Annie Armstrong offering reaches $56.5 million
Southern Baptists gave $56.5 million in 2009 to the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering for North American Missions. The amount was 2.7 percent (or $1.5 million) off the previous year’s giving mark and $8.5 million below the stated goal of $65 million. The $56.5 million received in 2009 is the fourth-largest total in the offering’s history.
SBC Pastors Conference to focus on ‘Greater Things’
The 2010 SBC Pastors Conference will focus on “Greater Things,” according to Kevin Ezell, pastor of Highview Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., and president of the Orlando, Fla., event to be held June 13-14. Ezell also announced the launch of the conference’s Web site, www.sbcpc.net.
SBC president Hunt clear of cancer
Follow-up tests for Johnny Hunt show him clear of cancer, according to a spokesman for the president of the Southern Baptist Convention. Jim Law, executive pastor of the Atlanta-area First Baptist Church in Woodstock where Hunt is pastor, shared Hunt’s doctor’s report that there was “no trace of cancer” and he “could not be more pleased” with Hunt’s prognosis. Hunt underwent surgery to remove his prostate Jan. 7.
Cliff Barrows at Hall of Faith dedication
With a rare public appearance by legendary music evangelist Cliff Barrows, the North American Mission Board and the Conference of Southern Baptist Evangelists (COSBE) dedicated the “Evangelists Hall of Faith” on Jan. 14. With brass plaques, the Hall of Faith – permanently located at NAMB’s offices in Alpharetta, Ga. – will perpetually honor the 30 living and deceased evangelists inducted at COSBE’s inaugural ceremony in Indianapolis in June 2008 as well as future inductees.
SWBTS obtains Dead Sea Scrolls fragments
Pieces from what many scholars argue is the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century have found a permanent residence at Southwestern Baptist Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Southwestern trustee Gary Loveless presented president Paige Patterson with the collection during a seminary chapel service Jan. 20. Loveless provided the lead gift for the purchase of the fragments, which were acquired from a private collector in Europe. The collection makes Southwestern one of only a handful of institutions of higher education in the United States to possess pieces of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
GuideStone Funds earn ’09 Lipper rankings
Eight of 11 GuideStone Select Funds in its GS4 class exceeded their respective mutual fund peer universe median as measured by Lipper Inc. over the one-year period ending Dec. 31. The news was even better for GuideStone Select Funds in its GS2 class, with seven of nine funds exceeding their peer universe median over a one-year period, and six of nine beating their peer universe median over three- and five-year periods ending Dec. 31.
Leaders urge religious liberty appointee
Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission president Richard Land has joined seven others in urging Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to work with President Obama to appoint quickly an ambassador-at large for international religious freedom. Land and the other religious liberty advocates made the request of Clinton in a letter dated Jan. 20. The letter called for Clinton’s “immediate attention” to the vacancy because of the “many serious religious tensions throughout the world.”