The original issue can be found at: http://www.baptistpress.com/issue-08/28/2015 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. -------------------------------------------------------------------- KATRINA 2005-15: Winds of change for disaster relief by Tobin Perry Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday EDITOR'S NOTE: This is part of a series of articles and columns this week in Baptist Press marking the 10-year recovery in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast from Hurricane Katrina. GULFPORT, Miss. (BP) -- "We've shared the Gospel with so many people in this community, I don't know if there is anyone else we can share with," Randy Corn thought to himself six months after Hurricane Katrina when he arrived in Gulfport, Miss., one of the many Gulf Coast cities devastated by the historic hurricane 10 years ago. "I don't know if there's anyone else who hasn't heard the Gospel," Corn thought in beginning a week of Southern Baptist Disaster Relief construction projects through his church, Biltmore Baptist in Arden, N.C., which had served in the area multiple times and seen many give their lives to Christ through SBDR ministry. Corn had prayed with the homeowner his team was serving on their first morning in Gulfport and, with his proclivity for evangelism, took a look around the neighborhood and spotted a group of young people talking at the end of a driveway. After striking up a conversation with the group, who expressed gratitude to Southern Baptists for their relief efforts, Corn led one of the young men to faith in Christ -- the first of eight people he would lead to faith in less than three hours. Thanks in part to Corn's experience as an SBDR volunteer following Katrina, he and his wife Ronda became North American Mission Board missionaries and have spent much of the past decade helping train SBDR teams in personal evangelism. Corn, who served on his first SBDR team just days after Katrina's onslaught, was one of nearly 21,000 volunteers from 41 Baptist state conventions to participate in Baptist relief efforts that began after the hurricane's Gulf Coast landfall on Aug. 29, 2005, and continued through March 2006. Another 26,000 volunteers would participate in Operation NOAH (New Orleans Area Homes) Rebuild from March 2006 to April 2009. The influx of new volunteers -- by far the most who would ever participate in a single SBDR response and rebuild effort -- would transform future disaster relief efforts by Southern Baptists. Most Southern Baptists recognize Hurricane Katrina as one of a handful of transformational events in the history of SBDR, from its inception during Hurricane Beulah in 1967 to the Southern Baptist response after 9/11. Yet no response remotely compares to Hurricane Katrina. Within the first five years after the hurricane, the number of trained volunteers soared by 46 percent -- from 51,300 to 95,000 volunteers – with more than 25,000 new volunteers trained in the first few months after the hurricane. "The disaster relief teams of the SBC are second to none," said former SBC President Fred Luter, pastor of New Orleans' Franklin Avenue Baptist Church for nearly three decades. "I don't just say that for what I've heard or read about. I say that because of what I've seen firsthand. "Being there in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, I saw missionaries and disaster relief volunteers come here from all over the country to help those of us in the city, whether it was to gut out our homes or our churches or to help us to paint or cut grass," said Luter, president of the SBC from 2012-14. Mickey Caison, who directed SBDR efforts when Hurricane Katrina hit, noted the additional volunteers vastly increased SBDR's capacity and boosted its standing among fellow disaster relief organizations. "There was a significant change in the perception of Southern Baptists coming out of Katrina," Caison said. "We went from an organization that worked with Red Cross and FEMA to an organization worthy of a relationship and a commitment from FEMA. It gave us a different kind of credibility in the eyes of emergency managers and government officials." With reports by national media outlets such as The Wall Street Journal, awareness of Southern Baptist Disaster Relief rose throughout all levels of government. "It opened doors that normally we couldn't even get close to knocking on," said Jim Burton, director of volunteer mobilization at the North American Mission Board at the time. "We got much, much better at telling our story through secular media. Then when the government got around to doing a report in 2006 to evaluate what had happened, they were all over the Southern Baptist Disaster Relief response with praise, according to what had been accomplished there." Burton noted that SBDR's Katrina efforts became a model for other organizations, even secular ones. As an example, he pointed to a national organization for project management professionals that asked him to write a textbook chapter titled, "A Faith-Based Response to Catastrophic Disaster: An Overview of Southern Baptist Disaster Relief Planning and Logistics in Hurricane Katrina." "What most observers could not understand or measure was the sense of call our volunteers had to serve Katrina survivors," Burton added. "That obedience to God's purpose for them as individual Christian volunteers drove our commitment to excellence and caring." SBDR volunteers returned home with a new passion for disaster relief -- as well as for New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. And some stayed, making a Gospel-sized impact on their new home. James Welch was finishing his studies at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., when Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. The following June, Welch's family joined a team from Louisville's Sojourn Community Church in moving to New Orleans to serve the city and dream about a future church plant. For the first several years, Welch simply served, often through SBDR, putting up drywall and painting -- and telling people about Jesus when the opportunity came up. Three and a half years after Katrina, Welch and his team began to explore locations for a church plant. Local Southern Baptists connected Welch with Lakeview Baptist Church, a declining church that had been hit hard by Hurricane Katrina. The connection proved to be a "win-win" opportunity for Welch, his team and the declining church. The new church, Harbor Community Church, which formed from the partnership, has grown to nearly 300 worshippers. Yet the young church's success has been about more than numbers -- it's also been a growing symbol of a city reborn, a living picture of the Gospel. "Before Katrina, evangelicals were largely seen as a group of people who were just coming to New Orleans to convert people or to tell people what they shouldn't do," Welch said. "After Katrina, New Orleans people see a more Gospel-centered view of an evangelical. Meaning that evangelicals come because they understand their own brokenness and they understand the brokenness that happens within culture and community, and they're here to present this Gospel of reconciliation." Today, Southern Baptists have 65,000 trained volunteers -- including chaplains -- and 1,550 mobile units for feeding, chainsaw, mud-out, command, communication, childcare, shower, laundry, water purification, repair/rebuild and power generation. SBDR is one of the three largest mobilizers of trained disaster relief volunteers in the United States, along with the American Red Cross and The Salvation Army. NAMB coordinates Southern Baptist responses to major disasters in partnership with 42 state Baptist conventions, most of which have their own state disaster relief ministries. Those wishing to donate to SBDR relief ministries can contact the Baptist convention in their state or visit https://donations.namb.net/dr-donations. For phone donations, call 1-866-407-6262 or mail checks to NAMB, P.O. Box 116543, Atlanta, GA 30368-6543. Designate checks for "Disaster Relief." For a video about NAMB's relief and recovery ministries after Hurricane Katrina, click here -------------------------------------------------------------------- KATRINA 2005-15: The story is still being written by Joe McKeever Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday EDITOR’S NOTE: Joe McKeever is the former director of missions for the New Orleans Baptist Association and former pastor of First Baptist Church in Kenner, La. He also is a cartoonist whose work has been featured in Baptist Press and other media. This is part of a series of columns and articles this week in Baptist Press marking the 10-year recovery in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast from Hurricane Katrina. NEW ORLEANS (BP) -- From the divine perspective, 10 years is a blip, one nanosecond in a timeless eternity. For us earthlings, it's one-eighth of a life expectancy. Even so, it's a convenient time to pull over and take inventory. Since Aug. 29, 2005, when Hurricane Katrina changed New Orleans forever, everyone wants to know: "What is God doing in this city? How are things now?" For one day, New Orleanians thought they had "dodged a bullet" as the hurricane's primary damage lay to the east, along the Mississippi coastline where entire communities were destroyed. Then, the levees protecting this sunken city broke under the strain in several places. Soon this great city was literally drowning. One million residents were evacuated voluntarily or otherwise from the hurricane's onslaught. Over 1,800 who refused to leave were drowned in their homes. Entire neighborhoods ceased to exist. Several church buildings would never be found. And now? Almost anything you say about New Orleans at this moment would be correct to some extent. The city is better off in places. The old housing projects, breeding grounds for crime and human misery, have been razed and multi-income-level housing erected in their place. Columbia Parc, an amazingly beautiful array of nearly 700 apartments, stands where St. Bernard Housing Development once stood. The landscaping is impressive, the architecture is award-winning, the interiors are luxurious. The levees have been raised five feet, and a king's ransom has been invested in new pumping stations to keep the city from flooding in the future. Neighborhoods such as Lakeview are seeing new construction on every block, with the price of lots skyrocketing. The city is worse off in places. Columbia Parc, however, appears as an island paradise. Nearby, large vacant areas indicate where houses were destroyed and nothing built in their place. Alongside Interstate 10 east, block after block of nothing indicates missing shopping centers. The Lower Ninth Ward appears snaggle-toothed from the occasional home rebuilt, surrounded by a weedy emptiness. Drive through Gentilly, not far from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, and you will see an odd mixture of lovely new homes, old homes that have been rebuilt and elevated, and vacant lots. The city is unchanged in places. Crime still leads the nightly news. Politicians still try to enrich themselves at the expense of the taxpayer and to the shame of the electorate. Two political leaders in post-Katrina life, New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin and Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard, were convicted of corruption in separate circumstances and sent to prison. The NOPD keeps rotating superintendents in search of someone who can weed out the corruption from within and safeguard the city. The city's population is down 75,000 from 10 years ago while the larger metro area is at pre-Katrina levels. African American numbers are slightly down; the Hispanic population has increased dramatically. The best news of all: God is at work on every block. When the living God undertakes something everlasting, He loves to start small, use unexpected means, and take His own good time, thus much that He is doing today will be known only in eternity. Over the last decade, the Lord has shuttered many churches and given new life to others. After Katrina, seniors whose children lived elsewhere moved away from the hurricane zone. In their place came large numbers of young professionals who love this city and are planting their lives here. Many churches are filled with young adults and growing families. The unity in these congregation tends to be a pastor's dream. Jack Hunter, executive director of the New Orleans Baptist Association, leads an aggressive program of church planting and ministry. A community health outreach has been established in the Ninth Ward, staffed with a medical team called by God and supported by our churches. Startup churches are being sponsored by multiple churches around the country, replacing the former system of one mother church birthing one mission. Baptists are still hailed as heroes by many. Following the storm, churches from across the country sent hundreds of mission teams to rebuild this city. Fresh-faced teens and collegians blanketed the city, sharing the love of Christ. Friendly seniors went from door-to-door offering kindness, supplies and a paint brush. A typical comment was voiced recently: "When we evacuated, we were taken in by Baptists in Texas. And when we returned home, the Baptists were painting our house. We love the Baptists!" The work goes on. Throughout this 10th summer, God's churches continue to send teams to share the Gospel and bless our people. The seminary's MissionLab and churches like Oak Park, Williams Boulevard and Gentilly host a relentless stream of mission teams who travel here to serve people in Jesus' name. Chuck Kelley, our seminary president, used to say, "The churches of New Orleans want to reap a harvest in a field they have not sown." Since Katrina, he says, "No city on earth has been so thoroughly sown with the Gospel as New Orleans." We are praying for the promised harvest. We are eternally grateful to all who have ministered to us, who still believe God with us for revival, who pray for New Orleans, and who continue coming to share His love. To access Joe McKeever’s cartoons in Baptist Press, click here. -------------------------------------------------------------------- 42 IMB missionaries appointed; Platt addresses trustees by Laura Fielding Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday FREDERICKSBURG, Va. (BP) -- Growing up in Brazil, Thiago Montanher de Queiroz came to know Christ at 10 years old and early on felt God calling’s to follow Him into international missions. As an adult while attending a local seminary, Montanher had a professor of missions and church planting -- an International Mission Board missionary -- who helped confirm and encourage his calling. “[The missionary’s] love for the nations was contagious, and I have never seen anyone so passionate about the Gospel,” Montanher said. The missionary continually reminded Montanher that not only does Brazil need the Gospel, but so do other nations. Montanher recalled conversations where the missionary asked, “Now what are you going to do about the other millions that have no access to the Gospel?” “It has been years since he challenged me last, but those words still resound in my heart with great burden, and I believe with no doubt that my call in this life is to carry the ministry of the Gospel to the nations,” Montanher said. Now, Montanher has become an IMB missionary himself. He was one of the 42 missionaries appointed in a service at Spotswood Baptist Church of Fredericksburg, Va., Aug. 26. Montanher, his wife Liana and two daughters will serve among Sub-Saharan African peoples. ‘Follow me’ IMB President David Platt addressed the packed crowd in the church’s sanctuary, speaking on Matthew 4:18-22, where Jesus is calling His first disciples, and particularly verse 19: “And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men’” (ESV). Those two simple words -- “Follow Me” -- are the essence of what it means to be a Christian, Platt said. Breaking down this phrase, Platt first discussed who is the “Me” being followed. In the first four chapters of Matthew alone, Platt noted, Jesus is described 20 different ways, including the Savior, Center of History, Righteous Judge, Light of the World and Hope for All Nations. “This Jesus is clearly and absolutely worthy of far more than nominal adherence or casual association,” Platt said. “Let us not patronize Him. He’s infinitely