Monday at the Pastor's Conference

Bonnie and I had a long day! There were three sessions of the Pastors' Conference today! Nonetheless, I must say that this was a wonderful day. There were a total of ten speakers at the conference today. I am not going to go into the detail that I did yesterday on the three that I listened to last night. Here is the list of the speakers that presented sermons for the day:

Monday Morning: What if we had the same love?

1. Mike Landry, Pastor of First Baptist Church Sarasota, FL.
Outline:
I. What does missions look like without love? Bottom Line: read the book of Jonah
II. How do we maintain missions and have "same love"?
A. View the Great Commission as a relational mission.
B. Know God Intimately
C. Value People

2. Ed Stetzer, President of Lifeway Research and Interim Pastor of Hendersonville First Baptist Church.
Outline: from Ephesians 4:1-8
Main Point: God has already made us one, we just need to live it out.
I. Walk Worthy
II. Display Right Attitudes
A. Humilty
B. Gentleness
C. Patience
D. Accepting in Love
III. Live the Unity God has already Created
IV. One in Christ

3. Francis Chan, Pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, California
Did not get much of an outline from Pastor Chan, but he did an amazing job. Francis is a native of Hong Kong, China and is a pastor in California. I enjoyed his genuine, no-nonsense approach.

4. Tom Eliff - did not get to listen to his sermon. Bonnie and I went to eat lunch.

Afternoon Session - What if...we were One in Spirit?

1. Michael Catt, Pastor of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, GA (the church that did Facing the Giants and Fireproof)
Michael did not have a full outline and he basically preached an encouragement sermon for young and old pastors alike. Good words.

2. Dennis Swanberg also spoke. He is a Christian Comedian and he was hilarious. He started off the bit by imitating Billy Graham and he sounded just like him! Swanberg has just written a book called, The Man Code.

3. Fred Luter, Pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church in New Orleans. Fred Luter is an African American pastor of a Southern Baptist Church and he was the highlight of the afternoon. He was ELECTRIC!!! Here is his outline:
What happens when we wait on HIS spirit? - Acts 1:8
A. You Become a New Person
B. You have a New Purpose
C. You will have a New Power

4. Mike Huckabee: everyone knows who he is. He spoke mainly about the roles of the family, the pastor, and government. He made the basic point through his speech that we are not to be like Abimilech in Judges 9.

Monday Evening: What if...we were one in Purpose?

1. Alvin Reid, Professor of Evangelism at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.
Outline: Tipping Points (Acts 19:8-10)
I. Relationships
II. The Gospel
III. The Future
IV. Relating to Culture
V. Defining Success

2. David Platt, Pastor of the Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, AL.
David Platt, in my opinion, was by far the best preacher of the conference and he is only thirty years old and a pastor of a vibrant church in Alabama. David Platt told the conference that the one purpose for us is the GLORY OF GOD! His text was out of Hebrews 13:11-14. The major question that he offered was: Are we going to die in our religion, or are we going to die in our devotion? I simply stopped writing notes and sat down and listened to Platt preach the gospel. He really drove home the need for global missions awareness and the fact that the Gospel of Christ is on the march among the nations.

3. Johnny Hunt, Senior Pastor First Baptist Church in Woodstock, GA. Johnny Hunt is the current and presumed re-elected President of the Southern Baptist Convention. I did not take notes on his speech, but it basically was an exegesis of Malachi and was a stirring sermon on being dependent upon the LORD.

Overall, I truly enjoyed the Pastor's Conference. Tomorrow, I am looking forward to the first day of the actual Annual Meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention. Tomorrow morning, it has been announced to my Seminary class that we will be asked to join the leaders of the convention on the platform of the annual meeting of the SBC for us future pastors, pastoral staff, missionaries, and denominational leaders to be prayed over by the convention. Since the convention is at Louisville, KY Southern Seminary, its leadership and students are being spotlighted.

