
Posted: 9/15/06
National Baptist leader asserts
nation, church abandoning idealsBy Ken Camp
Managing Editor
DALLAS—Two esteemed institutions—the United States and the church—appear in danger of abandoning the high ideals of their founding documents, the president of the nation’s largest African-American Baptist group said.
“A haunting shade hangs over both our country and the church,” said William Shaw, president of the National Baptist Convention USA, in his message to the group’s annual meeting in Dallas.
See Related Articles:
• Group critiques prosperity gospel
• National Baptist leader asserts nation, church abandoning ideals
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Scrapbooking enables women to pass along their values
Posted: 9/15/06
Wendy Jones and her sister, Christi Denney, work on projects during the Scrapbook and Craft Extravaganza at Mobberly Baptist Church. Scrapbooking enables women
to pass along their valuesBy Rachel Stallard
Special to the Baptist Standard
LONGVIEW—Jodie Hilburn found a distinctive way to tell her husband she was expecting their third child—through a scrapbook project for his office. Carol Weiss is preparing for her family’s first holiday season without her father this year, after borrowing her mother’s Christmas album. Wendy Jones found a hobby on which she knew her family would not mind her spending time and money.
All three women are proud to call scrapbooking—or cropping—an art form. And many more women consider it a ministry of Christian encouragement and outreach.
Stacy Pentecost of Macedonia Baptist Church in Longview participates in an Open Crop held once a month at Scrapbooks & Such in Longview. She is finishing a book from her children’s band trip to Disney World. 09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Texas Tidbits
Posted: 9/15/06
Texas Tidbits
Accreditation extended for UMHB program. The Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs has extended until 2012 accreditation of the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor’s community counseling program. The program is part of the graduate psychology and counseling department at UMHB, which offers master’s degrees in professional counseling.
BUA provides mentoring program. Baptist University of the Americas has launched a higher-education mentoring program for Hispanic youth and their families living in San Antonio’s South Side. The Sigueme program uses Hispanic university students and BUA staff as mentors and role models for public school students. Key partners in the mentoring initiative include Buckner Baptist Benevolences and Communities in Schools, a national nonprofit group. The program also involves working with South Side churches to promote education through ongoing training for youth pastors, as well as providing seminars for families with prospective college students.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
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Problems can lead to divine opportunities
Posted: 9/15/06
TOGETHER:
Problems can lead to divine opportunitiesProblems can lead to special, unexpected moments. Rosemary broke her arm the other day; and, as we were getting this taken care of, a woman eyed Rosemary’s cast and said, “Oh, you broke your arm, too. I just got two casts off my arms. I broke them both this summer.”
We had a conversation with this woman and her husband that genuinely blessed us, and in a few moments, we discovered they were members of one of our Texas Baptist churches.
Executive Director
BGCT Executive Board
They told us how much they were enjoying their intentional interim minister and the blessing his preaching and wise counsel were bringing to their fractured fellowship.
The husband is on the transition team charged by the church with helping them process their way to a new future for their congregation.
09/15/2006 - By John Rutledge
