Posted: 3/18/05

Divine detour directed Ratcliffe to classroom

By Jonathan Petty

Wayland Baptist University

PLAINVIEW–If someone had asked Carolyn Ratcliffe 40 years ago what she intended to be doing at this stage in her life, she would have gladly replied, “making quilts and baking cookies.”

Somewhere along the line, however, her life took what she considers a divinely inspired detour, leading to her current position as assistant professor of religion at Wayland Baptist University.

“This is not exactly what I intended to do with the rest of my life,” she explained, sitting in a small office stacked wall-to-wall with books.

In fact, when she first attended Texas Tech University straight out of high school, Ratcliffe had only one thing in mind–get married. She met her future husband, Ted, during her first year at Tech. They married, and she left school to raise a family.

“I accomplished at school what I intended to accomplish, and that was get married,” she said. “I never intended to go back.”

Four years later, she felt a clear sense of direction, clear as a voice telling her to go back to school and complete her degree.

She completed her degree in education in 1966 but never entered the classroom as a teacher. She spent the next 20 years rearing her children. It wasn't until her daughter, the youngest of four children, asked her not to join the PTA board during her high school years that Ratcliffe started feeling “rather useless.”

“I remember praying and asking God what I should do with the rest of my life. The kids didn't need me anymore.”

A few weeks later, as she and her husband were attending a worship service at Highland Baptist Church in Lubbock, she again sensed that guiding voice.

“It was just so clear,” she said. “'Go back to school and teach my word in college.' When I walked into church that morning, that was the farthest thing from my mind.”

As Ratcliffe attended the evening service, she listened to a guest speaker preach about Jonah running from Nineveh. The preacher that night was Gary Manning, religion professor at Wayland.

“That sort of sealed it for me,” she said.

At age 45, Ratcliffe decided to return to college, entering the master's program at Wayland. After finishing her master's work in 1989, Ratcliffe applied to the doctoral program at Baylor University.

Although she eventually was accepted by Baylor, Ratcliffe was beginning to see some underlying resistance from Christians who believed women should not teach men in a religious setting.

Taking seminary courses between her time at Wayland and Baylor, she always was the only woman in the class.

“Everyone was trying overly hard to be nice to me,” she said. “But the professors were all very accepting, with the exception of one.”

Ratcliffe recalled taking a course under a prominent professor that she enjoyed very much. On the last day of class, she walked up to him to tell him how much she enjoyed the class.

“He looked at me seriously and said, 'We have enjoyed having our one token female student in the class,'” she said. “I had never even said enough in class for him to even know my heart.”

Ratcliffe found the statement “interesting,” especially from someone in his position. But she didn't let that deter her. It wasn't the first time she heard something negative about her career choice.

“Everyone told her, given the situation, that she shouldn't be doing this because there will never be a job for her,” explained Fred Meeks, chairman of the religion division at Wayland. “Jobs in religion are by far the toughest to get. But she was going through with her calling.”

Meeks, who taught Ratcliffe as she worked on her master's degree, watched her progress through the Ph.D. program at Baylor. By the time she completed everything but her dissertation, Meeks had been promoted to division chair and was looking for an adjunct faculty member to teach courses at Wayland's Lubbock campus. Meeks asked Ratcliffe if she would be interested in teaching, and she jumped at the opportunity.

Ratcliffe received her doctorate in 1995 and continued to teach as an adjunct professor at Wayland.

“She was teaching regularly four to five courses a semester,” Meeks said. “Finally, I went to the administration and said it was not ethical for us to be using someone to teach full time and not give them faculty status.”

Meeks explained that controversy in the Southern Baptist Convention placed every move under a microscope.

“Wayland was taking a big risk,” Meeks said. “Not only to employ a woman teaching in the religion department … that was risky enough. The seminaries had used women to teach church history and things like that, but not Bible courses.”

Wayland's administration offered Ratcliffe full-time faculty status in 1999. Meeks said, to his knowledge, there has been no resistance to Ratcliffe. In fact, she has been asked to teach at associational meetings, as well as the Pastors' and Laymen's Conference Wayland hosts every February, and she was just named Wayland's 2004-05 favorite professor.

Ratcliffe said she has always felt accepted at Wayland and hopes she can now be a role model for young women who feel called to the ministry.

“I tell them to toughen up and understand that their call is from God and not from human beings,” Ratcliffe said. “Church history is full of individuals who followed God and paid a price for it. I tell them they are going to find some resistance in some areas. Although, I think by the time my generation dies off … there will be a day where there will be no resistance, but we have to get rid of us old dead-heads first.”

Posted: 3/18/05

Churches change as city moves to country

By George Henson

Staff Writer

Rural churches and inner-city churches sometimes face similar problems from opposite ends of the spectrum.

Stories of once-thriving inner-city churches struggling to minister in transitioning neighborhoods are common. Changing demographics can lead to challenges the church is unprepared to handle. Some find a way to channel the tides of change and continue to find a way to minister to a community that looks little like it did just a few years ago.

What might not be as readily apparent is that some rural churches are facing similar challenges, close observers report. They are not, however, facing dwindling numbers, but ever-increasing ones. Some churches are seeing their towns transformed into bedroom communities for Texans who want a more rural lifestyle while maintaining a job in a metropolitan area.

“The problem can be one of mindset,” explained Bob Ray, director of bivocational/smaller church development for the Baptist General Convention of Texas. “If the community begins to think of itself as suburban, but the church persists with a rural mindset, the church can become isolated.”

A key element to a church making the transition smoothly is a to share leadership with those who are new to the community, advised Larry Johnson, director of missions for Ellis Baptist Association.

While newcomers should be included, their way of thinking is likely to be different, Johnson said. To keep decisions from becoming adversarial, it is probably best for changes to be made gradually, he suggested.

