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Archives For November 30, 1999

Mission Illinois Week of Prayer: Day 3

Meredith Flynn —  September 17, 2013

MIO_blogDAY 3: Watch “Help Others”

The cheerful woman in a yellow shirt will willingly wield a hammer, turn a shovel, or push a wheelbarrow. But if those tasks are covered, she would rather be talking. Mostly she talks about Jesus.

As a Disaster Relief chaplain, Jan is a vital member of the team on the scene after storm clouds pass and flood waters subside. Every DR team has a chaplain who focuses on devastated homeowners while other workers “mud out” their devastated houses. “The owner of the little white house was saved today,” Jan reported from a flood site in Peoria in May.

IBSA supports SBC’s Disaster Relief, the nation’s third largest relief agency, with 1,600 volunteers and Rex Alexander, the IBSA staff member who trains and deploys them.

Read: Jonah 1:17-2:10; Isaiah 61:1

Think: What does Jonah’s prayer show us about the needs of people in distress? How shall we pray for them?

Pray for 1,600 Baptists from Illinois who are trained as Disaster Relief workers. Pray for the chaplains on each team who share the Gospel with hurting people, while other workers cook, clean, and rebuild after crisis.

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Mission Illinois Week of Prayer: Day 2

Meredith Flynn —  September 16, 2013

MIO_blogDAY 2: Watch “Share Christ”

Gosen Church in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, is a large building with silk flowers hanging from the ceiling. Illinois volunteers helped build this church over three weeks last November. Cinderblocks with artful designs cut out of them make up the windows, and the doors are always open.

When Meredith and her team went there to work in July, they met at the church building to sing and pray together. Then they went to work building houses in a community hard-hit by Haiti’s earthquake in 2010.

This team was one of many from Illinois serving on international mission trips, creating long-term relationships and sharing Christ with people around the world. In fact, more than 25,000 Baptists from Illinois are engaged in missions and mission trips each year.

Read: Jonah 1:10-16; Habakkuk 2:14

Think: How does God use catastrophic events, such as storms and earthquakes, to reveal Himself and His plans?

Pray for IBSA’s Bob Elmore, who helps arrange mission trips, including several each year to Haiti. Pray for your church’s next mission trip.

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Mission Illinois Week of Prayer: Day 1

Meredith Flynn —  September 15, 2013

MIO_blogHEARTLAND | More and more, churches in Illinois are responsible for missions in Illinois. This is where we live, work, shop, and go to school. This is where our families, friends, and neighbors live – 13 million of them. And at least 8 million don’t yet know Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

In the face of such great spiritual need, some of our denominational partners are focusing on church planting as their main method of evangelism. That is a worthy tactic. But it means that Illinois Baptists must make up the difference in other areas that are still fertile for advancing the Gospel. We must focus on missions that remain vital to us here in Illinois, including compassion and crisis ministries, outreach on college campuses and in inner cities, and the education and mobilization of church members for missions. Children, students, and families in Illinois need the life-saving Gospel of Jesus Christ. And Illinois churches need help in dozens of ways that are funded only by Illinois Baptists.

Many of these ministries and missions efforts would not be possible if not for the Week of Prayer and Offering for state missions each September.

DAY 1: Watch “Partner to Plant”

Pastor Peters is passionate about winning lost people. Perhaps it’s because as a kid growing up in Chicago, he never heard the Gospel. Or because so many family and friends still living there do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ. “We have to win the cities, because that’s where the people are,” Peters says of the teeming metro areas. Pastoring a church near St. Louis, Peters has led his congregation to engage in ministries nearby. And he has led them to partner with several churches in metro Chicago.

Read: Jonah 1:1-9; Isaiah 62:6-7

Think: Is our reaction to big cities and people we don’t know more like Jonah’s opinion of Nineveh, or Pastor Peters’ feelings about Chicago?

Pray for the 200 places in Illinois already identified as needing an evangelical church. Pray for IBSA churches to pray, partner with existing churches, and plant new churches.

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It could have been me

Meredith Flynn —  September 9, 2013

Jonathan_HayashiHEARTLAND | Jonathan Hayashi

Editor’s note: The following column is adapted from a response Jonathan Hayashi wrote after a gang-related shooting outside Uptown Baptist Church in Chicago August 19.

August 19 was a normal Monday here at Uptown Baptist Church.

