Here are the two files from the Calvinism discussion panel. Click part 1 or part 2 for the files.

Nathan Finn's paper is here. And, Nathan also posts a plea for kindness in the debate-- what an idea.

Tomorrow, I will post more information about the Calvinism research.

I mentioned earlier about Tadd Grandstaff, who Tom Brokaw thinks is both in the Emerging Church and a threat the Republican Party hegemony over evangelicals (particularly in regards to moral issues such as homosexuality).

Today, I speak at the PCPA meeting at the United Methodist Publishing House, unfortunately abbreviated UMPH.

I just returned from a day in Columbia, South Carolina. I was there to lead a conference on Mike Dodson and my new book, ComeBack Churches. I met with a group of "Directors of Missions," which are local leaders (often a county or two) who both consult with churches and help them partner for mission.

While in town, I stopped by to meet and have breakfast with the leadership of Columbia International University. I have had the privilege to teach at C.I.U. twice and have been very impressed with the school. (I have taught in their A.I.M. program which I think is a model program for schools wanting to train in-service leaders.)

Wikipedia describes the history as follows:

We don't know details, but there has been a shooting at a Youth With a Mission training facility... see here for more info. Please be praying.

Update: YMAM posts an update and some photos of young men and women who give all for Christ.

Today it was announced that I will be the Interim Teaching Pastor at First Baptist Church of Hendersonville, TN.

I just received and email from the folks at Global Church Advancement about their upcoming conference. Yesterday, Acts 29 posted their upcoming conference. The Next Initiative (the Purpose Driven church planting guys) are also planning their church planting conference that week. And, we will be talking church planting at Liberty that same week. Yikes.

What does it all mean? God is working in church planting! And He appears to be doing it all in one week.

Take a look and attend a conference of your choice.

Global Church Advancement

The GCA email I just received explains about their Orlando conference:

Ed Stetzer, Director of LifeWay Research and LifeWay’s Missiologist in Residence joins Steve Childers, Tom Nebel, Randy Pope, Scotty Smith, Daniel Montgomery, Chan Kilgore, and 20 other church planting leaders at the North America Church Planting Conference January 28 - February 1, 2008 in Orlando, Florida... Join 400 other church planters and leaders for Ed's half-day Workshop or experience the entire week of excellent training (more than 75 workshops), networking (with leaders from 30 denominations), daily corporate worship and heart renewal.

Steve Childers, the President of Global Church Advancement, has a heart for planters—and they do a great job preparing them in both the biblical and the practical.

Acts 29

The Acts 29 site just posted the ckeeky title, "No Blow-Hards in the Windy City."

They explained:

Speaking at the boot camp in Chicago is Mark Driscoll, Ed Stetzer, Mark Dever and Darrin Patrick. Dr D.A. Carson has also been invited but is not yet confirmed. We are blessed to have the caliber of men to lead and train this conference. The boot camp is a theological compass to guide the church planter. It is not a “how-to” for church planting. Participants will hear about contextualized preaching, gospel-centered theology, how a missional church is a biblical church, leading the mission of Jesus, the characteristics of a missional church planter and marks of a healthy church plant.

Carson, huh? We will see if he shows. Grin. But, either way, it will be a great week focusing on the gospel and transformation.

The NEXT Initiative

The guys at the NEXT Initiative also have a conference in Ocala that week. Ron Sylvia, the director, has asked me to be a part and I am trying to be there, but they have a great group already speaking. They explain:

Jan 29-30, 2008 || Ocala, FL, Feb 5-6, 2008 || Phoenix, AZ Start with a Crowd, not a Core! Most churches never grow beyond 200. But over 70% of churches we've coached have broken through the 200 barrier in the first two years! NEXT emphasizes the power of the Gospel to transform an audience into a congregation. Don't miss the NEXT conference! We will show you how to start a church with momentum by launching large.

These NEXT Initiative guys have a passion and a plan to start 1000 churches… and they are well on their way. Ron and I have been friends for years and he is the real deal.

Thomas Road and Liberty University

On Wednesday night, I will be speaking at Thomas Road in Lynchburg, VA. The next day, several of us are meeting with new pastor Jonathan Falwell, who wants to create a major church planting initiative. They have already set part of the theme for their new Innovate Church conference around church planting. Liberty already has a great church planting center, but they are talking about stepping it up to a new level.

So, a big week for church planting. Hope to see you there.

By the way, we like to list church planting conferences at our church planting site, www.newchurches.com. If you have a conference, please let us know at NewChurches.Com at this page. I co-sponor the site along with Church Plant Media, and Passion for Planting. (Passion for Planting are the guys who help coordinate the Mother of All Church Planting Conferences: The National New Church Conferencehttp://www.exponentialconference.org/.) By the way, the NNCC (now called "The Exponential Conference" is already at double the registration from last year...

This weekend we were struck with the very real prospect of violence and missions as a gunman attacked a Youth With a Mission training facility and New Life Church.

Although it makes bigger news when it is on U.S. soil, mission work takes place in violent contexts every day-- and missionaries and nationals lose their lives.

Today, when I came home, I found that my copy of Keith Eitel's timely book had arrived. I cannot find a graphic or a link, but I will update it when I can. The book is called, Missions in the Contexts of Violence.

I have skimmed the book and it looks like an important new read with a breadth of contributing authors.

This book is part of a series published by the folks at the Evangelical Missiological Society. You can find the whole series, minus this new book, here (click on publications).

I believe that such violence will get worse, and not better, in the coming years. But, as IMB spokesman (at that time) Mark Kelly said:

Missions has always been a dangerous enterprise... In 1845, it was shipwrecks and malaria. Today, it's bandits and car wrecks. There simply aren't any safe places, even here in the United States. While safety is important, every missionary decides as part of obeying the missions mandate that it is better to serve God where he calls than it is to disobey and remain where it is 'safe.'

Keith Eitel quotes martyred missionary Karen Watson, who wrote a letter before she was killed along with three other missionaries in an ambush in Iraq. She wrote a letter before she left that would have profound significance after her death.

Keith reports that she told her pastor to put the letter in a safe place in case she did not return. She did not.

Karen's letter included this credo:

The Missionary Heart

Cares more than some think is wise.

Risks more than some think is safe.

Dreams more than some think is practical.

Expects more than some think is possible.

May we all learn from the missionaries that our lives are not our own, and Christ may call us to make the greatest sacrifice.

From Christopher Wright, The Mission of God, pg. 125:

God makes visible God’s own self through the incarnation of God the Son. So, then, to know Jesus is to know the Father (Jn 8:19; 10:38, 12:45). But this knowing God through knowing Jesus is not to be confined to those who saw him in the flesh. On the contrary, that privilege was accorded to them for the purpose of making him known to the world, “to let the world know that you sent me” (Jn 17:23). So, in truly priestly fashion, Jesus dispenses the knowledge of God, first to his immediate disciples and then through them to the world.

I fly to Chicago in the morning. The weather does not look good, but we shall see if I make it.

I will be spending the day with some of the missions and pastoral ministries faculty at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. Trinity has a great slogan about "studying with the ones who WROTE the books," so I am looking forward to spending time with these great leaders and thinkers.

While I am off to one meeting, let me point you to a story from an earlier meeting.

... and I have responded to the accusation here. For the record, I deny that I did it (much). I also deny that Beth Moore is in any way related to NAMB or can be compared to a certain preacher inferred in the post (and we love her at LifeWay and think she is a great Bible teacher).

We just posted the Calvinism research data at LifeWay Research. Click the header above to head over to the LifeWay Research site. Also, you can read some of the presentations and listen to the messages here.

Research FAQs

One of the primary reasons LifeWay Research created this blog was to interact on research.

I was interviewed by Christianity Today yesterday about the research I presented at Ridgcrest. As such, that prompted me to write down a few answers... So, let me share a few FAQs with you.

These issues are also addressed in the presentation (you can listen here).

How did the survey originate?

There were two surveys—one from LifeWay and one that was done at NAMB. The LifeWay survey was of all pastors and the NAMB survey was for recent seminary graduates.

I presented both studies at the Ridgecrest Building Bridges Conference.

For more information about the LifeWay Calvinism research from last year, click here.

We have posted a PowerPoint with the NAMB data here.

The NAMB research was part of a bigger project that included a few Calvinism related questions.

When NAMB began the Nehemiah Project, there was an agreement with the participating schools that there would be an evaluation at a later date. The NAMB leadership decided to do a robust survey on issues that could then be cross-tabbed with NAMB focus areas. Thus, the NAMB survey asked about many different issues, including Calvinism, and then cross-tabbed to see if those issues impacted such things as planting new churches, evangelistic effectiveness, and other factors.