Roger Yancey, director of missions in Tryon-Evergreen Baptist Association, agreed. “The challenge has to do with how to deal with the transition of leadership from the pioneers to include the new homesteaders,” he said.

Ed Seay, pastor of First Baptist Church in Magnolia, which has made this transition, said the key to including newcomers is in answering two questions: “Who owns the church?” and “Why do we exist?”

“Sometimes rural people unconsciously believe it is their church, and it is there to keep them comfortable,” he said.

Changing that mindset does not come overnight, he cautioned.

“It was a little bumpy at times, but they came to realize this is not their church, but God's church. But it was sometimes a three steps forward, two steps back process,” he said.

“Those who had shared the burden for all those years when the church was stable had to determine to share leadership with those who were bringing the growth,” he said. “Used to be, you had to be 'old Magnolia' to be part of the leadership, but that has changed.

“Though it was not easy for them, they realized things had to change for the church to be what God wanted it to be.”

When Seay came to the church in 1990, about 200 people attended each Sunday morning. Now almost 1,000 attend. The church has three Anglo services, a children's service and a Spanish-language service each Sunday.

A key to growth is to not forget the needs of long-time members who still yearn for a traditional service, he noted. The church also provides an “easy contemporary service, but no rock” for those who would prefer that sort of worship music.

Despite the number of services, the church still had to build to accommodate the growth, which meant taking on debt. By that time, the church was ready to do what was necessary to reach the community, he reported.

“The more conservative people were not as resistant to taking on debt as I expected them to be,” he said. “They really had a vision, and that is the key to making it work–the older leadership has to be visionary.

“They're not ever going to worship in a contemporary format, but they realize the need to allow others to.”

Byron Reeves, pastor of Rural Shade Baptist Church in Cleveland, said his church's lack of facilities has held them back in ministering to people who have moved into the area.

While the population growth began more than five years ago, his church still is running close to the same number of people it was then.

“We've been running 80 to 90 percent of capacity in worship and Sunday school for years. Because of that, we have a lot of people who visit and don't come back,” he said.

The church now is addressing the need for space by building a new sanctuary. The old worship center will be renovated to create more education space, he said.

Reeves is pleased that his congregation sees the need to reach out to the newcomers to the area, as evidenced by their giving.

While the church averages about 150 people in attendance, they gave about $500,000 in offerings last year–about half that amount directed to the church's building program.

With the space issues soon to be alleviated, Reeves said, his church expects many of those who visited will once more return, giving the church a second chance at ministering to them.

Posted: 3/18/05

Prayer & love power vibrant church

By George Henson

Staff Writer

THORNDALE–Larry Givens has been pastor of First Shiloh Baptist Church in Williamson County since 1986, just two years after the rural congregation installed its first indoor plumbing.

The Sunday the church called him as pastor, about 15 people–all senior adults–warmed the pews.

“My wife and I were the youth group when we came here, and I was 46 years old,” he quipped.

That's changed now. Average attendance hovers around 75–many of them young couples with children–in a sanctuary built less than five years ago.

The transformation of this rural church from one in danger of dying off slowly into a vibrant congregation is not one of new-fangled techniques but of applying principles straight from the Bible, Givens said.

The not-so secrets of success are prayer and love.

“When I came here, I had someone tell me: 'You're going to your funeral as a pastor. Those small, rural churches will kill your ministry.' Well, somebody forgot to tell two little praying saints in this church, and somebody forgot to tell God,” Givens said.

He also is careful to accept anyone God brings to the church, located seven miles of pasture south of Thorndale.

“God hasn't called us to change anybody. He's called us to love people,” Givens said. “If he thinks they need to be changed, he'll change them.”

One specific example springs immediately to his mind. A young woman started visiting the church and soon asked her husband to join her. He didn't want to but eventually gave in, arriving at church in a T-shirt touting a popular beer.

Givens remembers one of the women in his church asking him what he was going to say to the young man.

“I told her, 'I'm not going to say anything; I don't need one of those,'” he recalled.

The man came back the next week, without the T-shirt. A few months later, he accepted Christ as his Savior. That man now is one of the church's most active deacons, Givens said. The story might have had a different ending, he added, if he had made an issue of the shirt in the beginning.

The lesson of love is one Givens said he continually teaches. “I get frustrated with people, 'cause they'll say, 'If we could just change these people …,' but I say, 'No, we've just got to love them, and God will change them.'”

Givens retired from the Air Force in 1982, and First Shiloh Baptist Church is his first pastorate, other than an interim in Panama while in the service. He believes God used his time prior to arriving almost 19 years ago to prepare him to serve First Shiloh.

“I grew up in this church. It was in the Ozark Mountains, but it was just like this one. So, I know how country folks are,” he said, adding that he is one himself.

His time as a senior military officer prepared him to deal with the retired executives who also have joined his church.

Another major asset that often comes into play is his long tenure, he said.

“I would tell this to any pastor, but especially to pastors of small churches–go with the commitment to stay there,” he said. Pastors who come for only a year or two and move on to a larger congregation have hurt many small churches, he asserted. Staying would be best for both the pastor and the church.

“I'm not just pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church but pastor of this whole community,” he said. “Sometimes all I get to do is marry them and bury them, but I'm their pastor.”

A rural pastor also has other opportunities, he added.

“A pastor of one of these small churches better be ready to help vaccinate calves, bale hay, fix fence–whatever comes up,” he said. “But they better have a commitment to the community, or all they'll be is another preacher. That's pretty good advice for city preachers, too.”

Throughout Giv-ens' tenure, some things have stayed the same. The tabernacle still sits behind church for use during warmer months. Pastures, not houses, still surround the church. Prayer requests and praise reports still have a place in the Sunday morning order of worship.

