This Big Mac attack unfair

Morning shows were abuzz with the recent report that a survey revealed many more Americans could name the ingredients in a McDonald's Big Mac than could recite the Ten Commandments. Clearly, the implication is that American society is more interested in the trivial than the significant.
Of course, that is true. So-called reality TV shows reveal that fact, however, not this survey near the release of the new animated movie about the Ten Commandments.
The triple-decker burger embraced by Americans in 1968 has faced criticism in more recent years as health-conscious diners started reading nutritional charts.
But the beleaguered burger should share no blame for the lack of knowledge Americans possess about the Decalogue.
The answer is simple: We learned the jingle, and jingles never leave us.
The words, "Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun," have been seared into our brains.
That doesn't mean that more important information cannot be similarly learned. While recalling the Ten Commandments took a little effort for me, reeling off longer lists like the 12 Disciples and the 66 books of the Bible remain easy.
That's because Sunday school and Vacation Bible School wardens of my childhood put them to simple tunes. ("There were 12 disciples Jesus called to help him, Simon Peter, Andrew, James, his brother John....").
We memorized the words because we too wanted to be good disciples of Jesus — and be able to go outside to play, eat cookies, drink Kool-Aid and make ashtrays during craft time.
So does anyone have a catchy tune for the Big Ten? America's moral future may rest on your jingle.

'Pack some heat, we're going to church'

My journalistic scope has its limits. There are more books offered than I can read or care to review. More story ideas are tossed my way than I have time to explore.
Likewise, the daily “interview opportunities” promoted by publicists are wide-ranging and more numerous than I can conduct.
This week, at risk of failing in my duty to keep church leaders well informed, I passed on the chance to interview “terrorist-shooter” Charl van Wyk, author of Shooting Back.
During a deadly terrorist attack on St. James Church in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1993, van Wyk used an automatic weapon to fight back. On tour in the U.S. this fall, he is urging churchgoers to arm themselves as well.
According to his publicist, van Wyk “makes a case for individuals arming themselves with guns and does so more persuasively than perhaps any other author because he found himself in a church attacked by terrorists.”
Tragically, this looks more like someone making a buck off of another tragedy than providing helpful information. However, I’m sure the more NRA-oriented church folk will have great interest in hearing van Wyk.
Perhaps he will begin with the biblical text where Jesus said to plug those who persecute you.
Church safety measures are one thing. This is a ridiculous other.
And just think, all my parents used to ask before heading out to church was: “Do you have your Bible?”

