The original issue can be found at: http://www.baptistpress.com/issue-04/28/1998 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. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Mark Brister accepts OBU presidential post by (BP) Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday SHAWNEE, Okla. (BP)--The Oklahoma Baptist University trustees, in a special called meeting April 27, elected Mark A. Brister, pastor of Broadmoor Baptist Church, Shreveport, La., as OBU's 14th president. Brister will become president-elect effective Aug. 1 and will assume the presidency when Bob R. Agee retires, effective Sept. 1.
"Believing this to be God's clear call, I accept the invitation to become the next president of OBU," Brister told the trustees. "Pray for us as we now must share this with our church."
Addressing the faculty, Brister added, "We are awed, humbled and honored to be here with you. The process that has unfolded in recent weeks has been an incredible journey for us. We have prayed and sought God's leadership and feel a very deep, profound sense of calling. OBU must never lose its vision of who we are in Christ. But we must not compromise the academics in this journey one iota."
Brister was the unanimous choice of the OBU presidential search committee, according to Sam Hammons, chairman of the committee and an attorney from Edmond, Okla. "We really felt the prayers of a lot of people," Hammons said. "We have really sensed the movement of the Lord in this matter."
"He did not apply for the job," Agee noted. "In fact, he was very surprised when the committee contacted him and said his name had been submitted."
Agee recounted that the search committee "had been interviewing college presidents and chief financial officers, but had been waiting for that 'aha' moment when you know it is the right person. With him, that moment finally came."
Anthony Jordan, executive director-treasurer of the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma, said, "All the way through, the group had the sense that God would lead us to the right person."
Active in Baptist life, Brister was chairman of the Southern Baptist Convention Program and Structure Study Committee which developed a reorganization of the convention's agency structure from 1994-96.
Before becoming pastor of the 6,000-member Shreveport church in 1989, Brister was pastor of Memorial Baptist Church, Baytown, Texas, for five years. Earlier he was pastor of First Baptist Church, Bolivar, Mo.
The nomination of Brister for the OBU presidency came from John Newport, vice president for academic affairs and provost at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas. "I believe Mark Brister has just the right background and qualifications to be president of OBU," Newport wrote. "From my perspective, Mark has the right theological and denominational perspective for OBU and Oklahoma. I believe Mark Brister is a person uniquely equipped for this strategic position."
A graduate of Baylor University, Waco, Texas, Brister received his master of divinity and doctor of philosophy degrees from Southwestern Seminary, where he received the Albert Venting Jr. Memorial Award as the outstanding graduate in the school of theology.
Brister was an adjunct professor at Southwestern seminary, 1977-80, and has been a guest professor at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, Southwestern Seminary, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Missouri, and the Baptist Theological Seminary of Eastern Africa. He has served as a trustee at Houston Baptist University and Louisiana College, where he was chairman of the business affairs committee.
He grew up in a family of educators. His father, C.W. Brister, is the Warren Hultgren distinguished professor of pastoral care at Southwestern Seminary and his mother, Gloria, has been a mathematics teacher and administrator in the Fort Worth public schools. His grandmother, the late Elaine Holmes Brister, was professor of history at Louisiana College.
Brister has served on the Southern Baptist Convention Committee on Committees and on the Southern Baptist "Reaching America for Christ" Task Force. He recently has served on the Glorieta/Ridgecrest Capital Campaign Cabinet for the Baptist Sunday School Board. He also has been involved in volunteer missions in Scotland, Kenya, Mexico and Romania. For three consecutive years his sermons were published in The Zondervan Pastor's Annual.
Brister's wife, Rhonda, directs New Orleans Seminary's satellite program in Shreveport and earlier served on the faculty at Southwest Baptist University when they lived in Bolivar. The Bristers have two children: Barrett Nugent, born in 1981, and Austin Andrew, born in 1986.
Agee, OBU president since 1982, will become president emeritus, continuing to assist OBU with the leadership transition and with fund-raising and alumni relationships. Agee also has been elected as executive director of the Association of Southern Baptist Colleges and Schools, a position he will assume June 1. ASBCS is an association of 65 Southern Baptist-related seminaries, colleges, universities, Bible colleges and academies.