While the church built a new sanctuary in 2000, the church still does not have a baptistry. “It was primarily the young people who said, 'We want to keep using the horse trough,' so that's what we do.

“I tell everybody that we're 40 miles and 50 years from Austin,” Givens said.

The church also has gone through some changes. Only seven of the members who originally called him still are at the church, and some of them have health problems that keep them from regular attendance. The new sanctuary sits beside the building the church had used since 1908. And possibly Giv-ens' favorite change, children abound.

“You can't know how it excites me to hear a 7-year-old raise a hand and say, 'I've got a praise report.' And a few weeks ago, a little boy asked that we pray for his dog. I told him, 'We'll be glad to pray for that puppy.'”

The sound of children also is special for those senior adults who called Givens nearly two decades ago.

“When we first started having young people come, we didn't have a nursery, but just put them in one of the little side rooms,” he recalled. “One morning, one of those babies started crying, and one of those senior adult ladies said with tears in her eyes, 'That's the sweetest sound I've heard in this church in years.'”

As for himself, Givens is grateful for the opportunity he's had to serve the church.

“If you offered me all the money in the world, I wouldn't trade the experience I've had here as pastor for First Shiloh Baptist Church,” he said.

Posted: 3/18/05

Tehuacana sees shared vision

By George Henson

Staff Writer

TEHUACANA–Dale McDaniel vividly remembers sitting with his pastor and friend Billy Don Roberts as Roberts described his vision for First Baptist Church in Tehuacana.

“We were just sitting out in the parking lot talking,” McDaniel recalled. “Billy said: 'Can you see it coming? There will be cars coming up and down this street to get to this church. Can you see it coming?'” That was Dec. 12, 2003. Roberts died of a heart attack a few hours later.

But McDaniel hasn't let go of that vision. Now he is the church's pastor.

“Now, I can begin to see it, and the church can, too. The excitement is building in these pews, and it's going to start rolling down the steps, and people are going to start coming,” McDaniel said.

He acknowledges his church, which averages about 35 people in Sunday school, probably will not explode overnight. Tehuacana is a community of about 300 people a few miles northwest of Mexia. McDaniel describes the town as being eclectic, counting many artisans and craftsmen among its residents. It also has more than its fair share of dogs and guinea hens, seemingly coexisting without much friction.

Acceptance comes easy to the people of the community, McDaniel said, recalling one of the church's recent music directors.

“He had been a member of an international grunge band in Europe. He was a lesson to our church in acceptance, but by the time he left, the ladies were all bringing him food and telling him, 'Son, you look so skinny.'”

The church is quick to accept people primarily because they feel Christ will return soon, and they must be busy about loving people into the kingdom of God, he said.

“The excitement around here is that Jesus really is going to return, and we need to be ready,” McDaniel said.

In trying to reach out to as many people as possible, the church hosts a bluegrass night once a month. McDaniel fixes a meal for everyone, and then they stay and play.

The bluegrass concert was one of Roberts' ideas for reaching out to people who would not otherwise come to church. The concerts give the church members an opportunity to develop relationships with people. It was after one of those concerts that McDaniel and Roberts had their talk in the parking lot.

“I've just patterned my ministry after Billy's–do whatever it takes to reach the community, even if it's a little off the wall,” he said. One of McDaniel's favorite ministry tools is fishing.

“If I can put him on to a string of fish, he starts to thinking maybe pastors aren't so weird,” he said.

He also provided CPR training for the local fire department, and he has incorporated into his ministry a longtime hobby–kung fu. He was taught by a student of the famous Bruce Lee and felt compelled to find a way to minister through the martial arts.

“I thought: 'I've been entrusted with these skills. What am I going to do with them?'” he said.

He now has a handful of adult students he teaches each week–none of them church members.

“Kung fu is a way to put your life into someone else. It allows you to teach character traits that make a real person,” he said.

He incorporates spiritual truths in with the teaching, he said. “I tell them: 'If you learn these skills, you will be able to deal with an adversary much larger than you–not because of the strength you possess, but because of the skills. It doesn't happen quickly but over time. Develop the skills, and people you were afraid of will be afraid of you. In the same way, God can make you an overcomer of life's problems that were once too big for you.'”

His students are not church people, but “they are spiritual people,” he said. “They have been burned by churches, but if I need help at the church and say, 'Can you help?' they are the first ones there.”

His church's philosophy of ministry is simple. “How do you reach people? If it's raining, help people fix fences so their cows won't get out. Do whatever they need. That's how you show the love of Christ,” he said.

While his congregation may be small, they by no means feel too small to matter. The church, founded the same year as the Cooperative Program in 1925, gives 10 percent of its undesignated offerings to that fund for worldwide missions. It also prepares care packages for college students, participates in the shoebox ministry of Operation Christmas Child and gives to special missions offerings.

“They are just used to being involved in missions,” McDaniel said. The next population his church members want to change for Christ is their own neighbors, he said.

“I have to chase after them–they are so excited about making a change in their community. And if you get a couple of people serious about changing the face of their community, God will come to use it.”

Posted: 3/18/05

Rural Church Challenge

By Ken Camp

Managing Editor

Church growth experts insist a church is a living organism, and everything that's alive grows. But even the most avid advocates of church growth acknowledge it helps if the church is planted in fertile soil.

When it comes to growth potential, not all churches are created equal. Churches in communities experiencing population increases have an advantage over churches in declining areas.

Although the overall Texas population continues to grow, 117 Texas counties have lost population since 2000, said Clay Price, manager of research information services with the Baptist General Convention of Texas. Three-fourths of those counties are in rural areas west of the Interstate 35 corridor.

Some rural church leaders ask: “In places where the best and the brightest move away after high school and jobs are in short supply, what is the proper way for a church to gauge success?”

