Resolved To Get Cookin’: Overdue Diligence

At the Founders Ministries pre-Convention conference in Nashville, June 2021, the theme was “Resolution,” playing off opposition to the ill-conceived Resolution 9 (on critical race theory and intersectionality), hustled through a vote in 2019 in Birmingham, before messengers knew what was happening. The bulk of the talks at the Nashville conference were keyed toward the folly of that particular resolution and the cultural/theological crisis it represented. With those concerns laid out by the time I got up to speak mid-afternoon, I addressed the need to be diligent in our ministries—a work-ethic message. Granting the need to unstring the bow, to rest and restore ourselves, I suggested that the greater issue today was the one laid out in Alistair Begg’s book, Crazy Lazy, rather than the one in Kevin DeYoung’s excellent book, Crazy Busy. And so I offered a dozen or so suggestions, drawing on my experience in the pastorate, the army, academia, and denominational service.

Nashville, Tennessee, June 14, 2021

1989 Resolutions Committee Report

SBC President Jerry Vines asked me to chair the Resolutions Committee at the Las Vegas convention in 1989. The other committee members were David Allen, Jerry Brown, Joy Dorsett, Ken Hemphill, David McAlpin, James Merritt, Linda Shrewsbury, Jerry Sutton, and Walt Tomme. The resolutions at the previous year’s convention in San Antonio generated some serious furor, especially one on “the priesthood of the believer.” It cautioned that this doctrine should not be used to justify misinterpreting, demythologizing, and otherwise misusing the Bible. When it passed, two hundred messengers turned in their ballots and marched to the Alamo in protest, where they got glowing coverage in the secular press, such as what you find in this piece by the Los Angeles Times. (https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-06-18-me-4652-story.html) With that background, I floated the idea of having a year’s moratorium on resolutions, to let things cool down a bit. President Vines (who’d won election narrowly over Richard Jackson in 1988, in a contest involving 30,000 messengers at the height of the Conservative Resurgence) said we should go ahead and do our work as usual, and he was so right. It turns out that SBC entities, particularly the CLC (now the ERLC), used those resolutions to do their work, a fact I would fully understand two years later when I went to work as Vice President for Public Relations for the SBC Executive Committee. In relating to the press, I constantly drew on resolutions to explain our thinking on various issues. I should add that the entities now only ask for resolution-tools, but also sometimes urge us to not speak on things. I think, for example, of a request from the FMB (now the IMB) to refrain from presenting one on a political conflict overseas, in that it could stir up difficulties for their personnel working there. And so we complied.

Las Vegas, Nevada, 1989

Our Blessings in Christ

In January of 2013, I led a Saturday workshop on aesthetics at Evangelical Community Church in Bloomington, Indiana, and then stayed over to preach a Sunday morning sermon on “Our Blessings in Christ” from Isaiah 61.

Bloomington, Indiana, January 20, 2013

Wield he Sword: Aesthetics

Founders Ministries asked me to talk on aesthetics for the Wield The Sword series, so I traveled to Cape Coral, Florida, to tape these comments. The video is crafted and image-salted by the gifted artists of The Chocolate Knox.

Cape Coral, Florida, May 17, 2021

Mammas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Ethicists

In the spring of 2017, I delivered the annual C.W. Scudder Lectures at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City. The lectureship was established "to explore the biblical basis for dealing with contemporary challenges and ethical issues." The first day, I spoke under the theme, "Mammas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Ethicists" (playing off the old Willie Nelson song about cowboys). The next day, I followed up with "Mammas, Encourage Your Babies to Grow Up To Be Ethicists." The trials came first, and then the resources and rewards. You can find the second video at: https://vimeo.com/207198452

Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, February 28, 2017

Mature Manhood and Womanhood

Founders Ministries held a conference in Birmingham, June 2019, the day before the SBC began its session across the street in the convention center. Here's I'm tearing a newspaper to show that it has a grain, analogous to the gender "grain in the created order.

Founders Ministries, July 3, 2019

Should Christians Celebrate Halloween?

A number of us SBTS profs were enlisted to speak on theological and cultural matters, and I drew this one as one of my assignments.

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, October 31, 2017

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Military and Public Service Policy Forum

With C-SPAN2 coverage, I joined a panel of five arguing the registration women for the draft. With an SBC resolution in hand, I spoke before the U.S. Commission on Military, National, and Public Service, meeting at Washington D.C.'s Gallaudet University, April 25, 2019

Washington, DC, April 25, 2019

Whither America?

At 42:21 in this video, I begin my message from Matthew 11:16-24 (Jesus' words of woe to unresponsive cities). The title: “Whither America?” Preached at FBC Henderson, KY, November 1, 2020.

Henderson, KY, November 1, 2020