We started our second service that evening with “Amazing Grace,” while around 100 people in the pews waiting to hear the sermon. Then, “Bang, bang, bang!” About 20 loud noises that sounded like fireworks. In fact, that’s what our speaker said from the podium. But it was too loud to be fireworks.

Pastor Michael Allen rushed to the east side door that opens onto Sheridan Avenue. We opened the doors to chaos. It looked like a war had taken place. People running in every direction, hundreds of people on the streets, people screaming and crying. Shattered glass, bullet shells on the ground; two men I remember coming through the building, one was shot in his thighs and another in his wrist.

I knew I could have been one of them.

If I had stayed in the gang, it could have easily been me. I still remember like it was yesterday, when I found out a friend had died at age 18 because of gang activity. I knew God loved me and had a plan for my life. But what about them?

God is not willing that any should perish. The problem is us.

We would rather stay safe, while neglecting our call to evangelism and discipleship. We are called to be the hands and feet of Jesus. The Great Commission itself is about people being with the people and living there with the people!

Evangelist Dwight L. Moody recognized this important principle. “Moody was one of the few who had the audacity and courage to go into the worst district of Chicago, the Sands,” writes Lyle Dorsett in his biography of the missionary. “Sometimes called ‘Little Hell,’ this is where Moody went to rescue souls.”

Church, we are to rise up! Let’s get out of our seats and go into the streets. We wonder why revival doesn’t break forth in our community. But where are all the Christians? We are to be salt and light, seasoned by God’s grace and holding to the teaching of Scripture. Surely, then, there will be change in our communities.

We must learn how to view both the city and the Gospel with new eyes. We must see every person as more than a number, each made in the image of God. Every number has a name, and every name has a story. We must recognize the Gospel more like an every day process than a one-time event.

Moody himself said, “Water runs down hill, and the highest hills are the great cities. If we can stir them, we shall stir the whole country.” It’s time for a fresh wind in the Windy City. We must win souls for Christ and have victory for Jesus, but there will be no victory without a battle.

Jonathan Hayashi is minister of music at Uptown Baptist Church in Chicago and a student at Moody Theological Seminary.

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Coming home

Meredith Flynn —  August 26, 2013
Kids in Haiti crowd around to see themselves in a camera’s tiny screen.

Kids in Haiti crowd around to see themselves in a camera’s tiny screen.

HEARTLAND | Meredith Flynn

Re-entering my everyday life American life after a week in Haiti, I was reminded of

something Mark Emerson said: “We’re pretty good at going away on mission. We may not do as well with coming home.”

Emerson, who leads IBSA’s missions team, said we need a how-to about coming back from a short-term mission trip. Because the emotions run so high during a week in Haiti or inner city Chicago or Bulgaria or East St. Louis, it’s inevitably an adjustment to come back to our normal houses, routines and lives.

It’s not just mission trip participants that are prone to a letdown. Any spiritual mountaintop experience is wonderful when you’re in the middle of it, but it’s hard to come back down to earth. On our last night in Haiti, our team leader Bob Elmore talked about how to come home well. He and others who had been on previous international mission trips cautioned us newbies about the challenges we might run into, and how to counteract a bumpy re-entry. Their counsel focused mostly on how we should interact with people who weren’t on the trip.

One volunteer laughingly told the team about a message she’d received from her parents, gently reminding her that they were going on family vacation the day after she returned to the States and that they would like her to be in a better frame of mind than last year – when she got back, walked into the house, and promptly burst into tears.

The lesson is that others who weren’t on your particular mountaintop may not full grasp the emotional connections you formed with a place and a people in just a week or two. We ought to be patient, speak well, and remember God gives us unique experiences so that we can magnify how great and creative He is.

When we come down from the mountaintop, we also have to be responsible in the stories we tell. It’s tempting to focus on the spider you saw, or how hot it was, or how delicious soda is when it’s made with cane sugar. Say those things – details help people remember and pray – but say them quickly. Get them out of the way so you can talk more about how God worked to transform you and your team, and how He’s at work in parts of the world you rarely or never thought about before.

Make Him the main character in your stories – after all, He’s the one who took you to the mountaintop.

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Breath of life

Meredith Flynn —  August 12, 2013

From Acts 17:22-27

“Then Paul stood in the middle of the Areopagus and said: ‘Men of Athens! I see that you are extremely religious in every aspect. For as I was passing through and observing the objects of your worship, I even found an altar on which was inscribed:
TO AN UNKNOWN GOD

Therefore, what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it – He is Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in shrines made by hands. Neither is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives everyone life and breath and all things. From one man He has made every nationality to live over the whole earth and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live. He did this so they might seek God, and perhaps they might reach out and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.'”

