The original issue can be found at: http://www.baptistpress.com/issue-04/21/2016 DISCLAIMER: Baptist Press should be credited for any reprinted stories that originate with BP. Suggested credit line: Reprinted from Baptist Press (www.baptistpress.com), news service of the Southern Baptist Convention. Please note that Baptist Press periodically carries stories from other sources by permission. Individuals interested in reprinting non-BP stories should contact the entity where the story originated to seek reprint permission. -------------------------------------------------------------------- FIRST-PERSON: Whose money is it anyway? by Joseph Bunce Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (BP) -- I was put in a difficult situation as pastor of a small Baptist church many years ago. One of the largest financial supporters for our little congregation had made a commitment to a friend that would require a significant change in our church's doctrinal position. He had promised that his friend could unite with our church by simply transferring his membership from a church that is viewed as a cult to this very day. My answer was that we would love to help this person find new life in Christ and follow in believer's baptism, but we do not receive such transfers from churches that are not theologically sound. I also said I was certain that the church in question would not send any transfer of membership. I was immediately threatened by the major giver and told we would accept this person by statement or he would withhold his giving to the church. I will never forget the sting I felt as he said these words. I realized that I was heading into a dark storm, and my fear seemed nearly overwhelming. I am sad to say that my experience was not unusual. Many pastors have shared similar experiences when a significant giver was inappropriately leveraging them with the threat of withholding giving. I have talked with pastors who felt muzzled from clearly speaking the truth because of similar issues. When I look at Scripture, the very first act of church discipline is found in Acts, chapter 5. God was less than pleased with a couple who sought to use money for prestige and personal gain in the early church, versus the example of an early church member's giving from a pure heart in Acts 4:36-37. Let's consider what we should expect as a Return on Investment (ROI) when we give money to the local church. Is ROI really the standard we want to use in our giving? Giving begins with God, and I can assure you that He was not looking at a Return on Investment when Jesus died for your sin and mine. His gift for my salvation is far superior to any return that I can offer Him. Let's remember: -- God owns everything. Psalm 24:1 tells us that God is Lord over all. Colossians 1:16 explains that all things were created by Him and for Him. Deuteronomy 8:17-18 both promises and warns when it states that God is sovereign over our ability to make wealth. In an instant, He can prosper or destroy us financially. 1 Corinthians 4:7 asks an interesting question, "What do you have that you did not receive?" -- Stewardship means we are not owners, but managers of everything God places at our disposal. That is why tithes and offerings are merely one aspect of our stewardship. God also holds us accountable for how we spend our time and how we use our talents. 2 Corinthians 5:10 tells us that we will stand before God and give an account of stewardship. -- We make a major error if we think money can provide anything lasting. Possessions cannot provide satisfaction (Ecclesiastes 5:10), significance (Luke 12:15) or security (Proverbs 23:5). Having dealt with that errant church member more than 30 years ago, the experience taught me a great deal. I had to learn to trust God to provide for my family's every need. My responsibility was to seek God as Matthew 6:33 instructs. The threatening man I faced went to the church's deacons and shared his demands. The deacons were nonresponsive, and I felt more alone than ever. I could not understand why they would not step up and take a stand. I praise God that our association of churches had a godly director of missions who walked beside me. He reminded me there are times that leadership may even cost you your job by staying true to scriptural convictions. That counsel prepared me for one of the most difficult evenings of my life. It was a Wednesday night prayer meeting, and you could cut the tension with a knife. The big giver was noticeably absent and emotionally present. I was walking to the front of the auditorium when the church treasurer handed me a note. I thought it was a prayer request. One sentence read, "I guess you know that you ran off 10 percent of our church's budget." I knew the time had come to settle the matter once and for all. I stood before the core of our people and said, "Tonight you all will decide to either follow me or fire me." I sent my wife to gather the boys and we went home. I told the men of the church to please stop by the house when they had made a decision. I was scared. The home we lived in belonged to the church. My meager bank account would not last long. In about two hours, a couple of men came by and said, "Preacher, God called you here and we are going to follow you." The rest is history. We lost the big giving family that night and God sent others to more than cover the need. My biggest lesson from this experience had nothing to do with anything other than I learned that every gift I would ever place in the offering plate was God's with no strings attached, period. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Priscilla Shirer's new journey tackles spiritual warfare by Aaron Earls Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday NASHVILLE (BP) -- A conversation with her sons over scrambled eggs one morning led best-selling author Priscilla Shirer on a new writing journey that addresses spiritual warfare. After seeing the way a story captured the imagination of her oldest son and fielding questions from two of her sons on spiritual warfare, Shirer had the idea of communicating that very real topic using a fictional story. The initial idea became the young adult novel, "The Prince Warriors," which follows bickering brothers Xavier and Evan, along with several friends and classmates, into the mysterious land of Ahoratos. It's there that they discover the part they play in an invisible battle raging all around them. Shirer says the recently released first book of a trilogy from B&H Kids, a publishing arm of LifeWay Christian Resources, tries to "capture the epic tone of a mysterious and intriguing adventure novel while simultaneously uncovering principles about spiritual warfare, particularly the armor of God." While her latest book departs from her previous best-selling devotional books like "Fervent" and "The Resolution for Women," this, much like her acting debut in the Kendrick Brothers' film "War Room," is another in a long line of risks for Shirer. "When I think back on the journey that the Lord has taken me on over the past 20 years of ministry, most every single thing He's set in my path to do has been outside of my comfort zone and has required a full reliance on His strength in order to accomplish it," she said. "With this series, God has given me a fresh opportunity to flex new creative muscles and trust Him again and again." For her other books, Shirer studies a passage of Scripture or biblical topic and then takes a year to craft lessons to help readers comb through the appropriate verses. By contrast, The Prince Warriors took around six years from start to finish. In addition to working with veteran fiction writer Gina Detwiler on the story, Shirer says this has been the most collaborative project she's ever done. "Usually, I'm writing my projects all alone from start to finish," she said. "But with this series, there have been many minds lending their expertise to the end result. I believe that the project is stellar because of it." Shirer invited several theological scholars to read through the book to ensure nothing would be unbiblical, but she was also committed to "having fun dreaming up a fictional environment and story." She wanted to strike a delicate balance of presenting truth in a creative way. "I wanted hints of spiritual things to be tucked below the surface of the story, not so deep they can't be mined, but not so conspicuous that a young reader would find the story 'cheesy' and not stay until the end. The fact is, youth can smell 'cheese' a mile away. I wanted to do my best to avoid that stench." Shirer hopes The Prince Warriors helps young readers recognize the reality of spiritual warfare and the existence of "divine armor that will enable them to walk in victory. Alerting the next generation to this reality as soon as possible will prepare them to be adults who make right choices, live in an awareness of spiritual realities, and fight their battles using divine weapons that actually work." The second book in the series, "The Prince Warriors and the Unseen Invasion" and a related devotional entitled "Unseen" are set to release this October with the third book in the trilogy coming next spring. For more information, visit BHKids.com and ThePrinceWarriors.com. -------------------------------------------------------------------- FROM THE SEMINARIES: MBTS & preaching; SBTS & cultural witness; SWBTS & religious liberty by SBC Seminary & Baptist Press Staff Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday Today's From the Seminaries includes items from: Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary Southern Baptist Theological Seminary Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary Midwestern launches 'Preaching & Preachers' podcast By T. Patrick Hudson KANSAS CITY, Mo. (BP) -- Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has announced the addition of a "Preaching & Preachers" in which MBTS President Jason K. Allen will interview guests on topics and issues from the sphere of preaching and beyond. The first in the series, posted at JasonKAllen.com on April 18, is an interaction between Allen, Timothy George and Christian George titled, "Great Preachers in Church History." Also among the new podcast's guests will be leaders in the field of preaching and pastoral ministry such as R. Albert Mohler Jr. on "Convictional Preaching"; Tim Challies on "The Preacher and Personal Productivity"; Paige Patterson on "Why Inerrancy Matters"; and D.A. Carson on "Avoiding Exegetical Fallacies." Allen said he intends for the podcast to reach a wide constituency with insightful, edifying content within the vital calling of church pastors, teachers and ministry leaders. "My hope for Preaching and Preachers is to serve the church by discussing a wide range of topics that are directly related to the discipline of preaching and to those who proclaim God's Word," Allen said. "We'll also, at times, reach beyond the subject of the podcast and interrelate on topics more distantly connected. Ultimately, we pray that God will be honored through these conversations." Allen acknowledged deriving the show's title from a preaching legend's book. "I borrowed the podcast's title from the immortal Martyn Lloyd Jones, who wrote the book, 'Preaching and Preachers,' because it has shaped several generations of preachers," Allen noted. "Through the insight and wisdom obtained from the great pastoral and ministry minds of today, we pray that future generations of pastors will be encouraged to fulfill their ministry calling as well." Allen, who became the fifth president of Midwestern Seminary in October 2012, formerly pastored churches in Alabama and Kentucky, served on the administrative staff at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., and taught courses in personal spiritual disciplines, pastoral ministry and preaching. Offer an 'apologetic of love,' speakers say at SBTS conf. By Robert Chapman LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP) -- In an increasingly secularized culture, Christians must articulate their worldview in defending the truth, evangelical leaders said at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary's inaugural Driven By Truth conference. "[From] this generation forward, no Christian will have a non-apologetic moment," Southern's president, R. Albert Mohler Jr., told the conference's 200 attendees. Mohler said faithful Christians must not take for granted the notion of truth. Every worldview, he said in preaching from John 18:33-38, must answer four questions: Why is there something instead of nothing? What has gone wrong? Is there any hope or a remedy for the wrong? How does the story end? "Christians seeking to be faithful cannot avoid understanding that we are going to have to deal with, in every single moment, the perpetual responsibility of being clear about what Christianity is, and there is no way to do that without being clear about what truth is," Mohler said. In outlining 16 characteristics of truth, Mohler noted, "The most important apologetic that we can offer the world is an apologetic of love. That means that if we are really sharing the truth, we are doing so out of a love for the human being to whom we are speaking. "If our apologetic is rooted in anything other than love, it will destroy our credibility, because no one is shouted, shamed, humiliated, embarrassed into the Kingdom of Christ," he said. Mohler was joined at the March 18-19 conference by Russell Moore, president of the SBC's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission; Dan DeWitt, dean of Boyce College, the undergraduate school of Southern Seminary; and Greg Thornbury, president of The King's College in New York City. Moore, formerly Southern's academic vice president and dean of the school of theology, explained how a proper worldview is rooted in a Christian ethic. Speaking on Matthew 25:31-46, Moore said Christians may often find themselves in situations when what is right is not easy to discern. During these times, he said, Christians must strive to live ethically even if it does not make sense in the eyes of the world, like loving those who are ignored and overlooked by society. "The faith that attaches to Christ is not looking at itself, but it is looking at Christ. Then Christians recognize Jesus in the most vulnerable around them," Moore said. "Sometimes we lack confidence and are afraid, but we are ...- being driven by truth." DeWitt preached from Colossians 2:1-10, showing how to answer plausible arguments against the Gospel. People who have non-Christian worldviews are not stupid, he said, but are enslaved and blinded by Satan. "The best remedy for radical secularism is not reading a lot of books, but a better understanding of the Gospel. At the end of the day, the Gospel is the only thing that can defeat secularism or radical Islam," said DeWitt, author of a new apologetics-themed book, "Christ or Chaos." "There are a lot of plausible arguments and indeed there is much deceptive philosophy, but the Gospel will not bow to a single one of them and it will not be intimidated." Thornbury warned conference attendees not to miss opportunities for Gospel witness when engaging the culture. Describing the friendship of Lutheran pastor Oskar Pfister and psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, Thornbury said Pfister refuted Freud's beliefs but never called him to repentance and faith. "There is a whole generation who traded apologetics for cultural engagement. However, our problem is not engaging culture, but figuring out how to disentangle ourselves from it," Thornbury said. "We cannot engage the culture without getting to the Gospel. If you miss getting to 'Repent for the Kingdom