The seven-member search committee which recommended Brister to the trustees included Hammons; Jerry Fielder and Nadine McPherson, both of Oklahoma City; Ray Finch and Michael Gabbert, both of Tulsa; James Robinson of Clinton; and Skip Robinson of Durant. Ex officio members were Anthony Jordan, executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma; Max Brattin, chairman of the faculty council; Elizabeth Howell Dillard; president of the Alumni Association; and Sarah Sitzes, president of the Student Government Association.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- Patterson to Texas conservatives: God blesses witnessing churches by Dave Couric Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday GARLAND, Texas (BP)--Being "inadequately grateful" is the only conceivable reason why Christians do not become soul-winning or witnessing people, said Paige Patterson, who will be nominated as Southern Baptist Convention president in June, in a keynote address at a statewide rally of the Southern Baptists of Texas April 24.
The SBT, which held its rally at Orchard Hills Baptist Church in the Dallas suburb of Garland, is in the process of moving from a "fellowship" to a "convention" with full recognition and participation in the SBC and its agencies, according to Dee Slocum, vice president of SBT and an Amarillo pastor.
The process of becoming a convention will be finalized at the SBT fall meeting at which time a constitution, budget, personnel and other matters will be adopted officially and the transition will have been made to an autonomous and democratic organization, SBT officials reported in printed materials distributed at the rally. The SBT constitutional convention will take place on Tuesday, Nov. 10, and will coincide with the annual meeting of the Baptist General Convention of Texas Nov. 9-10 in Houston.
Challenging the 300 churches that have so far expressed an interest in the Southern Baptists of Texas, Patterson urged that they make witnessing their top priority.
Patterson, known as an architect of the conservative resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention, is president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Wake Forest, N.C., and former president of Criswell College in Dallas.
Voicing his vision of all Southern Baptist churches becoming soul-winning churches as the only way to guarantee the blessing of God, Patterson told the SBT rally, "If Southern Baptists of Texas make their priority soul-winning, witnessing, church-planting, getting people to Christ, then it doesn't matter who is against you. If God be for you, who can be against you?"
"How can you guarantee the smile of God?" Patterson asked in a sermon from Revelation 11. "How can you have the anointing of God on your life, your ministry, your church? It's so unbelievably simple. You don't have to write church-growth books about it; thank God for every one of them that says anything good, but you don't have to do it. It's as simple as this: Great churches blessed of God are witnessing churches; they are soul-winning churches.
"If SBT (churches) want to prosper and want to have the smile of God and the anointing of God on what they're doing, then don't worry about what anybody else in the state of Texas is doing," Patterson said. "But (say), `We are going to show the love of Christ to a lost and dying generation; we are going to excel in one thing: Our love for Christ is going to manifest itself in our love for lost men and women ... .' The blessings of God rest upon you if you're a soul-winning, Christ-honoring group."
As an example of the kind of church-planting and growth that he envisions for the SBT and the SBC in general, Patterson told of a partnership between Southeastern and Baptists in New Hampshire of the Baptist Convention of New England. The seminary has agreed to start 50 new Southern Baptist churches in New Hampshire over the next 10 years in response to a request by the director of missions there. Patterson said he had been looking for just such a project for Southeastern graduates. When he heard about the need in New Hampshire, which has only 19 Southern Baptist churches, he accepted the challenge on behalf of the seminary.
Texas has always been the most Southern Baptist state, but New Hampshire may deserve that designation in the next 10 years, Patterson remarked.


-------------------------------------------------------------------- Southern celebrates racial diversity, creates scholarship for black students by James A. Smith Sr. Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP)--Although the founders of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary could not have imagined participating in a racially integrated worship service during their days in the mid-19th century, the modern-day stewards of Southern Baptists' oldest seminary did just that April 23 in a lively, two-and-a-half-hour "Service of Celebration."
The worship service honored the first four African American graduates of Southern Seminary with a scholarship named in their honor and looked to a future of closer ministry efforts between the seminary and Louisville, Ky., area black congregations.
"There is a sense in which ... our founders in their earthly lifetimes would not have been able to understand the picture before us now," President R. Albert Mohler Jr. said of the multiracial congregation assembled to worship. "But I believe that now they understand the picture. For gathered with them is a great multitude of saints far more diverse than this.
"Our commitment as the Lord gives us sight is to know how better to order our ways, how better to live our lives, how better genuinely to be a Christian institution in the service of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ," Mohler added. "And we are gathered here tonight on our part to say to you, please help us to know what it is we ought to do and to know how it we ought to do so."