God’s role as creator of all things demands our praise. Worship artists All Sons and Daughters speak to this truth in their song “Great Are You Lord.” Take a minute to listen and pray, and have a great Monday!

From YouTube.com, All Sons And Daughters- “Great Are You Lord” LIVE (OFFICIAL)

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Your ‘moronic 2 minutes’

Meredith Flynn —  August 5, 2013

HEARTLAND | By Joe McKeever, on Baptist Press

Pastor, have you ever had a meltdown in the pulpit?

pull quote_MCKEEVERIn the news recently, two Atlanta radio jocks were fired for the on-air mocking they did of a New Orleans icon, former Saints football player Steve Gleason who has ALS (Lou Gehrig’s) and lives in a wheelchair and speaks through a computer.

They made fun of him, parodied his situation, and someone role-played Steve speaking of his coming death and such.

It was the ultimate in offensive.

In the article which ran here in New Orleans, one of the terminated men said, “What were we thinking?” The jocks apologized, and in a subsequent story, Gleason said he accepted their apology.

One of the men called it “a moronic two minutes.”

No argument.

I have had a few moronic two minutes in my long lifetime, and expect some of our readers have also.

I know a pastor who was so exasperated with his small congregation that in a Sunday morning sermon, he berated them for their laziness and unresponsiveness and, working himself up into a lather, stalked out of the service, leaving his people sitting there.

The deacons — I think the church had three — went to him that afternoon to try to bring him to his senses.

Later that day, in the evening service, the pastor apologized to the church and kept on talking. Big mistake. The more he tried to explain why he did what he had done, he slipped into that same rant and once again, walked out of church, leaving the members stunned.

You will not be surprised to learn he was fired that week.

An uncontrolled display of the flesh by an undisciplined minister has aborted many a ministry.

Impulsive humor is often repulsive humor.

Impulsive anger has caused a zillion problems. (Just the other day, I heard of a man who owned racehorses growing exasperated because a prize stallion kept fading in the stretch and failing to win. In a burst of anger, the owner took a shotgun and killed the horse on the spot.)

Impulsive buying by a husband or wife has ruined many a marriage.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is … self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23).

When Margaret and I were young marrieds, we moved 350 miles with our 1-year-old son to enroll in seminary. This was the first time Margaret had ever lived away from her hometown and I was trying to learn subjects like Hebrew and Greek while holding down a part-time job. The stress on our marriage was considerable.

On one occasion during one of our frequent arguments, I was so angry, I put my fist through the wall. Granted, it was only sheetrock and that’s not hard to do, but the sight of that — and the humiliation of having to go to the campus housing office and report it so it could be repaired — got my attention.

More and more, as I prayed about my temper, Galatians 5:22-23 kept returning to my mind. The solution to my anger, I realized, was not working on anger issues. It was to be filled with the Spirit and let Him bear His fruit through me.

As I grew in Christ, the temper — and everything else — came more and more under His control.

What to do after your moronic two minutes

I apologized to Margaret for the display of the flesh. She forgave me, then said, “I was goading you into it.” Her taking part of the responsibility helped me deal with it.

When any of us have such a meltdown, there is no substitute to the basic Christian steps all of God’s people are asked to do when they sin:

1) Repent.

2) Confess.

3) Apologize to our victims and the spectators.

4) Restore or repay, to the extent you can.

5) Learn from it.

6) Now, get up and try again. Do not park by your failures, do not grovel in your failings and do not camp out on your weaknesses. You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you, including overcoming this failing.

7) Put it behind you now and be proactive for the future. Anticipate moments and situations that could be stressful, and prepare. Pray!

You are not perfect and never will be in this life. But the Lord deserves servants who strive to please Him in all we do.

“Set a guard upon my mouth, O Lord. Keep watch over the door of my lips” (Psalm 141:3).

Uncontrolled and undisciplined anything is always unworthy of Christ-followers.

Joe McKeever, on the Web at http://www.joemckeever.com, is a Baptist Press cartoonist and columnist, a former longtime pastor and former director of missions for the New Orleans Baptist Association.