worthy of all glory in all the universe, and He doesn’t need us at all. We need Him. ... He is worthy of supreme adoration and total abandonment.” Platt then discussed what it means to “follow” Jesus: -- To live with radical abandonment for His glory. “Leaving behind, laying down, abandoning everything in your life doesn’t make sense until you realize who Jesus is,” Platt said. “But when you realize who He is, when you realize who Christ the King is -- laying, leaving, abandoning all these things is the only thing that makes sense.” -- To live with total dependence on Him. “Who among us wants our lives to be summed up by what we can accomplish on our own?” he asked. “Don’t we want to be used by our King to do things that we could never do on our own?” -- To live with faithful adherence to His person. “Followers of Jesus are those for whom Christ is their life. Missions is not your life, Christ is your life,” Platt said. -- To be “fishers of men.” To be a disciple is to be disciple-maker. All Christians are called to tell people how they can know Jesus as Savior. “This is not an extraordinary picture, this is an ordinary Christian picture -- to say ‘I’ll go wherever You want me to go,’” Platt said. With 4.5 billion people in the world without Christ and several billion who have never even heard how they can go to heaven, “we don’t have time to waste living out a nice comfortable, Christian spin on the American dream. It makes no sense whatsoever,” Platt said. “To follow this King in this world, it means total abandonment, dependence on His grace, adherence to His person and urgent obedience to His mission.” Trustees' board meeting The service marked the conclusion of IMB trustees’ August board meeting, which was held in Richmond, Va. During the plenary session, Platt spoke about the essential role of the local church in missions, as signified by the appointment service at a local church. “That’s the whole beauty of this convention,” Platt said. “It’s not about churches farming out mission to a mission board. It’s about churches taking responsibility for mission and a mission board helping them do that -- because no one church can do this alone. “I want to be crystal clear: the IMB does not exist to usurp the role of the local church in the accomplishment of the Great Commission. The IMB exists to serve the local church in the accomplishment of the Great Commission.” In fall 2015, Platt said, IMB will pilot a training event aimed at equipping local churches to become centers for global mission. The event will arm pastors and church leaders to see the unique role God has given them to play in the Great Commission and to develop an intentional strategy for leading their local church to make disciples right where they live and all around the world. The next appointment service will be Nov. 8 at First Baptist Church of New Orleans, La. The trustees’ next meeting will also be held in New Orleans, Nov. 5-6. *Names changed. -------------------------------------------------------------------- 'Post-worship war' counsel offered by Page & Gray by By David Roach Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday NASHVILLE (BP) -- Breaking the paradigm of age-segregated services, navigating a "post-worship war culture" and fostering multicultural praise gatherings are among the topics addressed in a book by Frank S. Page and Lavon Gray on worship challenges for 21st-century churches. Worship "has become a big claim in the twenty-first century church; but, based on the reality of people's lives, the worship that we claim to be experiencing is not truly affecting the quality of our lives, our families, and our witness," Page, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee, writes in the introduction of "Hungry for Worship: Challenges and Solutions for Today's Church." The book, published by the Woman's Missionary Union's New Hope imprint, is intended as "a challenge to all of us," Page writes. "It is a challenge to our churches, to our entities and to our educational institutions. It is a challenge to every believer to look seriously at how he or she worships." Gray, minister of music and worship at First Baptist Church in Jackson, Miss., writes of "the enormous challenges for churches in the area of worship." "Decades of 'worship wars' have left many congregations shell-shocked and uncertain of their core identities," Gray writes. "Church music and worship education continues to lag years behind actual church practice, leaving many worship pastors with minimal theological training. These with other factors including church consumerism, performance-driven worship, and the changing demographic landscape of our communities raise important issues for church leaders that must be addressed." The book's recommendations to church leaders include: -- Replace "age-segregated worship" with a "multigenerational worship approach." For decades, some churches have separated youth, college students and adults into separate worship services, Page and Gray write. Based on Deuteronomy 6:4-9 and other Scripture passages, they recommend involving multiple generations of believers in the same worship service as a means of passing down the Christian faith. "Creatively presented hymns" and avoiding labels like "contemporary," "traditional" and "blended" can help congregations begin "worshipping together, learning from and teaching one another," Page and Gray write. -- Don't be satisfied with the present "truce" in worship wars between proponents of traditional and contemporary music; work to achieve God-focused unity. Weariness from fighting, a natural affinity between the boomer and millennial generations and a proliferation of contemporary songs that reflect solid theology all have contributed to a lull in worship wars, Page and Gray write. Worship leaders must "rise to the occasion and lead people in authentic worship of the King of kings and Lord of lords ... something that never should have divided us in the first place." -- Build a multicultural worship experience by diversifying leadership, planting new churches and breaking down walls of racial prejudice. While noting numerous challenges associated with diversifying local congregations, Page and Gray write, "There should be no confusion concerning God's mandate to reach our communities with the message of Christ: the requirement is clear. When churches acknowledge the changing identities of their communities, reaching across cultural barriers becomes a question of obedience." Other topics addressed in the book include using technology effectively, educating worship pastors based on the needs of modern churches, affirming the lifelong calling of worship pastors and ensuring that songs used in worship have robust theological content. Mike Harland, director of LifeWay Worship, labeled "Hungry for Worship" "not just another worship book." "It is an important answer to the questions about worship on the hearts and minds of the modern church," Harland writes in a foreword. "And it's not just a book with another set of opinions on the subject. It is a serious attempt to gain a biblical perspective on these issues from two students of the Word and servants of the church." -------------------------------------------------------------------- KATRINA 2005-15: Disaster training proved its worth by Tobin Perry Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday GULFPORT, Miss. (BP) -- Dionne Williams opened the large French doors that led into his Gulf Coast home and couldn't believe what five and a half feet of Hurricane Katrina's storm surge had done. Clothes were ruined. Books destroyed. Tools unusable. Photos, memorabilia, priceless family mementos gone forever. Williams knew what intense hurricanes were like. He had been a preteen when Hurricane Camille wrecked the Gulf Coast in 1969. As a veteran of many hurricane seasons, he didn't take lightly the prospects of Hurricane Katrina barreling down on the Gulf Coast. He and his wife Susie even had a hotel room booked in Natchez, Miss. But no one expected what happened on Aug. 29, 2005. Yet, for two important reasons, the devastation wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been for Williams and his family in Gulfport, Miss. "We had flood