The survey, called “New Millennium Ministers,” was originally developed by the Center for Missional Research team, then modified by the NAMB Executive Leadership team, sent to the Nehemiah Project Professors at the SBC seminaries for feedback, then emailed to the provosts of the seminaries, and finally sent to the recent graduates.

The work was primarily done by Richie Stanley (Director of Research at NAMB) and through a contract with Reggie Ogea (professor at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary). Dr. Ogea worked with many New Orleans students to make phone calls, analyze data, and do other research. (For example, you may be interested in the recently released research from NAMB on recent graduates and their views of church planting, Evangelism and Recent Seminary Graduates, Denominational Loyalty of Recent Seminary Graduates, Persistence and Loyalty (from a presentation made at the Southern Baptist Research Fellowship in Fort Worth).

The Nehemiah Project professors, who serve in joint appointments with their school and the North American Mission Board, worked with the alumni offices of their schools to obtain mailing lists of recent graduates. (The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary declined to share these names, citing policy reasons.)

A letter was sent out to all graduates inviting them to participate in the on-line survey. Over 2000 did.

Why is LifeWay Releasing NAMB’s Research?

Perhaps because they do not want to write long FAQ files. Grin.

But, more seriously, the new leadership under Geoff Hammond “gave” us data from much of the New Millennium Ministers survey because they are looking to create a laser focus on evangelism, church planting, and sending missionaries. If you have been watching NAMB lately, you will find them to be greatly focused on their core mission.

Releasing studies on Calvinism was better suited at LifeWay Research, particularly since we have now been “assigned” such research by the Southern Baptist Convention. NAMB was able to learn what it needed from the research—how do these things impact evangelism and church planting. Knowing the percentage of Calvinists is less essential to them than knowing Calvinism’s impact on their core mission.

Why did you not release the numbers by school?

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary did not to release the data along with the other schools. So, we had a complete listing of all the Masters level graduates of the SBC seminaries—with the exception of SBTS.

Because we did not want to leave them out completely, we spent many additional dollars and hours to find a sample of recent SBTS graduates. (We did this by searching for graduation announcements in state papers.) That yielded 52 survey responses.

Although those 52 were very similar on most of the issues, there were some where they differed. So, in order to avoid the situation where the sample size was criticized for being too small, we did not release the exact numbers. However, we did rank the Calvinist percentage by school. As I indicated in my presentation, Southern, Midwestern, and Golden Gate had, in that order, more graduates who identified with Calvinism. We released that information at the Ridgecrest conference.

Feel free to interact below.

Yesterday I was in Philadelphia at a NAMB Missional Network event. It was good to see friends from many different churches there.

We had a morning dialogue with the pastors, church planters, and others at Real Life Church (more about them below).

The setting was great for dialogue.

And discussion.

And community.

After the morning dialogue, we then went over to Nazarene Baptist Church for the afternoon meeting. Nazarene Baptist Church has the unique challenge that if you mix up the name, it changes denominations. Grin.

The church is a large African-American church, pastored by the state convention president, Keith Marshall Williams, Jr., who was recently elected to be the “President” of the State Convention Presidents Fellowship.

The contrasts between the two churches were fascinating-- and it was encouraging that we were able to meet in both places in one day. The meetings illustrate the kind of partnership evidenced in these churches.

Let me specifically mention Rob Burns and Real Life Church. They were gracious to host the event in Philadelphia. The church is a new SBC church plant, also networked with Acts 29.

They started their church by purchasing a former neighborhood bar. (In the Northeast, most urban contexts have a small bar that caters to the people who live nearby.) The bar serves as something of a "Third Place."

Wikipedia explains:

"The Third Place" is a term used in the concept of community building to refer to social surroundings separate from the two usual social environments of home and the workplace. In his influential book The Great, Good Place, Ray Oldenburg argues that third places are important for civil society, democracy, civic engagement, and establishing feelings of a sense of place.

Oldenburg coins “first” place as our home and those we live with. Our second place is the workplace — where we may actually spend most of our time. Third places, then are "anchors" of community life and facilitate and foster broader, more creative interaction. All societies already have informal meeting places; what is new in our day is the intentionality of seeking them out as vital to our current societal needs. Oldbenburg suggests these hallmarks of a true "third place": free or inexpensive; food and drink, while not essential, are important; highly accessible: proximate for many (walking distance); involve regulars - those who habitually congregate there; welcoming and comfortable; both new friends and old should be found there. (58)

As part of their mission strategy, Real Life Church bought the bar, extensively renovated it, and turned it into a coffee and snack bar. And, it is an intentional Third Place outreach and church.