of God is now,' you may have run the risk yourself of having the form of godliness but denying the power thereof." State senator: Abortion & religious liberty battles similar By Alex Sibley FORT WORTH, Texas (BP) -- Texas state Sen. Konni Burton acknowledges that fighting for religious liberty is an uphill battle in today's culture, but she sees hope. Addressing students at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Burton recalled the Supreme Court's precedent-setting Roe v. Wade decision, pointing out that many thought it would end the discussion on abortion. "But actually, it led to more and more discussion," Burton said. "In the last few years we've made more progress, and the next generation is more pro-life than the last generation." Burton said pro-life legislators had to deal with the issue of abortion in incremental ways, passing bills targeting specific aspects of the practice, such as the relatively recent bill in Texas that closed numerous abortion clinics across the state. She concluded that, just as Roe v. Wade failed to silence the discussion on abortion, so recent court decisions will fail to end the protection of religious liberty. The politics of religious liberty was the focus of a question-and-answer session in Southwestern's "Grindstone" series April 4. Joining Burton on the panel was Barrett Duke, vice president for public policy and research for the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. Assistant professor of ethics Evan Lenow moderated the discussion. Duke noted that much of the conversation on religious liberty pertains not simply to one's freedom of belief but also the larger issue of freedom of practice. "There are many people who want to distinguish between religious freedom and freedom of worship," Duke said. "They want to say, 'You're free to worship within the walls of your church building or your synagogue or your mosque, but once you leave the walls of that worship space, you're under a different set of requirements and duties, and your religious freedom isn't as sacrosanct as it is within the walls of your church building.'" Driven by this mentality, efforts abound to restrict how people live out their religious beliefs, Duke said. "Our position, and the position of many people around the states, is that it isn't religious freedom if you can't follow the dictates of your conscience in the way that you live and the way that you behave," he noted. Examining various ways that states are handling issues pertaining to religious liberty, Duke noted that a number of municipalities have passed local ordinances preventing employers from making hiring decisions based on a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. Such ordinances are referred to as "SOGI" laws. These laws, Duke explained, essentially prevent faith-based businesses and people of faith from living out their religious beliefs. In response, however, some states are attempting to pass laws that invalidate SOGI laws as discriminatory against people of faith, "which, in reality, they are," Duke said. North Carolina, for example, passed a law saying that no local municipality can have a SOGI law that differs from state law. Tennessee passed a similar law several years ago. Regarding such legislation in Texas, Burton said that while the state legislature is currently between sessions (they meet during odd-numbered years), lawmakers nevertheless are hard at work preparing bills for the next session. In fact, the State Affairs Committee received a charge from Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick to spend this interim period examining "measures to affirm First Amendment religious liberty protections in Texas" so they can then make recommendations "to ensure that the government does not force individuals, organizations or businesses to violate their sincerely held religious beliefs." This interim period includes a vetting process in which people can voice their concerns regarding specific pieces of legislation, information about which is available online. Burton encouraged students to be involved in the process so their voices can be heard. Addressing the notion that contacting state representatives is difficult, Lenow noted that in order to invite Burton to Southwestern, he simply emailed her through her website and received a response later that same day. Burton counseled, "Make sure that you engage at every level and get good, pro-Constitution people in every level, and we will continue to fight. The good news is we are doing what it takes, and we're not going to quit." -------------------------------------------------------------------- Monkey study challenged over Darwinian claims by David Roach Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday NASHVILLE (BP) -- A study of monkey calls hailed as evidence for the evolutionary origin of human speech has been critiqued by an Intelligent Design proponent as "flimsy" support for the Darwinian scheme. An article in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society similarly has argued for the supernatural origin of language, stating that a divine creator is the "only reasonable way to account for" the phenomenon of language. The study of African gelada monkeys -- published