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Baptist Message

"Helping Louisiana Baptists Impact the World For Christ"

Wildcats expected to welcome largest class in LC history Aug. 12

By Elizabeth Clarke, LC News PINEVILLE, La. (LC News) - More Wildcats than ever will be arriving on campus starting Aug. 12 as Louisiana College is expected to welcome its largest class in the institution’s 115-year history, 350 freshmen, according to the school's president, Rick Brewer. “I am so grateful for the favor of the Lord on Louisiana College,” Brewer said. “All our faculty, staff and I are ready to get on campus and meet our new Wildcats and welcome back our returning ones. It’s going to be a blessed year.” Brewer noted in particular that Gage Dowling, the new director of residence life and student engagement  "is roaring to go!" “This will be one of the largest classes in LC’s history; that means it will be more fun than ever,” Dowling said. “Students are very excited and can’t wait to arrive on campus.” Dowling, who began in his position this summer; has worked in residence life for other institutions for six years, and he “can’t wait to serve the Lord here.” His wife, Casey Dowling, is the college’s first director of international student affairs and expects to welcome more than 40 international students this fall - up from eight last year. Incoming freshman Julia Thompson, the youngest of three from … [Read more...]

September 30 is coming!

By Clark Palmer TIOGA, La. (LBM) – For Louisiana Baptist churches, Sept. 30 is “Numbers Day” – that’s the end of the fiscal year and a calendar reminder for our congregations to submit their individual reports to the Annual Church Profile. And these numbers matter. When I became moderator of my local association, I considered setting some goals for increasing attendance and baptisms. My first step was to look at “the data” to create a baseline, and I discovered the numbers were “off.” What I mean is there were no discernible trends. One year we were up, the next down. Even the numbers from a decade ago seemed suspect because of this undulation. As I dug deeper, what I realized is that several churches were not reporting their numbers every year. And it only took a couple to throw off the numbers for the entire association. I’ve since discovered that 15-20 percent of our churches statewide don’t fill out and return the ACP. Importantly, this is a problem for making decisions about cooperative ministries such as where to plant a church and what congregations might need revitalization assistance. Then I began to wonder if this could also account for at least some of the reported overall declines for the SBC in … [Read more...]

Gov. Edwards mandates masks indoors

By Message staff BATON ROUGE, La. (LBM) – Ten days after Gov. John Bel Edwards strongly advised Louisianans to wear a mask indoors, he has issued an order requiring them in the fight against COVID-19. Edwards, during a news conference on Monday, Aug. 2, cited a continued rise in new cases of the coronavirus and hospitalizations. The new order, which goes into effect Wednesday, Aug. 4 and is set to expire Sept. 1, applies to those five years of age and older and must be worn in all buildings. The full mandate can be found at https://gov.louisiana.gov/assets/Proclamations/2021/137JBE2021StateofEmergency.pdf. “It is heartbreaking,” Edwards said. “Those are not just numbers. Those are our brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and aunts and uncles. Those are fellow Louisianans who are longer with us. And that is heartbreaking. “It has become extremely clear that our current recommendations on their own are not strong enough to deal with Louisiana’s fourth surge of COVID,” he continued. “In fact, nobody should be laboring under the misapprehension that this is just another surge. We’ve already had three of these. This is the worst one we’ve had thus far.” The Louisiana Department of Health reported, August 2, that there … [Read more...]