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The music of marriage

Meredith Flynn —  July 8, 2013

pull quote_ADAMS_julyHEARTLAND | Nate Adams

One of the ways my wife, Beth, and I celebrated our anniversary this year was to watch the video of our wedding ceremony and reception. It’s been a few years since we’ve done that, and I found myself a little surprised by some of the things I saw and heard, and how they made me feel.

I was ready to see a bride and groom that looked very young, but I was taken back a little at the site of our parents. For example my dad, on my wedding day, was exactly the age I am now after 28 years of marriage.

Having recently performed my own son’s wedding ceremony, there was something about seeing my dad perform my wedding ceremony when he was my age that was a little unnerving. Has a generation passed already? Will the next generation pass that quickly?

During that nostalgic viewing, however, I found great encouragement in the music we chose for our wedding ceremony. Some of it was just fun, such as the piano recessional that was the Charlie Brown theme song from the Peanuts cartoon series. Some of it was serious and prayerful, such as the hymn that truly expressed the desire of our hearts, “Savior Like a Shepherd Lead Us.”

But there were two more contemporary duets that spoke freshly to me as we watched ourselves getting married a generation later, and wondered at how quickly time passes. Just after our vows to one another, we heard this musical encouragement for lasting fidelity from the Farrell and Farrell song, “After All Those Years.”

“After all those years, when our children have said goodbye, after all those years I’ll love you even more.”*

I first heard Farrell and Farrell sing that song at an IBSA-sponsored Youth Encounter in Springfield, Illinois. Its message stuck with me, as I knew even then that I wanted to marry someone who I would adore, even after the kids were grown and gone. We’re almost there now. And I do.

But there was another duet, “The Wedding Day” by Harvest, that also reassured me, and helped me reset my perspective on weddings, and generations, and how quickly time passes. It pointed to the Wedding Day that is much more important than any here on earth.

“We will fly away, when He hears His Father say, ‘Jesus, go and get your bride. Today’s your wedding day.’”**

I think I understand more fully now why music is so important in our worship. We the Church are indeed the bride of Christ, waiting with longing for our Bridegroom to come and make our relationship complete. On one hand, it seems we’ve been waiting a long time. But when we live by faith with the one we’ve chosen to adore, the years and the generations fly by quickly. And that’s okay.

The music of a Christian marriage can give us a wonderful picture and promise of love and fidelity that lasts, both in a marriage and in a relationship with God. Many of us are fortunate to have been blessed by that kind of marriage for years, even generations.  And all of us in the Bride of Christ, His church, are blessed by it from now through eternity.

Nate Adams is executive director of the Illinois Baptist State Association.

* “After All Those Years,” by Tim Sheppard, ©1982, Tim Sheppard Music Company
** “The Wedding Day,” by Brent Lamb, ©1981, Straightway Music

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So long, kitchen table

Meredith Flynn —  July 1, 2013

tableHEARTLAND | Erich Bridges, from Baptist Press

We hauled the old kitchen table out to the curb the other day.

My wife found another table she liked at a yard sale. The old one was battered and beat up, so it had to go. We called a charity group to pick it up. I was in a hurry to go somewhere. My wife had errands to run, too. So we left it there. No moment of silence. No fond farewell. When we came home that afternoon, it was gone.

I felt a pang of sadness when I thought about it later. That old table deserved a better send-off than we gave it.

It wasn’t an antique or a fine work of craftsmanship, just a pine table from a low-end furniture store. But it was the center of our home for nearly 30 years. It’s where we got to know each other, where we talked, argued and made up. The first time our infant son laughed out loud, he was watching an empty pop bottle roll across the tabletop (he thought that was hilarious for some reason). The kids spent countless hours wriggling around underneath it as toddlers — and countless hours doing school projects atop it. My parents, both gone now, rocked their grandchildren to sleep beside it.

How many meals did we eat together around that table? How many prayers did we pray?

“Things don’t matter; people do,” was the motto of Martha Myers, the late, great missionary physician who spent her life — and ultimately gave it — serving the people of Yemen. For her, things had significance only if they could be used to help the needy. She had little interest in personal possessions for their own sake.

Martha was right. Things don’t matter. But things do have meaning, if we use them for people. That’s the difference between selfishly accumulating stuff and blessing others with it.

A missionary in Africa broke one of his sandals recently. What to do? “I did what I have always done,” he wrote. “I went to what I considered a nice store, sought out a pair of sandals that I thought would be serviceable and purchased them for $24. An astronomical price for the Africans, I am sure. But I am an American. When things break we don’t fix them; we throw them away. My new sandals broke two days later. I asked a local friend what he would do.

