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Archives For November 30, 1999

Illinois Disaster Relief teams on the scene at home and out west

Meredith Flynn —  July 6, 2015
Illinois Disaster Relief volunteers help clean a home in Colorado.

Illinois Disaster Relief volunteers help clean a home in Colorado.

HEARTLAND | Morgan Jackson

After severe storms swept across Northern Illinois June 22, several of the state’s Disaster Relief teams moved quickly to respond. By June 24, four volunteers were in Coal City to meet with homeowners and assess damage. More than 50 volunteers on chainsaw teams from Salem South, Capital City and Three Rivers Associations worked over the next few days while staying at First Baptist Church, Coal City.

On June 30, IBSA’s Disaster Relief Coordinator Rex Alexander got word of a new need in the community of Sublette, which was hit by a tornado on the same evening as Coal City.

“This area has been closed off to volunteers due to safety issues of gas leaks and electrical wires being down,” Alexander reported. “They are now opening up this area and requesting assistance for a large number of chainsaw jobs…” Alexander also was working to recruit assessors and chaplains to work in the area. The response was expected to begin Monday, July 6.

Outside Illinois, recent flooding in Colorado, Texas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma  caused severe water damage in many communities. The first of several waves of ministry teams from Illinois arrived in Colorado June 15.

Don Ile, from Greater Wabash Association, was supposed to lead his team to Colorado Springs. But storm-related issues and a tornado forced them to Berthoud, about 50 miles from Denver.

Another Illinois team from Williamson Association, led by Jerry Cruse, was delayed in arrival. But after staying overnight in Kansas, they were able to get to Colorado and start work.

Before arriving, Ile said they didn’t know what to expect. “We’ve been told there are major water problems; they’ve had at least a couple tornadoes…possibly some chainsaw work and tree situations, but more flooding than anything. People are happy we’re coming. We just hope to accomplish what some of their needs are right now.”

After a couple days on the job, Cruse said, “Our team draws closer to God all the time as we’re helping people. We just pray others grow close to him too through seeing us work and our interactions.”

While taking a break, Ile described his current view: beautiful, snowcapped mountains to the west, sunshine, perfect weather. But a booming thunderstorm the night before was a poignant reminder to the team why they were there, despite the picturesque landscape.

Their first task involved moving a large amount of a homeowner’s belongings in order to strip all carpet on the lower level. They faced a number of problems: no dumpster, stopping the spread of mold, not being able to power wash.
Ile sounded in good spirits, though. “Every house has its own challenges, but we’re doing good, we’re getting there.”
Both teams said God was certainly good to them during their travels, and that their goal was to help as many families as possible during their time in Colorado.

For more information about Illinois Baptist Disaster Relief, go to www.IBSA.org/dr.

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Columbus Discoveries: The new missions story

Meredith Flynn —  June 25, 2015
Kevin Ezell, left, president of the North American Mission Board, and David Platt, president of the International Mission Board end a joint Church and Mission Sending Celebration by recognizing missionaries with a standing ovation at the June 17 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting at the Greater Columbus Convention Center in Columbus, Ohio. Photo by John Swain/NAMB

Kevin Ezell, left, president of the North American Mission Board, and David Platt, president of the International Mission Board end a joint Church and Mission Sending Celebration by recognizing missionaries with a standing ovation at the June 17 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting at the Greater Columbus Convention Center in Columbus, Ohio. Photo by John Swain/NAMB

Columbus, Ohio | Meredith Flynn

A missionary “Sending Celebration” during the Southern Baptist Convention last week signaled a new, urgent day for SBC missions in North America and around the world. The vastness of lostness, said the leaders of the denomination’s mission boards, requires new thinking about getting missionaries on the field—and supporting them while they’re there.

That could mean sending out missionaries—students, retirees, and professionals— who are financially self-supported. Baptists who traditionally have focused on giving from the pew in order to support missionaries are now being called to go to the nations too.