Joining Southern Seminary administrators, faculty and students were leading African American ministers and laity from Louisville congregations. The service, originally scheduled to coincide with Black History Month in February, was postponed by a record snowfall.
In addition to Scripture readings, a scholarship fund presentation and a sermon, the service also included spirited musical presentations from two African American congregations, Galilee Baptist Church and St. Stephen Baptist Church, as well as a song performed by the seminary ensemble and Parkland Baptist Church choir.
While expressing gratitude for the theological and doctrinal heritage of Southern Seminary, Mohler acknowledged the seminary's founders allowed sin to distort their understanding of racial issues.
"There are many who look back to that era and try to look for an explanation, when a short, three-letter word you and I know how to speak is the only answer: sin. And the teeth of the children are set on edge even by the sins of the fathers," Mohler said, paraphrasing the prophet Ezekiel. "And the sad reality is that our teeth are still somewhat set on edge."
In a step to honor the legacy of Southern Seminary's first African American graduates and to improve educational opportunities for such students, Mohler announced the establishment of the Offut-Bottoms-Miller-Taylor Scholarship Fund for African American Students, named in honor of the graduates.
Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission President Richard Land presented Mohler with a check for nearly $17,000 from Southern Baptist Convention special funds raised to help rebuild arson-ravaged African American churches in 1995. Southern Seminary, along with the other five SBC seminaries, received the excess monies from the arson fund after all requests for assistance had been filled, Land explained.
Mohler expressed appreciation for "this down payment and investment," adding the seminary considered the funds "a seed we intend to plant and work hard to water and seek to grow." Donations to the scholarship fund received in offerings during the service pushed the total to nearly $20,000, seminary officials later reported.
Although tainted by the sin of racial prejudice in its early years, ethics professor C. Ben Mitchell explained administrators and faculty at Southern in the 1940s began to violate a 1904 Kentucky law which prohibited integrated education at public and private institutions. In 1942, Southern professors began educating black students "in faculty offices and in hallways" and through open classroom windows in defiance of the segregation law, Mitchell said. As a result of their efforts, Garland K. Offut was the first African American to be awarded a degree, a doctor of theology, from Southern Seminary in 1942. Ten years later, the first three blacks to be awarded the bachelor of divinity degree graduated, just two years after the segregation law was repealed in 1950.
Noting the snowstorm postponement of the worship service, Mitchell told the audience, "There were many hindrances along the way toward making this evening come to pass. I believe that we are in spiritual warfare. And I believe that there is a satanic desire to keep us apart. Greater is he who is in us than he who is in the world. And this evening we are able to meet and rejoice together in the glory of Christ and honor these courageous men who have gone before us."
Honoring the legacy of Southern's first black graduates also was a theme of A. Russell Awkard in his sermon from Acts 17 which recounts the Apostle Paul's sermon in Athens. Awkard is pastor of New Zion Baptist Church in Louisville.
"These men whom we honor tonight after 50 years were men who had the kind of thirst for knowledge that equipped them to endure unmentionable indignities during a time of legalized segregation," Awkard said. "They took the opportunity to be thoroughly prepared for the ministry that was beckoning as the doors of opportunity began to open."
Noting the legacy of the four ministers, who all enjoyed lengthy service in Louisville congregations, Awkard added, "Only God knows what the impact of their pioneering efforts have done to save the souls of those who were in charge during those years."
Awkard explained the unbiblical nature of racism by noting the commonality of the human experience.
"We don't look like one another; we don't have the same names. But we are all in the same family. And as a matter of fact, we are all in the same boat. ... And so, my brothers and my sisters, if the boat goes down, everybody goes down," he asserted.
Comparing sin to natural catastrophes that sometimes strike in unlikely places, Awkard said that like the calamitous El Nino, the effects of sin cannot be contained.
"There is no sin, there is no sickness, there is no problem that you can confine to the alley. You may think that you can contain AIDS and drugs and violence in the ghetto, in the inner city, but El Nino wants us to know that what starts in the alley, if it's not brought under control, will infect the suburbs," Awkard said.
An 18th-century slave in Savannah, Ga., who kept preaching in spite of the punishment of his master, provides an example of the power of the gospel, Awkard said. "We must keep preaching and we must not be hindered by the perception of the results," he declared, adding, "We must not preach only when we expect unanimous and positive results."