There is a helpful article on Third Place ministries here. It is worth a read.

Pray for Real Life Cafe that is helping make Real Life Church possible.

They are reaching Bridesburg, a section of the city that few know. It is very white, very Irish, and very Catholic.

This is hard soil, but the church plant is already seeing 60 or so people attend each week. That is remarkable for a year old church in a community like this.

At LifeWay Research, we recognize that research is often a part of discussions and debates. That will always be the case.

However, it is important that the research be accurately cited. This week, on the Trinity Broadcasting Network, it was not.

Last week a program aired, which can be seen in its entirety here, including some inaccurate information regarding LifeWay Research's recent study on the issue of "speaking in tongues."

This statement, from Pastor Dwain Miller of Cross Life Church in El Doreado, Arkansas, is not accurate:

“LifeWay… this past summer... did a survey… and they reported that 51% of Southern Baptist pastors believe in speaking in tongues as one of the gifts… The truth is that there are more than half, I believe, of Southern Baptist pastors, anonymously surveyed… said they practice a private prayer language... but they were anonymous about it."

I am assuming that Pastor Miller has taken the percent answering the survey question about belief (see the actual question below) and confused it with a claim of practice.

They are not the same thing.

Here is the correct information (click here for the original article):

Private prayer language

The survey asked Protestant pastors, SBC pastors, and laity their beliefs about private prayer language using this question wording: “Do you believe that the Holy Spirit gives some people the gift of a special language to pray to God privately? Some people refer to this as a Private Prayer Language or the ‘private use of tongues.’”

Fifty percent of Southern Baptist pastors answered “Yes,” 43 percent said “No,” and 7 percent responded “Don’t know.”

Non-SBC pastors are more likely to believe that the Holy Spirit gives some people a private prayer language than Southern Baptist pastors. Sixty-six percent of non-SBC pastors responded “Yes,” 32 percent responded “No,” and 3 percent responded “Don’t know.”

Protestant pastors (Southern Baptists and non-SBC) are more likely to believe the Holy Spirit gives some people a private prayer language (63 percent) than Protestant laity (51 percent).

Of the Protestant laity surveyed, 15 percent responded “Don’t know” when asked if they believe in the gift of private prayer language. Of the Protestant pastors, only 3 percent are unsure.

Later today, I will be calling Pastor Dwain Miller of Cross Life Church in El Doreado, Arkansas to inform him that he has an incorrect perception of our research. As a brother in Christ, I know that he will want to know the correct information. Furthermore, I will be writing the program host and TBN leadership asking that they edit the incorrect information from the program so that people are not confused by the inaccurate statement.

I have been doing a series of messages at my church that focus on the Theology of Christmas. I have not talked much about donkeys, wise men, and shepherds... though they are important. Instead, my focus has been on what God did in Christ.

You can download here:

The Theology of Christmas: Incarnation
The Theology of Christmas: Kenosis

This week I will preach "The Theology of Christmas: Glory."

Here is the outline of the Incarnation message:

Before I preached the Incarnation message I mentioned yesterday, I was asked to comment for a Wall Street Journal "reaction" story, responding to Romney's speech on faith and politics.

I declined. I don't need a "new issue"... I have enough issues already. Grin. If they would have asked a theological question, I would have been glad to comment.

The conversation prompted me to mention in my Sunday message that Mormonism is not Chrisitanity-- and the incarnation is an important part of why that is the case.

What/who Jesus Christ was makes all the difference-- two natures in one person. Fully God and fully man. The Incarnation is understood through the Hypostatic Union. I mentioned the concept but did not use the term in my Incarnation sermon.

Well, FoxNews asked Mormon scholars 21 questions about Mormonism. And, they answered... but the uber-apologeticists at the North American Mission Board decided their answers were insufficient. I agree.

NAMB's Rob Bowman gets at the "what/who" issue here (the format is the FoxNews questions, then Mormon answers, finally Bowman response):

Q: Does the Mormon Church believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God? Q: Does the Church believe in the divinity of Jesus? Q: Does the Church believe that God is a physical being?

A: Mormons believe Jesus Christ is literally the Son of God, the Savior and Redeemer, who died for the sins of humankind and rose from the dead on the third day with an immortal body. God, the Father, also has an immortal body.