Criswell didn't look like this

When the Southern Baptist Convention controversy was in full swing in the early 1980s, I was doing campus ministry in Marietta, Ga. The local newspaper, The Marietta Daily Journal, did a news story featuring two prominent pastors — Nelson Price of Roswell Street Baptist Church and Clark Hutchison of Eastside Baptist Church.
Both were supporters of the so-called Conservative Resurgence or Fundamentalist Takeover — depending on which lens you looked through. (I must add, with appreciation, that both were supportive of my ministry with students through the years.)
A photo with the story showed Clark and Nelson together, but they were apparently interviewed separately. Most interestingly, the two supporters of the same cause had different things to say about the Bible — the purported source of the battle.
While speaking of the need for a higher view of biblical authority among SBC leadership, one said: “The difference is we take the Bible literally and they do not.”
The other began with: “Of course, no one takes the Bible literally, but…”
Reading that news story back then reassured me that discussions about biblical authority usually lead to more heat than light. The widely defined term "biblical inerrancy” became the more common rallying cry.
But the father of the SBC takeover, W.A. Criswell, titled his book on the subject: Why I Preach the Bible Is Literally True.
We learned from reading Criswell and others of his persuasion, however, that they provide a lot of exemptions — for themselves, not those they quickly label as liberal — when it comes to biblical literalism.
My old Marietta friend who said he and other SBC “conservatives” take the Bible literally was wrong. The one that said no one takes the Bible literally was almost right.
At least now we have someone who tried.
While many have claimed to take the Bible literally, at least this one person actually gave it an honest effort and showed the multiple difficulties few would be willing to endure.
A.J. Jacobs (in before-and-after photos above) decided to take his best shot at a living according to the Bible — literally. He recounts his yearlong experience in the book, The Year of Living Biblically: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible, released this month by Simon & Shuster.
In an abbreviated account of his efforts, Jacobs tells readers of Christian Century how he fared.
“If the passage is unquestionably figurative, …I won’t obey it literally,” said the agnostic editor-at-large for Esquire, who grew up a secular Jew but felt the need for a spiritual quest. “But if there’s any doubt whatsoever — and most often there is — I will err on the side of being literal.”
So Jacobs set out to live without clothes of mixed fibers, any form of lying and the many other biblical prohibitions. His experiences are humorous, yet insightful.
Those with a constant need to prop up their fragile faith will find reasons to be offended, I’m sure. Some self-important “Christian leaders” will take him to task for belittling the Bible.
I just enjoyed the witty accounts of his efforts.
One of the more troubling experiences of complete obedience required stoning offenders guilty of sins like adultery, blasphemy, breaking the Sabbath, perjury, incest, witchcraft and more. Jacobs wrestled (pun intended) with how to fulfill this literal command without getting in too much trouble.
“The Hebrew scriptures prescribe a tremendous amount of capital punishment,” he noted. “Think Saudi Arabia, multiply by Texas, then triple that.”
Finally, the literalist picked up some small white pebbles in New York’s Central Park that he tossed at a pot-bellied man whom he had observed working both Saturday and Sunday for Avis — a sure sign of violating any form of Sabbath observance.
A second stoning subject — a grumpy, old confessed adulterer — threw back.
Some of the more difficult aspects of living literally are the ones we all must struggle with daily — keeping our tongues from evil (Psalms 34:13) and not despising a neighbor (Proverbs 14:21).
Jacobs seemed to take his year of living literally intently — without taking himself too seriously. It was encouraging to hear the agnostic say that he moved from dread to some pleasure when it came to prayer times.
One of the reasons Jacobs fulfilled this experiment — other than to write and sell a good book, I'm sure — was “to take legalism to its logical extreme and show that it leads to righteous idiocy.”
Good for him. I hope those tempted by legalism see the danger.
For those of us who hold the Bible as authoritative for faith and living, when rightly interpreted, we can benefit as well from the reminder that this collection of varied literary styles should not be reduced to an encyclopedia, a dictionary or a step-by-step handbook to health and wealth.
Our dishonesty about and misuse of the Bible — as well as our failure to follow its primary and indisputable teachings about how we should relate to God and one another — create our most failing witness.

Flannelgraph frailties

Those of us raised on flannelgraph Christian education recall the essence of most Bible lessons we learned as kids: The Bible character — unless a bad-guy pagan like Goliath or Herod — was good and faithful, and received God's blessing. Therefore, we should do the same.
Turns out that, after some honest reading of the fuller texts, a lot of these biblical heroes were of less sterling character than we were led to believe.
Last Sunday, I had the privilege of being guest teacher for a delightful Sunday school class of adults at Vineville Baptist Church in Macon, Ga. Like so many others around the world using the Uniform Series, we examined the conflicting, deceit-based relationship between Jacob and his uncle/father-in-law Laban, as well as Jacob's marriages to Laban's daughters, Leah and Rachel.
I mentioned that Jacob was a scoundrel, before realizing that no flannelgraph teacher of mine ever used that term for a Patriarch. This need to defend the character of Bible characters has apparently ended with my generation, however.
Last week I overheard my teenage daughter discussing Jesus and his Disciples with a friend.
"John was the conceited one," my daughter said. "He referred to himself as 'the one whom Jesus loved.'"
Well, I loved her honesty. There was no sense of being an image-protecting media handler for the disciple. What sounded like conceit, she called conceit.
Now why would I celebrate such honesty? Might such references to biblical personalities lessen faith?
No, such honesty teaches us the greater lesson that, throughout history, the hand of God has been at work through frail, faulty people, not superheroes.
The Bible is full of characters who were brave and fearful, courageous and cowardly, honest and deceiving, bold and weak, believing and unbelieving, firm and failing ... you know, characters like us.