insurance, and that really helped us," said Williams, who serves as associate director of missions for the Gulf Coast Baptist Association in Mississippi. "God, in His wisdom, caused a big rain 10 years earlier so we bought the flood insurance." Southern Baptist Disaster Relief became the other answer to prayer. Williams' insurance adjuster told him he needed his house gutted out. SBDR teams from North Carolina were there to help. He was among more than 17,000 homeowners Southern Baptists served in the first seven months after the hurricane. Though they'd been Southern Baptists for years, Dionne and Susie were genuinely moved by SBDR's ministry. "For the first four or five years after the storm, when there was a need for someone to go and do a mud-out somewhere, my wife was the first to volunteer," Williams said. "She remembered what it was like to be served by disaster relief." Williams had been trying to increase the association's involvement in SBDR for the five years before Katrina. Finally, in January 2005, 13 people attended the first SBDR training the association held since Williams arrived. In May of that year, just three months before Hurricane Katrina hit, Williams was among a group in the association who participated in a second SBDR training -- this time for mud-out work, which came in handy after Katrina. "With help from my family, I was able to get the furniture in the house out," Williams said. "I made them garb up and do everything they were supposed to do with the masks, the double gloving and the bleach water. I said, 'Thank you, God, that You prepared us to take care of that.' Then the North Carolina team came and gutted the house, taking out all the fixtures and everything." Williams spent much of the next few years on the front lines of the rebuilding effort on the Gulf Coast, managing and resourcing SBDR teams who wanted to help. For him, the experience underscored the importance of trained volunteers. While Gulf Coast residents were grateful for the help of any Southern Baptists who wanted to serve, Williams said it was much easier to use people who were adequately trained. In the Gulf Coast Baptist Association, the number of trained SBDR volunteers skyrocketed from 15 to 300 in less than two years. Williams encourages churches to get SBDR training and be prepared to serve during future disasters. Even for Christians, "there's still a sense of loss and sometimes that hopelessness" in a crisis, Williams said. "What are we going to do? How are we going to be able to come out of this? But the service of [Southern Baptist Disaster Relief] gave us a sense of hope and 'Yeah, there's a way we'll be able to survive this, get back to the way we were and be able to minister in the way we were ministering.'" -------------------------------------------------------------------- Iorg: Golden Gate embarking on historic year by Kathie Chute Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday MILL VALLEY, Calif. (BP) -- An academic year "like no other in the history of American seminaries" awaits faculty, staff and students of Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary, President Jeff Iorg said in a convocation address Aug. 27. "We are currently moving the primary campus of one of the 10 largest seminaries in the United States 400 miles to Southern California, while at the same time building a secondary campus in the Bay Area -- all while remaining fully operational," Iorg said in an address titled "A Great Adventure." "We haven't curtailed any academic programs, canceled campus activities or closed campus facilities," Iorg noted while expressing thanks for the support received by the seminary and voicing optimism for the future. In addition to the new Southern California campus in Ontario and the Bay Area campus in Fremont, Golden Gate also is changing its name to Gateway Seminary of the Southern Baptist Convention. The first of two affirmative votes for the name change occurred during the SBC annual meeting in Columbus, Ohio, in June; a second SBC vote is required, slated for the 2016 annual meeting in St. Louis. Iorg, focusing on the progress of the moves to Ontario and Fremont in his convocation address, reported that the seminary has about 2,000 students enrolled this year across all its programs, with virtually no decrease, in spite of the move. "While enrollment has declined at this campus," as expected, he said of the seminary's current Bay Area location in Mill Valley, "the students haven't gone to other seminaries. They have either enrolled in our online program or at regional campuses -- many planning to transfer to Ontario next year." Iorg called students who have come to Golden Gate Seminary in the past two years "special heroes." "They accepted the risk of coming to a school in major transition," he said. "Some of them have told me they chose Golden Gate because of the transition. As one student said, 'I could have gone to school anywhere. I can only watch history being made once.' That's the spirit that makes Golden Gate students such amazing people." Construction on both the Ontario and Fremont campuses has begun and is on schedule, Iorg said, reminding the chapel audience of God's providence in providing facilities. The building in Ontario, constructed in 2009 and never occupied, allows the seminary to complete the interior to its own specifications, at a cost of 30 percent below the price to construct the facility today, Iorg said. At more than 150,000 square feet, it will provide 20 percent more academic and administrative space than Mill Valley. The Fremont campus is being built on property given to Golden Gate by a church and is located on a major thoroughfare, close to major freeways and public transportation in the Bay Area. An appraisal set the property value at $2.9 million. Iorg reported that a special $500,000 gift has enabled the seminary to purchase a missionary-in-residence house near the Ontario campus, completely furnish it and provide a vehicle. In addition, an $850,000 cash gift by first-time donors has allowed establishment of a special scholarship fund for church planters. Other gifts have been designated for special parts of the building projects. Thus far, the seminary has received nearly $5 million in special gifts in the past 16 months, Iorg said. Recounting the steps the seminary has taken to prepare for the transition, he noted, "First, we have communicated openly through the Transition Update newsletter. Second, we have provided timely information about aspects of the change. Third, we have involved many people in designing the new facilities. Fourth, we have planned alumni events to help people crystallize their closure with this location. Finally, we have been dealt individually with every person who was employed on the day the change was announced. All our employees continue working hard, choosing a positive attitude and accepting the decision to relocate as part of God's plan for the seminary and for them." The new locations will help the seminary "to better accomplish our mission," Iorg said. "The primary reason for selecting the Fremont location is its centrality to the transportation patterns of Bay Area commuter students," he said. "There are several reasons why Ontario is the best primary campus location." The Ontario location will allow the seminary to employ more faculty and senior staff because they will be able to afford housing in the area, Iorg said. In addition, Riverside and San Bernardino counties will have an estimated 3 million new residents by 2050, putting the Ontario campus in an area with a population of more than 7 million people in the next 35 years. "This population growth will come from the nations of the world, creating a wonderfully diverse mosaic perfect for us as we train leaders for global ministry," Iorg said. "We have chosen to place our primary campus in a corporate office park, next to an airport, at the junction of two major freeways, and within a mile of a huge mall that claims to have more daily shoppers than people who go to Disneyland. "We made this decision intentionally," Iorg said. "We want Gateway Seminary to be where the action is -- where churches are growing, where new churches are being started and where ministries to meet human