The firm commitment of the slave to continue preaching, Awkard noted, resulted in the conversion of the master, the establishment of the first black church in Savannah and a state convention in Georgia.
Although only a few were converted under Paul's preaching in Athens, Awkard declared, "We must preach knowing that his Word will never return unto us void."
-------------------------------------------------------------------- Education savings accounts receive approval in Senate by Tom Strode Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday WASHINGTON (BP)--Education reform legislation permitting tax-free savings accounts to be used for private schooling has cleared the U.S. Senate.
The Senate approved the legislation, which includes the education savings account plan, by a 56-43 vote. A conference committee will be named to work out differences between the Senate version and similar legislation passed by the House of Representatives in October.
The education savings account provision, with Sen. Paul Coverdell, R.-Ga., as chief sponsor, allows parents to place as much as $2,000 a year for a child in an account at a tax-free rate if the savings are used for education. This post-tax money could be used for kindergarten through 12th-grade students at private, religious or home schools, but it also could be utilized for such expenses as tutoring, uniforms or home computers for public-school students.
The Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission endorsed the measure in August as one of its top 10 immediate legislative priorities. The proposal is consistent with a 1996 SBC resolution supporting parental choice in education, said Will Dodson, the ERLC's director of public policy.
"This will equip parents with a greater number of alternatives in their children's education," Dodson said. "For many, it may mean that they will no longer, as a practical matter, be forced to send their children to public schools that may promote values contrary to what is being taught in their homes and churches."
The Coverdell plan was rejected by President Clinton and removed from the budget deal last summer. The president has continued to signal his opposition. Some amendments added by the Senate probably increased the likelihood of a veto. Senators approved amendments prohibiting the implementation of Clinton's plan for national English and math tests, as well as removing federal control from education grants to state and local governments.
"I urge the president to review the legislation in its final form before making any decision about the substance of our proposal," Coverdell said in a written statement. The Senate vote "represents both a great victory for our nation's schools and a giant step forward in the journey toward genuine education reform. We are on the verge of providing desperately needed education assistance to millions" of families, he said.
Sen. Robert Torricelli, D.-N.J., cosponsor of the education savings accounts, and four other Democrats voted for the legislation April 23. All but three Republicans voted for it.
Sen. Edward Kennedy, D.-Mass., called the reform legislation a "scorched-earth" policy by Republicans toward education and an attempt "to privatize" it, The Washington Post reported.
Another Democrat, Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia, said in defense of his vote for the bill, according to The Washington Times, "I have been voting for education funding for decades, but American students are still mired in mediocrity. This is a new approach and is entitled to be tested."
One of the opponents of education savings accounts is the National Education Association.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- Ellen's fall from ratings finally earns network's ax by Dwayne Hastings Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday LOS ANGELES (BP)--News that the "Ellen" program was being canceled brought cheers and tears from opposite sides of American culture.
The Disney-owned ABC Network announced April 23 that the series, which broke ground with its portrayal of a homosexual as its lead character, would end after a one-hour finale May 13.
The program's homosexual thrust was cited by Southern Baptists in joining in the call for economic action against The Disney Company during the SBC meeting last June in Dallas for "promoting immoral ideologies."
Whether it was the protests by those opposed to the show's content on prime time or the program's aggressive exploration of DeGenere's lesbian lifestyle, Nielsen ratings dropped steadily for the program throughout the season.
The ratings slide began almost as soon as DeGeneres announced her homosexuality, carrying the show's lead character with her, in a program April 30, 1997, watched by an estimated 36 million viewers. The program, which made its debut in 1994, now averages around 11 million viewers, according to The Los Angeles Times.
News reports last December said ABC executives had not expected DeGeneres to go as far as she did in depicting lesbian dating situations on the show. During the ABC affiliates' board meetings, the network described the situation as "an ongoing battle" with DeGeneres.
Yet the Disney-owned network knew the program's story line was risky from the beginning but was apparently eager to shake free of tradition. Disney exec Susan Saroff, in an article in The Advocate, a leading journal for the homosexual community, released a day before the controversial episode aired, said, "Ultimately this move makes Disney even more reflective of America because we're acknowledging a basic truth about this country, that there are different kinds of people here. We're getting very good at showing that."
Richard Land, head of the Southern Baptists' Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, expressed delight that the program was being pulled.
