By Staff, Baptist Press

ORLANDO (BP) – Under the banner of “Greater Things,” speakers during the June 14 afternoon and evening sessions of the 2010 Pastors’ Conference – held at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla. -- focused on the Great Commission and the launch of a national campaign to help pastors adopt children.

‘A LONG-DISTANCE RACE’

Daniel Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., urged the assembly to fix their eyes on Jesus and follow His example. He used the example of a marathon, echoing the author of Hebrews, to teach on the necessity of focus and endurance to finish the life of faith.

Teaching from the text of Hebrews 12:1-3, Akin said, “The Christian life is not the life of a sprinter, but a long-distance race requiring steadfastness and endurance.”

By James Dotson & Mickey Noah, Baptist Press

ORLANDO, Fla. (BP) – A friendly conversation, a story, a realization and a prayer: that’s the gist of what happens when one person shares and another accepts the simple Gospel of Jesus Christ. And while the methods and venues may have varied, the scene played out more than 1,400 times June 7-12 as Southern Baptists expressed their core message of hope through Crossover Orlando.

By Staff, Baptist Press

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By Erin Roach, Baptist Press

ORLANDO, Fla. (BP) – A church with 103 members and an average 30-year Cooperative Program giving rate of 32.78 percent received the M.E. Dodd Award during the Southern Baptist Executive Committee's morning report June 15 at the SBC annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.

First Baptist Church in Sparkman, Ark., which averages 60 to 75 people for worship on Sundays, was recognized for "continuous, long-term excellence in supporting the principles, practice and spirit of the Cooperative Program."

By Bob Rodgers, Baptist Press

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP) – Sometimes we will fill in our knowledge gaps with anecdotal information and hold it to be true.

Resulting opinions are thrown around like they were fact. Anecdotal evidence, when used as fact, may cause some people to draw incorrect conclusions and/or make bad decisions.

IT ADDS UPA lot of statistical data generally applies to Southern Baptists. For example, a Barna study released in the spring of 2008 revealed that only 5 percent of adults in America donated 10 percent or more to their churches and charitable groups.

By Richard H. Harris, Interim President North American Mission Board

I have been asking myself a question over and over since the Southern Baptist Convention met in Louisville last year, voting to form the Great Commission Resurgence (GCR) Task Force. My question is this: Is our convention’s main problem primarily organizational, structural, systemic, faulty processes or partnerships – or is it spiritual?

Richard H. Harris Interim President North American Mission BoardI have a great deal of respect for the GCR Task Force. It is impossible for most of us to realize the excruciating hours of analysis they invested as they examined mountains of material and information.

Leo Endel, former Iowa pastor since May 2002 has been executive director of the Minnesota-Wisconsin Baptist Convention, which is considered a “New Work” state convention.

By Will Hall, Baptist Press

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP) – Seven recommendations to the Southern BaptistConvention are specified by the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force in the final report released May 3.

By Staff, Baptist Press
 

By Gary D. Meyers, NOBTS Public Relations


NEW ORLEANS (BP) – Sixteen two-bedroom apartments at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary will be ready for student families early this summer – just in time for the 2010-11 school year.

Seminary trustees approved the new apartments during their fall meeting in October 2009 and construction began on the $2.7 million project in November. Thanks to good weather and a dedicated construction crew, the project remains on schedule for a June completion. During their spring meeting April 14, seminary trustees toured the construction site to see the progress firsthand.

NEW ORLEANS - New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary trustees elected Deok Jae Lee, the seminary's first Korean professor, to serve as assistant professor of Christian ministry at the North Georg

By Debbie Thurman, Baptist Press

LYNCHBURG, Va. (BP) – Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious