Baptist News Global

Camp Piankatank dedicates three new lodges to enhance retreat setting

HARTFIELD, Va. — Camp Piankatank celebrated the construction of three new lodges with a dedication service and open house on Nov 15. The new structures differ substantially from their predecessors in their larger sizes and in their increased functionality. Planners…

Virginia Baptists increase 2010 budget, celebrate mission at meeting

FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — Despite a shaky economy, Virginia Baptists acknowledged their “God-sized” mission task Nov. 18 and adopted a 2010 budget of $14 million, about 1.4 percent larger than 2009’s budget, which is expected to see a shortfall. Next year’s…

EDITORIAL: Times change

Times of economic stress create tensions in religious bodies. I remember so well my first full-time church located in a far western county of Virginia known commonly as Missouri. Our church gave 18 percent to the Cooperative Program and 4…

From the Eastern Shore to Cumberland Gap

STAFF CHANGES • Bill Kittle, resigning as pastor of Rock Hill Church, Stafford, to accept a teaching position in Vermont. • Wellford Tiller, to Calvary Church, Winchester, as intentional interim pastor. • Andrew MacDaniel, to Laurel Hill Church, Verona, as…

Haymarket church finds ministry in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province

HAYMARKET, Va. — Five members of Haymarket Baptist Church traveled to South Africa Oct. 2-16 to work among the varied people of the Eastern Cape. The group was led by Haymarket’s associate pastor of Christian education, Matthew Hensley. Team members…

Storyteller Calvin Miller leads 2009 BGAV Pastors’ Conference

FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — Calvin Miller believes in stories. Writer in residence and research professor at Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Ala., Miller points to Jesus’ narrative parables as proof of the power and potential of stories to be remembered and…

Haymarket church finds ministry in South Africa

Advocate believes Christian-run prison would be constitutional

DALLAS (ABP) — A Baptist minister hoping to open the nation's first faith-based prison says he is confident it will pass constitutional muster. Americans United for Separation of Church and State wrote the Oklahoma Department of Corrections Nov. 18 saying…

Wiley Drake lifts call for ‘imprecatory prayer’ against President Obama

BUENA PARK, Calif. (ABP) — A former Southern Baptist Convention officer who made headlines in June when he said on national radio that he was praying for Barack Obama to die now says he wants to see the president live…

Does the SBC respect local-church autonomy or not?

By Wade Burleson During the November 11, 2009, business session of the Georgia Baptist Convention, messengers to the Southern Baptist-affiliated state body dismissed the First Baptist Church of Decatur, Ga., from fellowship for the church’s calling of Julie Pennington-Russell as…

Group says proposed Okla. Christian prison likely unconstitutional

WASHINGTON (ABP) — A church-state watchdog group says a faith-based prison being proposed in Oklahoma would likely be unconstitutional. Americans United for Separation of Church and State wrote the Oklahoma Department of Corrections Nov. 18 advising the state not to…

Teaching laypeople about the honor of preaching the gospel

By Amy Butler If I were being completely honest, I would tell you that the whole idea was a little, tiny bit self-serving. Having recently completed my doctor-of-ministry degree in preaching, I, strangely enough, managed to maintain my passion for…

Molly Marshall announces 2027 retirement

She preached anyway

It’s time to listen to the prophets

‘Alligator Alcatraz’ is no more