Archives
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Around the State
Posted: 8/19/05
Orchard Hills Church in Garland sent a team of 21 students and adults to the Rio Grande Valley. The team's work included street evangelism in Matamoros, Mexico, a one-day Vacation Bible School in an apartment complex and a three-day VBS in a trailer park. Throughout the week, the group saw more than 110 people make professions of faith in Christ. Shane Pruitt is student minister. Around the State
San Jacinto Baptist Association will present its third annual single adult conference Oct. 1 from 8:30 a.m. until 2 p.m. at Northside Church in Baytown. Don Piper, author of the book 90 Minutes in Heaven, will be the speaker. The cost of $25 includes lunch and an autographed copy of the book. To register, call (281) 422-3604. The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship endorsed 32 chaplains and pastoral counselors at its endorsement council meeting held in Grapevine. Texans receiving endorsement include Cherry Moore, chaplain with Hospice Brazos Valley in Bryan; Joseph Gross, chaplain with the Department of Veterans Affairs in Dallas; Mary Lewis, a CPE resident at Audie Murphy Veterans Memorial Hospital in San Antonio; and Cindy Goza, board certified chaplain for the Association of Professional Chaplains in Houston. After 25 years as worship leader for Paisano Baptist Encampment, Ed Wittner has retired. Wittner's connection to the camp began in his youth. His parents, Robert and Lillie Wittner, lived on the grounds while his father was a pastor and director of missions for District 7, which included the Big Bend area. Nathan McBride, pastor of First Church in Lamesa, will begin his term as worship leader in 2006. 08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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The Bible goes to school
Posted: 8/19/05
Photo by David ClantonControversy surrounds National Council on Bible Curriculum
By Ken Camp
Managing Editor
As students load their backpacks for school this fall, a growing number include the Bible among their textbooks.
08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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Christian teachers walk the line between church & state
Posted: 8/19/05
Christian teachers walk the
line between church & stateBy Ken Camp
Managing Editor
Many Christian public school teachers see their vocation as more than a job; they view it as a divine calling. But some wrestle with how to follow Christ without stepping out of bounds.
08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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Book Reviews
Posted: 8/19/05
Book Reviews
The Bible and Healing: A Medical and Theological Commentary by John Wilkinson, M.D. (Eerdmans)
The title is precise. It is not a history of Christian healing (touched on) or a systematic theology of Christian healing (regularly alluded to but never developed) but a survey of the Bible and healing.
There is one ambiguity. Wilkinson knows that “the Bible and medicine” is a much smaller topic than “the Bible and healing,” but the book leans as hard on medicine as it can. That is, it scours the text for any scrap of anything we today might recognize as medical, and it uses medical terminology and categories wherever it can. (Don't be intimidated.)
08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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Christian rock bridges secular and sacred music worlds
Posted: 8/19/05
Christian rock bridges
secular and sacred music worldsBy Beau Black
Religion News Service
WASHINGTON (RNS)–A rock 'n' roll revival? Better believe it. Soaring sales mean Christian rock is elbowing its way onto the forefront of the Christian music industry.
Switchfoot 08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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EDITORIAL: Battle against hunger picks up allies
Posted: 8/19/05
EDITORIAL:
Battle against hunger picks up alliesMaybe it's too early to declare a trend. But this summer, I attended four major religious gatherings (three Baptist, one evangelically ecumenical) and heard the same message over and over: Christians can lead the world in making poverty history and eliminating hunger.
On the eve of the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting, David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, urged Baptist journalists to seek global debt relief. Specifically, he requested support for the ONE Campaign, which asks the U.S. government to allocate an additional 1 percent of its budget (up from less than 1 percent) to provide basic healthcare, education, clean water and food to “transform the futures and hopes of an entire generation of the poorest countries.” It urges the world's wealthiest countries to forgive the debt of the poorest nations. Beckmann also asked Baptists to call on Congress to pass the Hunger-Free Communities Act of 2005. Its goal is to end hunger in the United States by 2015.
A week later, at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship general assembly, Coordinator Daniel Vestal repeated his charge that Baptists ought to be at the forefront of meeting the physical needs of the very people Jesus called “the least of these.” They're the 1 billion people who live on less than $1 per day, including 800 million who teeter on the brink of starvation in what demographers call “deep hunger.”
08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
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Texas Baptist Forum
Posted: 8/19/05
Texas Baptist Forum
Danger of 'relevance'
Some years ago, Elton Trueblood warned of the cult of contemporaneity. The church can become so obsessed with being relevant that it becomes irrelevant. If the church in its quest to be cool like the culture around it becomes so indistinguishable from the slovenly and often immodest attire, lingo and music, who needs it?
People get that every day in movies, television, popular music and life in general.
Letters are welcomed. Send them to marvknox@baptiststandard.com; 250 words maximum.
"He's at total peace, which makes me think it's really the right decision. There's no second-guessing; there's no struggling. In fact, he told me, 'Anne, I have perfect peace.'"
Anne Graham Lotz
Author and speaker, discussing the decision by her father, evangelist Billy Graham, to quit preaching crusades (Associated Press/RNS)"As we continue to try to politicize God, or market God, or say that America is Christian, or that God is with one (political) party, or that God is here and not there, it only further points to the fact that we don't understand how big God is–and how great God is."
T.D. Jakes
Pastor of the Potter's House in Dallas (USA Today/RNS)"What everyone can do is to see those … we'd rather not see with new eyes, whether they be the homeless, the outcast, the terrorist, those who irritate us, our enemies. And each time we see them, repeat to ourselves that we are seeing a precious child of God."
Lauran Bethell
American Baptist global consultant and recipient of the Baptist World Alliance's Human Rights Award, who works to aid women trapped in prostitution (American Baptist News Service/RNS)08/19/2005 - By John Rutledge
The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship endorsed 32 chaplains and pastoral counselors at its endorsement council meeting held in Grapevine. Texans receiving endorsement include Cherry Moore, chaplain with Hospice Brazos Valley in Bryan; Joseph Gross, chaplain with the Department of Veterans Affairs in Dallas; Mary Lewis, a CPE resident at Audie Murphy Veterans Memorial Hospital in San Antonio; and Cindy Goza, board certified chaplain for the Association of Professional Chaplains in Houston. 