“Success for a church is measured by finding and doing the will of God for the congregation,” said Gary Farley, a partner with the Center for Rural Church Leadership. “This may be something other than what we have come to identify as success for a church–bigger budgets, new buildings and more bodies.”

Farley, director of missions for Pickens Baptist Association in western Alabama and former rural church consultant with the Southern Baptist Home Mission Board, pointed to the New Testament book of Ephesians. He noted the Apostle Paul, writing to the church at Ephesus, listed unity, purity, mutual submission and focused attention as marks of a healthy church.

“I know small churches where this is the case,” he said. “The dynamics of multiple numbers make it more likely for this to happen there than in mid-size and large churches.”

Bill Wright, pastor of First Baptist Church in Plains, believes a rural church can diagnose its health by honestly answering a few questions: “Does the community know the church loves it? Does the community call on the church–and do other churches call on a church–to do things? Does the rural church have a world view, where it's not just focused on its own culture but also reaching outside its culture?”

Wright noted, for instance, when First Baptist Church of Plains has offered disaster relief training, it has made it available to anyone–male and female, without regard to denomination.

“We've had Church of Christ, Methodists and Catholics involved. You can't be exclusive,” he said.

That inclusive spirit includes making the church's physical resources available to anyone in the community, he added.

“It comes back to recapturing the philosophy of the church as the hub of life in the community,” he said.

Practically speaking, Wright added one additional criterion for evaluating rural church health: “If you can maintain what you've got, that's growth. We graduate 12 to 15 kids each year. They go off to college and never come back. So we're growing by 12 to 15 if we stay dead even.”

When young people leave their rural hometowns for colleges and careers, their churches and communities sustain a loss. But Pastor Buddy Helms of Bethel Baptist Church in Big Lake chooses to see small-town churches as missionary-sending agencies.

“We're living at the crossroads. We minister to people, and then they're gone,” said Helms, who also is volunteer director of missions for Castle Gap Baptist Association.

“We have them for a little while, and then we send them out, kind of like missionaries. Of course, we have some who have been here forever and never plan to leave, and we minister to them. But for others, we minister while we have them, and then we send the light out somewhere else.”

Rather than measuring success by how many people the church can hold, Helms believes a church can chart its health better by asking how many people it can send out to minister–whether in their rural homeplace or somewhere else.

Unity of purpose, consideration for needy people and participation in local and worldwide missions all are gauges of church health, regardless of the size or remoteness of a community, said Bobby Broyles, pastor of First Baptist Church in Ballinger.

“Another question to ask is whether there is an active witness in the community,” he added. “We have 4,300 people here, and I'm quite certain there are some of them who are not Christians.”

Church members in small rural communities need to “take off their blinders” and not assume their non-Christian friends and neighbors will never change, Broyles stressed.

“It's too easy to forget the power of God and the power of prayer,” he said, noting his church baptized representatives of three generations of the same family–a grandfather, his adult son and a junior high school-aged grandson–on the same Sunday earlier this year, and another family member came to faith in Christ later.

Broyles pointed out that even when he was pastor of First Baptist Church in Earth, a community of 1,000 people, he and the deacons kept a list of 90 men in their community for whose salvation they were praying.

Farley agreed. When the pond is small–and maybe even drying up–that's when a “fisher of men” really finds his commitment to Christ's Great Commission tested, he noted.

“Any old fisherman can catch his limit when the fish are biting and plentiful. Real fishermen are those who get fish in the difficult places,” he said.

“In places where there are few prospects, a church may be more effective in terms of ratio of lost to conversions–and often are–than in places where there are many lost. As long as there is one 'lost sheep,' the good shepherd does not give up.”

Bob Ray, director of bivocational and small-church development with the Baptist General Convention of Texas, emphasized a key way a rural church can expand its evangelistic vision is by redefining its church field beyond the traditional three- to five-mile “parish” approach.

Fairy Baptist Church in Hamilton Baptist Association, where Ray is longtime bivocational pastor, began to grow when it adopted what Farley calls a Wal-Mart approach.

“A church with a Wal-Mart mentality will ask how far people are willing to drive on a regular basis to do their shopping,” Ray said. “If people are used to driving 35 miles to shop, they'll drive 35 miles to church. That's the church field.”

Posted: 3/18/05

Judge bases legal decisions on 'foundation of values'

By Erin Curry

Baptist Press

WICHITA FALLS (BP)–Roy Sparkman has developed a reputation as an honest, fair district judge who expects sufficient preparation from those who bring cases to his courtroom in Wichita Falls.

Last fall, the Texas Lawyer newspaper portrayed him as someone whose Christian faith helps him measure with a straight stick.

“I was a little surprised that so much of the article focused on my church membership, Christian background and concerns lawyers may have had concerning that aspect prior to my taking the bench,” Spark-man said. “At the same time, I took it as a compliment that they believed I had lived my life in such a manner that they knew I was a Christian and sought to live by Christian principles.”

The article said Sparkman is a “bottom-line, big-picture person” who doesn't want to waste anyone's time in the courtroom.

“He runs a tight ship,” Stephen Bjordammen, a lawyer familiar with Sparkman's style, told Texas Lawyer. “When he says 8:30, you need to be there at 8:30. When he says, 'Let's take a 10-minute break,' it's a 10-minute break.”

Sparkman, 53, was a trial lawyer for more than two decades and won the bench for the 78th district in 2000.

Stephen Briley, a lawyer in Wichita Falls, told Texas Lawyer he was concerned before Sparkman took the bench that he would not be fair because “he is a conservative, a Republican and a lifelong defense lawyer.” But his assessment changed after watching Sparkman at work.

“You get a fair shake in Roy's court,” he said.

Once the article was published, Sparkman said, he received feedback from several friends who agreed with the positive statements made about him. Some Christian friends appreciated the fact his faith was included.