"Disney/ABC has finally succumbed to the financial pressures that were increasingly squeezing this television series that is barely clinging to the bottom rung of the ratings ladder," the ERLC president said. "The majority of Americans do not approve of homosexuality and lesbianism as a lifestyle. And they certainly disapprove of an openly lesbian lifestyle being flaunted in prime time on network television."
Said Tim Wildmon, American Family Association vice president, "This clearly demonstrates that viewers are tired of the constant in-your-face themes of shows promoting homosexuality. Americans aren't homophobes, but they do want to protect their children from unnatural lifestyles. Disney just didn't get it until they were slapped in the face with Ellen's dismal ratings."
The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation expressed sadness over the show's cancellation. "But the important thing to note," GLAAD executive director Joan Garry told the Reuters news agency, "is that 1997 will be remembered as an historic year for the gay community."
Garry told The LA Times the program "made history and changed hearts and minds." She told the New York Daily News in April, "I don't think people realize how powerful this show is."
Movie star Emma Thompson joined screen star Sean Penn in a November 1997 episode in which both characters played themselves announcing their homosexuality. It was during that show that Thompson, garnering up the courage to tell the world she was homosexual, told Ellen, "Let's go out and terrify some Baptists."
Land said Southern Baptists were never terrified by the program but instead "disgusted" at the show's promotion of a radical lesbian lifestyle. "Ellen's insistence in giving a week-by-week graphic depiction and description of the lead character's deviant sexual behavior has been rightly and roundly rejected by the American viewing public."
Ellen's departure leaves several television programs with some two dozen homosexual characters in supporting roles -- including "Friends," "Mad About You" and "Spin City," according to the Associated Press. The likelihood for another program with a homosexual lead is high, said Paul Schulman, a TV analyst whose company buys advertising time. "The trail has already been blazed," he said.
Despite the show's demise, experts suggest The Disney Company is intent on pushing the sexual envelope in their television and cinematic productions. "People see Disney as a squeaky-clean image of America," said the openly gay producer Neil Meron, in The Advocate. "But in fact, the company has become a more realistic reflection of America -- one that includes gays and lesbians. That's only fair, since so many of us are creating those images in the first place."
Ellen's prime time slot on Wednesday nights will continue to be filled by the midseason entry, "Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place." The situation comedy has become a ratings success, reported Reuters.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- New Kentucky convention exec tells Southern Seminary his 'burning vision' by Russell D. Moore Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP)--Ignited by a "burning vision" from God, Kentucky Baptists can seize a historic opportunity for the gospel of Christ, said Bill Mackey, the Kentucky Baptist Convention's new executive director, to a chapel service at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Preaching on the faith of Moses recounted in Hebrews 11:24-29, Mackey outlined the characteristics necessary for visionary leadership in uncertain times.
Even as a postmodern society seems to be increasingly directionless and chaotic, Mackey told the seminarians he is optimistic about the role of Kentucky Baptists in confronting the culture with the solid foundations of biblical truth.
"Only the second generation to live through a millennium transition, the last on the heels of the dark ages, what an opportunity we have!" Mackey declared.
Introducing Mackey to the seminary community for the first time in his post, President R. Albert Mohler Jr., praised the new executive director as "a man who firmly believes in the gospel and has a heart for evangelism and a passion for growing churches."
"I firmly believe that the Lord has brought Dr. Bill Mackey to this post for this hour," he said. "I believe we will see the fruit of his ministry for years to come."
Mohler pledged to Mackey the wholehearted backing of the seminary community as Mackey begins his service to Kentucky Baptists.
"We want to state publicly that we want to be with you and behind you," Mohler told Mackey. "We want Southern Seminary, our faculty, our students and staff to be on the front lines of every good thing in the work of the Kentucky Baptist Convention and the expansion of the gospel in this state under your leadership.
"It is with very great pride that we note that the Kentucky Baptist Convention has turned to a two-time alumnus of Southern Seminary for this most strategic and important leadership post," Mohler said of Mackey, who received both the bachelor of divinity and doctor of ministry degrees from the seminary.
Mackey pointed to God's dramatic self-revelation from a burning bush to the reluctant Moses whom he had chosen to lead the Israelites from servitude in Egypt to illustrate the urgency of a "clear and contagious vision from God" necessary to lead God's people in proclaiming the gospel of Christ to a new generation of unbelievers. Methodology and timing may be optional, Mackey counseled, but a captivation with God's purposes is crucial.