Atlanta hotel fire claimed, changed lives

A beautiful, new boutique hotel called The Ellis on Peachtree has just opened in downtown Atlanta, across from the Ritz Carlton.
I recall walking along famous Peachtree Street in 1994 and noticing a newly erected historical marker in front of the empty building that was once the scene of the deadliest hotel fire in U.S. history.
The marker detailed how a predawn fire at The Winecoff Hotel had claimed the lives of 119 persons decades ago. The 15-story high-rise had no escape stairs or ladders, much less a sprinkler system. Many jumped from the upper floors to escape the smoke and flames, or in failed attempts to reach a neighboring building.
Among the 280 guests registered at the Winecoff for the night of Dec. 7, 1946, 40 were teens participating in a mock legislative event at the state capitol, sponsored by the YMCA. Some of them perished.
The tragedy impacted rural communities and small towns all across the state that lost some of their brightest young persons.
Noting that the fire had occurred in 1946, I jotted a note to myself to give the event fuller attention in a couple of years when the half-century anniversary came.
So, in 1996, I wrote a package of stories for The Christian Index about the impact of that horrific event. It was an emotional effort for so many I spoke with who suffered loss on that day.
Truett Gannon, then pastor of Smoke Rise Baptist Church in Stone Mountain, Ga., and now a recently retired professor at Mercer University's McAfee School of Theology, was a 16-year-old participant in the Y-Club event who was awakened in a neighboring hotel to witness the tragedy firsthand.
His experience with a close friend who was injured in the fire and lost several family members, and a sense of helplessness in relating to those impacted by the fire had a life-changing impact on him that memorable day.
It was a story Truett felt to be "too sacred" and "too personal" to tell often. So I was grateful when he emotionally told it me and those who read what I had written.
He recalled returning to his hometown that fateful evening and meeting with God at Cordele's "big ditch" where he committed himself to ministry.
"All of a sudden, it made sense to me that the way to deal with death was to tell the story of Christ," the veteran pastor told me as he reflected on that pivotal moment in his life.
Looking back over 50 years of ministry, he confessed: "My assessment of my own ministry is that, in the Lord, I'm at my best when I'm helping people deal with death. From that experience, Christ is so real... Standing beside people when [death] happens is where I've had my best ministry."
Ironically, an ad in the Index during the very week of the deadly fire proclaimed the Winecoff to be "absolutely fireproof." And it didn't burn down. The loss was the precious lives of many within its strong walls.
The tragedy resulted in many of the fire safety practices required in multi-storied buildings around the world today.
After the fire, the Winecoff building struggled to find new life in an otherwise bustling part of downtown Atlanta. After a failed attempt as a reopened hotel, the property was given to the Georgia Baptist Convention in 1967 and served as housing for older adults for several years before being sold.
When the Olympics were in town in 1996, the lobby of the well-worn hotel served as a souvenir pin-trading business while a neglected real estate sign hung outside.
After several failed initiatives, a new hotel (with multiple fire safety features)has opened. The 15-story building — the tallest hotel in the city in 1946 — seems nearly hidden among its towering neighbors today.
Perhaps it will not only host visitors to Atlanta in the years to come, but serve as a tribute to those whose lives were cut short on that tragic day in December 1946, and be a testimony to the eternal truths that the old can become new, and that life can follow death.

