By John Hebert, Louisiana Baptist missions and ministry team leader ALEXANDRIA, La. - “By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was going.” (Hebrews 11:8) This verse describes the exercise of faith as accurately as any in the Bible. Abraham exercised faith by obeying and going. He didn’t even know where he was going, yet he acted. Exercising faith is an essential skill for all church leaders. In the past year, I have tried to present the skills of successful church planters and church leaders. Hopefully these articles have been of benefit to our readers. The idea behind my writing has been manifold. -- I wanted to present a complete list of necessary skills. --I wanted to clearly define each skill. --I wanted to describe them in such a way that individuals could assess their skill development on a practical rather than academic level. --I wanted to challenge all leaders to continue in the pursuit of skill development. The skill of exercising faith is harder to describe than to illustrate. In Hebrews 11, however, the writer seems to do both well. The New International Version (NIV) Bible … [Read more...]
Looking forward by looking back
By Chuck Kelley On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall near New Orleans, creating the greatest natural disaster in the history of the Unites States. The levees protecting the city were breached, and 70% of the city, including the campus of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, went underwater for weeks. The unprecedented devastation included thousands killed, tens of thousands displaced among all fifty states, countless businesses shuttered, no cell service for weeks, no power and no mail delivery for months. In the blink of an eye, life changed completely for the people of New Orleans and the nearby Gulf Coast. Today a far greater catastrophe has come. The Covid 19 virus has changed life completely for our nation and the entire planet. As of this writing, hundreds of thousands have been infected on every continent. Tens of thousands have died. There is not yet a cure or a vaccine. To limit its spread, public gatherings, sporting events, and activities as basic as children going to school and their parents going to work have been cancelled. A devastating economic impact is rapidly unfolding. This crisis affects us all, everyone in the whole world. As I look back on leading NOBTS through the Katrina … [Read more...]
Which seminary? The first spiritual milestone in our marriage
By Chuck Kelley Rhonda and I met on our first Sunday at Baylor University. We began dating during that freshman year, became an exclusive couple our sophomore year, publicly committed to a serious relationship in our junior year, became engaged in our senior year, and were married in June after graduation. We stayed in college one more year for Rhonda to earn a Master’s degree to qualify for the work she expected to do, while I continued studying philosophy and working in collegiate ministry on our campus. It was in the middle of the summer, forty-five years ago this week, when we faced our first spiritual milestone as husband and wife. The issue was where to go to seminary, our first major life decision we had to make as husband and wife. Rhonda and I began the process in the ordinary way. We prayed about it regularly. We explored the options and talked through them. Fortunately, we both agreed on what appeared to be God’s clear, obvious choice. We would go to Fort Worth, TX to attend Southwestern Seminary. My calling was evangelism, and Southwestern had the most famous evangelism professor in SBC history and a great academic program in evangelism. I was already preaching all over Texas in revivals, conferences, and youth … [Read more...]
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