Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Pennies from Heaven...



Many congratulations to Julie Pennington-Russell on being chosen as senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Decatur, Ga., a nearly 3,000 member mega-church in the SBC. Congrats to the congregation itself on choosing someone for their merits as a clergy person rather than to "make a statement." Pennington-Russell has certainly blazed a trail from Waco to Decatur. It's my understanding that only a few folks (or at least less than ten) are not supportive at Decatur, unlike some of the fights it seems she had at Calvary Baptist at Waco.

This is certainly a step in the right direction for the churches of the SBC, in my opinion, and reflects what we're hearing about who's actually graduating from seminaries these days. Kudos to Pennington-Russell for her tenacity and her faith, kudos to the congregation for choosing who they felt was the best pastor for them, regardless of what it "said" about them as a church.
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1 comment:

linda said...

could it be possible for this to start a trend? not so sure about that. but GREAT FOR HER!!!!!!!!

May 31, 2007 at 6:34 AM

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Why am I here?

I began this blog in preparation for what has been billed in some circles as the "last desperate hope for non-SBC Baptists," the New Baptist Covenant.

Who's us? Well, in my case, American Baptists. I am a cradle American Baptist, having grown up in the Union Baptist Church of Mystic, Connecticut (see links) where I was baptized into the faith in 1981. I pursued various secular goals for a while before recognizing a call to Seminary at Andover Newton Theological School, which led to ordained ministry here at First Baptist Church in Newton.

I am a disciple of the writings of C.S. Lewis, Walter Rauschenbusch, and William Sloan Coffin. As such, I am a student of "liberality," as so well expressed in the recent Christianity for the Rest of Us by Diana Butler Bass. That means I personally believe in welcome and inclusion of ALL persons into the Christian faith, even the folks I disagree completely with.

Is the title self-referential? No, not by a long shot. However,"...a vast number of folks have adopted the appellation 'Baptist' to mean a whole bunch of things that have little to do with what it meant to be Baptist in the first place.Who will be the last Baptist standing? That's unknown, but I can assure you: we'll have to choose from among the available Baptists. All three or so."