Click to Login or Sign Up

Baptist Message

"Helping Louisiana Baptists Impact the World For Christ"

2013 Baptist Golf Fellowship Team Champions

Submitted by philip on Wed, 04/24/2013 - 10:29 First Baptist Church DeRidder took first place again this year. Members of the the team include Diz Smith, Dennis Millsaps, Jerry Istre and Tony Branham. They had a combined score of 320, 9 strokes better than the competition. Select rating Give it 1/5 Give it 2/5 Give it 3/5 Give it 4/5 Give it 5/5 … [Read more...]

2013 Baptist Golf Fellowship Scramble Champions

Submitted by philip on Wed, 04/24/2013 - 10:30 The winning team for the scramble was Jerry Price, Fred Morgan, Tony Branham and Don Fox. They combined for a score of 60 for the round. Select rating Give it 1/5 Give it 2/5 Give it 3/5 Give it 4/5 Give it 5/5 Give it 1/5 Give it 2/5 Give it 3/5 Give it 4/5 Give it 5/5 … [Read more...]

At governor’s prayer breakfast, Bowden tells guests to make themselves available

Submitted by philip on Wed, 04/24/2013 - 10:32 Former Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden, who was the featured speaker at the 49th annual Governor’s Prayer Breakfast, joins the large audience in welcoming Gov. Bobby Jindal April 11 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel ballroom. By Mark H. Hunter, Regional Reporter BATON ROUGE – The 1985 murder of a Florida State University football player brought an assistant coach to salvation in then-head Coach Bobby Bowden’s office. Pablo Lopez, a 6-foot-5, 265-pound tackle, was shot in the chest with a shotgun at a party, Bowden told more than 1,000 people gathered in the Crowne Plaza Hotel April 11 for the 49th annual Governor’s Prayer Breakfast. A few days after the shooting, Bowden, now 83 and retired from a 50-year, Hall of Fame career, said he gathered the distraught players in the “team room,” where the chairs were arranged in rows of 11 seats according to first, second or third team offense and defense. “I pointed down to that empty chair and said, ‘Hey men, where’s Pablo?’” Bowden said. “It gave me an opportunity to talk to my boys about eternal life.” After the meeting, an FSU assistant coach asked Bowden what he was talking about. “With my Momma’s old Bible, I showed him how to … [Read more...]

Louisiana Milestones

Arrivals/Departures   Rick (wife Jonann) Byargeon, pastor of Temple Baptist Ruston, died April 4. Colin Trisler was ordained to the gospel ministry April 14 at First Baptist Winnfield. Pastor: Stephen Laughlin. Jerry (wife Dianne) Penfield, new as pastor of First Baptist Zwolle. Alex Davis, new as youth pastor at Summer Grove Baptist Shreveport. Pastor: Aaron Burgner. Jeff (wife Barbara) Feibel, new as pastor of Woodland Hills Baptist Shreveport. Yvonne Keller, new as children’s ministry leader at Cross Point Baptist Benton. Pastor: Shane Nugent. Peter (wife Misty) Tidovsky, new as music minister at Waller Baptist Bossier City. Pastor: Casey Hough. New as interim pastors: Wayne DuBose at Northwoods Baptist; Billy Crosby at Beulah Land Baptist; and Bill Treadway at Mt. Gilead, all in Northwest Louisiana Baptist Association. University Baptist Shreveport voted to disband. Ben W. Blackwell , new as Associate Pastor and Minister of Music at Faith Baptist Church in New Orleans. Bruce Baker, new as director of missions for Carey Baptist Association. From Lubbock, Texas. Vance (wife Cathy) Thomas, new as pastor of Gambrell Baptist, north of Starks.   Needed/Giving   Donation needed: large van or small bus, … [Read more...]

Breaking the mainstream media’s Gosnell blackout

Submitted by philip on Wed, 04/24/2013 - 10:37 Kermit Gosnell By Staff, World News Briefs Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., recently led a Special Order hour before Congress to raise awareness about abortionist Kermit Gosnell’s murder trial and the mainstream media’s refusal to cover it. Smith was joined by nine other representatives: Vicky Hartzler, R-Mo.; John Fleming, R-La.; Joe Pitts, R-Pa.; Scott Garrett, R-N.J.; Andy Harris, R-Md.; Keith Rothfus, R-Pa.; Roger Williams, R-Texas; Scott Perry, R-Pa.; and Marlin Stutzman, R-Ind. “Mr. Speaker, Kermit Gosnell is a predator who must be publicly exposed and openly denounced,” Stutzman said. “And that’s why I come to the floor—to bring attention to this case [so] that the American people are informed of it, aware of it, and realize the acts that are happening within our own country.” Andy Moore, director of AbortionWiki, condemned the media blackout and urged pro-lifers everywhere to raise awareness through social media. “If this was puppies that Gosnell was killing, the media would be all over it,” he told LifeSiteNews.com. Moore helped organize “TweetFest,” an effort to elevate the hashtag “#GosnellMurders” to Twitter’s top trend list and pressure mainstream media outlets … [Read more...]