The celebration in Columbus, Ohio, marked a shift from 20 years ago, when the commissioning might have featured flags of the world and missionaries in brightly colored international dress processing into the auditorium to “We’ve a Story to Tell the Nations.” But in Ohio, photos of the missionaries and families flashed up on large screens in the convention hall, with their home state, sending church, and a brief snapshot of the region where they’ll serve.

Across the room, the missionaries stood as their slides played, illuminated only by book-shaped lights fanned out in front of them.

The low-key, somber service hinted at the desperate spiritual need the missionaries will encounter here and abroad. In the Northeast U.S., said International Mission Board President David Platt, 82% of people don’t know Christ. In the western U.S., it’s 87%, and in Canada, 90%.

Those numbers are small compared to India, where 1 billion people are spiritually lost. Platt and Kevin Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board, focused on the role of the local church during the sending celebration, urging congregations to consider their responsibility to take the gospel to the nations.

Platt also pointed to the possibility of new strategies for supporting missionaries on the field. In 2009, he said during his report prior to the celebration, the IMB had 5,600 missionaries serving around the world. The number is 4,700 now, and headed toward 4,200, due to the Board’s inability to financially support them.

“We are evaluating all of our structures and systems to discern how we can more efficiently and effectively use the resources Southern Baptists have entrusted to us,” he said. But we’ll always be limited, he added, as long as full financially supported missionaries are the only way we think about getting the gospel to the nations.

Throughout the IMB’s history, the Board has sent about 25,000 missionaries to serve around the world. “Which is awesome, but the reality is we need 25,000 now,” Platt said.

After a year in which the IMB operated $21 million in the red, a new plan is needed to send more people to more places and people groups. And everyday Christians play a key role in that plan, Platt said, painting a picture of students and retirees and professionals forming a network of support around missionaries and church planters around the world. Regular people with regular jobs, leveraging those jobs to go overseas.

“What if God has designed the globalization of today’s marketplace to open up opportunities for the spread of his gospel?” Platt asked.

The time is now, he urged during his final challenge to the audience in Columbus. “Not one of us is guaranteed today, much less tomorrow. So, brothers and sisters, let’s make it count. Let’s make our lives and our churches and this convention of churches count.”

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Planted in Chicago: Interns work with city strategists to start new churches

Meredith Flynn —  June 22, 2015
One of the first stops for Cassidy Winters and three other Transplant student mobilizers was an orientation session in the courtyard of a Chicago pie shop.

One of the first stops for Cassidy Winters and three other Transplant student mobilizers was an orientation session in the courtyard of a Chicago pie shop. Photo by Charles Campbell

HEARTLAND | Two groups of interns will work in Chicago this summer to assist church planters already on the ground, and to help outline the demographics of other neighborhoods in need of new churches.

Transplant, a summer initiative for students sponsored by IBSA, placed four “mobilizers” in various parts of Chicagoland in June, each paired with a church planter reaching out to people in the city or suburbs. Cassidy Winters said the mobilizers’ goal is to give their planters “more arms” to reach out in the community.

The college freshman from Edwardsville is serving alongside Dave and Kirsten Andreson, who are planting Resurrection City Church in Avondale on the city’s North Side. This is Winters’ second summer in Chicago. Last year, she admits, she didn’t know much about church planting. Shortly after her arrival, she remembers texting her mother something along the lines of, “I’m starting a church, Mom!”

This summer, Winters is helping the Andresons as they plant a church in a community of 40,000—and little evangelical presence. Growing up in her Christian home, Winters said, she “kind of got stuck in a Christian bubble…just not ever thinking about people who don’t love Jesus.” But in Chicago, there is a lot of hurt, and a lot of love is needed. Winters is helping the Andresons identify the projects they’ll tackle during ChicaGO Week, when teens from around the state come to Chicago for a week-long church planting practicum.

Cody Wilson is another student serving in the city this summer, along with a group a mobilizers recruited by the North American Mission Board for the Generation Send program. Instead of spending most of their time working with existing church plants, Gen Send-ers will develop a prospectus for a future planter who will start something new in a specific community.

