In light of the confirmation hearings for John G. Roberts Jr., abortion is once again on the public radar. It is a travesty that the murder of millions every year only periodically comes to the public’s attention. In addition to my role as Teaching Pastor/Elder of Grace Community Church in Glen Rose, TX, I also serve on the Board of Directors for Promiseland Ministries, an independent, non-profit 501(3)(c) organization, and umbrella corporation for Hannah House Maternity Home.

Hannah House exists to provide a place of Christian refuge for teens and young women in crisis pregnancy situations who otherwise might consider abortion. We are adamantly pro-life and intentionally God-centered in all that we do. We provide a safe place for girls and young women to finish out their pregnancies and make informed choices about whether or not to parent or place for adoption, which about half opting for each. Our long-range goals include owning and operating our own adoption agency and increased after-care capabilities.

It is estimated that worldwide, there are nearly 46 million abortions annually, with nearly 126,000 abortions every single day. These numbers are staggering and they’re not going away. For too long Christians have done a lot of talk about the sanctity of life with little action. We must take up the banner of life in full force and pray for the end of abortion. We must also take action. Our policy-makers and judges must hear that they do not speak for us on this issue; that human life is precious and must be protected. Nothing less than the image of God is at stake. We must not become complacent, believing that it doesn’t directly affect us and we must be vigilant in keeping the issue before believers everywhere.

The issue must be framed in light of James 4:2a: “You desire and do not have, so you murder.” We have allowed children to be sacrificed on the idol of convenience and at the feet of the demon of “choice.” We elevate our ideal lifestyle to the point that we are willing to kill for it, and abortion is nothing less than the sacrifice of children in the name of pride.

Please prayerfully consider how you might support the cause of life within your own sphere of influence. Please consider making regular donations to organizations such as Promiseland Ministries, the National Right to Life and others. If you would like more information about supporting Promiseland Ministries and Hannah House Maternity Home, please contact me.

Read about the Roberts’ Hearing and abortion.
Visit the Promiseland Ministries website.
Visit the National Right to Life website.
Read Fifteen Pro-Life Truths to Speak by John Piper.
Read Rescuing Unborn Children… by John Piper.

Thanks to our friend Rhett for making me aware of this. Hugh Hewitt, conservative intellect extraordinaire has started the One True God blog. More “like a discussion board than a traditional blog,” the discussion will revolve around a question, with answers provided by the panelists, no slouches themselves (Al Mohler, John Mark Reynolds, Amy Welborn and David Allen White).

With the first question regarding demons, this endeavor will certainly provide interesting dialogue and will be a site to frequent, thanks Rhett.

Read the One True God blog.
Visit Albert Mohler’s website.
Visit John Mark Reynold’s website.
Visit Amy Wellan’s website.
Read about David Allen White.

As some of you may know, Southern Baptist Convention President Bobby Welch has recently issued the Everyone Can Kingdom Challenge. The lofty goal is nothing less than witnessing to, winning and baptizing one million people within a single year.

As part of this program, Welch is calling for the creation and implementation of Associational Baptism Rallies, calling for each of the 1,188 Baptist associations across the nation to hold two such outdoor rallies over the next year, between October 1, 2005 and September 30, 2006.

The article quotes Welch as saying “My prayer is that we will have bold, urgent, creative leadership emerge out of every association to have two of these baptismal rallies in that one year and that these rallies will begin to spring up all over the different parts of the country.” Welch continued to expound his vision, stating that “when people read about them and hear about them that they too will go and do likewise, and we’ll have in the course of 12 months these sparks turn into a raging wildfire of a fresh work for God and Christ across America and around the world.”

We must certainly admire Welch and his good ‘ol boys for their zeal. 1,000,000 new Southern Baptists in the upcoming year is no small goal. However, it will not begin to put a dent into the some 10.7 million M.I.A. Southern Baptists that we’ve discussed earlier. No matter their good intentions, it seems that the Everyone Can Kingdom Challenge is misguided at best. The Southern Baptist Convention currently has more missing members than many denominations have present. The number of missing nearly doubles the number of those attending, and all Welch can see fit to do is bring in one million more.

It seems that the resources of the Southern Baptist Convention would be better spent in reviving and reforming their existing members (both present and missing!) before they invested in bringing in one million more; many of whom will enter otherwise dead churches. It is a sad reality that most of our Southern Baptists churches are ailing to say the least and dying to be blunt.

Rather than deal with the issue on the level of church health, Welch continues the fine SBC tradition of looking for a band aid. His solution is pep rallies centered around baptism. Don’t misunderstand me for an instant; I am a theologically convinced Credobaptist and I uphold the doctrinal significance of baptism. I just don’t think it’s going to help the Southern Baptist Convention in the slightest.

Southern Baptists would do well to heed the minority voices amongst our ranks such as Mark Dever, wisely calling our attention to the state of the church. In his book Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Dever laments that “The purpose of too many evangelical churches has fallen from one of glorifying God simply to growing larger, assuming that that goal, however achieved, must glorify God.” I fear that this is exactly what we are seeing with the Everyone Can Kingdom Challenge and it’s call for one million new Southern Baptists. It will do no good to bring more people into churches that aren’t equipped to disciple them in the first place.