April 18 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences -- may offer insight into common ways in which animals and humans vocalize sounds, but it does not explain how language came to convey "complex meaning," said a biologist with the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that plays a leading role in the Intelligent Design movement, which argues the universe is the product of intelligence rather than blind chance. "Words can be combined to convey potentially any message," Ann Gauger, the Discovery Institute's director of science communication, told Baptist Press in written comments. "Language can be used to talk about itself; the sounds that convey particular meanings are arbitrary and dependent on conventions agreed to by the speakers; and language can convey events past, present, future or imaginary. These are just some of the characteristics of human language that resist any comparisons with animal vocalizations." The study, authored by two University of Michigan scholars and two Europeans, argues that gelada calls follow a linguistic principle known as Menzerath's law, which states that longer sequences of language tend to have shorter components. In human speech, for example, longer sentences tend to contain shorter clauses, and longer words tend to contain shorter syllables. With geladas, longer calls tend to contain shorter "grunts," "moans," "wobbles" and "yawns," as researchers classified the components. The researchers do not believe different types of gelada calls communicate different meanings, but they argued the meaning of monkey calls is not important in establishing initial evidence for the evolution of language. "Identifying basic patterns of sequence structure that are shared by human and nonhuman animal communication provides evidence for evolutionary preservation, or convergent evolution, of the processes underlying the emergence of such patterns," the four coauthors wrote. "... Finding Menzerath's law in gelada communication suggests that strings of sound following this law could predate the evolution of meaningful combinations." Lead author Morgan Gustison of the University of Michigan told NPR male geladas likely seek to produce longer vocal sequences with shorter, faster components in an attempt to dominate "vocalization" sessions and establish themselves as leaders in a group. Gauger, of the Discovery Institute, called the study "a pretty flimsy piece of evidence for the evolution of language." "My dog barks faster when he's in a fight with another dog over territory or dominance," Gauger said. "Is he trying not to be interrupted or just to overpower the other dog? The last dog barking wins. It's the same with monkeys, I would guess. But that has nothing to do with human language or its evolution. Language conveys complex meaning, and the meaning is not dependent on speed." In December, evangelical scholars John Baumgardner of Southern California Seminary and Jeremy Lyon of Truett-McConnell College went even further in an article published in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society. They argued the existence of language "falsifies" the "foundational truth claim" of those who argue the material world is all that exists and humans evolved apart from God's action. Language is expressed through a physical medium like ink on a page, sound waves in the air or electronic encoding in a cell phone network, Baumgardner and Lyon wrote. But meaning, which is an essential component of language, is independent of any physical medium and therefore cannot arise from a material source. That fact, they wrote, is key to proving God's existence. The laws of chemistry and physics, Baumgardner and Lyon wrote, "offer no clue whatsoever that matter can assign meaning or otherwise deal with meaning at even the most rudimentary level. Even when matter is organized in extremely complex ways, such as in electronic networks with trillions of interconnected transistors, there is no hint, in the absence of software, of any ability whatsoever to generate meaning-bearing signals or behavior. Although naturalists once imagined that such behavior might somehow emerge, there is no observational evidence that suggests it possibly can." The existence of language with meaning -- especially complex biochemical language like DNA coding -- appears to leave "no other rational possibility" than to believe an Intelligent Designer, God, created it, Baumgardner and Lyon wrote. "The case is so strong that God's reality ought to no longer be a topic for debate in scholarly circles." The "linguistic capacity of such an Intelligent Designer ... ought to draw a person's attention to the God of the Bible," they wrote. "The Bible, from its first page to its last, discloses God as a God who speaks. And especially in the Bible's opening verses, when God speaks, things happen." -------------------------------------------------------------------- Ga. fires physician for lay sermons, lawsuit says by Diana Chandler Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday ATLANTA (BP) -- First Liberty Institute has filed a lawsuit for a bivocational lay minister and physician, alleging the state of Georgia fired him because of sermons he delivered in the pulpit before