Another neat feature of my involvement in the SBC is that each of the students of the Southern Seminary students, including myself, will have to serve as microphone monitors for the convention business sessions. My session will be on Wednesday morning and will be manning microphone 5. This means that we have the responsibility of manning the microphones and operating a digital microphone computer box that will indicate to the chair of the convetion (Johnny Hunt) what the person at the microphone will be doing (making a motion, speaking for or against the motion, making an amendment, and making a point of order). This is the first year that the microphones will be digitally connected to the platform and the system is simple, yet complicated (sort of like touch-screen voting machines). I anticipate that it might get complicated.

Tomorrow starts the convention. The proceedings will be on live streaming video online at this address:

http://www.sbcannualmeeting.net/sbc09/sbcam.asp?cat=home

The recognition of seminary students should be at 9:00am EDT (that is 8:00AM central).

Sunday at the SBC Pastor's Conference

The Southern Baptist Convention's Pastors' Conference is now underway! Starting this late afternoon at the Kentucky Expo Center by the Louisville Airport, Louisville Six Flags, and Churchill Downs. Bonnie and I arrived in time for the pre-conference concert. Brother Marshall should be excited to know that the soloist, Starla Harbin, started out the conference singing "Days of Elijah" and during the evening's worship, we sang, "When I think about the Lord". Bonnie and I felt like we were right at home.

This year's conference president is Ed Litton, Pastor of First Baptist Church of North Mobile, Alabama. The worship team also is from the North Mobile church and they did a fantastic job.

The speakers this evening were J.D. Greear of The Summit Church in Durham, NC, Mac Brunson, Pastor of First Baptist Church Jacksonville, FL, and Chuck Colson, founder of Prison Fellowship and prolific Christian author. All three of the speakers did an excellent job and I would like to outline their speeches.

Ed Litton started off the speaking with a "theme interpretation" on the motto for the Pastors' Conference, "What if". Dr. Litton gave the congregated messengers various convicting questions based around the motto. The questions that caught my attentions were:

What if we adjusted our thinking and sought out God for a greater vision?

What if we truly cast ourselves upon the Lord and not on the numbers?

What if we "opened up the silos" and quit storing up for ourselves and gave freely the gospel of Christ Jesus to those around us?

What if we gave up the stubborn problems that have plagued us.

The theme for this year's conference is Philippians 2:2 - "complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind." [ESV]

J.D. Greear preached from Matthew 23, where Jesus gave the seven woes to the Pharisees. Dr. Greear focused on the difference between religiosity and true gospel ministry. This cut me to the quick! He introduced the sermon by outlining the three tendencies of religiosity:

1. Religion tends to displace the gospel from God's people.

2. We tend to see the conflict in others in the past but we do not see that in ourselves in the present.

-the Pharisees loved missions.

-the Pharisees loved scripture

-the Pharisees loved doctrine

-the Pharisees loved disciplined obedience

-the Pharisees thought these proved that they were the people of God.

3. Religion makes us horribly ineffective at evangelism.

-the Pharisees were not effective on people who were not like them. But Jesus did. When Jesus called Peter to cast the net on the other side of the boat and Peter and the disciples-to-be were unable to bring in all the fish that they had caught, Jesus said, "from now on you will be catching men' (Luke 5:10). Jesus was saying, like you have caught the fish, so shall you catch men. Jesus drew people unto him.

The main outline of the sermon detailed six characteristics / ways that we are religious and how that displaces the gospel:

1. Religious people are obsessed with Recognition - they love honorary titles and really love the praise of people.

2. Religious people substitute religious rituals for a love for God. We can make a big deal of a set of conforming behaviors. We many times focus on what we do instead of knowing God. We must encounter God. We must have a white hot passion for God's glory - a thirst to know more of him.

3. Religious centered Christians elevate secondary traditions above the love of God. We can so easily place more emphasis on tradition than calling sinners to repentance.

4. Religious centered Christians elevate secondary traditions above love for others.

5. Pharisees are more aware of the sins of others than in their own life.

6. Pharisees always think that preachers and teachers are talking about someone else when talking about sin and short coming.

