By Jimmy Barrentine Executive Director Baptist Convention of Iowa DES MOINES, Iowa (BP) – There are good people who seem to have the impression that state conventions, especially small ones such as the Baptist Convention of Iowa, are seeking to assure their own future even to the point of placing the fulfillment of the Great Commission at risk.[img_assist|nid=6190|title=Jimmy Barrentine Executive Director Baptist Convention of Iowa|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=70|height=100] The fact is that we are diligently seeking a continued opportunity to collaborate with the North American Mission Board in seeking the fulfillment of the Great Commission. We want to work with the entire Southern Baptist Convention family, but it is our partnership with the North American Mission Board that seems to be most in peril. Before writing us off, releasing NAMB from its cooperative agreement with us, please prayerfully consider the following offers. We offer to continue to help lift and carry “Buckets of Hope.” All across Iowa individual believers and churches have been filling food buckets destined for Haiti. Appointed NAMB missionaries are coordinating the Iowa effort, but all of us are helping to collect and transport those … [Read more...]

FRESNO, Calif. (BP) – To Our Southern Baptist Brothers and Sisters: What an amazing day it is to be Southern Baptists! [img_assist|nid=6192|title=Walter Price President California SBC|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=68|height=100]The challenges before us are greater than ever; the Commission from our Lord is as strong as when He uttered the words to His disciples; and the power of the Holy Spirit is the same today, yesterday and forever. We must recognize that the challenge before us calls for new strategies, new forms, new wineskins. We have heard the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force Progress Report and we would like to respond from way out West. [img_assist|nid=5981|title=Rob Zinn Chairman Executive Board California SBC|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=64|height=100]The argument can be made that we in California are among those who have the most to “lose” potentially from the recommendations. In terms of actual dollar amounts that is probably true. We recognize the huge effect this will have on us here in California. We know that changes will have to be made. With heavy, prayerful hearts we realize the impact and economic challenge this will be to real people – people whom we love and appreciate for … [Read more...]

By H. Norman Wright and Gary Oliver, PH.D Courtesy of LifeWay Anger is a challenging emotion, but it can also be one of the major bumps in the road to modeling a Christ-centered life for your child. In our marriage and parenting workshops, parents have told us that they struggle more with their anger than with any other emotion. Parents have also told us that they have a difficult time knowing how to deal with their children’s anger.[img_assist|nid=6194|title=Parents struggle more with their anger than any other emotion|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=67] Modeling for Your Child Many Christian parents feel discouraged or defeated by the ways in which they deal with their own conflict and anger. However, we have discovered that these situations present a unique opportunity to model for your child the difference that Jesus Christ can make in your own life and your family. Why is anger the most difficult emotion for most parents to deal with, both in themselves and in their children? What is so unique about anger? Why is this emotion such a problem? The real problem is that most people do not understand what anger is, why God has given anger, and that healthy anger can be used in constructive … [Read more...]

By Michele Louviere, Director of Counseling Celebration Church, Metairie Question: My friend has been depressed and has even said she wishes she was dead. What can I do to help her? [img_assist|nid=6061|title=Michele Louviere, Director of Counseling, Celebration Church, Metairie|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=90]Michelle Louviere responds: Many people in our society struggle with depression. One of the possible symptoms of depression is suicidal thoughts. When people are depressed, sometimes the pain are so great that living seems hopeless and the only option to end the pain is death. Suicidal statements should never be ignored or minimized. Knowing the signs of suicide and what to do when someone is suicidal is profoundly important. First of all, warning signs include the following: depressed mood, engaging in reckless behavior, feeling trapped, increased drug or alcohol use, withdrawing from family or friends, anxiety, agitation, inability to sleep or sleeping all the time, dramatic mood change, lack of purpose for life, writing a suicide note, giving away personal items, making a will, changes in appearance, obsessed with death, and rage or seeking revenge. Sometimes a suicidal person will actually … [Read more...]

BOSSIER CITY – Elm Grove Baptist Church hosted a grand opening and dedication service for its new food pantry ministry on Sunday, March 7. The dedication service marked the official launch of the new ministry that was five months in the making. [img_assist|nid=6197|title=Elm Grove Baptist Church members inspect food pantry inventory|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=59]“When I first proposed the idea of the food pantry ministry, church members immediately caught the vision,” said Pastor Brian Prucey. “Excitement filled the congregation as we moved closer to the launch date and culminated in the dedication service. Our members were eager for a ministry that provided a tangible benefit to the community in Jesus’ name.” Several area families received help from the food pantry even before the official start of the ministry. “Word got around about what we were doing and we were excited to help meet those needs,” the pastor said. The food pantry ministry received a significant amount of its initial food stock from the members of Koran Baptist Church in Haughton. In addition, the Northwest Louisiana Baptist Association provided a start-up grant of $400, and $2,000 was received from Grace Baptist Fellowship, a Bossier … [Read more...]