his employment as a district health director. The Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) fired Eric Walsh a week after hiring him as a district health director for northwest Atlanta because of the content of sermons he delivered as an ordained lay minister, alleges the suit filed April 20 in U.S. District Court in Atlanta. The termination violates Walsh's rights to free speech, free exercise of religion and freedom of association guaranteed under the First Amendment, the suit asserts. It also stated the termination violated his right to equal protection guaranteed under the Fourth Amendment and his freedom from religious discrimination guaranteed under Title 7 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. "Religious liberty means we should be able to find sanctuary in our own sanctuary," senior counsel Jeremy Dys said on First Liberty's website. "If the government is allowed to fire someone over what he said in his sermons, then they can come after any of us for our beliefs on anything. We must ensure every American has the right to talk about their faith at church without getting fired or being barred from public service." A noted physician who has directed the Pasadena, Calif., public health department and served on President Obama's Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS, Walsh is an ordained Seventh Day Adventist lay minister. "I am a devout member of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, and, as a part of my sincerely-held religious beliefs, I believe in expressing my faith," Walsh said in a complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission preceding the lawsuit. "My faith is important to me; I regularly speak about my faith at churches and religious conferences." His sermons focused on topics including following God, health, marriage, sexuality, world religions, science, creationism, compassion for the poor and other topics. The Georgia Department of Public Health has said it fired Walsh for other unspecified reasons. The DPH fired Walsh in May 2014, one day after he provided copies of his sermons to the state, said Walsh's attorneys, who provided a copy of an email indicating the DPH asked several employees to review and critique Walsh's sermons. Walsh has been unable to find employment in public health since then, Liberty Institute said. The law firm of Parks, Chesin & Walbert joins Liberty Institute in the civil action filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. In a similar case in Georgia, the Atlanta Fire Department terminated Kelvin Cochran in January 2015 as fire chief because of a self-published book he wrote for his church's Bible study group. In "Who Told You That You Were Naked?" Cochran included a brief reference to the biblical teaching that sex is reserved for a man and a woman in marriage. An Atlanta district court amended a lawsuit in December 2015 that the Alliance Defending Freedom filed on Cochran's behalf, but allowed the primary claims of "retaliation, discrimination based on his viewpoint, and the violation of his constitutionally protected freedom of religion, association, and due process (firing without following proper procedure)" to proceed, the ADF said. Cochran, a deacon at the 19,000-member Elizabeth Baptist Church affiliated with the Georgia Baptist Convention, has since entered the preaching ministry. The Georgia Legislature passed a religious liberty bill March 16, the Free Exercise Protection Act, but Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal vetoed it less than two weeks later. The bill had combined elements of a Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a First Amendment Defense Act and a Pastor Protection Act. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Tenn. Bible bill veto sustained by Lonnie Wilkey and David Roach Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday NASHVILLE (BP) -- An attempt to override Republican Gov. Bill Haslam's veto of a bill that would have made the Bible the official state book of Tennessee failed Wednesday (April 20). After nearly two hours of discussion, members of the Tennessee House of Representatives voted 50-43 against overriding the veto, The Tennessean reported. An override would have required only a simple majority in both chambers of the state legislature, a margin it achieved comfortably upon initial passage. Because the House did not vote to override, the Senate did not take up the issue. The veto was Haslam's fourth since taking office in 2011, according to The Tennessean. Rep. Jerry Sexton, the bill's House sponsor and a former Tennessee Baptist pastor, told Baptist Press he believes some lawmakers who supported the measure initially opposed an override because of "pressure that was put on from the governor's office." Sexton added he is not aware of any other factors that influenced legislators to change their votes. Following the vote, Sexton, a first-term Republican, told local reporters he knew overriding the veto would be "a strong uphill climb." "There is so much oppression today of Christian beliefs and values," Sexton said according to The Tennessean. Although being a Christian "is not the popular thing to do," he said, "I stand today to say that I'm a Christian