His concluding thoughts were to not use God for another agenda in our lives. Based on a less then gospel-centered ministry in many churches throughout the Southern Baptist Convention, many people get converted to the SBC and not to Christ. We must repent of our religion and our self-righteousness, and thinking that we are better than everyone else. One of the best lines of the conclusion was that Southern Baptists must not trade the deadness of liberalism for the deadness of traditionalism.

Mac Brunson came shortly thereafter to bring a message from I Peter 3:8-9. His sermon was not as clearly delineated as Greear's so my outline is not a clear. Brunson focused in his remarks on the responsibility of ministers and pastors to encourage and edify one another.

In his first point, Brunson outlined the five characteristics of how ministers and Christians should be in the Southern Baptist Convention. First, we are to be harmonious or same minded. God is not calling us to be clones, but are there are cardinal truths that we should all agree on and be like-minded. We ought to all agree on the Great Commission (this is a reference to the controversy over the document entitled, "The Great Commission Resurgence". Second, we are to be sympathetic, truly and honestly identifying with the felt hurts and needs of fellow ministers and Christians. Thirdly, we are to have a brotherly intention. Fourthly, we are to have a brotherly submissiveness and be humble in spirit. And finally, we are to have a tender heart. In this section of the message, Brunson highlighted a couple of illustrations. The first illustration was that of the satellite buffalo. Apparently, in nature there is always one buffalo in a wild herd that will always stay on the fringes of the herd, and not interact with the other buffalo. For the whole of its days, it will always be removed from the other buffalos and they always die a premature death due to the neglect of interaction with other bison. Brunson made the point that we are not to allow the pastors of our convention feel like the satellite buffalo. Secondly, Brunson mentioned a book that two very successful female ad execs wrote once they had built a company from the ground up. The title of the book was what these two women believed was the key to their whole success. The book was called, The Power of Nice.

In his second point, the exact wording of which I did not get, he focused on verse 8 of I Peter 3. He discussed a minister not returning evil for evil or insult for insult. We all have this emotional itch called the flesh and it always tempts us with the conviction that we always have to defend ourselves and our honor and return insult for insult. This is a natural reaction . But the Bible tells us that we don't have to. The best thing that Satan can do is to knock us off our game - off our rhythm.

One final illustration was that Dr. Brunson showed pictures of a church in Germany in which its foundations had wasted away until one day the entire church (save the front facade) collapsed. Instead of building back the church, the town decided to just repair the facade and not to build the actual church back up. Now, all that remains is a beautiful facade without any church attached. Brunson encouraged pastors to rest or take pride in a precious and beautiful facade of a church if the foundation is crumbling. We must have a firm foundation.

Chuck Colson came to speak at the end of the evening and his focus was on leadership. Just a copule of quick highlights:

-Pastors have the eternal destiny of souls in their hands. We must not take this responsibility lightly.

- [quoting Spurgeon] "we must tremble lest we misspeak the word of God"

-being a pastor is an awesome charge and we must approach the ministry with great humility

-not only are you called to preach, but you have been called to lead as a pastor.

-we are not to pander the people and tell them all that they want to hear, but we must preach the word of God and lead the people toward His glory.

Well, this was the conference for Sunday evening. Bonnie and I are looking forward to tomorrow. Bonnie will be attending the Pastor's Wives Institute during the morning, while I will remain with the other ministers for the continuance of the Pastors' Conference. The speakers slated for tomorrow include Mike Landry, Ed Stetzer, Francis Chan, and Tom Eliff in the morning. During the afternoon, Michael Catt, Fred Luter, Jr., and Mike Huckabee will speak. Finally, to conclude the conference that evening, Alvin Reid, David Platt, and Johnny Hunt (Hunt is the current and most likely to be re-elected President of the Southern Baptist Convention). Bonnie and I are looking forward to it! God bless...

