Paul Chitwood

“Will you make the first and most expensive Christmas gift this year a gift to our Global Missions Offering?” Sitting in the sanctuary of Calvary Baptist Church in Winston Salem, N.C., on the first Sunday of December, I heard pastor Will Toburen ask that question of his congregation. 

Why does generous giving to support missionaries matter? Reality for every human being is this: No matter where they are, who they are, where they have been or where they are going, who they know, what they do, whether or not they have an education, whether they can or cannot see, can or cannot hear, can or cannot walk, live in plenty or poverty, enjoy peace or endure war, whether they are free or imprisoned, sober or addicted, short or tall, eastern or western, tribal or urban, Asian, European, African or Middle Eastern, it is appointed unto every human being, once to die, but after this the judgment. 

The author of Hebrews states this clearly: “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment” (9:27). John’s vision, recorded in Revelation 20, reveals the consequences of that judgment: “If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire” (v. 15). Because all have sinned, no one who is apart from Christ is able to escape God’s judgment, nor the eternal consequences of their sin. 

This is the world’s greatest problem. [Read more…]

Obstacles are real! Have you ever noticed that everywhere you go, you are always facing obstacles? Some of these obstacles are relatively small, but at other times we face obstacles that look insurmountable from our point of view. 

As we enter into 2023, the outlook seems to be filled with many obstacles. For some, the obstacle is a financial one either in your own life or at the church. Recession is a reality that affects all of us on many levels. For others, the obstacle may be related to your family or your fitness. Still, for others the obstacle is one of faith. 

I talked to a lot of our Tennessee Baptist Convention family at the 2022 Summit and discovered that many are struggling with their faith. It is not that they are uncertain of their salvation, but they are struggling to trust their all to God because of the many obstacles, anxieties and distractions they are facing in both their lives and in ministry. 

I am reminded of the story of Joshua and the people of God approaching the walls of Jericho in Joshua 5. The obstacle of Jericho’s walls is an obstacle that many of us can identify with as God’s people. [Read more…]

Over the past few weeks, while I’ve been gorging on Christmas music, there have been a couple of songs that have sent me down a rabbit hole of deep thought. 

Neither of the songs is new — not by a long shot — but I think this is the first year that I’ve ever really stopped to think about their meaning.

Both of the songs have essentially the same lyrical concept. One of the songs is “Christmas Time” (made popular by 1980s rock star Bryan Adams) and the other is “I wish it could be Christmas every day” (which has been sung by numerous popular artists through the years). 

The general message of both songs is, “Hey, wouldn’t it be great if we all kept the Christmas vibe going for 365 days each year?”  [Read more…]

Johnnie Godwin

A city pastor in a country church. After feeling called to preach and being in my early years of preparation, I was led to pastor a country church. I was a city boy and had never spent much time on a farm. That became evident as I got oriented to pastoring a country church. There were no signs to tell what time church started.

On the first Sunday, toward evening in Daylight Saving Time, I asked a group of the men talking outside what time church would start. They all laughed. Then the chairman of deacons said, “It starts about dark-thirty.”

I had lived by a clock and deadlines all of my life, so I wasn’t prepared for a clock-less Sunday starting time. The farmers explained to me that the cows couldn’t tell the difference in Daylight Saving Time or Standard Time. They just needed to be milked when they were full of milk. I soon adjusted to life by the sun and not a clock. [Read more…]

Lonnie Wilkey

One of my favorite Christmas songs is “Go Tell It on the Mountain.” It’s an upbeat, simple song that proclaims a timeless truth: “Go, tell it on the mountain over the hills and everywhere. Go, tell it on the mountain that Jesus Christ is born.”

In today’s world, it is more imperative than ever before that we keep proclaiming the news of the birth of Jesus Christ and what that means to a lost world.

As Christmas approaches in just a few days, it is a reminder that another year has come and gone.

Like the past two years, 2022 had its share of highs and lows. The economy has gone south and it is taking a toll on many families, not only in our churches and communities but all over the world.  [Read more…]

Week in and week out, the same group of unconverted people come to our worship services — and we practically ignore them. We’d never treat first-time visitors like this, and if we ever heard that they felt ignored, we’d certainly respond quickly to go out of our way to make them feel at home.

But this group? We basically ignore them. If you haven’t realized already, I’m talking about the children in our gatherings. Even in thoughtful, biblically sound churches, you can hear months of sermons without a word spoken to them.

Don’t assume children can’t or won’t listen. Many things will escape them, but they understand more than we give them credit for. 

Surely, anyone who has raised children has learned this. But for some reason, in church, we’re training them to think they don’t need to listen — that what the adults are doing is simply not for them. I know we don’t mean to do this, but when, week after week, we never directly speak to them, I can’t say I blame them. [Read more…]

There were a million adventures awaiting my family when we moved to England in 2009.  The first was to attend church at All Souls Church in London, the church theologian John Stott led for decades. 

We settled into our balcony seats and I said to my wife, “I wonder if we are going to hear any semblance of the gospel preached in John Stott’s church.” All Souls is a Church of England church which to a large degree lost its biblical bearings years ago. Moments after my comment, minister Rico Tice stepped to the pulpit. 

“The greatest need humanity has is to repent of its sin, confess that Jesus is Lord and submit to Him in worship.”

We evangelicals offer an “amen,” but let me ask you Paul’s question. “How will they hear without someone preaching?”

Statistically, “they” aren’t hearing because Christians aren’t “preaching.” Spiritual lethargy defines a large percentage of those sitting in Southern Baptist churches, and what is often preached from pulpits is “moralistic, therapeutic deism,” not the gospel. Theologian Michael Horton says American Evangelicals are at a point where we too often practice “Christless Christianity.” [Read more…]