Luter names Committee on Resolutions for 2013 SBC

By Staff, Baptist Press HOUSTON (BP) – SBC President Fred Luter has named the members of the Committee on Resolutions for the June 11-12 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Houston. Luter, pastor of the Franklin Avenue Baptist Church in New Orleans, appointed the committee in keeping with the provision in SBC Bylaw 20 that its members be named 75 days prior to the start of the annual meeting. Luter named Steve Lemke of Louisiana as committee chairman. Lemke is provost at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary in New Orleans, where he also serves as professor of philosophy and ethics, occupies the McFarland Chair of Theology, directs the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry and is editor of the Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry. Lemke is a member of First Baptist Church in New Orleans. The other committee members, in alphabetical order, are: Matthew Arbo, assistant professor of Christian ethics, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, member, Redeemer Fellowship, Kansas City, Mo. Tom Biles, recently retired executive director, Tampa Bay Baptist Association, Tampa, Fla.; interim pastor, First Baptist Church, Dade City, Fla.; member, Idlewild Baptist Church, Lutz, Fla. David Crosby, senior pastor, … [Read more...]

99-year-old M.O. Owens remembers the birth of the Cooperative Program

Submitted by philip on Wed, 04/24/2013 - 10:41 M.O. Owens By Karen L. Willoughby, Managing Editor MEMPHIS, Tenn. (BP) -- M.O. Owens Jr. was still in knickers on May 13, 1925, the day his parents took him to a pivotal session of the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting. That was the day the Cooperative Program was born. Now 99, Owens recalls the vote that ushered in the CP as a system of financial support for the missions and ministries of Southern Baptists within state conventions and throughout the nation and world. “I was there but I was only 11,” Owens told Baptist Press. “I don’t have a keen memory of specifics. There wasn’t any great opposition, but it was a new idea to the pastors. “I remember very vividly how excited my dad was, how delighted he was, and I do remember so well he was concerned about enlisting the other pastors,” Owens said of his father, the late Milum Oswell Owens Sr., who pastored two churches. “He was the only pastor from that association [Orangeburg County, S.C.] who attended that convention.” His parents must have realized the historical significance of the vote because Owens was allowed to stay with relatives during the other sessions of the five-day event, which took place in … [Read more...]

Questions We’ve Pondered

By Johnathan Patterson, NOBTS Question: Did God call Esther to sin? Jonathan Patterson responds: Esther 2 tells us that Esther was gathered, along with other young women, and placed among the king’s harem of virgins. After a year of preparation, each virgin was appointed one night only with the king and returned the next morning to the harem of the king’s concubines. Esther had been instructed by Mordecai not to reveal her racial heritage, so when it was her time she entered into the king’s chambers as instructed. The Bible never specifically tells us that Esther slept with Artaxerxes, but the implication is quite clear. So how do we then rectify what we know of God’s commandments to refrain from sexual relations outside of marriage with what we recognize to be the divine hand of guidance upon Esther’s life? Had God called Esther to sin by committing fornication? A soldier is thrust into war for the primary purpose of eliminating an enemy threat. When that soldier kills an enemy combatant, we do not consider this murder but rather the necessary consequences of the situation he or she is facing. That soldier’s choice is simple: kill or be killed. Esther’s was not a choice of retaining or surrendering her virtue; it was a … [Read more...]

The Supreme Court tackles homosexual marriage

By Richard Land, President of the ERLC Recently the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments on same-sex marriage; it was a high-stakes moment for both American society and for the court itself. The Court heard arguments on California’s Proposition 8 (Hollingsworth v. Perry) case and also reviewed the federal Defense of Marriage Act in U.S. v. Windsor. Just like in Roe v Wade, a case widely discredited by legal scholars as poor law and credited by conservatives as the spark that ignited Christian activism, the court has a massive challenge ahead of it -- threading the needle between state’s rights and the press of coastal public opinion. The California case has the potential for far-flung reverberations in all 50 states. In the Proposition 8 case, the court will decide whether to overturn a lower federal court’s renunciation of Proposition 8, in which the voters of California voted to amend their state constitution to define marriage as only between one man and one woman. The presiding judge, the since retired Vaughn R. Walker, declared that “excluding same-sex couples from marriage is simply not rationally related to a legitimate state interest.” The Obama administration filed a friend-of-the-court brief in the Proposition 8 case … [Read more...]

Situation at LC unfolds

Submitted by philip on Tue, 03/12/2013 - 10:27 A controversy has emerged at Louisiana College in reference to President Joe Aguillard’s articulation in a “President’s Pen” column that the theology known as Calvinism would not be advocated on the Pineville campus. By Kelly Boggs, Message Editor PINEVILLE – The Louisiana College Board of Trustees gathered for a special called meeting on Feb. 25. The purpose of the meeting, which was conducted in Executive Session with only trustees in attendance, was never disclosed. Convened in Granberry Hall on the campus of LC, the meeting, according to a variety of observers, lasted more than four-and-a-half hours. When the meeting adjourned, no statement was issued by the Board explaining the nature of the meeting. With a regularly scheduled meeting of the LC Board on the calendar for March 18, social media was abuzz with conjecture concerning the special called session. The overwhelming speculation was the meeting was called to address a controversy that had emerged as the result of three professors not having their contracts renewed. Additional speculation suggested three students whose weblog postings helped to stir up the controversy might also be a part of the closed-door … [Read more...]