Wilson, a student at Middle Tennessee State University, is serving in the Lakeview neighborhood and looking for what he calls “third spaces.” These are the coffeeshops, gyms, and arts programs where people hang out, and where a church planter might go to build relationships.

He had met a lot of people after just over two weeks in the city. “But it’s still obvious that in one of the busiest cities in the world…people are incredibly lonely and have very high walls and don’t let people in.”

In mid-June, team members joined Wilson, Winters and their fellow mobilizers to help further develop their prospectuses and projects. Their teams bring the total number of college students serving in Chicagoland through IBSA and NAMB to around 55 for the summer.

Look for more updates from Transplant and Generation Send interns, and a full report from ChicaGO Week, in the July and August issues of the Illinois Baptist.

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Sending Celebration commissions missionaries, churches

Meredith Flynn —  June 17, 2015
Kevin Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board

Kevin Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board

Columbus | Missionaries aren’t sent out on their own. Or even solely through the power of missions agencies like the North American and International Mission Boards. Churches–supporting, sending churches–are central to the process.

David Platt, president of the International Mission Board

David Platt, president of the International Mission Board

That was the main idea behind this morning’s Sending Celebration, hosted by Southern Baptists’ two mission agencies following brief reports by both. Instead of their traditional separate presentations highlighting missionaries, NAMB and IMB joined forces to celebrate people serving around the world, and the churches who have helped send them. In hopes that more will catch the vision for how they can be engaged with taking the gospel to the world.

Worship leaders Shane & Shane

Worship leaders Shane & Shane

“Churches almost unknowingly begin to farm out missions to missions organizations,” Platt said. “But this is not how God designed it.” You won’t see IMB or NAMB in the New Testament, he said. Instead, you see churches like the one at Antioch.

“We want to see 46,000-plus Antiochs,” Platt said at the beginning of the sending celebration.

As worship artists Shane & Shane led music from the stage, slides introduced church planters serving across North America and others working across the globe. As their slides showed on giant screens in the convention hall, many of the missionaries stood, illuminated only by simple, book-shaped lights fanned out in front of them.

At the end of the service, they stood again together, and people sitting around them stood and prayed over them as Platt and Ezell led from the stage.

“Not one of us is guaranteed today, much less tomorrow,” Platt had said during his final charge to those in the audience. “So, brothers and sisters, let’s make it count. Let’s make our lives and our churches and churches in this convention count.”

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SBC Monday: In pictures

Meredith Flynn —  June 15, 2015

Columbus | The SBC Pastors’ Conference continues today, and the nearby exhibit hall is busy too. Keep checking back here for more news from Columbus!

Pastors' Conference attenders prayed this morning for Pastor Saeed Abedini, who is imprisoned in Iran. Abedini's wife, Naghmeh, was interviewed by Conference President Willy Rice.

Pastors’ Conference attenders prayed this morning for Pastor Saeed Abedini, who is imprisoned in Iran. Abedini’s wife, Naghmeh, was interviewed by Conference President Willy Rice.

In the first prison where her husband was held, said Naghmeh Abedini (left), so many people were coming to faith in Christ that they had to exile him.

In the first prison where her husband was held, said Naghmeh Abedini (left), so many people were coming to faith in Christ that they had to exile him.

Travis Cottrell, worship leader at Englewood Baptist Church in Jackson, Tenn., leads "Revelation Song" during the Pastors' Conference Monday morning.

Travis Cottrell, worship leader at Englewood Baptist Church in Jackson, Tenn., leads “Revelation Song” during the Pastors’ Conference Monday morning.

In the SBC exhibit hall, the North American and International Mission Boards have adjoining spaces--and complementary giveaways. NAMB has coffee mugs printed with the airport codes of each of its SEND focus cities. IMB has coffees and teas from countries and regions around the world where missionaries are serving.