The relationships between believers is also of paramount concern, Mackey said. He told seminarians that he is beginning his tenure in the Bluegrass State with a conviction that God will heal whatever rifts may exist between Kentucky Baptists.
"God showed me that he was going to bring Kentucky Baptists together," Mackey said, recalling a morning of prayer as he prepared to accept the call to the executive director's position. "I don't understand how he's going to do it, but I believe he's going to do it in his timing."
Mackey said he believes building a "fabric of relationships" is imperative as the convention faces the issues and challenges that inevitably will come. Mackey said he believes with such relationships are necessary to enable Kentucky Baptists "to stay together through all the tension and the conflict and the issues that may come."
Alluding to Moses' rejection of the pleasures of sin available to him in Pharaoh's court, Mackey contended that a Christlike character, forged by God in the adversities of life, is a vital facet of godly leadership. He recalled his own period of extended fasting and prayer several years ago as a humbling and life-transforming experience as Mackey, then evangelism director for the South Carolina Baptist Convention, came to a renewed awareness of his own depravity, God's holiness and the preciousness of the atoning work of the cross of Christ.
"God will use the circumstances of your life and mine to shape us into the kind of instrument that he can use to accomplish his purposes," he said.
The courage Moses exemplified in his defying the power of Pharaoh and trusting the providence of God is also necessary for visionary, God-directed leadership, Mackey noted.
"It takes courage to be a seminary president. It takes courage to be a pastor. It takes courage to provide leadership in your family. It takes courage to obey the call of God in your life," he said. "But God will bless you if you're willing to venture with him."
The chapel service also served as a time of prayer for the seminary community following the death of longtime childhood education professor Kathryn Chapman. Mohler described her death as a "loss for the children of our churches."
Mohler differentiated the deep grief evidenced by the prayerful tears of students and faculty members in the chapel from the hopeless grieving of those without Christ.
"We really mourn our own loss," he said. "Of this we are certain, our sister is with the Lord she knew and loved and served."
Marsha Ellis Smith, associate vice president for academic administration and one of Chapman's closest friends, led the chapel service in praying for the family, colleagues, students and churches across the nation who were blessed by Chapman's ministry.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- Army chaplains abandon tradition to reach young soldiers with gospel by James Dotson Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday FORT BRAGG, N.C. (BP)--The Sunday morning All-American Service at Fort Bragg is no ordinary U.S. Army chapel service.
The chaplains often wear jeans.
A praise team, accompanied by drums and guitar, leads worship.
Video clips and live drama highlight message themes.
Most significantly, there are many young, single soldiers in attendance -- many of whom have made new or renewed commitments to Christ as a result of their involvement.
Those changed lives were precisely what the leadership group of chaplains had in mind when they started the service about a year and a half ago. And despite the risky departure from military tradition, their success has been noticed.
"I really think this concept is going to be not only the accepted method, but probably the directed method of chapel service in the Army to come," said Lt. Col. Jerry Graham, leader of the team of chaplains responsible for the service.
"We're going to have to understand that we must focus on our target audience, and that is the single soldier. And the more we focus, the more services we are going to do like the All-American service."
Graham was one of four Southern Baptists on the original team of six chaplains who started the service. Although Southern Baptist military chaplains are commissioned and compensated as officers, their ministries are endorsed and given non-financial support by the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention.
The concept for the All-American Service grew out of a shared burden for the thousands of soldiers around them who didn't attend chapel.
"We noticed out of 100 to 150 people, we could literally count on one hand the number of young single soldiers in that service," said Capt. David Mikkelson, another Southern Baptist on the team who now has primary preaching responsibilities.
"They were mostly officers and senior enlisted and their families … in their 30s, 40s and 50s," Mikkelson said. "God just impressed on our hearts this was not why we came to the Army. I didn't come here to just maintain the status quo."
Army chapel services normally come in just a few flavors, Mikkelson explained. There are services for Catholics, Protestants, the African American community and occasionally for other groups with special needs. But he used an analogy of church-growth expert Rick Warren in why they eventually decided to start an entirely new service.
"It's like a radio station trying to attract listeners by playing every style of music," Mikkelson said. "If every song changes style, who's going to listen? Nobody. So it really backfires."
