JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (ABP and BP) – David Clippard, embattled executive director of the Missouri Baptist Convention, was fired April 10 by the convention's Executive Board. Following a second closed-door meeting about Clippard's leadership within six months, Executive Board members…
Churches show lasting benefits from intentional interim ministry, study says
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C.—Churches that go through the intentional interim ministry process show lasting benefits, recent research has demonstrated. The Center for Congregational Health examined churches 24 to 36 months after they completed the intentional interim process, paying particular attention to how…
Missouri associate Jim Austin tapped for top Baptist spot in South Carolina
COLUMBIA, S. C. — After spending less than two years as associate executive director of the Missouri Baptist Convention, Jim Austin is expected to become new executive director-treasurer of the South Carolina Baptist Convention. A South Carolina search committee announced…
Churches seeking pastors put plenty of hooks in the water
RICHMOND—What's in a name? For churches seeking a new minister, the bottom line is collecting names of candidates—and lots of them. That's not always an easy task, and search committees typically discover it takes a variety of approaches to create…
Florida pastor leads church to ministry-based evangelism
Charles Roesel served as the pastor of First Baptist Church, Leesburg, Fla., for almost 30 years. He retired in the spring of 2006. Under his leadership First Baptist, Leesburg, was in the top 1 percent of the nation in evangelism…
Self-examination benefits church with pastor, too
PLAINVIEW, Texas—At some point, every church needs to step back and re-evaluate its purpose. Micheal Summers, Wayland Baptist University's director of church services, believes an intentional interim minister can most effectively lead churches through that process, but churches with pastors…
Masters winner buoyed by faith, marriage
The day before Johnson won the tournament April 8, J.B. Collingsworth, president of the Marriage and Family Matters ministry, sent the golfer a text message of Psalm 16:8: “I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at…
BREAKING NEWS: Supreme Court upholds ‘partial-birth’ abortion ban
WASHINGTON (ABP) — A sharply divided Supreme Court did April 18 exactly what many pro-lifers hoped and what many abortion-rights advocates feared it would: It upheld, for the first time, a nationwide ban on a specific abortion procedure. In a…
In sweeping decision, divided court upholds ‘partial-birth’ abortion ban
WASHINGTON (ABP) — A sharply divided Supreme Court did April 18 exactly what many pro-lifers hoped — and what many abortion-rights advocates feared. For the first time, the majority upheld a nationwide ban on a specific abortion procedure. In a…
In court’s abortion decision, both sides see risk for Roe
WASHINGTON (ABP) — In upholding a federal ban April 18 on a rare kind of late-term abortion procedure, the Supreme Court may have begun undermining its key abortion precedent. Activists on both sides of the abortion issue greeted the court's…
In days following shootings, Hokies search for bright spots amid tragedy
BLACKSBURG, Va. (ABP) — Two days after Cho Seung-Hui shot and killed at least 32 students and professors on the campus of Virginia Tech, students are searching for something good to come of the massacre. “There are people out there…
Churches in parenthesis: Intentional interims serve specific purposes
PLAINVIEW, Texas (ABP) — According to Michael Summers, a director of church services at Wayland Baptist University in Texas, every church needs to step back periodically and reevaluate its purpose. It's a time for members to determine who they are,…