needs will proliferate. We believe a seminary is a training facility -- not a retreat center. We have put ourselves at the economic, political and social crossroads of the fastest-growing region of the West." Iorg reported that the seminary is embracing a student housing model for students to live in surrounding communities, with the seminary aiding them in finding housing. "We want students to live in communities -- real communities, not artificial Christian communities," he said. "If you are a student, we want to you train for ministry while living in the kind of community you will live in for the rest of your life." Iorg quoted his own words when the move was announced 16 months ago: "You are part of one of the boldest moves by any seminary in the past century. We are selling a campus, not closing our doors. We are relocating and repositioning for future success, not abandoning our vision. We are sacrificing short-term comfort for long-term fulfillment of our mission. We are positioning ourselves strategically, geographically and financially to impact the Western United States and the world like never before." Using Luke 8:22-25 as a text, Iorg said that when one of Jesus' disciples awakened Him in the boat to calm the storm, they failed to trust His direction in His initial invitation to cross over to the other side of the lake. "The principle parallels our situation," Iorg said. "God has directed us, and confirmed His direction to us, to relocate to two new campuses in California. We are in the boat with Him. It's already a little windy, and it's likely to get stormy in the next few months. Our challenge is resting in the direction we have been given and staying steady in the storm." -------------------------------------------------------------------- Should we watch murders on social media? by Russell Moore Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday EDITOR'S NOTE: Russell Moore is president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. NASHVILLE (BP) -- I watched a video that I'm ashamed to say I viewed. No, it wasn't pornography -- at least not the kind of pornography we typically think of. The video was the live shooting of two television journalists as they were reporting in Virginia. At the time, I saw the post on Twitter, which noted "unexplained shooting noises." When I watched the clip, I assumed there was gunshots around them and that the journalist and her interviewee had ducked for cover. It wasn't until later that I learned that what I had seen was a cold-blooded murder streaming across my Twitter feed. There's been much debate as to whether news sources should show the video, or whether people should watch it on their social media feeds. Many respected voices are calling this the equivalent of a "snuff film," the sort of twisted video that feeds into morbidity and bloodlust. The killer himself recorded the bloodshed on his phone and immediately posted their deaths onto social media, where thousands, and perhaps millions of people, could watch it again and again. On the one hand, I strongly believe that we should not hide from the reality of evil. That's why, when many suggested media shouldn't carry images of the falling twin towers after the September 11, 2001, attacks, I disagreed. We should see the images before us, if we as citizens are to know the depth of injustice with which we are called to address militarily. The Planned Parenthood undercover videos are awful, but I have encouraged people to view them, precisely because our consciences must be made aware of this injustice toward the most vulnerable among us. So, what then should we make of this, what Charles Cooke [on the National Review website] is calling "the first social media murder"? I don't think we should watch the video. I don't think we should post it. And I don't think media outlets should run it. Here's why. We have no lack of consensus in our society that the gunning down of innocent people is morally wrong. To be fair, we do have legitimate debate about what to do about gun violence but not about the morality of the violence itself. The conscience of society is already awakened to the horror of such evil. Moreover, our watching the video seems to feed into the wicked desires of the murderer himself. He chose, after all, to carry out this atrocity on what he knew would be a live television feed. He wanted not only to kill these innocents but also to broadcast their deaths. Perhaps he wanted the notoriety of killing. Perhaps he wanted to humiliate them with the recording of their deaths at his hands. We shouldn't enable this murderer his wishes. He wanted not only to murder their physical lives but to murder their digital images as well. As Christians, we ought to have very sensitive consciences to this. Our Lord Jesus, after all, was murdered by the Roman Empire, publicly humiliated on a cross where he was mocked by the populace for the shame of the way he was killed. The cross was meant to signal not only death but also the most shameful death possible, as a way of warning others not to commit the same acts. The church reclaimed the cross but not on Rome's terms. The cross is explained, for us, in light of incarnation and the resurrection and the enthronement of Christ. A videotaped massacre can easily be a kind of pornography, turning human beings -- made in the image of God -- into spectacles, all while giving the illusion of a safe distance between their suffering and the audience. We can justify watching this as "being informed," but there is a very thin line these days between news and entertainment. The last thing we should ever be entertained by is the taking of human life. That's why our early Christian ancestors refused to go to the gladiatorial games. This killer's video isn't exposing darkness. It is celebrating darkness. He put forward a kind of pornography of violence, and from that we must turn away. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Las protestas en Planned Parenthood atraen a los bautistas del sur by Por David Roach Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday NASHVILLE (BP) -- Había bautistas del sur entre el estimado de 50.000 a 75.000 activistas pro-vida que protestaron en las clínicas en EE.UU. el 22 de agosto llamando al desfinanciamiento del proveedor de abortos más grande de la nación. Manifestantes en más de 350 ciudades a lo largo y ancho de 47 estados, de acuerdo a estadísticas reportadas por LifeNews.com, se unieron en lo que el Washington Post llamó "el más grande rally en contra" de Planned Parenthood. Organizadas por una coalición de por lo menos 60 grupos pro-vida conocidos como ProtestPP, las demostraciones llegaron ante la oleada de ocho videos encubiertos divulgados por el Centro para el Progreso Médico (CMP por sus siglas en inglés) que supuestamente muestran a ejecutivos de Planned Parenthood discutiendo la venta de partes de bebés obtenidas a través de un aborto. El último video muestra a una mujer identificada como Melissa Farrell, directora de investigación de Planned Parenthood Costa del Golfo en Houston, hablando de "alterar nuestro proceso…para obtener cadáveres fetales intactos." El video luego corta a Farrell indicando: "Es solamente un asunto de partidas." Joe Horan, pastor asociado de culto de la Iglesia Bautista Old River en Dayton, Texas, protestó en Planned Parenthood Costa del Golfo con su esposa Sara después de saber sobre la reunión en un artículo en línea del pastor y autor John Piper. De 600 a 700 manifestantes en contra del aborto se reunieron en la protesta de Houston, de acuerdo al estimado de Horan. Él le dijo a Baptist Press que los videos de CMP "nos descorrieron la cortina y nos dejaron ver lo oscura [la industria del aborto] que realmente era y lo oscura que nuestra cultura era en EE.UU." Para los Horan, los videos llevaron de nuevo al aborto "de ser un asunto político a ser un asunto muy moral y algo que no podemos aplazar 'solo como una cosa política,'" dijo. Luego de llegar a la demostración, "realmente deseábamos haber llevado a nuestras hijas porque había una atmósfera familiar," dijo Horan, estudiante del Seminario Teológico Bautista New Orleans. La multitud incluía muchas familias jóvenes y era diversa tanto en términos de