Bowman:
What this answer—which is accurate as far as it goes—neglects to make explicit is that Mormons understand what it means for Jesus to be “the Son of God” in a way that differs radically from orthodox Christianity. When they say they believe he is “literally” the Son of God, the significance of this qualification will be lost on most people. Mormons believe that God the Father is an immortal Man and that he is the literal father of Jesus Christ “in the flesh,” just as Mary is his literal mother (see below). This is not what orthodox Christianity means when it affirms that Jesus is the Son of God. To us, Christ has existed eternally as the Son of God, personally distinct from the Father yet one and the same God. For us, to affirm that Jesus is the Son of God means to affirm that he is eternally of the same absolute, infinite divine nature as the Father.

It is peculiar that the LDS Church did not directly address the question of the divinity of Jesus. In their view, Jesus is Jehovah, the God of the Old Testament, and yet he is a different God than Elohim, the Father, and will always be subordinate to him. Mormons do not pray to Jesus. In their view, Jesus, and all other human beings, and all angels, existed in the distant past as the spirit offspring of our heavenly parents (God the Father and his wife); Jesus is simply our Elder Brother and the first of God’s children to become a God himself.

So, read Rob Bowman's answers to the Mormon answers here.

I still remember the day in 1998 Rick Warren called me and encouraged me to go to Southern Seminary to teach church planting.

In the early days, Saddleback helped start the Nehemiah Project, a program to help seminary students become church planters. His encouragement helped me to leave the church I had planted and and start a journey that would focus on training planters, and eventually pastors. I am not sure I would have done it without his encouragement.

Rick has been a friend at some key moments. He gave away all his resources to my students and provided resources and training at important times. When I was struggling with a decision a couple of years ago, he prayed with me and encouraged me. His name has been on several of my books and projects and I am honored he would lend his name. And, as he has become one of the leading evangelicals in the world, I have still found him humble and gracious-- and more concerned with others than with himself.

It is amazing to see how God is using Rick and Saddleback today.

I prayed for him last week as they had an important planning meeting at Saddleback and Purpose Driven.

I will pray again this week as God has given Saddleback some incredible opportunities, including these listed in a recent email:

-14 Christmas services at Saddleback

-Fox News will broadcast “Christmas with Rick Warren” multiple times on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

-The US Armed Forces Network will broadcast “The Purpose of Christmas” (last year’s Saddleback service) for all troops around the world to watch.

-All Wal-Marts and Sam’s Club are broadcasting “The Meaning of Christmas” a message by me, along with Christmas carols by the Salvation Army, on all their in-store TV screens.

-Good Morning America is broadcasting our roundtable about “The Good News of Christmas” on Christmas Day.

Viewers on Fox and elsewhere will be directed here. The pamphlet that is on the web page explains:

It All Starts with God.

It’s not about you.

I have already posted my first message from the Theology of Christmas series here. The audio is up (see below) and I have included my outlines for all three messages (at the bottom).

First, here is the audio:

The Theology of Christmas:

Incarnation
Kenosis
Glory

The outlines are below. (This will probably be my last post until I am back from family vacation time.)

Now that we are back from the holidays, we start the new blog year with research. In this case, it is denominational research.

LifeWay Research released an analysis in Facts and Trends tracking certain age groups and their attendance at Southern Baptist Convention meetings.

The report is an analysis of age / attendance numbers and a graph of two demographic groups. These numbers are collected each year and we graphed them. (We will post some other graphs of the data later.)

Thom Rainer (and Danny Akin) have weighed in here. Later today, we will share some new graphs that give additional information. Tomorrow, I will share some feedback from Jimmy Draper on the subject. If you would like to enter into the dialogue, feel free to do so in the comments. Perhaps Thom Rainer's quotation referring to Morris Chapman would be a good place to start:

Morris Chapman stood before an audience of state convention executives and state Baptist paper editors in February 2002 and said that the SBC stands at a crossroads. It is facing the choice of becoming a group of committed churches that impact the world with the gospel or relegating itself to becoming an ineffective regional denomination.

We’re six years down the road. Which road are we choosing?

What do you think? Which road are we choosing?

Update 1:

Here are two more charts.

The first looks at the age groups from 1990-2007.

The second looks at the groups since 2000.