In Louisville

Bonnie and I arrived in Louisville for the Southern Baptist Annual Meeting and seminary class last night after leaving Martin in the early afternoon. This whole day (9:00am - 4:00pm) I have been in a lecture session with my 100 classmates with Dr. Russell Moore. Dr. Moore spent the day getting us all prepared for what an annual meeting usually looks like. He also outlined the origins of Baptists in the 17th Century England and also the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention in the United States in 1845 and the denominational distinctives that make Baptists unique from other denominational groups. We also studied the details and breakdown of the Southern Baptist Cooperative Program and also were introduced to some controversy that the Southern Baptist Convention is experiencing over the funding of convention agencies. At the end of the day, we covered the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention that started in 1979 (this convention marks the 30th Anniversary of that event).

The Pastor's Conference starts tomorrow evening. I will share my notes on this blog each night after the events of that day.

Looking for to it...

John 3:36

This week's Scripture Memory Verse is John 3:36, which reads as follows:

"Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him."

This verse is similar in tone to John 3:16 with the emphasis on "whoever believes in the Son --> has eternal life". This phrase gives Christians three very important implications:

1. The word "whoever" as in John 3:16 gives the Christian the call, command, and conviction to spread the gospel. We all are to share the gospel with those we come in contact with. God has ordained Christians to be the means through which the most glorious good news is to be preached, taught, and spread. Sunday School teachers, never forget that you are to call people to repentance and faith everytime you teach from the word of God (this is not just for preachers). Christians, we are to be a confessing Christian to the world. We are not to keep our "Christianness" hidden from worldly view, but we are to confess Christ, and him crucified, before men. Matthew 5:16 states that we are to "let your shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." This "light" includes a confessing spirit that can't help but talk about Jesus, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. This verse that we are memorizing this week is placed within the context of the Sending of the Son of God. This verse provides the purpose. Christ came to save sinners. Bottom line. That is our purpose as well - to bring the gospel of Christ to a lost and dying world - for he is our only hope.

2. The word "has" in this verse gives us the bold assurance that the eternal life that we hope for is not just a future expectation but is already a present experience. This is the "already, not yet" language of Scripture. We are frail in our bodies and are so vulnerable to sin, death, and decay. Our life is but a vapor in the wind. Yet, through Christ, we have eternal life. This is a glorious hope that will not disappoint (see I Corinthians 15). Not only that, but this eternal life is a present reality, for we are no longer perishing, but are justified freely by the grace of God and are now set apart for sanctification - a life long pursuit of the holiness of God that only comes through the cross of salvation. Eternal life for the believer is a future hope that is assured along with a present reality that sustains and preserves the Christian through trial and tribulation. Rest in God's sustaining grace!

3. "Wrath of God remains on him" - this part of the verse echos the seriousness of John 3:3, which states, "unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God". Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the only way to eternal life. Believe in the Son - receive His free offer of salvation - and you have eternal life. Refuse to accept the Lordship, Kingship, absolute rule, and awesome and inconceivable grace of Christ, and you are perishing and the wrath of God remains upon you. The choice is stark and it is clear. Come to Jesus and live. Turn the other way and die.

This Wednesday's Message

I will be leading the Wednesday night worship service this Wednesday night (06/17/2009) at Dresden First Baptist Church and am looking forward to the service! I hope that you will pray for this service. I know it is a Wednesday night and many people don't give it a second thought, but it is our opportunity as a local body of believers to come together and learn of the needs of our congregation and community and lift them up to God - it is a wonderful opportunity for the ministry of intercession!

This is what we are going to do. I would like for us to spend some time in corporate prayer on Wednesday night. We will be praying in the following categories:

1. Adoration

2. Confession

3. Thanksgiving

3. Supplication

This is the A.C.T.S. principle. And I would like for us to go through this prayer principle on Wednesday night. I will talk more about this then, just be thinking about this in your own prayer life.

Also, we will be continuing our study on 1 John tomorrow night. I will be preaching out of 1 John 3:4-10 and the title is "The Child of God and Sin". Here is the actual text from the English Standard Version:

4. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 5. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. 7. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9. No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. 10. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil; whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.

This is a very important text and one that can be perplexing and troubling for some, but GLORIOUS for those who truly understand what John is talking about here in the passage. I hope to see you tomorrow night!!!

