Baptist News Global

Do not lose heart while tending the soil of God’s work, speakers urge CBF assembly

Faced with concurrent pandemics of health, politics and racism, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship churches have not lost heart but have pressed on amid the challenges, CBF Executive Coordinator Paul Baxley said in an address to the group’s General Assembly Aug. 27….

Our vision of missions should shift from Matthew 28 to John 21

Over the more than a half century of my participation in Christian cross-cultural missions, I have noticed a gradual shift in missions strategy. This change is both theologically sound and morally significant. It is a shift to prioritize John 21…

Scholar explores the ways migration changes people’s attitudes, beliefs and religion

Over time, immigrants to new countries behave in new ways and embrace new ideas that they would not have embodied had they never left home, according to João Chaves, author of a forthcoming book titled Migrational Religion: Context and Creativity…

Churches urged to get ready to welcome Afghan refugees

Cooperative Baptist Fellowship field personnel across the U.S. are preparing partner networks and local congregations for the expected arrival of Afghan refugees attempting to flee as the withdrawal of American forces continues. “We expect a huge influx all over the…

What should you do if a sex offender wants to attend your church?

When someone who is a registered sex offender shows up at church and wants to participate — even in such a simple way as attending worship — what should church leaders do? There is a five-step process pastors and lay…

Friendly Neighbor Epidemiologist is back and armed with data for parents to fight for masks in schools

Your Friendly Neighbor Epidemiologist has come to the masking debate armed with new data, and she’s ready to help health-conscious parents advocate at their schools, school boards and churches. Emily Smith, assistant professor of epidemiology at Baylor University and a…

Pandemic has accelerated needed changes in churches, panelists report

The COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges to churches, but it also helped them sift through outdated programming and policies to reinvent ministry going forward, according to panelists of “Expanding Engagement in the Local Church,” an Aug. 25 workshop of the Cooperative…

Row with the dual oars of God’s word and the wind of the Spirit, pastors proclaim as CBF assembly opens

The Spirit of God is blowing, and Christians can either follow that wind or be left in the past, a team of preachers said in a fast-paced dual-language sermon that opened the 2021 virtual General Assembly of the Cooperative Baptist…

Why aren’t we better at differing?

Where I come from, we had colorful descriptions of people who are argumentative, or with whom it’s hard to differ. I’m sure you did, too. Here are some I remember: Why, he’s as stubborn as a mule. She’d argue with…

Pastors ponder pandemic preaching problems — and how they’ve survived

Preaching has been radically different and difficult for Pastor Cheryl Adamson since March 2020, and not only because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The parallel scourges of police brutality, political subjugation and racial oppression faced by African Americans, and exacerbated by…

Of sheep and goats, vaccines and conspiracies, biblical literacy and illiteracy

I’m not exactly sure when or how it happened, but calling someone a sheep is now meant to be an insult. In this new vernacular, being called a “sheep” or “sheeple” means you’re foolish and easily led astray. It means…

With refugee and immigrant ministries already on high alert, Supreme Court delivers an unwanted message

While the nation’s agencies serving refugees and immigrants are scrambling to welcome thousands of Afghan refugees, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to their advocacy on another front Aug. 24 by telling the Biden administration it must reinstate the…

Eradicating DEI hasn’t made anything better

How Christian nationalism shows up in patriotic worship services

Dear Trump-supporting Christians, are you really OK with this?

‘Every Student. Every State’ campaign promotes school tax credit