Capt. Dave Shoffner, another Southern Baptist who previously had started several nontraditional services in California, was the initial "senior pastor." Graham said he initially was mystified at such concepts as video clips during a service, but he soon became convinced the idea would work.
"The bottom line for me is just using a different method, but proclaiming the same message," Graham said, adding his superior chaplains and the post commander also encouraged the concept.
They even gained approval to use the Hall of Heroes, a memorial to war heroes, for the services. "We intentionally chose this building because it is not a chapel building," Mikkelson said. "It's informal, comfortable and also very identifiable. … The soldiers know where it's located."
Each Sunday morning the military auditorium is transformed into a worship center. Signs are posted out front, equipment is set up and even the straight rows of chairs are curved toward the center to encourage participatory worship.
Chaplains occasionally walk through the barracks encouraging soldiers to come as they are. And although informality is the rule, the chaplains said much more preparation is required than for traditional chapel services, such as computer graphics throughout the service.
Relationships are of primary importance to the target "baby buster" generation, Mikkelson said, so there is ample fellowship time -- whether through bagels served after each service, monthly outdoor dinners during the summer or small groups that meet during the week.
Mikkelson said targeting the "busters" also requires a complete change in how scriptural truth is presented. Their belief in the authority of Scripture cannot be assumed. Initially, biblical truth often is accepted only on the basis of its perceived relevance to daily life.
"After a while they kind of scratch their head and say, 'This must be true; it works,'" said Mikkelson. "And when they get to the point when they say, 'I want to follow this Jesus that you're talking about,' then you can lead them in the traditional doctrines of Scripture."
A "biblical exploration" class is offered after the service each Sunday, and leaders are working with The Navigators to begin ongoing discipleship. Mikkelson said the intent is not necessarily to provide a full-service church, however, and some have even been encouraged to join a civilian congregation as they mature in their faith. Chapel services are generally a secondary responsibility for military chaplains, who are kept busy with counseling and other full-time responsibilities for between 500 and 1,000 soldiers and their families.
The All-American Service chaplains specifically volunteer for the extra duties, however. Specialist Luke Heibel, who has attended for many months, said that sort of dedication doesn't go unnoticed.
"They just try to get on everybody's level," he said. "They can understand a lot of the doubt and the negative stereotypes of Christianity. They can understand how contradictory (the gospel) is to the world. And they really try to relate it to you.
"… It's strengthened my faith, it's convicted me in a lot of ways and it's motivated me to get involved in a lot of ways."
The service also has helped Heibel introduce others to Christ, and several friends have become regulars. "I have a hard time witnessing to people a lot of times, but I know that if I bring them there they are going to get a good gospel message and a good perspective of how real Christians are."
Sgt. Michael Hayhurst, sergeant in charge on the leadership team, said the service allows many nominal Christians who "start hanging around with the wrong crowd" to discover their own Christian identity.
"You get them involved in this service and they start thinking, 'Hey, maybe I don't have to live like my parents (and still be a Christian),'" he said.
As of early April, 21 individuals had made first-time commitments to Christ, and 73 had made recommitments. More than 600 first-time visitors have been documented from the decision/communications cards filled out at the service, although leaders believe the actual number is close to 1,000. Attendance currently averages about 100 and is growing.
The concept is even being exported. Shoffner, now stationed at Fort Irwin, Calif., recently started a similar service there. Another Southern Baptist chaplain, Mark Jones, began a service in Korea several months ago.
Mikkelson said their detractors still see the service format as a dangerous concession to culture -- "that we are changing church to match the world."
"Of course we'd all like to see the church impact the culture … but in order to do that we have to gain a hearing," he said. "So we remove as many barriers as we can so that they can come in and hear the message of Christ."

-------------------------------------------------------------------- CORRECTION by (BP) Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday CORRECTION: In (BP) story titled "Sunday School Board contributes for Nashville tornado relief," dated 4/27/98, please correct the third paragraph to read, "… as of April 27 more than 90 volunteers had prepared more than 80,000 hot meals … ." -------------------------------------------------------------------- EDITORS' NOTE by (BP) Date: April 28, 1998 - Tuesday EDITORS' NOTE: A (BP) photo has been posted in SBCNet BP Photos Library in connection with the 4/27/98 (BP) story, "African American outreach part of BreakOut '98 success."

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