Looking ahead to the Southern Baptist Convention

I start off this week looking ahead to a very busy couple of days. I have to wrap everything up so that Bonnie and I can go to Louisville, KY on Friday to attend the Southern Baptist Convention. This week I am spending my free time reading and preparing for the class that I will take at Southern Seminary in conjunction with the annual meeting. Here are the books that I am reading:

Baptist Reformation by Jerry Sutton

Baptists and the Bible by Russ Bush and Tom Nettles

Uneasy in Babylon by Barry Hankins

A Hill on Which to Die by Judge Paul Pressler

The class, based on my reading and the required texts, appears to be a study on the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention, which began in 1979. Interestingly, this year's annual meeting marks the 30^th Anniversary of the 1979 SBC Annual Meeting in Houston, TX where Dr. Adrian Rogers was elected as president of the convention and marked the first time a conservative, inerrantist was elected to the Presidency. From that point to the present day, all of the elected presidents have held to the authority of Scripture.

I have just finished reading the Baptist Reformation and have been exposed to the details of the reason for the Conservative Resurgence and the truth surrounding the opposition espoused by the moderates and liberals of the convention. To say the least, reading that book has been eye-opening. I am in the process of reading the Baptists and the Bible, which is another great read. The thesis of this book is that Baptist history tells us that Baptists – from John Smyth and Roger Williams all the way to Herschel Hobbs – have believed in the full authority, trustworthiness, infallibility, and inerrancy of Scripture. It is only through the influence of the modernist theological movement with an emphasis on higher criticism in the mid-late 19^th Century that influenced many Protestant theologians (including Southern Baptists) to move away from a high view of Scripture. This has given me confidence and pride to know that Baptists have been traditionally a Bible believing faith. In this regard, the Conservative Resurgence was a needed corrective against the modernist tide.

Another milestone that Bonnie and I will get to participate in is the 150^th Anniversary of the founding of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, of which I am a student. I am proud to be a student at a seminary that has reclaimed its heritage as a bastion of conservative theological convictions. Under the leadership of Dr. R. Albert Mohler, the school has become one of the flagship seminaries in the United States, if not the world. It will be enjoyable to finally listen and watch in person speeches and comments made by Mohler and other faculty that I respect at this event.

I am enjoying my reading and looking forward to the next few days in studying the Southern Baptist Convention and witnessing it in action at the annual meeting.

Back to writing...

I apologize for the absence on the blog. Please understand that I have been extremely busy since the first of May that has caused me to set my blog article writing on the top shelf and not pick it up again until today. Here is what I have been up to:

1. Finished up my Spring Semester at Southern Seminary by the middle of May. Had to write a paper for Missiology that I finished on May 10th, 2009.
2. Went to the Rotary District Conference in Franklin, TN on May 15-16th, 2009. Had a great time. The best thing about that event is that I am almost done with my year as Rotary President. I hand over the reins with pleasure to Todd Hampton on July 2, 2009 (only three weeks from today - 06/11/2009)!
3. When I got back from the Rotary District Conference I had two weeks to read four books for the History of the Baptists class. Plus, I had to start working on study guide worksheets for the class on these four books. The questions alone took up 15 pages! So, I had to plug away for two weeks trying to get through that in preparation for the class. All of my free time went to this project.
4. The class itself for History of the Baptists went from June 1 - June 5th, 2009 at Southern Seminary in Louisville, KY. I absoloutely loved the class. History is my favorite subject and learning about the heritage and legacy of the Baptist movement from 1608 to the present day was fascinating! Tough class though. Lot of hard work. I just finished the worksheets and mailed them in on June 9th, 2009 (Tuesday). I might write some blog posts about some of the most influential Baptists in our history from time to time.
5. Yesterday, I had the privilege of preaching at church during the Wednesday night prayer service. I preached on I John 2:28 - 3:3 continuing the exposition through the epistle. Our main discussion last night was on the subject of being confident that you are a child of God. I truly enjoyed studying that passage of scripture!

That brings me to today. I am in the midst of trying to get caught up with all the other aspects of my life that I had to put on hold to complete the History of the Baptists class, and therefore, I am starting up my blog writing again. It is good to be back!