“‘Fix them,’ he replied. Apparently there are men all over town who repair shoes for a living. He took my old sandals home. The next morning he brought them back, having sewn the sole of my favorite sandal to the upper part. Amazing! They still work. They feel great. Cost: $1. I had them fix my new sandals as well for the same price.”

The missionary also brought a new soccer ball with him from America, but it wouldn’t hold air.

“I went and bought another ball. The Africans with whom I was playing asked if they could have my broken ball. ‘Why?’ I asked.

“‘Because we can sell it,’ they replied. They were able to get $4 for it. Apparently one of the boys from the area took some glue and inserted it into the hole and plugged the leak. Who knows how long it will stay inflated, but some kid and I are each $2 richer!

“What have I learned? God is teaching me how to be a better steward of what He has given me. Can what I am about to throw away be repaired or used again in some other way? In America, when something breaks, you replace it. In Africa, we are learning to see things differently — and even find the value in something that looks ‘broken.'”

I wish I had done that with our good old kitchen table.

Erich Bridges is an International Mission Board global correspondent.

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Colorado firefighters get impromptu concert from youth choir

Meredith Flynn —  June 24, 2013

Youth_choirHEARTLAND | Todd Starnes, via Baptist Press

As the sun began to fade behind Pikes Peak, firefighters trudging back to their command post at Pine Creek High School in Colorado Springs heard a most unusual sound.

“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound …”

It was Tuesday, June 18. 8 p.m. Shift change.

“Twas grace that taught my heart to fear …”

The command center was a flurry of activity. Weary firefighters were returning from the front lines — looking for a hot meal. Their replacements were suiting up — fire engines rumbled, sirens wailed. But amid the clamor was that most unusual sound.

“Through many dangers, toils and snares …”

Many of the firefighters had been away from their families for days to wage war on the Black Forest Fire, a blaze that had killed at least two people, destroyed more than 500 homes and consumed more than 14,000 acres of land.

But for a brief moment on Tuesday, a group of young people from more than 1,400 miles away brought a bit of joy to the command post when they serenaded the firefighters.

The 100-voice student choir from First Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala., was in Colorado on their summer tour — performing at rescue missions, nursing homes and even at a Colorado Rockies baseball game.

On Tuesday, they had been invited to sing at Focus on the Family’s headquarters in Colorado Springs. After their performance, a staff member asked if they might consider singing for the firefighters.

“We said absolutely,” music minister Chip Colee told Fox News.

The Alabama youngsters were taken aback by what they saw. Local residents stood along the road leading to the command center cheering the firefighters, holding signs that read “We love our firefighters” and “Thank you.”

The group started off singing “The Star Spangled Banner” and then launched into a 20-minute concert.

“It was very moving — for all of us,” Colee said.

Caroline Elliott, 18, told Fox News it was an honor to be able to sing for the firefighters.

“I feel like it was something we had to do,” she said. “It almost felt like we had a duty to pay back to them for all they do for us.”

Chris Colee, the music minister’s son, said the choir felt compelled to extend their hours in Colorado Springs.

“These guys are putting it all on the line,” he said, referring to the firefighters. “It was the least we could do — to go out there and sing to the Lord for them.”

After their concert, they were asked to sing for firefighters eating meals in food tents.

“So we took all 100 of our kids and moved from tent to tent to sing for the guys who were eating,” the music minister said. “We were so touched. Here were these guys and ladies — hot, sweaty, exhausted. We just wanted to put a smile on their faces.”

The young choir members said they hope their songs were an encouragement to the community.

“All we’re trying to do is shine the light of the Lord,” the music minister said.

The choir went now back on the road, heading toward Wichita where they were to sing on Wednesday — but Colee believes what happened in Colorado Springs will be a lifetime memory.

“Our kids will never forget that,” he said. “They will never forget the looks on the faces of the guys fighting those fires.”

Before they left, one firefighter told the young people she had been away from her family and her church for days.

“She told us that when we started to sing “Amazing Grace,” she felt like she was back home,” Colee said.

“When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun, we’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, than when we first begun.”

Todd Starnes, with the Fox News Channel, is the author of “Dispatches From Bitter America.” This article first appeared at http://www.toddstarnes.com.

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