In the SBC exhibit hall, the North American and International Mission Boards have adjoining spaces–and complementary giveaways. NAMB has coffee mugs printed with the airport codes of each of its SEND focus cities. IMB has coffees and teas from countries and regions around the world where missionaries are serving.

Jeff Calloway (left), NAMB's city missionary to Cleveland, talks with visitors at the NAMB exhibit.

Jeff Calloway (left), NAMB’s city missionary to Cleveland, talks with visitors at the NAMB exhibit.

IMB_exhibit_hallIMB_exhibit_hall_2

SBC President Ronnie Floyd (left) is interviewed by LifeWay Research President Ed Stetzer in the exhibit hall.

SBC President Ronnie Floyd (left) is interviewed by LifeWay Research President Ed Stetzer in the exhibit hall.

Rosaria Butterfield, author of "The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor's Journey into Christian Faith," is one of several authors who will sign their books at the LifeWay Store here in Columbus.

Rosaria Butterfield, author of “The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor’s Journey into Christian Faith,” is one of several authors who will sign their books at the LifeWay Store here in Columbus.

Cliff Woodman, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist in Carlinville, visited the exhibits with his wife, Lisa, and son, Daniel.

Cliff Woodman, pastor of Emmanuel Baptist in Carlinville, visited the exhibits with his wife, Lisa, and son, Daniel.

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Illinois Baptists at Crossover Columbus outreach events

Meredith Flynn —  June 15, 2015

Columbus, Ohio | Several Illinois Baptists were among those serving Saturday through Crossover, the day of outreach and ministry that precedes each year’s Southern Baptist Convention.

Crossover volunteers from Uptown Baptist Church, Chicago, on their way to a day of service in partnership with United Faith International Baptist Church in Columbus.

Crossover volunteers from Uptown Baptist Church, Chicago, on their way to a day of service in partnership with United Faith International Baptist Church in Columbus.

The Uptown team taught classes, prayerwalked, and shared the gospel one-on-one. Above, IBSA zone consultant Steven Glover (left) shares his faith with a young man from Somalia.

The Uptown team taught classes, prayerwalked, and shared the gospel one-on-one. Above, IBSA zone consultant Steven Glover (left) shares his faith with a young man from Somalia.

IBSA church planting leaders Van Kicklighter and Charles Campbell and their families also served during Crossover. The group worked with Neil Avenue Baptist Church in Columbus and another partnering church from North Carolina to garden and make improvements to a local apartment complex.

IBSA church planting leaders Van Kicklighter and Charles Campbell and their families also served during Crossover. The group worked with Neil Avenue Baptist Church in Columbus and another partnering church from North Carolina to make improvements at a local apartment complex for physically handicapped people.

Crossover_2Pastor Michael Kanai also took a team from Orchard Valley Baptist Church in Aurora to participate in Saturday’s outreach. Look for more on their Crossover experience this week.

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SBC meetings start tonight in Columbus

Meredith Flynn —  June 14, 2015

WelcomeThe Southern Baptist Pastors’ Conference just began in Columbus, Ohio, to be followed by the SBC Annual Meeting June 16-17. The Illinois Baptist staff is in Columbus to cover the meeting, so check back here often for news, and stay up-to-date at Facebook.com/IllinoisBaptist or Twitter.com/IllinoisBaptist.

A few things to look for during this week’s meetings:

1. Focus on prayer. SBC President Ronnie Floyd has made the last year all about praying together in an extraordinary way. The schedule for this year’s meeting was revamped to make room for Tuesday evening’s SBC-wide Call to Prayer, beginning at 6:30. Watch it live at sbcannualmeeting.net, or on the Daystar Television Network.

2. Young leaders in Columbus. Over the last several years, the annual meeting has seen an uptick in young attenders. At least one piece of early anecdotal evidence shows the trend continues this year: Lots of blue jeans. Look for updates this week from meetings popular with young Baptists, like the annual Baptist21 panel discussion, and 9Marks-sponsored gatherings following the Monday and Tuesday evening sessions.

