Baptist Press reports that clergy salaries are outpacing inflation. Really?
Bryant Wright iscalling for Southern Baptists to get busy with the Gospel and missions. The guy is a workhorse, not a showhorse. He calls for every SBC church to send their pastor on a mission trip "annually." I'm for that.
Here in Georgia, one of the worst states for foreclosures and bank failures, the economy is quite bad...but our state sponsored lottery is doing just great, thank you. The lottery, our tax on poor and stupid people, is effectively transferring money from po' folks to educated middle class folks by paying for their kids' college education.
Back in the mid-1990s long before I could afford a cell phone, people were coming by the church asking for assistance, uh, money to pay their bills. How long before someone shows up at my church with an Iphone needing help to keep their water turned on?
We're deep into indirect losses from the BP oil disaster. Maybe the BGCT, whose revenues are way, way down, can put in a claim. I think Texas has a good bit of land that borders the gulf.
The little Texas Japanese bulldog, David Montoya, can't seem to get answers about just how much BGCT employees are paid. Good luck, David. Don't give in or give up. It's your money. You deserve to have your questions answered.
An observation: Church conflict blogs that are successful, as in seeing the pastor resign (Two Rivers BC, Nashville) disappear. Those that don't achieve that success (FBC Jax, Bellevue) stick around and morp into sort of a watchdog and commentary function.
I'm still waiting for Frank Page to tell me what I need to do Sunday...
5 comments:
Hi William,
Three observations:
1) Our pastor has been making mission trips for years. Having been on 4 myself, it's not just the pastors that need to go, the laymen also need to go to see exactly what things are like where life isn't as good as it is here in the US.
2) There has actually been a church over in the Mobile area that submitted a claim to BP because giving is down. Around 50 members and the claim was for $50 large.
3) Your observation about the blogs is spot on. But there doesn't seem to always be a lot of good news from them.
Have a great weekend.
I read about the church filing a claim because of lost offerings. Maybe every church in New Orleans should have done the same after Katrina.
I think Wright had in mind the pastor getting excited about overseas missions and involving the church.
Norm: Perhaps people could use the following comment that you previously ventured to place your above post in context?
"William: Just a side note: All of my kid's education was pretty much paid for by the special, voluntary tax that we have here in Georgia on poor and stupid people. I appreciate their contributions. (BaptistLife, May 11, 2009)."
Sure, Norm. It's all I have to keep me patient when I'm in the checkout lane at a convenience store behind folks buying lottery tickets.
You are correct, the excitement does flow from the top down many times.
It took our pastor becoming involved to really get our church behind making mission trips.
About the lottery, I have a hard time when someone's buying the tickets and then pays for other items with their food stamp card.
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