'Trust us' is not enough

An updated and expanded version of Mary Kinney Branson’s Spending God’s Money: Extravagance and Misuse in the Name of Ministry is out this month.
Originally published in January 2007, the book details the freewheeling spending of Bob Reccord, former president of the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. This fourth printing contains 45 new pages of revisions and updates, including responses to the original release.
Branson was uniquely positioned to write this most revealing account of an egomaniac using the sacrificial offerings of faithful Baptist Christians to support his extravagant lifestyle and to provide big financial deals for his friends.
As NAMB’s director of marketing, Branson saw the abuses of leadership up close and knew many colleagues who lost their jobs or worked under intimidation. Because she left voluntarily and on good terms, Branson — unlike most departing employees — was not required to sign an agreement “to make no public or private statements or disclosures concerning my employment or treatment by NAMB or any of its officers, directors, or employees, and not to portray them in a negative or poor light to anyone.”
Reccord, a former Virginia pastor, chaired the committee that formed NAMB by combining previous SBC agencies. He used the position to gain the top job.
Obviously, it went to his head quickly. Some of his actions demonstrated wild spending of millions of dollars without the knowledge of trustees. Others simply revealed a man who thought he was more important than others, earning him the nickname “Hollywood Bob.”
Branson tells of Reccord hosting a luncheon for local political leaders at which he arrived late and had his personal server bring him his food first. He didn’t even share his private salad dressing!
As marketing director, Branson was instructed to “brand Bob” rather than the work of the missionaries. In addition, Reccord had NAMB paying $12,000 a month for an outside public relations firm to try to get his face on CNN.
Also, Reccord and his wife, Cheryl, spent nearly $3,800 to fly to London for the movie premiere of The Chronicles of Narnia.
These abuses that Branson details first came to light through extensive reporting by Joe Westbury, managing editor of The Christian Index. Trustee leaders reacted very defensively before finally carrying out their own investigation into Reccord’s leadership.
Even when Reccord finally resigned in April 2006, with the promise of a reported half-million-dollar severance package, trustee chair Barry Holcomb of Alabama praised him for “the wonderful ministry that has been accomplished by our missionaries and our staff under Dr. Reccord’s leadership.”
Reccord, instead of apologizing for his multiple and extensive abuses, blamed his departure on being too “entrepreneurial” to work within a denominational structure.
It is interesting to note that with a $126 million budget, NAMB only fully funds 32 missionaries in North America. That leaves millions available for an out-of-control CEO to use for his extravagant lifestyle.
Reccord’s “wonderful” and “entrepreneurial” leadership — as detailed in Branson’s book — included an annual $1-million-dollar slush fund requiring no approval or reports of spending, a contract for a private jet although Atlanta has the most daily flights of any airport in the world, a relatively unused and then dismantled million-dollar welcome center, and other failed projects that wasted millions of dollars of blue-collar or fixed-income tithes.
“Bob Reccord wanted to brand himself, and in a sense, he has,” Branson wrote. “His name is right up there with Bakker and Swaggart, synonymous with extravagance and self-indulgence.”
Reccord had his friend, Steve Sanford, conduct an audit of NAMB’s media strategy in 2003. In response, Reccord canned 31 employees. Then he contracted with Sanford, who had created a company called InnovOne, and funneled $3.3 million to his buddy.
According to Branson, Reccord also funneled $300,000 to evangelist Jay Strack and $92,000 to Johnny Hunt, Reccord’s pastor at Woodstock First Baptist Church, without written contracts for specific ministries.
Not surprising, Strack and Hunt were among the 41 big-time SBC leaders who came to Reccord’s defense when his leadership abuses surfaced. They signed a statement expressing support for Reccord as “a godly man of uncompromising integrity.”
How did this happen? Why would someone spend the offerings of faithful Christians so carelessly? How could it go so far without accountability?
Since the fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention in the 1980s and ‘90s, a culture has emerged in which the top leaders are not to be questioned. Any criticism of leadership or convention action is equated with disloyalty to the cause.
Trustees like the perks of traveling to board meetings, having their housing and meals covered and positioning themselves for future appointments. To ask questions is to risk future assignments.
NAMB trustees have reported making policy and procedure changes to assure no future abuses. However, they seemed way too eager to move ahead without contrition.
And there was no salary package reported when Reccord’s successor was hired earlier this year, indicating that the people who give the money do not have the right to know how their offerings are being spent.
One messenger to the SBC annual gathering in San Antonio this summer sent an email to Branson noting that the meeting's focus was on repentance. Then the Louisiana pastor asked: “I’m wondering if there has ever been any apology given from any of our convention leaders? Has anyone stated anywhere that what was allowed to take place [at NAMB] was wrong?”
In a word: NOPE. Just excuses about being too entrepreneurial — and another quick call to “trust us.”

