The tagline on the CBF website is one that we can all celebrate and, at the same time, be challenged by: Partner in Renewing God’s World By Katherine Smith The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship is a Christian network of individuals and churches working together to spread the hope of Christ. Our diverse community includes partners all … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed For a long time there has been commonly-held wisdom about church size dynamics and the role of the pastor at each church size: The family size church has fewer than 50 people, with most of them related to one another. This congregation experiences little numerical growth because it is difficult for visitors … Continue reading
By Beth R. Bailey As I walked into the door of Agora Coffee Shop in Fredericksburg, Virginia, I felt a sense of home, a sense of why many college students love to study, talk and read in this quaint coffee shop. I was meeting a Mary Washington student, Jessica, for coffee and to catch up. … Continue reading
By Rick Burnette “Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” (II Corinthians 9:6-7) One Saturday morning in February at Misión … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed Over the course of their vocational lives, many pastors find themselves charged with leading a church staff. This is not only true for senior pastors, but associate pastors can also function in the same way within their more specialized ministry areas. The supervisory role is challenging. Most pastors enter ministry expecting to … Continue reading
According to the New Oxford American Dictionary, a firestorm is “a raging fire of great intensity, as one fueled by oil or gas, that spreads rapidly.” That might be the best way to describe what Kristen Kobes Du Mez’s work around her book, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured … Continue reading
“Real transformation requires real honesty. If you want to move forward – get real with yourself.” — Bryant McGill By Crystal Ham The word of the day is transform. As I googled quotes about transformation, the one above spoke loudly from the computer screen. Transform. Honesty. Forward. Real. All words that represent potential and oftentimes … Continue reading
By Laura Stephens-Reed In A Path to Belonging: Overcoming Clergy Loneliness, leadership specialists Mary Kay DuChene and Mark Sundby raise the red flag that loneliness among clergy, a stress response to not having adequate levels of social connection, is epidemic. This was true before the pandemic, but our need to distance ourselves physically during the … Continue reading
May 18, 2023 By Aaron Weaver DECATUR, Ga. — The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship will commission five new Global Missions personnel on June 30 as part of the closing Friday worship service of the 2023 General Assembly in Atlanta. Jana Lee is being commissioned as a career CBF field personnel to work closely with a local … Continue reading
What’s your theology of caring for the dead? You haven’t thought much about it, have you? Neither did I until I sat down with the authors of Corpse Care: Ethics for Tending the Dead, Mikeal Parsons and Cody Sanders. “What we do in relation to this stage of bodily becoming, the inevitability of our incarnation … Continue reading
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