“I got the impression that some people were encouraged by the fact that a Christian could stand on principle, yet still make it in the legal world and be respected both as a professional and as a Christian,” he said.

Sparkman, a deacon at First Baptist Church in Wichita Falls, said the foundations of his faith were laid by parents who taught him the importance of daily devotions, church attendance and other keys to a close walk with God.

“I seek to have a quiet time daily, attend church regularly, teach a Sunday school class for newlyweds and pray daily for wisdom in the decisions I make,” he said.

As a judge, Sparkman often makes decisions that deeply impact people's lives, such as which parent will be allowed to raise a child, whether someone will go to prison for the rest of his life or whether someone will experience financial ruin as a result of his ruling.

“In my mind, all of those types of decisions necessitate a foundation of values and a source of wisdom that is much deeper and more encompassing than what the world can offer,” he said. “Through the experiences over the years, the confidence and assurance that I have received through my faith and staying in the Bible and receiving regular Bible teaching have proven invaluable in going through difficult days, difficult challenges, difficult decisions and even sometimes attacks on my faith.”

Sparkman recalled an experience from his time as a practicing attorney when both sides had fought aggressively in court, and his client had won. The opposing counsel then told Sparkman, “And I thought you were supposed to be a Christian.”

“That was a very personal attack to me. It hurt deeply, and yet I did not believe I had done anything 'un-Christian,' so I ultimately took it as a compliment that the lawyer thought that was the worst thing he could say to hurt me,” Sparkman said.

In 1992, a defeat after his first run for district judge caused him to rely even more intently on God, Sparkman said. The loss was public, he was mentally and physically tired, and he started immediately to second-guess and wonder why God would allow him to lose after he felt led to run.

“I still had my faith, but I found myself discouraged,” he said. “At that point, God brought me to Isaiah 40:31, 'But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.'”

Over time, Sparkman realized the loss was in fact something positive because more time in private practice benefited him financially, he was able to accomplish some things professionally that he would not have done as a judge, and the path was cleared for him to run unopposed in 2000.

“Through that verse, I was able to wait until another time and be renewed, and things worked out better than I could have imagined,” he said.

While he said he does not feel worthy of being made an example of, Sparkman acknowledged the need for more Christians in the marketplace, those who will stand up for Christ in the midst of a society that questions their faith–sometimes aggressively.

“In that greater context of where many Christians perceive our society and nation today, not so much as a compliment to me, but in general, I think Christians are very excited to see Christians that have managed to succeed in some challenging areas like the legal field but still maintain integrity and Christian principles,” he said.

Posted: 3/18/05

Volunteers start framing (left) on more permanent structures for tsunami refugees in Sri Lanka. The finished house (right) is ready for a family to move in.

Tsunami response demands
quick start, long process

By Craig Bird & John Hall

Baptist Child & Family Services & Texas Baptist Communications

SRI LANKA (ABP)–Tsunami disaster relief is not a race between the tortoise and the hare. It's more like a relay effort by the two.

Baptist groups that remain deeply involved in helping victims of the catastrophe insist the sprint to keep people alive by providing them emergency food and shelter has given way to the marathon of restoring the communities and hope wiped away by the wall of water Dec. 26.

“This looks like it will be a long-term project, possibly lasting several years,” said Gary Smith, disaster relief off-site coordinator for Texas Baptist Men, which has had teams in Sri Lanka since early January.

Emergency food aid is giving way to more long-term help in Sri Lanka.

“Our first crews concentrated on feeding and water purification. But now we are shifting to home construction and even building schools and other permanent structures. I think we will be rotating volunteers in and out of Sri Lanka into 2006, if not beyond.”

Karolyn Southerland of Alice recently went to Sri Lanka as a volunteer to feed tsunami victims. She ended up cleaning wells contaminated by sea water. Nonetheless, she is eager to go back.

“I want to see if I can do more than I did the first time,” she said. “I don't think a feeding unit will go, but maybe I can help build a house. Maybe I can help feed children. I'd go back in a minute.”

Some Sri Lankan families still rely on emergency food provided by Baptist aid workers, said Paul Montacute, director of Baptist World Aid, the hunger and relief arm of the Baptist World Alliance.

Returning recently from the island nation off the southern coast of India, Montacute confirmed the need for more permanent housing for tsunami victims. The emergency tents provided for so many are proving to be too hot for the climate, he said, and people need to move into wood or block accommodations.

The challenge for many aid groups–Baptist and otherwise–is to make the appropriate use of personnel while practicing the best stewardship of an unprecedented outpouring of contributions.

The International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention reports tsunami-relief donations have passed $10 million. The Baptist World Alliance has received $1.5 million and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship $1 million. Some individual state Baptist conventions also have their tsunami-relief programs. The Baptist General Convention of Texas has received in excess of $1.19 million.

But relief workers will need patience to match the generosity. While some Christian groups have grabbed headlines with over-aggressive evangelism techniques, most Christian groups agree now is a time to build relationships, not churches.

In many Asian countries, there is widespread suspicion among the majority religions that Christian groups are only using tsunami aid as cover to “steal” needy individuals from their traditional faiths.

“It is hard because many of us didn't have experience in countries that aren't open to the normal ways of sharing our faith,” said Kevin Dinnin, president of Baptist Child & Family Services.

“When our assessment team was in Sri Lanka in January, I did what I always do and asked if I could pray for every (refugee) camp we went into. But one of the camps was Muslim, and I didn't know that. When I bowed my head, the leader of the camp got very upset and chased all the children away from us. It took awhile, but I finally convinced him that I was not trying to steal the children but sincerely wanted to ask God's grace and care for them.”

