World News for July 1, 2009

Posted July 1, 2009 in Web Exclusive, World News

• According to Compass Direct News, Christians in India are greatly relieved after a Hindu nationalist party in Orissa was defeated in the elections this spring. Orissa was (Read more of this article…)

The Multisite Church

Posted in July/Aug '09 Issue

As my family and I took our seats following the final congregational song, a large screen descended from above the pulpit. Within seconds, a pastor appeared on the screen and asked us-and the 1,200 other worshipers-to open our Bibles to Ephesians 4. He would be preaching a sermon titled, “Imitating God in Our Relationships with One Another.”

Knowing that the thriving midwestern church had embraced a multisite church structure, my wife and I had informed our children that they would not hear live preaching that Lord’s Day morning, but their response to a preacher on a screen surprised me. (Read more of this article…)

Growing Churches in Nebraska

Posted in July/Aug '09 Issue

Roger Ridley pulls into the parking lot of McKinney’s Food Store and points in the distance to a bluff covered with suburban housing.

“Chalco Hills is an entire community of 12,000-projected to grow to 20,000 in the next 10 years,” says Roger, a churchplanting missionary in Gretna, Neb.

Roger knows this parking lot well. Soon after moving to Gretna in 1997, Roger and Sheryl Ridley started dreaming about a network of new Baptist churches in the north and west suburbs of Omaha. Dreaming, and praying. Roger would drive to the grocery, find a parking spot that overlooked his target area, and pray about the next church plant. (Read more of this article…)

Reforming Evangelicalism

Posted June 30, 2009 in July/Aug '09 Issue, Web Exclusive

Conservative evangelicalism is changing, driven by an admirable zeal for confessional orthodoxy, Reformed theology, and pastoral leadership. Rising from the ashes of what Rolland McCune called “the failed promise of evangelicalism,” a loose network of conservative pastors and theologians have deliberately distanced themselves from the pragmatism, postmoderism, and cultural infatuation that marred the broader evangelical movement. Because these movements are still in development, it has become difficult to sort out all of the overlapping organizational structures. (Read more of this article…)

How Much of a Doctrinal Statement Do We Really Need?

Posted in July/Aug '09 Issue, Web Exclusive

As if to unwittingly confirm the Gospel Coalition’s call for stricter theological formulations, two evangelical groups with murky doctrinal beliefs met on the weekend after the Gospel Coalition.

The New Baptist Covenant Regional Conference at Wake Forest University on April 25 and 26 was organized by former president Jimmy Carter, but he downplayed the importance of specific theological beliefs. (Read more of this article…)

Church Planting in Chalco Hills

Posted in Association News, GARBCnews, July/Aug '09 Issue

Blane Barfknecht was drunk, again.

He was only 18-who knows where he’d gotten the alcohol-and had just dropped out of high school to find work in a no-name Texas town, living an empty life on the fast track to nowhere.

“I was cleaning carpets and drinking every night,” Blane tells us, 10 years later. He’s not the sort of guy who relishes his past life, so he speaks in summary, with both pain and victory in his eyes. Like the body piercings he gave up, his former life is gone now, but a few scars remain. (Read more of this article…)

Is World Peace Our Objective?

Posted in July/Aug '09 Issue, Q&A

Q. Taking the view your group does on dispensationalism, premillennialism, and the pretribulational Rapture, I sense that you don’t believe in peacemaking in the world today. This is unfortunate. Don’t you see the need we all have for doing all we can to bring about peace? Blessed are the peacemakers. (Read more of this article…)

Last Trumpets Not the Same

Posted in July/Aug '09 Issue, Q&A

Q. First Corinthians 15:51 and 52, apparently referring to the Rapture, link that great event with a sounding of the last trumpet.  In Revelation 11:15-19, the last of the seven trumpets is sounded, five chapters after the commencement of the Tribulation.  How then can the rapture of believers precede the Great Tribulation? (Read more of this article…)

2009 GARBC Conference Audio

Posted June 26, 2009 in GARBCnews, Web Exclusive

The 2009 GARBC Conference at First Baptist Church, Elyria, Ohio, was marked by excellent preaching and exciting reports about the GARBC. This web page has links to conference audio and sermon notes. (Read more of this article…)

2009 Talents For Christ Winners

Posted in Uncategorized

ELYRIA, Ohio—John Greening introduced the 2009 Talents For Christ winners with a bit of encouragement to all who participated.

“Our greatest desire, while we are happy to pass along some awards today and the possibility of scholarship money, is that our students will study to show themselves approved to minister in their own churches and across the world,” Greening said.

• See Friday’s photo gallery.

These students won first and second place awards at the annual Talents For Christ competition held at First Baptist Church (Elyria, Ohio) on Thursday, June 26: (Read more of this article…)