HATTIESBURG, Miss. (ABP) — John Merritt, general secretary emeritus of the International Baptist Convention, died of cancer Dec. 29. He was 76. Merritt served as a missionary with the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board — then known as the…
Robertson predicts ‘mass killing’ by terrorists in U.S. this year
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (ABP) — In the latest of a long-but-unsuccessful line of predictions and prophecies, Pat Robertson said Jan. 2 the United States will face a massive terrorist attack in late 2007. The 76-year-old religious broadcaster uttered his prediction…
Mass. legislators vote to send gay-marriage ban to voters
BOSTON (ABP) — A week after the state's highest court chided them for not acting sooner, Massachusetts legislators relented Jan. 2 and OK'd a proposed state constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage in the only state that currently allows…
Students at Antiphony explore callings, celebrate New Year
ATLANTA (ABP) — Students who gathered in Atlanta over the New Year's holiday may well remember it as a time for conversations about “things that matter.” Event organizers said the second annual Antiphony conference was intended to help Christian young…
Massachusetts court chides legislators for not voting on marriage ban
BOSTON (ABP) — The same court that three years ago ordered Massachusetts legislators to legalize same-sex marriage in the state has rebuked — but not punished — the state's lawmakers for failing to vote on an amendment that would ban…
Belmont names first non-Baptists to board as controversy continues
NASHVILLE (ABP) — Belmont University, embroiled in a lawsuit with the Tennessee Baptist Convention, has further angered some convention leaders by appointing non-Baptists to its board of trustees. The Nashville school announced, via a Dec. 21 press release, that eight…
Joy to the Church
Have you ever had occasion to sit on the platform of a church or in the choir and look into the faces of the worshippers? It is sometimes unsettling. I remember such an occasion not long ago looking at the…
ANOTHER VIEW: Room at the inn
Jesus seeks the forgotten, the downtrodden and the rejected people of this world. Why? Because He embodies God's love. He also understands the plight of the rejected: He was born an outcast. On the first Christmas Eve, the subjects of…
Treasure houses
On a recent Sunday evening the lights were dark at the First Baptist Church of Richmond. The members were down Boulevard at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts where they were honoring their pastor, Peter James Flamming. On the last…
News about Virginia Baptists and their ministries for December 21 ,2006
Staff Changes Lowell Wright, to Trinity Church, Louisa, as pastor. Robert Johansen, to Spring Creek Church, Darlington Heights, as pastor. Calvin Sacra, to North Bedford Church, Forest, as pastor. David Burgess, resigning as pastor of Seventeenth Street Church, Roanoke. Ray…
Baptist battles dominated news in 2006, editors say
DALLAS (ABP) — The election of an outsider as president of the Southern Baptist Convention was chosen by Baptist journalists as the most important story in Baptist life in 2006 — a year when denominational affairs outweighed world news in…
Embattled Bellevue Baptist faces new conflict: ‘moral failure’ allegations
CORDOVA, Tenn. (ABP) — The president of Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary has called for the senior pastor at one of the largest Southern Baptist congregations in the United States to resign. Michael Spradlin, who leads the seminary situated across the…