Baptist Child & Family Services has accepted what may be the longest of the long-term projects involving Baptists–partnering with the Sri Lankan government to organize and administer the country's first foster-care program.

“We have been asked … to set up a pilot program, initially involving approximately 50 children, as well as train Sri Lankan government staff in how to do child care and even fund a government employee who will be the liaison between our work and the government,” said David Beckett, Sri Lanka director of BCFS's overseas arm.

“The government leaders see the need but have such limited resources. I admire their wisdom and their courage in asking us to help them in this area.”

“The initial estimates of 10,000 orphans proved to be extremely overstated,” Beckett said.

“And some non-Christian aid groups are resisting our program because they say all the orphans have been placed in homes. But you often have a grandparent or a single mom already living near the poverty level trying to find the energy and resources to care for children they suddenly are responsible for. And there is no system to support them–or to protect the children–in place. The government wants to do the right thing, and we want to help.”

That sentiment is found among Baptist volunteers all across the tsunami area, whether they are doing medical exams, cleaning out wells or helping fishermen acquire new boats.

The tortoises and the hares are working together.

Posted: 3/17/05

TBM building new lives in Sri Lanka

By John Hall

Texas Baptist Communications

When Texas Baptist Men initially went into Sri Lanka, God led them day by day, footstep by footstep, reported Dick Talley, the group’s ministry logistics coordinator.

Leaders are only now starting to clearly see the plan God was developing for Texas volunteers, he said.

In early January, it was difficult for Texas Baptist Men to lay out a long-term plan for relief and recovery because leaders needed to find the proper governmental channels, Talley said. God orchestrated those contacts, and his mission is becoming a reality in Sri Lanka.

“God did not allow us to plan ahead over there,” Talley said. “He showed us the way day by day.” Now “literally some of the barriers that were there when we arrived are coming down.”

As each wall has fallen, TBM volunteers have been able to meet more needs, he noted. They have cleaned more than 400 wells with the help of Sri Lankans and are looking for equipment to drill 300 more wells that could survive another tsunami.

Volunteers also have started serving in Batticaloa General Hospital. The men’s group purchased commercial laundry equipment to help supply the hospital with clean linens for patients. TBM has supplied a television and digital video disc player and Veggie Tales discs so children can watch Christian programming. Volunteers have cared for some of the children.

Texas Baptist Men provided a refrigerator and freezer for a temporary house for orphans. The children also were given school uniforms. TBM has contracted with locals to make clothing and school uniforms for several hundred more children who will stay in a Compassion International-constructed orphanage.

Texas volunteers have donated kitchen equipment for 700 nationals in refugee camps and trained them on how to use it. Gospel for Asia, a nondenominational mission organization, is working alongside TBM in each of the refugee camps.

The Texans have built eight homes after getting the design approved by the Sri Lankan government, and they may construct as many as 200 for all the people in Vaddavaan refugee camp. The group also built a community center there that will serve as a meeting place for refugee activities, including church services.

Carroll Prewitt, a member of First Baptist Church in Lindale who served as on-site coordinator for TBM relief efforts, said he believes there is a nucleus for a church in Vaddavaan, due in some part to TBM’s presence. He documents at least nine people coming to faith in Christ while the Texans were there.

That is the tip of the spiritual iceberg, Prewitt said. Five of the volunteers’ drivers and interpreters have converted to Christianity. One member of a nongovernmental organization made the same commitment. Texans have shared their faith and prayed with numerous people around the house they are renting.

The TBM home has become known as the “lighthouse of prayer,” partly because of its proximity to a lighthouse. Their offices are called the “faith cottage.”

“I really think the spiritual impact is greater than anything else we’re doing,” Prewitt said.

The Sri Lankan government has accepted their evangelistic efforts, Talley said. It has praised them for continuing to serve long after other agencies left.

In a sign of a growing relationship between TBM and the government, Sri Lanka leaders have invited Texans to help with a festival for children.

Some logistical issues still continue, as TBM tries to find people with the appropriate skill sets to match needs, but Talley believes God will work it out. TBM next is sending another building team.

“There are obstacles, but the acceptance we’re being shown is exceptional,” Talley said.

Posted: 3/18/05

Texas Tidbits

Baylor hires search consultant. Baylor University's board of regents has engaged Bill Funk, head of Korn/Ferry International's National Education Practice, to help find a successor to President Robert Sloan. Based in Dallas, Funk has conducted more than 250 university and college presidential and chancellor searches for institutions such as Vanderbilt, Syracuse, Miami, Tulane, Purdue, University of Washington, University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Iowa and University of Texas at Austin.

Neaves scholarship fund established at DBU. The Neaves endowed scholarship fund has been established at Dallas Baptist University to provide scholarship assistance to deserving students. The fund was made possible by a gift from the Mary Emma Neaves estate. It honors Neaves, a longtime member of Park Cities Baptist Church and public school teacher, and her parents, Roy and Ethel Neaves.

Easter pageant set at UMHB. The 65th University of Mary Hardin-Baylor Easter pageant will be presented March 23 at 12:30 p.m., 3 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. The outdoor presentation of Christ's passion, resurrection and ascension will be held at the Luther Memorial arches on campus. The drama is produced, directed, costumed and performed by university students. More than 90 students, along with children from the area, will participate in the pageant.

HPU scholarship benefits former Girl Scouts. Raye Ann Embrey of Midland and her husband, Boley, have established the Ray and Ruth Hoyle Endowed Scholarship at Howard Payne University in memory of her parents. The scholarship is available to full-time Howard Payne students who participated in Girl Scouts within the Heart of Texas Council, where Ruth Hoyle was longtime executive director.