3. Baptists still do Baptist things. They reunite with old friends outside the convention hall. Sip coffee at Starbucks (we haven’t found it yet, but there’s almost certainly one in the building.) And they celebrate missions and evangelism. The Wednesday morning business session concludes with a commissioning service of International and North American Mission Board missionaries.

We’re excited to be in Columbus! Thank you for “being here” with us!

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Let’s all go to Columbus

Meredith Flynn —  June 12, 2015

SBC_logo_2015Midwest is host for Southern Baptist business, prayer next week 

Columbus, Ohio | Missions, evangelism, and cultural impact will highlight the 2015 Southern Baptist Convention June 16-17, which also will emphasize prayer—“extraordinary prayer.”

In his year as SBC President, Ronnie Floyd has positioned the Columbus meeting as an opportunity for Baptists to pray together. The annual meeting’s theme is “Great Awakening: Clear Agreement, Visible Union, Extraordinary Prayer,” based on Romans 13:11. Floyd told Baptist Press he hopes Southern Baptists of all ages and ethnicities will attend and “rise to this moment in our nation calling out to God for the next Great Awakening in our nation.”

“We’ve got to understand that we need everybody,” said Floyd, pastor of Cross Church in northwest Arkansas. “I know historically and biblically there is no great movement of God that ever occurs that is not first preceded by the extraordinary prayer of God’s people.”

The prayer focus will culminate in a Tuesday evening Call to Prayer to be streamed on sbcannualmeeting.net and broadcast on the Daystar Television Network. “We will join together in the same room and around the world via technology for this one epic night of prayer,” Floyd blogged last month. “Plan now to adjust your dinner or fellowship to before this session or gather with friends after the session itself. Please let NOTHING
keep you from this extraordinary night of prayer together.”

Floyd also will host a discussion Wednesday afternoon on preparing churches for the future of marriage in America. Panelists include two SBC pastors, Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission President Russell Moore, Southern Seminary President Albert Mohler, and Rosaria Butterfield, author of “The Secret Thoughts of an Unchurched Convert: An English Professor’s
Journey into Christian Faith.”

On the Saturday before the Convention convenes, more than 140 projects and activities are planned for the annual Crossover evangelism outreach.

Sending Celebration
The North American and International Mission Boards will hold a joint missionary commissioning service during the Wednesday morning session of the Southern Baptist Convention. Along with celebrating the missionaries about to embark for their mission fields, the service also will celebrate the churches that are sending them.

“The mission fields we serve are unique and need to be approached differently; but the people we want to reach are growing more similar all the time,” said NAMB President Kevin Ezell. “The Sending Celebration is another example of the greater collaboration between IMB and NAMB.”

Musicians Shane & Shane will lead worship during the celebration.

Movies, meals, and an app
LifeWay Christian Resources will offer free screenings of two upcoming movies in Columbus.

“War Room,” the newest film from Alex and Stephen Kendrick, will be shown June 15 at 9 p.m. in the convention center. “Woodlawn,” a true story about spiritual awakening among high school football players, will screen June 16 at 9 p.m. in the convention center.

LifeWay’s The Gospel Project will host a light breakfast and panel discussion on different preaching styles and philosophies. The June 16 meeting begins at 6:30 a.m. and features Pastors H.B. Charles (Florida), J.D. Greear (North Carolina), Chip Henderson (Mississippi), and LifeWay VP Ed Stetzer. Register at Gospel Project.com/SBC15.

The SBC Men’s Breakfast is June 17 at 6:30, sponsored by the North American Mission Board and LifeWay. Speakers include Greear, Matt Carter (Texas) and Michael Catt (Georgia), along with LifeWay and NAMB personnel.

The annual SBC Ministers’ Wives Luncheon, featuring author Angie Smith, is sold out, but there are several other opportunities for women attending the Columbus meeting. The Pastors’ Wives Conference begins at 8 a.m. on Monday, June 15, at the Hyatt Regency, and a women’s expo area will be open prior to each of the events. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary will host “Tea at 3” on June 15 from 3-4 p.m. at the Hyatt Regency, featuring short messages from women in a variety of leadership roles.

