Baptist in a Pentecostal Wilderness

 In my years in ministry, I've seen my share of ugly in the area of staff members dismissed (fired, forced to resign, etc.) by senior pastors, elders, personnel committees, or (unfortunately) deacons. The commonality in all the cases I've witnessed: the dismissals were forced by the senior pastor. I'm not talking about termination for cause (because of a crime or sex related or another egregious act). I'm talking about relational or some disagreements or theological differences within the realm of orthodoxy. Sometimes these ministers are dismissed for good reason, but sometimes the reasons are petty (and usually the petty ones are silenced from the congregation and public). Sometimes these dismissals are amicable, and sometimes they are heavily contested. The commonality among the contested ones regardless of the reasons: the motives of the contestants are always considered evil and divisive, and the others (the ones generally complaining about the evil and divisive con...

  Right now I'm working on a sermon about love, and particularly about not hating brothers and sisters in Christ. It's a more difficult message for me to prepare than it should be, for I have been far from perfect in this area. But since I preach verse-by-verse through books, I force myself to deal with subjects as they arise in the text. So here I am! If you have a similar experience and background as I (25 years of work/ministry experience across four states, and many church positions), then you would know that not every transition was on the best of terms (or even my idea!). I'm just beginning to have cordial conversations with a former pastor over social media, but back when I served with him it got tense, and when I moved to another state and ministry position it was a major relief on all sides. I'm hoping the same thing will begin to occur with a more recent situation, but I'm certain it won't. It was even more bitter. I still wonder sometimes if that past...

 Sometimes I do things I regret. Last week I posted about the "dumpster fire" I thought the SBC Annual Meeting was this year. Even though I still do believe it was every bit of that, I regret sharing it on such a platform as that. I don't know exactly what I intended to accomplish outside of basic venting, which I should be doing on this site instead of something more public like Facebook or my other blogsite. I appreciate the current SBC President, and recognize the difficulty of the SBC Executive Committee CEO. I may not always agree with Jeff Iorg on his public stances, or consider his reasoning to be wrong or unfounded or deceptive or whatever else; but he might be the best person for the job from the usual crop of gentlemen. However, maybe he should step aside at next year's meeting to make way for the current SBC President, Clint Pressley (although he might reject taking the job after two years as President). Truth is, a few of the major reasons I thought it to ...

 It doesn't look like we'll get to see Jubal at all this summer. Even if we travel up there (which isn't far from my parents, so we probably will), he won't be allowed off the base and getting on base will most likely be incredibly hard. Looks like it's nothing but letters. Hoping to visit my parents in July, if we can get a good time scheduled with them to visit. __________________ Anyway, today is day 3 of VBS. We're doing it, special events are hard to deal with in this church due to competing narcissistic personalities. We only have 8 children, but they've all been there both days so far. Not really sure if a full week of events is worth it for 8 kids. As the old saying goes: "If ONE salvation comes out of it..." -- It's funny that Christians who hate pragmatism accept this phrase as reason to do all kinds of stuff. Then fully forgiven or forgotten if zero salvations come out of it. Probably the roughest thing I've dealt with as pastor ...