Can't 'celebrate life' too much

On a recent Sunday morning at Highland Hills Baptist Church in Macon, Ga., an ensemble of about two dozen adults performed Celebrate Life! The classic musical by Buryl Red and Ragan Courtney, published in 1972, has amazing staying power.
Youth choirs of the '70s sounded the then-contemporary expressions of faith and hope in the Resurrection throughout worship settings large and small.In fact, several of the aging performers (We're all aging!) at Highland Hills were reliving their youthful experiences with the musical.
In the late '90s, a new generation of youth choirs performed Celebrate Life! to mark the 25th anniversary of its release. The music and the message registered with another generation.
But that one rebirth, a few years ago, of Celebrate Life! was not enough for some. The Highland Hills adults (in above photo taken by director Ruth DuCharme) returned with a more dramatized version. It was a worshipful experience.
Courtney, who is now co-pastor of Tarrytown Baptist Church in Austin, Texas, with his wife, singer Cynthia Clawson, penned the words to the signature song after a failed experience on Broadway. It was a personal testimony of faith that has been affirmed by many:
"He's the wind I soar on; He's the grass I run through; He's the one I turn to when I have to laugh or cry. He's the light of my world; He's my priceless pearl; He's my answer to why, He's my friend even after I die. He's the sun I sing in; He's the sea I swim in; He's the mountain I climb to when I want to reach a new high. Jesus my Lord."
During the softer "In Remembrance" song, that focuses on the death of Christ, our congregation shared grapes and bread for Holy Communion. Then the Resurrection was affirmed through the resounding affirmation of "HE IS ALIVE."
Surely, there are varied opinions about this musical, but I've rarely heard a negative word since the more upbeat songs rang loudly through the often-quiet sanctuaries of the '70s where such exuberance had not been heard.
But one thing is sure: You cannot experience Celebrate Life! without taking some of it home with you. Weeks later, I still find myself singing: "You shall know the truth ... You shall know the truth and love is the proof, and the truth will make you free."

Practicing what we preach

Practicing what we preach is one of the hardest disciplines in life. Often we set the bar higher for others than we are willing to leap ourselves.
In some cases, we simply don't follow the advice we quickly dispense to others. That seems to be the case with health professionals and flu shots.
An Oct. 8 story in The Boston Globe revealed that hospitals from coast to coast are "bribing workers with granola bars, throwing immunization parties, and, in one case, forcing unvaccinated staff members to wear face masks in the hopes of persuading more medical personnel to get an annual flu shot."
The shocker is that nearly 60 percent of doctors, nurses, orderlies and other health-care workers in the U.S. do not get vaccinated against the flu, though they are clearly in the high-risk groups and have exposure to many other high-risk populations.
I recall several years ago when a personal physician first told me that males over 40 with family histories of heart disease should take low-dose aspirin daily. His explanation made sense.
But since he was clearly a male over 40, I asked whether he found it easy to do as part of his morning or evening routine. He sheepishly confessed he was not yet into the routine.
Of course, I'm not picking on heath-care folks. (Offending people with needles and other sharp objects is not something I want to do.)
The reality is that most of us, regardless of vocation or avocation, do not live up to our own convictions and sermonizing. Count me in with the crowd.
When my daughter gets her learner's permit to drive next year, it will be hard for me to instruct her with full conviction about safe and courteous driving. The 18-year experience of cruising through metro Atlanta daily has not worn off after nearly eight years removed.
Some parents resort to the adage: "Do as I say, not as I do." That cop-out rarely if ever works.
The harder, better approach to living and teaching is to practice what we preach.

Warning! Incoming Baptists!

