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Baptist Message

"Helping Louisiana Baptists Impact the World For Christ"

Associations, churches encouraged to join ELBA hosted prayer event Aug. 22-23

By Baptist Message staff WALKER, La. (LBM) – Eastern Louisiana Baptist Association is hosting a focused prayer event later this month and is asking other associations and churches to join them in the effort. The event, 24-hours of continuous prayer, begins at 8 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 22, and continues through 8 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 23. Each church has been asked to recruit members to pray in one-hour increments that will focus on confession of sin, revival in the church, awakening, unity and healing for the novel coronavirus pandemic. The event is based off Psalm 57:1-2: “Be gracious to me, O God, be gracious to me, For my soul takes refuge in You; and in the shadow of Your wings I will take refuge until destruction passes by. I will cry to God most high, oh God who accomplishes all things for me.” Eastern Louisiana Associational Missions Coordinator Richard Blue said he is excited about how God will move from this time of focused prayer. “It's time to pray,” he said. Our land needs to acknowledge God, repent of our sins, and return to God so He might return to us.” … [Read more...]

What would Jesus do in a pandemic?

By Waylon Bailey Recently, I saw a tweet on Twitter that asked the question, “What would Jesus do in the midst of a worldwide pandemic?” No answer to the question was given, but the author obviously had an agenda and a suggested answer. The good news is that it led me to really ask, “What would Jesus do?” A man I’ve known about for a long time tried to answer that question biblically and seriously. Wallace Henley said that Jesus would do now what He did then. At that point Henley began to describe what Jesus did then and what the church today should do. In my words, the church needs to come out of this pandemic stronger than when we entered this difficult time. We need to make sure we live biblically and express the hope that we have in Christ. What did Jesus do? 1. He worshiped. Jesus worshiped, and He taught people to worship. He told us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, and soul. He told us to worship God in spirit and in truth. Luke reminded us that Jesus made it His custom to worship the Father. 2. Jesus interceded. One of the great things we can do is intercede for our neighbors. In times like these, people want to pray, and they want us to pray for them. One of my favorite old … [Read more...]

LC experiences ‘move-in day’ unlike any other

By Brian Blackwell, Baptist Message staff writer PINEVILLE, La. (LBM) – Louisiana College experienced a move-in day unlike any other in its history Wednesday, Aug. 12. The usual flow of incoming students was instead only staggered groups that moved into dorm rooms, and all were encouraged to wear masks and observe proper social distancing because of novel coronavirus pandemic concerns. Schools officials reported less than 250 incoming freshmen participated in move-in day, and were assisted by upperclassmen, faculty members and church groups. Another 50 will commute from home this semester. Wednesday’s move-in day kicked off Welcome Week, a time of orientation and numerous activities that will include “The Awakening” revival featuring evangelist Curtis Zachary Aug. 14-17, 6:30 p.m., inside Guinn Auditorium. Upperclassmen will return to campus this weekend, and classes will resume Aug. 17. While final enrollment numbers will not be available until later in the semester, LC President Rick Brewer is optimistic the school will enroll at least 300 new freshmen for the fourth consecutive year. He asked Louisiana Baptists to pray for students as they begin classes and noted that 70 students professed their faith in … [Read more...]

Skills of a church planter – exercising faith

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...]