Youth ministry retreat set at Howard Payne. A youth ministry workshop and retreat sponsored by Howard Payne University's School of Christianity will be held April 4-10. Chuck Gartman, assistant professor of Christian studies at HPU and director of student ministries at First Baptist Church in Lubbock, is program coordinator. Cost is $45, which includes four meals, lodging, a ropes course experience and conference materials. For more information, contact Gartman at (325) 649-8307.

BGCT offers VBS overviews. The Baptist General Convention of Texas Bible Study/Discipleship Center is offering a series of Vacation Bible School material overviews featuring five publishers. Representatives from BaptistWay Press, Gospel Light, Group Publishing, LifeWay Christian Resources and Standard Publishing will present their materials in meetings across the state through the coming months. BGCT Bible Study/Disciple-ship Center staff members will be on hand to help ministers understand how to evaluate which materials are best for their church, said Diane Lane, preschool/children's ministry consultant.

Pennington-Russell keynotes Truett luncheon. Julie Pennington-Russell, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Waco, will be the featured speaker at the George W. Truett Theological Seminary Alumni Association luncheon scheduled during the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship General Assembly, 11:45 a.m. June 30, at the Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center in Grapevine. Cost is $45 with a reservation and $50 at the door. The luncheon is open to alumni, students, faculty and friends of Truett Seminary. To reserve tickets, send a check payable to the Truett Alumni Association to Dorothy Terry, One Bear Place #97126 Waco 76798 by June 6. For more information, call (800) BAYLOR-U option 5.

Posted: 3/18/05

TOGETHER:
Who would you follow except Jesus?

Dallas Willard teaches philosophy at the University of Southern California. He is a gifted teacher who is deeply committed to Christ. At Epicenter, our Texas Baptist gathering for evangelism and the missional church, he said: “Sometimes students step alongside me as I walk across campus and ask, 'Is it true that you are a follower of Jesus?' I ask, 'Who else did you have in mind?'”

Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do you say I am?” Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16). And they followed him. Who else could they go to? And as they followed Jesus, with many a detour, they became more and more shaped by God into the likeness of Christ.

Executive Director BGCT Executive Board

I am deeply moved this Easter week as the Baptist General Convention of Texas has been recommended for full membership in the Baptist World Alliance. To be connected in Christ-centered fellowship with Baptists around the world is to join a global group of disciples who, with Peter, proclaim Jesus is the Christ and move forward to follow him. And together this Easter week, Christians around the world are thinking about what it means that Jesus died on the cross and was raised from the dead.

The earliest expression of this comes from Peter: “This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge, and you with the help of wicked men put him to death, by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him” (Acts 2:23-24).

This straightforward announcement holds two truths. God was in charge. The cross was no accident. And people acting out of their own will chose to put him to death. It was and is God's purpose to save. It was and is our choice to sin, and we are accountable. God is sovereign, and we are responsible. There is no slipping the consequence of our sin by blaming it on God's purpose. He holds us accountable.

There also is the wonderful saving word, “It was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.” Contrary to all appearances, death does not have the last word. Death goes mute in the presence of Jesus.

Jesus gave a word that his disciples remembered after his death. “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men to myself” (John 12:33). Later, he said: “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. … Because I live, you also will live” (John 14:18-19).

Easter means that because of Jesus we do not walk into death as orphans, alone and helpless. The one who conquered death has promised to meet us there and deliver us into the place he has prepared for us (John 14:3).

Paul's rich language concerning the cross and resurrection paints painful and joyous images of suffering and victory. “For Christ's love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. … We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:14, 20-21).

In Christ, God reconciled the world to himself. He does not want anyone to remain at odds with him. He wants to turn every enemy into a friend. He wants to work within our minds and souls to create a likeness in us to Christ himself.

You will become like the one you follow. With Dallas Willard, I would want to ask, “Who else would you suggest?” Why on earth or in heaven would you settle for less?

We are loved.

Posted: 3/18/05

Ugandans follow Texan's steps in walk of faith

By Sue Sprenkle

International Mission Board

KAABONG, Uganda–Looking up from his daily chores, a village elder saw a group of men in the distance picking their way across the dry, rocky terrain. The presence of a stranger among them attracted his attention, but he continued working.

A few days later, he saw the same group walking and talking with the stranger.

“Again and again and again, I saw this group of men walking past my village,” Longole said. “I had to know what their purpose was.”

So, one day, he went early to the walking path and sat waiting for the men to pass. When International Mi-ssion Board missionary John Witte and two companions came upon Longole, they stop-ped to chat.

Hundreds of Dodoth walked to nearby Kaabong, Uganda, to participate in a chronological Bible storying celebration. Many walked up to 10 miles to participate in the retelling of stories they learned during the past year. Witte spent the last year walking around the African nation, sharing the Bible stories.

“What happens when you pass by?” Longole asked.

Witte, a Texan from First Baptist Church in Midland, said he walked from village to village teaching about God.

Without hesitation, the village elder responded: “Is it so important that you should share with me and my village? We will listen.”

Witte, together with two other men from the area, soon began teaching the Bible through chronological Bible storying in the village of Kajiri. As the group began learning the Bible through oral stories, Longole said it was the first time he had heard Jesus' name.

One year later, Longole and many others made their faith in Jesus Christ known at a special ceremony drawing together surrounding villages to celebrate the end of the first round of chronological Bible storying. The small group was baptized in a makeshift baptistry–a canvas bathtub filled with water.

The baptisms marked the special day when everyone gathered to eat and retell all of the Bible stories they had learned during the past year. The villagers also performed songs, dramas and dances they made up depicting the different Bible stories.

Longole and other new Chris-tians noted God sent his word to them through a messenger “on foot.”

Witte walked from village to village to model how to plant churches in a way reproducible by the Dodoth people, who live in the remote northern province of Uganda. There are not many cars in this area, nor many bicycles. Most people walk from place to place.