I believe that this provides two things that we can infer from these numbers:

1. The trend is accelerating.
2. The "Younger Leader" emphasis did not lead to a change in the trend.

Later, I will post some thoughts from Jimmy Draper.

Feel free to continue the dialogue below-- some very interesting comments.

Update 2:

We have posted a PowerPoint with more details and graphs here.

In these graphs, you will see that the middle category has remained relatively constant. We cannot know for sure, but perhaps the former young leaders were moving up in age, but were not being replaced as they did.

Of course, it is important to keep in mind that we are looking at percentages, not numbers-- the numbers are down much more than the percentages. In other words, if you looked at the actual numbers of younger leaders attending each year, the trend line would be much "steeper."

We have also included the male / female percent. It has remained relatively stable.

Update 3:

You can find many interesting and challenging comments in the comment stream.

Here is one from Jimmy Draper, who started the "Younger Leader Initiative," seeking to involve more young pastors:

The graph above shows what we all know to be true. Our convention is being more and more represented with older people and less and less with younger people participating. I have a deep conviction that my real task in life is to pass on to my children and grandchildren values, convictions, loyalty to the Gospel, and support for what God is doing through Southern Baptists. That is difficult at best… and impossible if we make no effort at all. I recognized about 5 years or so ago that if we did not invite and urge the participation of our younger ministers and laymen we were going to lose that battle and the SBC would soon be something far different and far less effective than it has been.

That is why I began the emphasis on the younger minister and layman. This coming generation is one of the sharpest I have ever seen. They have a heart for the world, for the gospel, for the church and for sacrificial ministry in difficult places. Most of them have not grown up in church the way I did and do not see the value and importance of our cooperative efforts as a convention unless we show them. Rather than condemning them for their disinterest, it is our task to appeal to their tremendous passion and energy and bring them into the ministries and leadership of our convention.

Many of us are afraid to do this. As we get older we can fall into a trap of feeling that we have all the wisdom, creativity and passion necessary. We often feel threatened by younger ministers with their new and/or different ideas. My generation must embrace these younger ministers or we will cease to exist as a SBC. I deeply believe that the SBC is the greatest, God-given strategy for complete ministry in the world today. If that is true, then we have to enlist the younger people to be involved or the convention dies when we do. I received a lot of criticism for beginning this emphasis on the younger generation, but I believe it is imperative to engage them and bring them into the significant workings of our convention .

This coming generation has new, fresh ideas of how to communicate the Gospel, how to do missions in new and expanding ways, how to do church. They use every possible means of modern technology in communicating their messages. They reach into the unreached areas of our society. They are not afraid of living austere lifestyles in order to connect with a lost world and thus have won the right to witness to them. They just do it differently than most of us do it. But, why should that frighten us? We utilized the expanding advances in science and inventions to increase the ability to travel and minister. My grandfather traveled by train to his speaking engagements. He could only go a short distance in a reasonable amount of time. I was recently in 8 states in less than a week, using modern air travel. Am I wrong to use something my grandfather did not use? Is it wrong for me to travel like that to do ministry while serving as pastor of a local church? I now use email, internet and modern technology in my ministry. Is that wrong since my father and grandfather did not do it? Of course not. Neither is our way of “doing church” the only way. If it were, the New Testament would have given us instructions as to how to do it. It does not tell us that…but it does tell us that we must pass on what God has given us to our children and grandchildren. We are not doing well at that.

I am excited that across the convention now we have younger individuals in their 20s and 30s being used on boards of trustees, elected officers of state conventions, etc. I believe we are beginning to address this issue, but we have a long way to go. We need to be reminded that change is not optional, it is inevitable. We can not stop it, thus our only hope is to manage change and not be victimized by it! Praise God for the younger leaders who are emerging in our convention. Rather than condemning them, let’s embrace them, thank God for them and work with them as partners in ministry.

Are their dangers in this? Absolutely. With youth comes immaturity. Remember when we were younger and did some of the unusual things we did. Immaturity has its own sets of problems. We are seeing some of the younger individuals exercise their liberty and their new found channels of communication in an inappropriate way. We have always had youth who used their youthfulness to further their own agendas and who attacked the status quo. I suppose we all did that to one degree or another. We must not spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about those who are not making a positive and constructive contribution to the ministry of the SBC. There are others out there that represent the very best in character, passion, convictions and energies. Let’s help them grow and become involved. That is our assignment.

Read again Paul’s admonishment in 2 Tim. 2:1-2.

We must do it!