By David Wilkinson The Rev. Peter de Villiers got an answer to his prayers: he won the lottery. Some of his parishioners and denominational kinsmen, however, aren’t celebrating the pastor’s good fortune. My wife has her doubts, too. According to…
Fairness and freedom
By David Wilkinson Another Baptist editor has been ushered out. And that thud you hear is another door to Baptist freedom slamming shut behind him. Technically, Norman Jameson is still editor of the Biblical Recorder of North Carolina, one of…
Bonhoeffer and the power of story
By David Wilkinson For Eric Metaxas, a New York Times best-selling author, one story led to another. A few years ago a friend gave Metaxas a book on Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the brilliant and courageous German theologian, pastor and writer who…
Ice cream and the ministry of hospitality
(Editor’s note: While ABP Executive Director David Wilkinson’s “After the -30-” column normally is published every other Friday, technical difficulties prevented it from being posted on its normal schedule last Friday.) By David Wilkinson At our house, hospitality is…
Mom finally promotes out of 2nd-grade Sunday school
By David Wilkinson Forty-nine years ago my mother and I advanced to the second-grade Sunday school class together. This year, on her 50th “Promotion Sunday,” Mom finally made it out of the second grade. It nearly broke her heart. In…
The legacy of Elijah Lovejoy
By David Wilkinson A few days ago I stood at the grave of Elijah Lovejoy, a journalist, newspaper editor and Presbyterian minister, who was murdered on Nov. 7, 1837, by a mob in Alton, Ill., for his courageous and uncompromising…
Some compelling Christians called Baptists
By David Wilkinson The same week that novelist Anne Rice announced that her faith in Christ has led her to disown the name “Christian,” a young woman from Bolivia quietly renewed my hope for people called Christians — and for…
The proper way to eat animal crackers
By David Wilkinson What’s the proper way to eat an animal cracker? According to the book Panati’s Extraordinary Origins of Everyday Things, the most popular order of dismemberment among children is as follows: back legs, forelegs, head and, lastly, torso….
Stray bullets
By David Wilkinson What goes up must come down. As our family recently discovered, that includes a .40-caliber bullet. Our daughter Meredith, driving a car she had borrowed from a cousin for a month-long summer job, was preparing to return…