edad como de raza, dijo. Estudiantes de por lo menos cuatro seminarios de la Convención Bautista del Sur asistieron a las protestas, de acuerdo a reportes recibidos por BP. Garland Honeycutt, director de misiones de la Asociación Bautista de Avery en el oeste de North Carolina, le dijo a BP que él y otros 235 manifestantes en Asheville "pacíficamente se reunieron…para manifestar que las personas del oeste de North Carolina y los cristianos en el oeste de North Carolina son pro-vida, y que esperamos que esto haga suficiente presión en nuestros representantes en el Congreso para realmente desfinanciar Planned Parenthood." Reportes de los medios han indicado que Planned Parenthood recibe cerca de $500 millones anualmente del gobierno federal. Honeycutt dijo que "no esperaba ver" a cerca de 70 manifestantes pro-elección reunidos en oposición a la demostración. "Fue verdaderamente chocante ver que hubiera ese número de personas defensoras de la industria del aborto a través de Planned Parenthood y estuvieran dispuestas a respaldarlos a pesar de todos los videos que han sido publicados por el Centro para el Progreso Médico." Sharayah Colter, miembro del personal de la Convención Bautista del Sur de Texas y estudiante del Seminario Teológico Bautista Southwestern, estaba entre los casi 600 manifestantes en la clínica de Planned Parenthood en Fort Worth. "Más allá de donde yo alcanzaba a ver en cada dirección," la gente "sostenía rótulos que decían cosas como 'Todas las vidas son importantes' y 'Una persona es una persona no importa lo pequeña que sea,'" le dijo Colter a BP en comentarios escritos. "De vez en cuando mientras estuvimos allá durante dos horas, grupos se unían cantando 'Sublime Gracia' y otros himnos y en grupos pequeños orábamos juntos por los futuros padres, por los bebés nonatos y por un brote de reavivamiento en nuestra nación." Al igual que Honeycutt, Coulter fue afectada por la respuesta de algunos defensores de Planned Parenthood. "Luego, cuando estaba poniendo la nota acerca de la mañana en Twitter, noté que alguna gente pro-elección estaban poniendo en #ProtestPP, así que decidí tratar civilizadamente de involucrarlos en una conversación," dijo Colter. "Me quedó claro entonces por los nombres despectivos y las burlas en sus respuestas que verdaderamente lo que necesitamos en EE.UU. es un reavivamiento. Los corazones están gélidos, no solo por el futuro de los bebés nonatos, a quienes estas gentes dijeron que no consideraban personas, sino por Dios y todo lo que él es. Las personas con las que hablaba declinaron que les hablara de la esperanza encontrada en Jesucristo y me dijeron que sus vidas estaban bien sin él. La respuesta me rompe el alma tanto como lo han hecho los videos de Planned Parenthood." Phillip Bethancourt, vicepresidente ejecutivo de la Comisión de Libertad Religiosa y Ética de los bautistas del sur, le dijo a BP que él participó en la manifestación en la clínica Planned Parenthood de Nashville con tres de sus cuatro hijos de 6, 5 y 3 años. "Nashville es un destino del aborto en el sur debido a las leyes de aborto de Tennessee," dijo Bethancourt en comentarios escritos. "Ver más de 300 personas -- de todas las edades, razas y denominaciones -- unidas afuera de la clínica Planned Parenthood en Nashville para tener un tiempo de oración y adoración fue un momento poderoso e inspirador. Espero que mis chicos, los que fueron conmigo al evento, miren hacia atrás cuando sean mayores y vean que el 2015 fue un tiempo crucial para proteger la santidad de la vida." El vicepresidente de Planned Parenthood, Eric Ferrero le dijo al Washington Post que las demostraciones tuvieron "la intención de acosar a nuestras pacientes, quienes dependen de nuestros centros sin fines de lucro para el cuidado básico y preventivo de la salud. La gente detrás de estas protestas tienen una clara agenda política: Quieren prohibir el aborto, y bloquear a hombres y mujeres para que no tengan acceso al cuidado básico de la salud reproductiva." Sin embargo Denny Burk, profesor de Boyce College quien se unió a cerca de 500 personas para protestar en una clínica Planned Parenthood de Louisville, Kentucky, escribió en su blog que los manifestantes que estaban con él parecían decididamente tranquilos. "Fue interesante observar la protesta de los pro-vida," escribió Burk. "Los pro-vida no son gente radical, del tipo que protesta. Son un poco menos que 'occupy (ocupar) Wall Street' y un poquito más que 'I miss (extraño) Mayberry.' En otras palabras, estos manifestantes pro-vida tienden a ser aburridos y normales -- lo que significa que no saben lo que están haciendo cuando se trata de protestas. Varias veces el presentador musical trató de organizar un canto, pero nunca lo logramos. Fue un poco triste, pero también fue un poco chistoso. Hay algo encantador acerca del hecho de que atrajimos a tantos manifestantes sin experiencia; ese hecho en sí es importante." Burk expresó una motivación para protestar probablemente compartida por las decenas de miles que se unieron a él a lo largo y ancho de Estados Unidos. "Fui a esta manifestación porque eI aborto por encargo sigue siendo la mayor crisis de los derechos humanos de nuestro tiempo," escribió Burk. "Más de 57 millones de bebés humanos han sido matados legalmente en nuestro país bajo el régimen de  Roe v. Wade. Planned Parenthood está a la vanguardia de esta matanza. Esto debe terminar." -------------------------------------------------------------------- Líderes de IMB anuncian plan para balancear presupuesto by Por el personal de IMB Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday RICHMOND, Virginia (BP) -- Los líderes de la Junta de Misiones Internacionales han delineado un plan para tratar los déficits en los ingresos de IMB y un completo restablecimiento de la organización para poder avanzar hacia el futuro con "una visión innovadora, una mayordomía sabia y un alto grado de responsabilidad." El plan fue presentado por el personal directivo de IMB, incluyendo al presidente David Platt, durante una reunión abierta el 27 de agosto que incluyó misioneros y personal, quienes colectivamente asistieron fuera en persona o a través de comunicación digital. Los directivos de IMB fueron informados del plan durante la reunión de la junta el 25 y 26 de junio en Richmond, Virginia. Platt dijo que la urgencia del plan se basa en la realidad de que aunque el dar de los bautistas del sur a través del Programa Cooperativo y de la Ofrenda de Navidad Lottie Moon ha incrementado en los años recientes, a los proyectos de IMB les faltarán $21 millones de su actual presupuesto anual, lo que marca varios años consecutivos de faltantes del presupuesto de la organización de 170 años de antigüedad. Durante los seis años pasados, los gastos de la organización han totalizado $210 millones más de lo que ha recibido para cada año. Para tratar los faltantes de ingresos, IMB estableció un plan para lentamente reducir el número de misioneros a través del desgaste normal y las designaciones limitadas, mientras usa las reservas de IMB -- incluyendo las ventas de propiedades globales -- para mantener tantos misioneros en el campo como sea posible. "Alabamos a Dios por las reservas y las ventas de las propiedades que han hecho esto posible y por el liderazgo que escogió gastar estos recursos para el esparcimiento del evangelio," dijo Platt. "Pero no podemos continuar gastando más de la cuenta. Por el bien de la responsabilidad financiera a corto plazo y la estabilidad de la organización a largo plazo debemos actuar." Sobreponiéndose al déficit en los ingresos Sebastian Traeger, vicepresidente ejecutivo de IMB, explicó que el personal directivo consideró varias opciones para sobreponerse al déficit en los ingresos. "El reto es que estamos mirando tanto el déficit grande de los ingresos como el bajo efectivo de las reservas -- así que cualquier acción necesita incluir un plan para tratar ambos simultáneamente," dijo Traeger. "Consideramos múltiples opciones -- como una reducción en los nombramientos de misioneros o la liquidación de propiedad adicional -- pero ninguna de ellas lleva a cabo un presupuesto balanceado lo suficientemente rápido, o no son factibles de implementar a corto plazo. Nuestra meta es alinear nuestra