Sometimes an email subject line can get your mind to wondering. Such was the case with one sent to me recently by Callie Davis, staff assistant for the Baptist House of Studies at Duke University Divinity School directed by Curtis Freeman.
Enclosed were results from a survey they conducted of Baptist students entering the divinity school in Durham, N.C., this fall. Some of the statistics, though not shocking, were interesting.
For example, half of the students entering Baptist House this year are age 24 or younger. Which even a non-Duke student might assume means half are age 25 or older.
Five percent are age 40 or older.
Males comprise 59 percent of the incoming Baptist divinity students.
Roughly one-third of the new students identifies with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship while a quarter of them claims to be Southern Baptists. National Baptists (from four predominately African-American conventions ) are represented by one-tenth of the new students. So are American Baptists.
Nearly one-third marked their denominational affiliation choice as “other Baptists.” There are a lot different Baptist groups around.
Ninety-five percent of all those surveyed said they had been called to Christian ministry. That’s encouraging.
All the students reported being active in church as children and more than 90 percent stayed involved during their youth and college years. More good news.
Pastors ranked extremely high in helping these students to discern their ministry callings and to make their choices about seminary education. Such nurture and mentoring from congregational leaders has a positive ring as well.
But it was the subject line in the email — “Incoming Baptists” — that first grabbed my attention and sent my mind into contemplation.
Before I realized the email contained a survey about incoming Baptist theology students at Duke, it registered differently with me.
Initially, it registered: “WARNING! INCOMING BAPTISTS!”
What do “incoming Baptists” — to a school, a community or anywhere else — bring with them? Should others be warned of their arrival?
While some Baptists are known to be judgmental, narrow-minded and exclusive, not all give that impression.
Historically, where someone’s religious liberty is threatened — anyone's and any religious expression — an invasion of Baptists is most helpful. Warning! Incoming Baptists.
Where there is human suffering and despair — Warning! Incoming Baptists.
Where words of comfort and eternal hope are needed — Warning! Incoming Baptists.
Wouldn’t it be great if such warnings were met with open arms rather than fear of condemnation? Guess it depends on how the Baptist name is perceived — which, of course, depends on how we Baptists relate to others.

Holding off Christmas

Advent — the four-week period leading to Christmas — has been gaining recognition in recent years among Baptist churches that otherwise have given little or no attention to an observance of the Church Year.
Worship planners introducing the season marked by anticipation of and preparation for the coming Christ often have a hard time keeping the faithful from jumping ahead to the celebratory birth. Anticipation of what lies ahead is more difficult when you have previously celebrated what is coming.
But why am I writing about this now? Because the secular trappings of the season — many already highly visible — make holding off Christmas even more difficult.
Several department stores had their Christmas displays in place while the calendar was still showing September.
One Atlanta radio personality has had enough. She is making a list — and checking it twice — of stores with “elaborate Christmas displays” erected nearly a full quarter-of-a-year ahead of the holy day.
Supportive callers squeal on the various and many retailers getting a jump on the ever-expanding holiday season. However, their efforts seem more oriented toward protest than serious boycott, but who knows?
One concerned caller said she asked someone in management at a Belk store why the hurry. The response, she said, was that Macy’s was doing it, so they had to compete.
Another woman called in to report that she asked a Macy’s employee to explain the rush to get Christmas displays up, and she said it was in order to keep up with Belk.
Whatever the justification, kicking off the secular celebration of the Christmas season seems to have no limits.
Soon, perhaps, we can anticipate after-Christmas sales in June. It would be after Christmas — as well as just before the displays go up again.
For those seeking a bit of perspective amid the chaos, maybe the wreath of candles, a countdown Advent calendar or some other step-by-step observance can slow us down on our journey toward Christmas.
Of course, we won’t even unpack those items for nearly two more months. But one thing is for sure, we can’t expect to find any help at the mall.

