By Randy C. Davis TBC Executive Director The overflow crowd crammed into the small room and spilled out into the street. You needed to be early or fast to get a good seat. Neither of those are an option when you can’t walk. Late arrivals are relegated to the farthest reaches of the human sea, and a long way from hope. That is unless you have friends committed to doing

By Johnnie Godwin Contributing Columnist, B&R My “Baptist” dad went forward at invitation time one Sunday night when I was 16. I didn’t have a clue why he might be doing that. All my life Dad had done all the Baptist things the rest of our family did: the whole shebang. Growing up, I had never wondered why Dad took me to the Presbyterian Church in Sandusky, Texas, when we

By David Evans TBC Staff In the New Testament, the nature of evangelism is organic (natural and irregular). Evangelism should occur naturally from all believers and will occur at irregular times. Evangelism was not something that was programmed. Instead, evangelism was part of personal preparation. The evangelist was prepared because evangelism could happen at anytime with anyone as the Holy Spirit guided. The heart of the Great Commission is that

By Lonnie Wilkey Editor, Baptist and Reflector On May 22, voters in the country of Ireland made a decision that will forever impact their nation. Ireland became the first country to hold a public vote amending its constitution to allow gay marriage (see story “Ireland Votes to Allow Gay Marriage”). With 62.1 percent of the vote, Ireland became the 20th country in the world to approve gay marriage. According to

By Randy C. Davis TBC Executive Director Okay, be sure to pay attention here. This first part could be a little confusing. “Z” is not “Y,” and both “Z” and “Y” are certainly not “X.” No, this isn’t algebra; it is the generational alphabet soup. As a member of the Boomer Generation, I’m just glad I wasn’t assigned to a letter. I think I’d be confused bobbing around with all

By Randy C. Davis TBC Executive Director I have a friend, I’ll call him, “Pamin” (pah-MEEN). He’s Egyptian, a Coptic Christian, lives in the United States and fears for his life. ISIS, he says, is rooted in the United States and he believes would torture and kill him — and other Coptic believers — given the opportunity. As hard as it is for me to relate to his journey, it

By Lonnie Wilkey Editor, Baptist and Reflector As one might expect, an editor’s desk (or e-mail box) can be filled quickly in the course of a week. Regardless of whether we get it the old fashioned way (via mail) or electronically, editors are inundated with requests from people who want us to share their messages. Normally, I very seldom use items that do not have a direct tie with one

By Bob Brown TBC Church Revitalization Team Leader Church revitalization is a stewardship issue over the congregations God has entrusted to every pastor and church member who are affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Convention. Several years ago, a man I barely knew walked into my office with a shoe box under his arm. He said that God had told him to give me something. After he handed me the box,