estructura de costos con la cantidad de dinero que se nos da cada año." El liderazgo determinó que la única opción que es tanto factible como de impacto financiero es reducir el número del personal que sostiene, ya que la vasta mayoría de los gastos de la IMB están relacionados con el personal. "Si vamos a balancear nuestro presupuesto, debemos reducir aproximadamente de 600 a 800 de nuestros empleados y del personal de campo," dijo Platt indicando que ese número representa más del 15 por ciento del total de empleados de IMB. El liderazgo de IMB ha decidido que la mejor manera de reducir el personal es comenzando con un incentivo de retiro voluntario que será ofrecido a todos los empleados elegibles, incluyendo tanto a misioneros como a personal. Aunque los parámetros que definen quién es elegible todavía están siendo finalizados, los detalles de los incentivos se anunciarán el 10 de septiembre de 2015, y aquellos elegibles serán notificados en los días siguientes al anuncio. "Aunque aceptar el incentivo es una decisión voluntaria completamente a discreción de las personas elegibles," dijo Platt. "Esto le ofrece al personal que esté considerando una transición en su vida una oportunidad de hacer esa transición. "Queremos ser tan generosos como sea posible, y queremos honrar a cada hermano y hermana por su servicio. Sabemos que tomar un retiro voluntario no significa quedarse al margen de la misión, sino cambiar a una nueva fase del involucramiento en misiones." IMB está enviando aproximadamente 300 nuevos misioneros en 2015 y espera enviar un número comparable en 2016. Cuando la fase uno del plan (el incentivo para el retiro voluntario) sea implementada, la fase dos del plan se enfocará en concluir un restablecimiento de la organización. Platt dijo que esa fase incluiría servicios de apoyo de consolidación, reajustar la movilización, evaluar el involucramiento global y revisualizar el entrenamiento. Él señaló que la organización debe humillarse y abiertamente preguntarle a Dios: "¿Qué nos estás guiando a hacer?" y los empleados deben preguntarle a Dios: "¿Qué me estás guiando a hacer?" "Debemos llegar a un lugar saludable en el presente para poder estar en un lugar saludable en el futuro," dijo Platt. "Queremos seguir adelante con una visión innovadora, una mayordomía sabia y un alto grado de responsabilidad para las iglesias a las que servimos, las gentes que alcanzamos y el Dios al que adoramos." Frank S. Page, presidente del Comité Ejecutivo de la Convención Bautista del Sur, respondió a las últimas noticias del déficit de presupuesto en una declaración a Baptist Press: "Recibí esta información de David [Platt, presidente de IMB] con profunda tristeza. Las misiones extranjeras es el corazón del por qué existe la convención y recibe más del 50 por ciento del presupuesto nacional de asignación del PC.  "Esta inquietante noticia es la consecuencia a largo plazo de la reducción en el dar de las iglesias bautistas a través del Programa Cooperativo durante los 1990s y los 2000s," dijo Page. "Es imperativo que esta generación de pastores y líderes bautistas del sur revigoricen este consagrado plan de dar que activó a IMB a ser la principal fuerza enviadora de misiones que fue a través del siglo XX. "El poder sistemático y proporcional de dar de miles de iglesias puede darle un giro a esto para la IMB y para todos nuestros ministerios," dijo Page. -------------------------------------------------------------------- KATRINA 2005-15: 'Prueba de nuestra fe' by Por Fred Luter Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday NOTA DEL EDITOR: Este es el primero de una serie de artículos y columnas esta semana en Baptist Press que marcan 10 años de recuperación de New Orleans y de la costa del golfo del huracán Katrina. Fred Luter, cuya columna aparece hoy, es pastor de la Iglesia Bautista Franklin Avenue, la cual fue inundada cuando el dique se rompió en New Orleans después de Katrina. Luter también fue el presidente 2012-14 de la Convención Bautista del Sur. NEW ORLEANS (BP) -- Hace 10 años nuestras vidas fueron dramáticamente cambiadas por el huracán Katrina. No solamente impactó nuestra ciudad físicamente, sino que nos impactó espiritual y emocionalmente. Fue un tiempo que nunca olvidaremos. Fue una prueba de nuestra fe. Fue una prueba de nuestra creencia. También fue una prueba de nuestra disponibilidad para regresar y reconstruir. Nos tomó dos años y medio volver a la iglesia aquí (Iglesia Bautista Franklin Avenue New Orleans). En el entretanto tuvimos cultos en diferentes instalaciones -- Primera Iglesia Bautista en New Orleans, Iglesia Bautista Istrouma en Baton Rouge y Primera Iglesia Bautista en Houston. Antes de Katrina éramos la iglesia reunida. Después de Katrina éramos la iglesia dispersada. Ahora estamos de vuelta. Sin embargo, hay muchas personas que todavía están desplazadas y a las que les encantaría volver pero no han tenido la oportunidad. Tengo la gran esperanza de que las cosas continúen creciendo y nuestra ciudad continúe siendo impactada y crezca. Nunca volveremos a ser la ciudad que éramos antes. Pero creo que Dios tiene grandes planes para nosotros en la ciudad de New Orleans. Siempre comprometidos a regresar Una vez que vimos la devastación en la ciudad y en nuestra iglesia, fue horroroso. Yo estaba determinado desde el primer día a regresar. Hemos sido parte tan vital de nuestra comunidad que no podía ver que no volviéramos. Franklin Avenue ha sido un faro de luz y esperanza. Si había una oportunidad de que el vecindario regresara, Franklin Avenue tendría que regresar. Nunca hubo ninguna duda de que volveríamos. Pero no sabía que nos tomaría tanto tiempo. Recuerdo vívidamente una cosa cuando vivía en Birmingham e iba y volvía cada semana a la ciudad. Una de los miembros había puesto un rótulo de cartulina en el frente de la iglesia: "Pastor Luter, ¿Dónde está?" Eso me sacó lágrimas. Ver que esa persona se preocupaba por su pastor y si yo estaba bien o no fue una de las historias que siempre recordaré. Orgulloso de la respuesta bautista Después de la tormenta, una de las cosas de las que más me llenaron de orgullo fue la respuesta de los equipos de Ayuda en Desastres de los bautistas del sur. Yo alardeo de nuestros esfuerzos de socorro en casos de desastres. No hay muchas organizaciones que hayan sido capaces de hacer lo que pudimos hacer exitosamente. Nuestros equipos llegaron sin saber lo que iba a pasar y lo que tendrían que confrontar. Fueron a cada área de la ciudad y no solamente para ayudar las iglesias bautistas del sur. Ayudaban a todo el que necesitara ser ayudado. El Times-Picayune publicó un editorial cuando el proceso de reconstrucción iba lento. El editorial decía que si los bautistas del sur hubieran sido los responsables de reconstruir la ciudad, ya estaría construida para ese momento. Eso me llenó de orgullo. Quiero agradecerles a todos los que llegaron de todas partes del país para ayudarnos aquí en New Orleans. No estaríamos donde estamos sin la ayuda y las oraciones. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Un estudio se enfoca en el suicidio by Por Lisa Canon Green Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday NASHVILLE (BP) -- La mayoría de los estadounidenses cree estar presenciando en su país una epidemia de personas que se quitan la vida, según muestra un estudio de LifeWay Research. Pero la mayoría de los estadounidenses no ven el suicidio como una opción egoísta, y no creen que éste envíe a la persona al infierno, según los hallazgos del estudio mencionado. "Los estadounidenses están respondiendo con compasión ante una tragedia que toca a muchas familias," dijo Scott McConnell, vicepresidente de LifeWay. "Por ejemplo, mientras los investigadores aprenden más sobre los efectos de las enfermedades mentales, es más probable que la gente reaccione con misericordia ante el suicidio." En una entrevista vía telefónica hecha a 1,000 estadounidenses, LifeWay Research encontró que más de un tercio (36 por ciento) había tenido un amigo o pariente que se suicidó, y 56 por ciento describe al suicidio como una epidemia en los Estados Unidos. El estudio, dado a conocer el 21 de agosto, se basa en un sondeo realizado del 26 de septiembre al 5 de octubre del 2014. El nivel de