Diogo Carvalho’s initial foray into evangelism was motivated by an emphasis on saving souls from hell and counting converts. “It was hit-and-run evangelism. I would approach someone in the streets, speak with them five minutes and let them go,” the…
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….
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…
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…
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The COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges to churches, but it also helped them sift through outdated programming and policies to reinvent ministry going forward, according to panelists of “Expanding Engagement in the Local Church,” an Aug. 25 workshop of the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…
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…