While this sentiment seems to have grassroots support, and local pastoral involvement, those at the top of the SBC foodchain seem sadly insulated. Many are still riding the wave of the “Conservative Resurgence,” and have neglected the fact that the seeds of destruction planted in our churches during the liberal years are in full bloom. Local churches have long been neglected and many SBC churches are on the brink of extinction. Many pastors feel isolated and ill-supported, while many members don’t have the slightest clue what the church ought to look like as the Body and Bride of Christ in the first place.

I publicly challenge Southern Baptists everywhere to turn their attentions inward. Challenge real spiritual growth in your people, take care of the spiritual health of your congregation, implement church discipline and meaningful membership; focus again on the Glory of God as your ultimate goal. Until these things happen, the Southern Baptist Convention at large is piling more people onto a sinking ship and lamenting that there are still empty seats while ignoring those jumping overboard.

Visit the Southern Baptist Convention website.
Visit the Everyone Can Kingdom Challenge website.
Read the article from Baptist Press.
Read the Resolution on Integrity in Reporting by Tom Ascol.
Read Southern Baptists, An Unregenerate Denomination by Jim Elliff.
Read Wikipedia’s entry on The Little Engine That Could.

As previously stated, I was prompted by reading Nancy Pearcey’s chapter When America Met Christianity, Guess Who Won? in her book Total Truth to go back and re-examine another book that explores some similar themes from an entirely different perspective. While Pearcey’s book is from the perspective of a believer examining the destructive effects of American philosophy on Christian theology, Alan Wolfe has written from the perspective of a non-believer wondering why what Christians say and do doesn’t match.

Wolfe has written a book that Christians need to read. Though not a believer, Wolfe has managed to pick up on something many professing Christians tend to miss: there is drastically little difference between what most Christians claim to believe and the way we actually live. Though we claim to be separate from the world, Wolfe claims that there is actually very little difference from us and those we claim to be separate from.

Wolfe notes that “the faithful in the United States are remarkably like everyone else. It is time for Americans to stop discussing a religion that no longer exists and to concentrate their attention on the one that flourishes all around them.”

Wolfe is essentially writing to two distinct audiences; the academic elite and the “faithful” in America, which to him includes Jews, Catholics, Mormons, Evangelical Christians, etc. To the first group, he essentially says that they really needn’t worry about all of those radical things they hear Christians saying about sin and salvation because we really don’t live any differently than anyone else; so instead, look at their lives rather than their words. To the faithful in America (for our purposes, we will limit our discussion to Evangelical Christians), Wolfe encourages us that we should be proud of how resilient our faith has proven in its ability to adjust to any culture, including the radically individualistic one of modern America.

Leaving little doubt regarding his position, Wolfe asserts that “in every aspect of the religious life, American faith has met American culture - and American culture has triumphed. Whether or not the faithful ever were a people apart, they are so no longer.”

Throughout Wolfe’s book, he give account after account of how Christians in America are really no different in lifestyle and worldview from the rest of the culture that surrounds them. At some point, we must ask the hard questions of whether or not Wolfe is right, and if so, how did it come to be this way?

I’m sad to say that on the whole, considering the church-at-large, Wolfe is probably right. But because Wolfe is not a believer, I think he misses the theological significance of what he’s essentially saying and I don’t think he understands the seriousness of his charge. At root, Wolfe is saying that most who claim to be Christian in America either are not, or do not understand salvation.

We must not be timid in arguing that true salvation will manifest itself in thoughts and deeds. Those who do not demonstrate visible change have reason to doubt their state before God. We may lament that too many Christians look just like the rest of the world because too many Christians don’t understand salvation in the first place; it is an act of God, replacing the heart of stone with a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19; 36:26) , raising the spiritual dead to newness of life (Ephesians 2:1-10, Colossians 2:13-15) and a new birth from above (John 3:1-15). When a child is born, we display dire concern if it does not grow, because we know the only alternative is death. Why do we display less concern for those who claim to have been “born again” spiritually yet display no growth?

For the sake of discussion, I’d like to put forward the idea that once the church moves away from a Reformed view of soteriology (salvation), such a decline is inevitable. Once salvation is removed from the “God” column and placed in the “man” column, it is automatically cheapened into a “take it or leave it” option. The underlying implications are that if we can choose it, we can un-choose it, but also, we can choose how far we want to take it. The idea of the new birth requiring growth is subtly replaced by the idea of taking on a new hobby, which you only get as much out of as you put into.

Wolfe’s observations ought to cause serious concern among believers. Over a period of many years, we have lessened our view of God, His holiness, our sin, and thus, salvation. We have sought to make the Gospel and the Church “relevant” and meaningful, playing down its distinctives, all the while missing the point that the there is nothing more meaningful than the Gospel lived out in hurting lives. Much of the modern church differs very little from the world and we wonder why it is that people don’t take us seriously. Yet Wolfe points out that it’s because our words and our lives simply don’t match.

It’s time to raise up a generation of believers with a high view of God. It’s time for people to understand the height of His holiness and the depth of our sin and the glory that is true salvation. The idea that We must first challenge ourselves to put off the things of the world and clothe ourselves with Christ (Colossians 3:1-17), and we must challenge those around us to follow suit, but they must see that it’s real in our own lives first.

Read The Transformation of American Religion by Alan Wolfe.
Read Christianity Transformed? An Important New Look by Al Mohler.
Read Total Truth by Nancy Pearcey.
Watch the Incredible Hulk movie trailer.
Visit the Transformers website.