and I'm proud that I am and I'm proud that I live in a country that I have the freedom to do that." During floor debate, Rep. Terri Lynn Weaver speculated that overriding Haslam's veto could help spark a national revival. "What if we are the state that fans the flame and causes other states to pay attention and read our actions," Weaver, a Republican, said according to The Tennessean. "What if Tennessee was the state that started the revival that this nation so desperately needs." Haslam told NPR he opposed making the Bible Tennessee's state book for three reasons. "One, I had some issues around the constitutionality," Haslam said April 21. "But even more than that, personally I think it trivializes the Bible. We have an official state insect and state salamander and 500 other things. That's not what the Bible is. "And then third, the bill was passed kind of under the premise that, 'Well, we're not honoring it as Holy Scripture. We're honoring it for its historical and economic significance.' Well, either the Bible is the inspired Word of God or it's not. But don't ... pretend you're honoring it for one thing when you're really honoring it for another." Randy C. Davis, executive director of the Tennessee Baptist Convention, had previously noted his disappointment following Haslam's veto. "Holy Scripture needs no human affirmation," Davis said. "The authority of God's Word has not been diminished because a state hasn't declared it 'official.' Personal affirmation of the Bible and regularly reading the Bible is far more important than state-sanctioned recognition of the Bible." In 2015, a similar bill passed the Tennessee House but was killed in the Senate through a procedural vote. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Bible Study: April 24, 2016 by Staff/LifeWay Christian Resources Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday NASHVILLE (BP) -- This weekly Bible study appears in Baptist Press in a partnership with LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention. Through its Leadership and Adult Publishing team, LifeWay publishes Sunday School curricula and additional resources for all age groups. This week's Bible study is adapted from the Bible Studies For Life curriculum. Bible Passages: Genesis 27:41, 33:1-11 Discussion Question: What's a silly argument you had when you were a kid? Food for thought by Clayton King: The first thing I did when I got engaged was call my parents and grandparents to tell them the good news. My grandfather -- equal parts straight-shooter and comedian -- remarked: "Well, that's pretty good, I guess. I just have one question. Do you like this girl?" The question took me off guard. Why else would I have asked her to be my wife? "I love her with all my heart," I said. He replied, "I didn't ask you if you loved her. I asked if you liked her. You're going to be married to her for the rest of your life, and you're probably going to disagree and argue and fight a lot, so if you're going to work through conflict, you better really like this girl as a person and a friend." He knew a truth about all relationships: conflict happens. Broken relationships often go off track because somebody insists on having something their way. Jacob and Esau are a prime example, but they also show us the key to repairing a broken relationship. Jacob was continually grabbing at his brother's heel. He grabbed Esau's birthright. He grabbed Esau's blessing. And if he wasn't careful, he was going to grab more than he bargained for: "Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. And Esau determined in his heart: 'The days of mourning for my father are approaching; then I will kill my brother Jacob'" (Genesis 27:41). If you've ever been let down or injured, if you've ever experienced searing anger, then you can relate to the raw emotion Esau expressed toward Jacob. Esau felt his anger was justified, and we often feel the same. A relationship that once was a blessing can become broken. Twenty years later, Jacob had become a changed man. More than having matured, he had moved forward in repentance and restoration. This required humility. Humility is a needed cure for the sickness of a broken relationship. Thankfully, God had also been at work in Esau's life. In the end, the brothers were able to reconcile because one humbled himself and the other forgave. Either one could have kept up the wall. Both were willing to knock it down. In the same way, it's up to us to knock down the walls we've put up in our lives. We start here: If you've wronged someone, ask forgiveness. If needed, seek to make restitution. If someone wronged you, forgive. Period. Even if the offender never apologizes, forgive. Our example is Jesus Christ, who came to earth for the very purpose of reconciling us to God and restoring our right standing with God. He forgave all who killed Him, and He forgives us. Exercise humility and take the first step. Trust God with the rest. Bible Studies For Life Bible Studies for Life is a life-stage focused family of resources that addresses key issues in the lives of adults and students. Consisting of seven curriculum lines developed for various life and generational stages plus two others designed for deeper study, all of these resources focus on the same Bible passage for each week. Information about the seven curriculum lines and more information can be found on the Internet at LifeWay.com/BibleStudiesforLife. Other ongoing Bible study options for all ages offered by LifeWay can be found at LifeWay.com/SundaySchool. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Grace & truth needed, say Moore, Scroggins to Va. pastors by Tom Strode Date: April 21, 2016 - Thursday FREDERICKSBURG, Va. (BP) -- Christian ministry in America's sexual culture calls for both grace and truth, Southern Baptist ethicist Russell Moore and pastor Jimmy Scroggins said in a conference for Virginia church leaders. Pastors and other leaders "must be separated from sin, but we can never be separated from sinners," Moore told an audience April 19 at the Empowered Conference sponsored by the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia (SBCV). "But it is easier in ministry to do the reverse." Christians must be willing to endure criticism for spending time with transgender and other sexually broken people "in order to speak with truth and with grace, with conviction and with kindness" to them, said Moore, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. In this way, pastors and others must speak "with the confidence that you are on mission with Christ so you are not afraid of the lost people who are offended by what it is you are saying and you are not afraid of the religious critics who are upset that you are having those conversations with those lost people," he said. Scroggins, lead pastor of the Family Church in West Palm Beach, Fla., told the leaders they have "to be saturated with the grace of God" as they teach on sexuality, gender and marriage. "Teaching on this stuff in this culture with a really hard edge, slicing people to ribbons with the Gospel machete, that's not going to help," he said. Moore and Scroggins were the keynote speakers for the annual conference, which was held this year at Spotswood Baptist Church in Fredericksburg. They addressed the theme -- "The Gospel, Morality and Marriage" -- in separate messages and a question-and-answer session. Basing his message on the John 4 account of Jesus' encounter with the Samaritan woman, Moore said a faithful church "has to be the kind of church that earns the respect of the people around us by speaking and telling the truth. Our neighbors can read texts. They understand what our Scriptures teach." What non-Christians want to know is, Moore told the conference attendees, "Do you really believe this, and do you believe this enough that you are willing to lose my esteem because you hold to these things?" "If you and I are going to equip people to be able to minister in a world that has much confusion when it comes to issues of relationships and sexuality and marriage, we must be willing to undergo the controversy of being assumed to be bigots, being assumed to be hateful, being assumed to be people who don't get it when we speak of a vision of sexuality," he said. During the question-and-answer session, Scroggins was asked how to apply grace and truth to ministry to convicted sex offenders or child molesters. They should be called to repent of their sins and believe the Gospel, then pursue God's design, Scroggins said. They will have a "high level of accountability" in the church, however, including separation from the nursery and children's ministry, he told attendees. The church should separate the offenders from temptation and children from potential dangers, Scroggins said. Moore said a church should have "an absolute, zero-tolerance policy" and "never, never, never cover up anything that even approaches the abuse of a child or a vulnerable person." Civil authorities, as well as church authorities, should be involved in every possible situation of abuse, Moore said. "And you cannot substitute one for the other." "One of the worst and most egregious things" regarding the cause of the body of Christ has occurred when people "have had their entire lives destroyed by predators within churches and within ministries, and those things have been covered over because people didn't want to deal with them," he said. "That is not just wrong; that is an abomination before God, and we have to be the people who make sure it doesn't happen." During his remarks based on 2 Cor. 5:17-21, Scroggins told the audience "one of the best ways that we can be ambassadors" of reconciliation between God and human beings "is what we do with our gender, our sexuality and our families." "One of the best ways to be an ambassador is just to have a healthy marriage," he said. Scroggins offered various ideas for church leaders to consider when training others and speaking about sexuality, gender and family structure, including: -- Remember it is an ongoing conversation, not just a sermon. -- Continually connect sexuality to God's design in marriage. -- Make it clear but not crude. -- Encourage, don't condemn. -- Focus on stewarding the gift of sexuality rather than a once-for-all triumphalism over lust. SBC President Ronnie Floyd addressed conference attendees by video, encouraging pastors to preach the Bible, rely on its authority and address moral issues truthfully and lovingly.