New BWA leader looks for SBC return

On Oct. 1, exactly one month after starting his new job, General Secretary Neville Callam of the Baptist World Alliance and I sat down for a conversation. He was in Atlanta as part of an 18-city tour throughout the U.S. and Canada.
A bright, articulate and gifted man, it is easy to see why Callam was chosen to lead the worldwide fellowship of more than 200 diverse Baptist groups around the globe. A Jamaican, he holds the distinction of being the first non-white to serve as BWA general secretary.
Of his many open and interesting responses to my questions, I was intrigued by one in particular. Callum expects the Southern Baptists to return to the century-old fellowship they helped found.
“I entertain the view that in due time members of the Southern Baptist Convention, the leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention, are going to recognize the lack they have brought upon themselves by having withdrawn from the Baptist World Alliance,” Callam told me. “I am convinced that in due time, God’s time, the Southern Baptist Convention is going to want to return to … the Baptist World Alliance.”
Those familiar with the story know that the now-fundamentalist-controlled SBC withdrew from involvement in and support for BWA after the more moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship was admitted into the BWA in 2003.
Speaking to SBC messengers, convention kingpin Paige Patterson urged the withdrawal with claims of “a continual leftward drift in the BWA.” It was a similar charge he once made of fellow Southern Baptists.
Leaders of the worldwide fellowship countered that the small, medium and large Baptist groupings around the world possess a wide variety of theological perspectives.
Callam said Southern Baptists are responsible for introducing Jamaican Baptists, and others in the Caribbean, to the Baptist World Alliance. They are grateful, he said, and don’t plan on turning back.
An effort by current Southern Baptist leaders to build international relationships apart from, and possibly in competition with the BWA, is “a transient effort, a fleeting moment that’s going to come and going to pass,” said Callam.
“God must want Baptists of the world to be together, not to be segregated in various entities sometimes giving the impression of being at war or in competition with each other,” Callam added.
Is the new general secretary hopeful? Naïve? Realistic? Patient? Who knows.
To me, it does not seem likely that current SBC leaders, who mistakenly equate any form of cooperation with condoning the full beliefs of others, would ever consider such a return. They have demonstrated a strong commitment to only involving themselves in those things they can control.
Even within their own denominational structure, there is a continuing effort to draw the circle smaller.
Certainly, it would take a kinder, gentler kind of SBC leadership such as current President Frank Page and those working to stop the stranglehold of fundamentalism on the convention. But such persons emerging within the SBC to any degree of lasting influence does not seem likely.
While the BWA could benefit from the restored funding of its once largest and most generous partner, many Baptists around the world have expressed relief at not having the large and loud theological watchdogs of the SBC exporting their divisiveness abroad.
It is interesting that Callam believes the mission of the BWA is so compelling that the SBC will eventually return. His faith is greater than mine.
(The full interview will appear in the November issue of Baptists Today. For print or online subscriptions, visit www.baptiststoday.org or call 1-877-752-5658.)

Judgement time, again

The world may or may not end this month. But in case you want an insider view with all the details, Faith Baptist Church in LaGrange, Ga., has quite a deal for you.
“Judgment Journey” will be shown numerous times throughout the month. For five dollars per person — cash only — one can experience a “45-minute journey through the end times of this world the way the Bible says it’s going to be.”
Promoters claim the video “will change the way you think about your future.” That’s what I’m afraid of.
Excuse the sarcasm in my fingertips, but I’ve heard enough dispensationalist eschatology to last a lifetime thanks to Hal Lindsey’s nonsense in the 1970s. He made a fortune selling books like "The Late, Great Planet Earth," that assured us the end was near and made all kinds of crazy connections between biblical prophesy and modern-day events.
My beloved religion professor Dr. Jorge Gonzalez at Berry College finally put it in perspective for me. He told me to imagine that the young Christian Church is at risk of extinction due to severe persecution.
Then God intervenes and a special “Revelation” is given to the aging disciple John. The centerpiece of that message is not for the faithful few to hold on to their faith in the resurrected Christ, but rather: “Here’s what going to happen in about 2,000 years; just put this on a shelf for them.”
The idea that fulfillment of biblical prophesy is uniquely for us to know and experience is another example of how self-absorbed we have become. It’s always about us!
And how much more clearly did Jesus need to say that no one other than God knows this stuff?
So I think I’ll save my five dollars for something else this fall. And do something more helpful to the kingdom cause than trying to figure out how and when the world ends.
Of course, the good news is the church could have spent their time and energy presenting a more gruesome Judgment House this month instead.