The SBC’s two mission agencies will co-host the fifth annual Send North America Luncheon June 15 at the convention center. Ezell and International Mission Board President David Platt will discuss how the mission boards’ closer cooperation will serve Southern Baptists. Free tickets are available at snaluncheon.com.

Baptist21 will host its annual lunch and panel discussion on June 16 immediately after the morning session. Panelists, including Platt, Moore, Mohler and Charles, will discuss the most pressing issues facing the church. Register at baptisttwentyone.com.

Messengers can once again schedule their SBC activities with help from an app available for iPhone, iPad, and Android
devices. Search “SBC Annual Meetings” in the app store. Along with up-to-date schedule and speaker information, the app also includes a map of the exhibit hall, local restaurant list, PDF versions of the book of reports, daily bulletins, and SBC Life, and a list of area churches.

SBC messengers can register online at sbcannualmeeting.net. Each messenger will receive an eight-digit registration code to present at the annual meeting’s Express registration lane. Childcare for kids in grades 1-6 will be provided, as will hands-on mission opportunities for teens. Pre-registration is required at sbcannualmeeting.net under the “Children/Youth” tab.

SBC Annual Meeting information is from Baptist Press, online at BPNews.net. For more, including a schedule of the Annual Meeting June 16-17, read the May 18 issue of the Illinois Baptist online.

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Cooperation: The pathway to plenty

nateadamsibsa —  June 8, 2015

HEARTLAND | Nate Adams

My work has always involved a fair amount of travel. And so early on, I discovered the value of joining various reward programs, where the airline or hotel chain or rental car company gives you a certain number of reward points each time you use their services. Those reward points can then be redeemed for free flights or stays or rentals.

Nate_Adams_June8I know many travelers actually choose the company with which they travel based on the reward points they are seeking to accumulate. That’s exactly the kind of loyalty the company is seeking to achieve with its program.

However, I’ve always felt that I should try to choose the least expensive option, whether using my employer’s travel funds or my own. So over the years, I’ve ended up joining multiple rewards programs, hoping to earn at least a few points, no matter what hotel or airline happens to be least expensive.

I think that’s why a certain television commercial caught my attention a few days ago. It was advertising a new rewards program, one that multiple companies of all different types were cooperating to sponsor. There were nationwide chains of supermarkets, gas stations, retailers, and insurance companies, as well as the option of earning points through online ordering. And not only could you earn points in these multiple ways, you could spend them in multiple places!

Now I’m not mentioning this program to endorse it or encourage anyone to try it. But I have to admit it was very attractive to someone like me, who wants to choose the best option for my employer or me, regardless of which company is providing the service. These individual companies had chosen to work together to provide rewards in ways that were more beneficial to me, their shared customer.

It then occurred to me that this is actually one of the reasons that I find our Southern Baptist Cooperative Program so attractive and compelling. What if individual SBC mission boards or ministries chose to compete with one another for my loyalty and support? What if I had to choose between state missions, North American missions, and international missions?
What if my missions dollar only “earned points” with one “service provider,” to the exclusion of the others?

Part of the genius and effectiveness of Cooperative Program missions is that it allows me to “earn points” in multiple mission fields and ministries, along with every other faithful giver in my church. A portion of each dollar I give through my church is set aside for the larger cause of SBC missions and ministries. And as those points are accumulated with the gifts of other
churches, they grow and can be “redeemed” through multiple service providers, not just one.

How many “points” for missions does your weekly giving through your church earn? If you don’t know, that’s a good question to ask your missions or finance committee, or your pastor. My home church designates 10% of its undesignated offerings for Cooperative Program missions. That means a dime out of every dollar I give each week earns multiple “rewards,” through the International Mission Board, the North American Mission Board, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, our six world-class seminaries, and, of course, right here in Illinois through IBSA.

