Delay GCR till 2011, Missouri board urges
Missouri Baptist Convention executive director David Tolliver will attempt to make a motion at the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in June asking messengers to receive the report by the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force (GCRTF) and delay any action for one year until all entities involved can do a spiritual/financial impact study. The motion by Tolliver was sanctioned by the 54-member MBC executive board in an April 13 vote without opposition.
SBC daycare, Fuge registration open
Registration is now open for families to enroll their children in preschool childcare and the children’s conference – as well as Fuge camp for grades 6 through 12 – in conjunction with the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Orlando, Fla. For all information regarding registration, visit www.sbcannualmeeting.net and click on “Children & Students.”
NOBTS trustees reverse pay cuts
New Orleans Seminary trustees approved a $21 million budget for the 2010-11 school year during their spring meeting April 14. The new budget includes only small increases in tuition and fees. The trustees also were able to roll back some of the cuts issued under the seminary austerity budget in January 2009. Faculty and staff members who received a 5 percent pay cut during the height of the national economic crisis will have their pay returned to the pre-recession levels for the 2010-11 budget year.
Student volunteers needed in Haiti
The International Mission Board needs students willing to spend two weeks serving in Haiti. IMB is sounding an urgent call for 275 Christian students to work with children displaced by the earthquake that struck the island nation Jan. 12. Beginning May 15, the IMB will send teams of 25 student volunteers to spend two weeks ministering to children in refugee camps, orphanages, schools and villages near Haiti’s border with the Dominican Republic. For more information, visit gohaiti.org or call 1-888-421-4408.
Student missionary dies in accident
A 21-year-old student missionary with the Southern Baptist International Mission Board was killed April 12 in a motorcycle accident in the southeastern African country of Mozambique. Jeremiah Johnson, a member of Royal Palms Baptist Church in Phoenix, Ariz., and driver of the motorcycle, was riding with an interpreter when the accident happened. Reports from overseas personnel say Johnson was killed instantly in the accident and his passenger was injured. Johnson was working with IMB’s Hands On initiative among an unreached people group. The program enables college students to work on the mission field for a semester.
Two to be nominated for SBC president
Jimmy Jackson, president of the Alabama Baptist State Convention and senior pastor of Whitesburg Baptist Church, will allow his name to be placed in nomination for president of the Southern Baptist Convention. Jackson joins Georgia pastor Bryant Wright of Marietta’s Johnson Ferry Baptist Church as the only other candidate for the position. Ray Newman, who oversees the Georgia Baptist Convention’s ethics and public affairs ministry, announced on April 19 that he will allow his name to be placed in nomination for second vice president of the convention. There are no other candidates for either first or second vice president positions.
Chinese lawyer gets religious liberty award
Fan Yafeng, a Chinese human rights lawyer and religious liberty advocate, has received the 2009 John Leland Religious Liberty Award for his defense of persecuted Christians in China. Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, presented the award during an April 14 ceremony at the U.S. Capitol. Land described Fan as “a courageous defender of persecuted Christians in China, including the defense of house church pastors and Christian lay leaders.”
Baptist leader outraged at Westboro protest
A prominent Southern Baptist leader in West Virginia says he is “outraged” that Westboro Baptist Church picketed a state mine following a tragedy, and he wants to get the word out that the congregation is not Southern Baptist. Terry L. Harper, executive director of the West Virginia Convention of Southern Baptists, released the statement several days after Westboro, a Topeka, Kan., independent church headed by Fred Phelps, picketed the Upper Big Branch mine. The church said the 29 deaths in the mine explosion were God’s punishment for mine officials supposedly opposing a previously scheduled Westboro protest in West Virginia. Westboro is not affiliated with any Baptist or religious group.