One way God's Word spreads from village to village is through cassette tapes. The tapes replay the chronological Bible stories. This allows villagers to hear the stories over and over–memorizing them, hiding God's word in their hearts. Some have even taken the cassettes and a hand-crank tape recorder to another village and played the Bible stories– being missionaries to their own people.

“I learned earlier in my career that when I drove my car, it modeled that was the best way to plant churches,” Witte said. “So, when I asked the guys I had been discipling to start planting churches, they couldn't do it because they didn't have a vehicle. They were not willing to walk. After all, the teacher never walked.

“When I started walking to villages, the people saw that they could walk to another village and teach them a story.”

Witte admits that initially this method is slow in getting churches started. However, in this part of Uganda, the Dodoth are getting a vision for telling others about Christ. Longole explains that telling someone about Christ is as easy as walking down the path to the next village.

“One time, I went to visit another area. I walked there. I took a tape of Bible stories to listen to while I was gone for the night,” he said. “I sat outside playing the tape and people gathered all around me to listen. I heard them saying: 'This is true. This is true.'

“They asked me to come back and to teach them more truths. Now, I walk there to tell them the stories that I've learned in my own village.

“God changed my heart, and he is changing their hearts. I will keep walking to other villages to tell them about the word of the Lord.”

Posted: 3/18/05

Musical turn-around sparks surge in youth ministry

By Marc Rogers

Southwestern Seminary

FORT WORTH (BP)–As recently as a generation ago, student participation in music ministry at most churches meant singing in the youth choir or playing in a bell choir. Especially gifted students might have had the rare opportunity to play piano or organ for the congregation.

But at one Fort Worth church, student participation in music and worship is undergoing a revolution.

When Youth Pastor Bill Bray arrived at Glenview Baptist Church six years ago, he noticed participation in the youth choir was lagging. Because in-volvement in the choir was a prerequisite for going on mission trips, many youth were missing out on ministry opportunities.

Bray saw the need for a change in the direction. Con-vinced that student-led worship could work to draw youth into a deeper commitment, Bray “threw together a band.”

“God provided four guys, and we had student-led worship for the first time,” Bray said.

Today, five youth praise bands are active at Glenview, comprising 40 to 50 students as instrumentalists and vocalists ranging in age from 12 to 18, or from seventh to 12th grade.

Three of the five bands lead worship each Wednesday evening for the sixth grade “Power Zone” and for the junior and senior high youth groups. The bands also take turns leading worship for the whole church.

The youth praise band ministry has produced a CD of youth-led worship music, which has expanded their ministry to other churches and groups.

The bands frequently play at rallies, retreats, camps and Disciple Now weekends throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Some of the bands have gone on trips to Russia, Mexico and Honduras as part of Glenview's mission outreach to youth and the world.

Bray had no background in music. So, he said, “at the beginning, until we got coordinators who were musical enough, I would just feed the students songs and say, 'Here are the chords, here are the charts, here are the CDs–learn them.'”

As the ministry grew, more and more students–many not formally trained in music–wanted to get involved.

Bray sensed God was in it when 70-plus students attended a meeting for youth interested in being in a band. Nevertheless, the ministry team must continually strike a balance between “involving as many youth as possible” and the need to “uphold a high standard of musical excellence.”

The effort has been worth it, with Bray noting the youth bands “really involve (students) spiritually, teaching them to lead out in worship. It forces them to be responsible in their own walks with the Lord.”

Bray maintains the spiritual emphasis by requiring every band member to participate in weekly accountability and discipleship groups in addition to rehearsals and practices as a band once a week.

“We've tried to raise the bar with (band members), and let them know that they have the responsibility to lead other students into the presence of God,” Bray said. “And to do that, they need to be in the presence of God themselves on a regular basis.”

Casey Meisinger, a high school junior, plays guitar, sings and is a youth band leader at Glenview. He said he agrees with the emphasis on both musical quality and spiritual growth. Participating in the youth worship band has “completely changed my view of worship,” he said. “I don't view it now just as a way to sing and play. I view it as a way to express to God how much we love him.”

When he started with the band, Meisinger “just wanted to play … it started as more of a musical thing. But now it is more of a spiritual thing.”

Youth intern David Martin, coordinator of the praise band ministry, was one of the four members of that first youth band Bray “threw together.” He credits Glenview's pastor, Dennis Baw, a guitarist himself who played in rock bands in his youth, for “loving youth and encouraging the music,” and “letting the youth lead the church in worship.”

Under Baw's leadership, Glenview was one of the first Baptist churches to adopt a contemporary music, praise and worship format in the early 1980s. But he also has encouraged his ministry team to recognize the importance of the classic hymns of the faith. He wants them taught to the youth and incorporated into worship services along with contemporary praise and worship music.

At Glenview, it is common to hear “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” and “Amazing Grace” sung by the youth group along with more recent compositions.

This mixture of old and new songs is an important connection between the generations in the church. “Our people are so thrilled when they hear the youth learning and playing the older hymns,” Baw said.

The ministry team at Glenview has found music is a key component of any ministry that seeks to lead students to Christ.

Bray said unchurched “musical kids find out about our students playing and say: 'Oh, you play guitar? Cool. So do I. I'm in a band, too. What does your band do?' And that provides a bridge between them.”

“In today's youth culture, music plays such a huge role. … It's just amazing,” Martin said. “We tried to cut the bands back to playing just two Sundays a month, but our students went crazy. They said: 'No. No. No. We need to have the bands all the time.'”

Baw is enthusiastic about the discipleship he sees the youth bands developing.

“We have tons of young people who are surrendering to full-time Christian service,” the pastor said. “They are real about the spiritual quality. It's not hype. Sometimes I will stop by on Sunday afternoon when they are practicing, and they won't be singing or playing at all. They'll be on their knees, praying.”