I really like the title of that rewards program I saw on that TV commercial. They simply call it “Plenti.” The idea, I think, is that there are plenty of points to be earned, and plenty of service providers to provide plenty of benefits to plenty of customers. It’s not competition and scarcity, but rather cooperation and generosity that lead to plenty. It’s a truth that we as God’s people should model, especially through our missions giving. Cooperation is the pathway to plenty.

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

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Tuesday Briefing: Scouts talk policy change–again

Meredith Flynn —  May 26, 2015

THE BRIEFING | Meredith Flynn

Boy Scouts of America President Robert Gates said last week that the organization should end its ban on gay leaders, a move that some Baptist leaders said was inevitable following the Scouts’ decision two years ago to allow gay-identifying youth to join.

The_Briefing“Back when they changed their thinking regarding the boys themselves, I knew that within a year or so they would reverse their stand with the leadership,” Georgia pastor Ernest Easley, chairman of the SBC Executive Committee in 2013, told Baptist Press. That year, messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention adopted a resolution affirming “the right of all families and churches prayerfully to assess their continued relationship with the BSA,” and urging the removal of leadership who sought the policy change “without seeking input from the full range of the Scouting family.”

Gates said May 21 that “Between internal challenges and potential legal conflicts, the BSA finds itself in an unsustainable position, a position that makes us vulnerable to the possibility the courts simply will order us at some point to change our membership policy. We must all understand that this probably will happen sooner rather than later.”

Mentioning councils already operating in defiance of the policy on gay leaders and the Supreme Court’s expected decision on same-sex marriage this year, Gates said, “We must deal with the world as it is, not as we might wish it would be.” The councils’ charters could be revoked, he said, but “such an action would deny the lifelong benefits of scouting to hundreds of thousands of boys and young men today and vastly more in the future. I will not take that path.”

Gates’ remarks reflect “an attitude that has infected many faith-based and religious organizations—and even entire Christian denominations,” blogged Joe Carter of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. “Like Gates, many religious leaders simply lack the courage to stand up to internally destructive dissidents for fear of losing the broader organization.”

LA Governor signs executive order for religious liberty
After legislators in his state struck down a religious freedom bill May 21, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal signed an executive order designed to protect “people, charities and family-owned businesses with deeply held religious beliefs that marriage is between one man and one woman.”

“We don’t support discrimination in Louisiana and we do support religious liberty,” Jindal said in the order. “These two values can be upheld at the same time.”

Gallup: Support for same-sex marriage at all-time high
60% of Americans support same-sex marriage, Gallup reported last week, up from 55% in 2014. The pollster also found Americans continue to overestimate the number of people who are gay or lesbian.

Theology debate among Arizona churches goes public
A group of churches in Arizona are working across denominational lines against the “progressive Christianity” they see evidenced at a sister church, Bob Smietana reports at ChristianityToday.com. The campaign, which includes a sermon series delivered at eight churches and advertised in the local paper, opposes the theology of The Fountains, a United Methodist church in Fountain Hills, Arizona. Pastor David Felten’s views include support for LBGT rights and rejection of the Virgin Birth, according to CT.

IMB missionary remembered in Malawi
An International Mission Board missionary who died of malaria last week is being remembered as “a mother to all.” Susan Sanson, 67, had been serving in Malawi with her husband, Billy, since 2000. The couple had no children, “but she didn’t feel the gap because we were all [her] children,” posted one student who knew her from her ministry at Chancellor College in Zomba, Malawi.

Illinois pastor details journey through anxiety
In an interview on Crossway.org, Joe Thorn, pastor of Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, shares about what he calls “the most difficult season in my personal life,” when anxiety got so bad he considered leaving ministry.

Millennials slightly less tuned in to TV
Barna’s report on what we watch on TV is fun and full of interesting facts, like the number of hours of television Millennials watch compared to older adults. (It’s two hours a day versus five for people 69 and over.) Other findings: Procedural shows scored big among Boomers and Elders, and almost everyone likes “The Big Bang Theory.”

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