preocupación es mayor entre aquellos de 25-34 años de edad, representando a la segunda mitad de la generación de los milenarios. Este grupo tiene más probabilidades de percibir una epidemia de suicidios (66 por ciento), dice que el suicidio es egoísta (45 por ciento) y cree que aquellos que se suicidan van al infierno (27 por ciento, entre aquellos entre 35 y 44 años de edad). Datos federales muestran que los suicidios han estado aumentando desde el 2005. Esto no es algo sin precedentes; las tasas de suicidio estuvieron entre las más altas a mitad de la década de 1980. A nivel mundial, los Estados Unidos ni siquiera figura entre los primeros 50 países con las mayores tasas de suicidio. Aún así, entre las personas de 25-34 años de edad, el suicidio es la segunda causa principal de muerte. "En una población joven, y saludable en general, se entiende que esto sea preocupante--muchos de la generación del milenio ahora conocen amigos y conocidos que se suicidaron o que han sido impactados por éste," dijo McConnell. No es un sendero hacia el infierno Menos de un cuarto de los estadounidenses (23 por ciento) dijo que la gente que se quita la vida va al infierno. Más de 6 de cada 10 estadounidenses dicen que el suicidio no lleva al infierno y el 16 por ciento no está seguro. Sin embargo, los cristianos (27 por ciento) –y en particular los evangélicos (32 por ciento)- son más propensos a creer que el suicidio lleva a la condenación. Los católicos creen más firmemente que los protestantes que el suicidio no envía a la gente al infierno, con un 63 por ciento de católicos y un 54 por ciento de protestantes tomando esta postura. Los protestantes (19 por ciento) se inclinan más a indicar que no saben si alguien que se suicida va al infierno, comparado con el 12 por ciento de los católicos. "La finalidad del suicidio hace que la gente dude sobre sus consecuencias," dijo McConnell. "La mayoría de las iglesias enseñan que el suicidio está mal pero muchas también admiten la misericordia y soberanía de Dios." Menos de 4 de cada 10 estadounidenses (36 por ciento) dicen que la persona que comete el suicidio es egoísta. Los números aumentan entre los cristianos (39 por ciento) y en particular entre los evangélicos (44 por ciento). LifeWay Research también encontró diferencias entre las razas. Un cuarto de los afroamericanos dicen que un amigo o familiar se ha suicidado, comparado con el 39 por ciento de los blancos. Los afroamericanos se inclinan más que otros a creer que el suicidio es egoísta (44 por ciento) y que envía a la gente al infierno (38 por ciento). En comparación, el 19 por ciento de los blancos y el 25 por ciento de los hispanos dicen que la persona que se suicida se va al infierno. El efecto de las enfermedades mentales Los estadounidenses estaban desconcertados el año pasado con el suicidio del comediante Robin Williams, señaló McConnell. Williams se ahorcó en agosto, unas siete semanas antes que LifeWay comenzara el sondeo. "Los expertos dicen que las enfermedades mentales afectan al 90 por ciento de las personas que mueren por suicidios," dijo McConnell. "Robin Williams encaja en el patrón--antes de morir, estuvo buscando tratamientos para la depresión." El suicidio y las enfermedades mentales han sido temas tabú en muchas iglesias, dijo McConnell. En estudios anteriores hechos por LifeWay Research, dos tercios de los pastores protestantes dijeron que hablan ante sus iglesias una vez al año o menos sobre el tema de las enfermedades mentales y el 65 por ciento de los miembros de las familias que cuentan con miembros que sufren de enfermedades mentales dicen que las iglesias deberían hacer más para hablar sobre las enfermedades mentales y lograr que el tema ya no sea un tabú. En años recientes, algunos han comenzado a hablar del tema. McConnell dijo que el pastor Rick Warren de la iglesia Saddleback ha hablado públicamente sobre el suicidio de su hijo Matthew, y Frank S. Page, presidente del Comité Ejecutivo de la Convención Bautista del Sur, publicó un libro sobre el suicidio de su hija Melissa. "Aprecio profundamente que LifeWay haga estas investigaciones y dé a conocer sus hallazgos," dijo Page. "Creo que sí apunta en dirección de cambios positivos en la manera en que la gente percibe este asunto. Sin embargo, tenemos aún un largo camino por recorrer como creyentes y como iglesias mientras damos ánimo a la gente que lucha con enfermedades mentales. Debemos seguir siendo un pueblo de paciencia, compasión y competencia a la vez que apuntamos a la gente hacia la esperanza y la ayuda que pueden encontrar en Cristo. Debemos también continuar animando a los dolidos que buscan asistencia psicológica verdaderamente cristiana." Page nombró al Grupo de Asesoría sobre Salud Mental como respuesta ante la moción sobre el ministerio de la salud mental y una resolución sobre las preocupaciones relacionadas con la salud mental presentadas en la reunión anual de la CBS en el 2013. Desde entonces, el grupo le ha reportado y aconsejado sobre las maneras en que los bautistas del sur pueden estar mejor informados sobre los servicios y recursos de salud mental que hay disponibles. Vaya a here para leer más sobre el reporte final de este comité. McConnell señaló. "Durante demasiado tiempo, muchos cristianos han visto las enfermedades mentales como una falla en el carácter en vez de una condición médica. Me anima ver una cultura que comienza a cambiar. La discusión abierta sobre el suicidio y la salud mental dentro de las iglesias puede marcar una diferencia entre la vida y la muerte." Metodología: La encuesta vía telefónica de estadounidenses se condujo del 26 de septiembre al 5 de octubre del 2014. Se usó un sistema aleatorio de marcación de dígitos telefónicos. Sesenta por ciento de las encuestas completas fueron a líneas caseras y 40 por ciento a líneas de teléfonos celulares. Se usaron las cuotas máximas y las pesas ligeras para el género, región, edad, etnicidad y educación para reflejar con más certeza a la población. La muestra completa fue de 1,000 entrevistas. La muestra provee un 95 por ciento de certeza de que el error de muestreo no excede 3,5 por ciento. Los márgenes de error son mayores en los subgrupos. Aquellos etiquetados como evangélicos se consideran a sí mismos como "nacidos de nuevo, evangélicos o cristianos fundamentalistas." -------------------------------------------------------------------- EDITORIAL: Cuatro Razones Para Leer Y Estudiar La Biblia by Por Gerardo A. Alfaro Date: August 28, 2015 - Friday FORT WORTH, Texas (BP) -- Cuatro razones para leer y estudiar la Biblia: 1. Las Escrituras te puede proporcionar Sabiduría En un mundo lleno de conocimiento y habilidades, pero también lleno de niños insensatos (tontos), que no saben tomar buenas y correctas decisiones. Pero no se trata de solo saberlo, se trata de "persistir" en lo que nos hemos persuadido. No es suficiente el dato de la Escritura, o las habilidades que Dios te ha dado. La meditación regular en la Escritura produce sabiduría que te transforma para saber cuando y como usar el conocimiento y la habilidad. 2. Las Escrituras son el Aliento (creador y poderoso) mismo de Dios. Enseñan Descubren nuestra oscuridad Enderezan lo torcido Son Guía pedagógica de justicia 3. Las Escrituras fueron diseñadas para que alcances la Perfección (Madurez). Sí, ya sabemos que no eres perfecto. Pero eso no significa que no busques la perfección, el estar completo, maduro. En efecto, Dios te ama tanto que no quiere verte imperfecto, y por eso te da la Escritura. La persona que le pertenece a Dios llega a estar completa por medio de las Escrituras. 4. Las Escrituras te preparan para hacer lo Bueno. Lo creas o no, el mundo como está no sabe qué es lo bueno. Y cuando alcanza a ver lo que es una buena obra, no puede hacerla. El estudio de la Escritura te prepara para sí hacerlo. 2 Timoteo 3:14-17. P.D. Estudia el contexto anterior y posterior de este pasaje.  En el contexto anterior encontrarás: maldad, engaño espiritual, oposición, y persecución del creyente. Es en este contexto que se le pide a Timoteo que persista en su apego a la Escritura. En el contexto posterior, el capítulo 4, Pablo le manda a Timoteo que predique la Palabra a tiempo y fuera de tiempo! La Escritura es crítica para el ser humano.