(ABP) — Here are some of the more memorable quotes that appeared in Associated Baptist Press stories and commentaries during 2010.
"In the midst of your concern for me I want you to compare my situation with the 4 billion oral learners who haven't heard and don't understood the Words of Life. At least 1.5 billion people have never heard of Jesus. They are the ones who need our attention and prayers." (Southern Baptist missions leader Avery Willis, who died July 30, on his diagnosis with leukemia. After retiring from the International Mission Board, Willis worked with populations that are functionally illiterate.)
"Love trumps evil." (Linda Dulin, telling her son-in-law Matt Baker, a former Baptist pastor convicted of killing her daughter in 2006, why she must forgive him.)
"T-shirt fronts serve as great tissues." (Jinny Henson, on lessons she learned in the first six months after her daughter died from injuries received in a church-bus accident.)
"There are scads of photos of Baptist university and seminary presidents being inaugurated and a good number of images of presidents kneeling for the 'laying on of hands' as an act of spiritual blessing. I dare say there are none depicting the baptism of a new president." (ABP Executive Director David Wilkinson, on the choice of Kenneth Starr, son of a church of Christ minister, as president of Baylor University.)
"I thought the way Cecil spoke truth intimidated his adversaries and scared the daylights out of his friends." (Baptist historian Walter Shurden at the April 23 memorial service for Cecil Sherman, first coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.)
"There are no barriers in God's love. There should be no barriers in God's house." (Ginny Thornburgh, director of an interfaith initiative for the American Association of People with Disabilities.)
"People are always saying 'Why don't you appoint more funded missionaries?' The fact is we don't have the money. What is amazing is that we have not had to call any missionaries home." (Cooperative Baptist Fellowship Executive Coordinator Daniel Vestal.)
"Let's stop worrying about our name and start reclaiming our witness." (Historian Bill Leonard, speaking at the CBF General Assembly.)
"It's too bad that I didn't take homiletics, because I have been preaching ever since." (Former WMU executive director Carolyn Weatherford Crumpler on study in the School of Religious Education at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. She took all her electives in the School of Theology but could not enroll because she was a woman.)
"A translator — especially a translator of the Scriptures — should not be known, because the important things are the words and the message that come through those books and not the person who did the translation." (Bob Bratcher, lead translator of the Good News Bible, who died July 11 at age 90.)
"A free flow of news remains vital for any democracy, and Baptist polity is the purest form of democracy." (Baptist Standard Editor Marv Knox, on the 20th anniversary of the firing of two Baptist Press editors that prompted formation of Associated Baptist Press.)
"We threw a rock at Goliath. We don't know yet whether or not we are Davids." (Shirley Taylor, on demands by a Christian women's right group that the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood apologize for teaching that subordinates women.)
"Some of us who have been speaking for so long need to be quiet and do some listening…. If we listen to each other, we'll have wiser words to say to each other." (North American John Upton, new president of the Baptist World Alliance.)
"The faithful are often the most susceptible to fear." (Bill Shiell, pastor of First Baptist Church in Knoxville, Tenn.)
"These are perfect projects for churches." (Tim Brendle, coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship's relief in Haiti, on a new technique for building permanent homes for earthquake victims using rubble created by the January quake.)
"If you're not willing to lose an election over important principles, then you don't deserve to ever win an election." (Rep. Chet Edwards)
Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press.