By Diana Chandler, Regional Reporter METAIRIE  – Celebration Church blends long-term discipleship with the New Testament model of church planting: Opening extension campuses and nurturing them towards optional independence. With campuses in Metairie, LaPlace and Arabi, Celebration is studying the possibility of opening a site on the West Bank of Orleans Parish, said Multi-site Coordinator Craig Ratliff, who leads the Arabi congregation. “It’s always been a personal call for us, for our lead pastor and our staff,” Ratliff said. “Dennis has always had a citywide view of New Orleans.” Lead Pastor Dennis Watson said the model is in response to a vision from God. “A number of years ago the Lord gave me a vision of planting 15 healthy churches locally that would partner with Celebration Church and other local Baptist churches in reaching the people of our city and region,” Watson said. He describes Celebration as a “church-planting church” that has birthed seven congregations locally, five in other U.S. cities, and 25 internationally. But the traditional mission church model didn’t accomplish Celebration’s goals in the local community. “Some of our local church mission plants didn’t thrive, and some didn’t survive,” … [Read more...]

By Karen L. Willoughby, Managing Editor JONESVILLE – “What missions project could we do in our association?” That’s the question then-director of missions Ralph Webber asked in 1984 of Jennie Belle White, an active member of Utility Baptist Church and Ouachita Baptist Association. “Tutoring,” she responded. An elementary schoolteacher, White was aware many students were not able to read and write at grade level. The association rented a building, churches donated tables and chairs, and volunteers came “from everywhere” to help in the fledgling ministry that today is known as Breadcrumb Baptist Ministry Center. White was honored one recent Sunday at Utility Baptist Church for 25 years as director of the ministry center. During the same event, two coworkers were honored for their first 15 years of volunteer work at Breadcrumb. Marie Towell and Hazel Chapman have worked at Breadcrumb for 19 years, but their fifteenth anniversary slipped by unnoted. “Jeannie Belle is known throughout the Louisiana Baptist Convention for the lives she’s touched,” said Wayne Sheppard, LBC partnerships strategist, who led in the celebration of her 25-year ministry at Utility Baptist. “She’s done so with one goal: to help other people … [Read more...]

MOORINGSPORT – The WMU of Mooringsport Baptist Church in Northwest Baptist Association recently began a project of making Witnessing Dolls to be given to children by workers on the mission field. [img_assist|nid=6201|title=Witnessing dolls|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=75]After reading about these dolls in the February Mosaic magazine published by the national WMU, the ladies decided to take this for a project. Under the leadership of Ann Ryals, the patterns were passed out and the sewing began. At one point, members brought sewing machines with the necessary supplies to the church and had a time of working on the dolls together. After the dolls were made of colorful fabrics and yarn, their faces were hand-painted. On one side their eyes are closed, representing a lost person’s spiritual condition; on the other side the eyes are open, and the lips are smiling. A beaded witnessing necklace is on each doll. Also, the plan of salvation is inserted in the doll’s pocket. The language of the plan of salvation will reflect the doll’s destination. Twenty of the dolls are going with a neighboring church’s mission group to Nicaragua so the plan of salvation in those dolls’ pockets is in Spanish, as it will be in … [Read more...]

By Diana Chandler, Regional Reporter ST. GABRIEL – Love was a long time coming for 66-year-old Mary Riley. When she should have been sheltered from harm at age 7, her grandfather fed her Four Roses Bourbon and molested her, and her mother beat her repeatedly under the guise of love, the prison inmate said.[img_assist|nid=6203|title=Christian inmates at the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women listen to Henry Blackaby|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=67] Broken, Riley ran away from home at age 13, suffered alcoholism, married six men by age 40, shot one husband to death, and is serving a life sentence at the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women (LCIW) after fatally stabbing her landlady in a fight more than 26 years ago. She’s among the 200 or so Christian inmates Henry and son Tom Blackaby taught during the Called and Accountable weekend March 19-21, the second Blackaby seminar in two years at the only women’s prison in Louisiana. “I just always related to the down and out, the broken,” said the elder Blackaby, founder and president emeritus of Blackaby Ministries International. “My daddy, who was a businessman, picked up all the broken people. I grew up with that, with my daddy touching the most … [Read more...]

By Karen L. Willoughby, Managing Editor SWARTZ – Carol Dark ran into Melissa, an old acquaintance, some time ago while on a church visitation at another person’s home. At Dark’s invitation, Melissa attended First Baptist Church of Swartz with Carol a few times, then faded away. But she came to a visitation service in January after Carol’s dad died, and Melissa now says words Carol said to her then – “I want to see you back here” – rang in her ears. “We became friends on Facebook,” Dark said. “Then she asked for my cell phone number and I kept inviting her to church. She came with me one Wednesday night, and Sunday, and again on Wednesday night, and she asked me, ‘Have you ever felt you needed to do something, but didn’t know what to do?’” Melissa made a profession of faith that night in mid-March. It was less than a month after Dark had signed a pledge card committing to finding one person to lead to the Lord. This is what ONE Focus is all about, said Bob Chambless, a consultant with LifeCatalyst, which is advocating ONE Focus in churches across Louisiana and the South. “ONE Focus is a one-year, missional movement that helps to grows Christians into disciples and non-believers into Christians,” Chambless said. … [Read more...]