Editor’s Note: Last night The Tennessean reported, on Wednesday, March 23, the “Bathroom Bill” was given new life in the House and advanced in the Senate. Although the House Education Administration and Planning Committee voted against the bill on March 22, when the committee reconvened on Wednesday, Rep. Jim Coley, R-Bartlett, made a motion to force the committee to reconsider its action. Tennesseans can still call their legislators to express their views on this bill.

 

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector

NASHVILLE — A bill that would require students in public education institutions in Tennessee to use restroom and locker rooms that are assigned to their biological sex is currently circulating in the Tennessee Senate and House of Representatives.

Senate Bill 2387 and House Bill 2414 are commonly referred to as the “Bathroom Bill.”

David Fowler, president of the Family Action Council of Tennessee and a former state senator, has been monitoring the progress of the bill. [Read more…]

Bellevue pastor shares goals and hopes if elected convention president

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector

BROWNSVILLE — Tennessee Baptist pastor Steve Gaines of Bellevue Baptist Church, Cordova, will be nominated for the presidency of the Southern Baptist Convention during the SBC annual meeting June 14-15 in St. Louis.

Georgia pastor Johnny Hunt announced he would nominate Gaines on March 9.

In an interview with the Baptist and Reflector March 14 in Brownsville, Gaines said he was approached about allowing his name to be nominated at the end of last year’s meeting. Current SBC president Ronnie Floyd of Arkansas is in his second and last term.

Throughout the year others have asked if he would be willing to be nominated. Gaines, though, said he never “aspired” to hold that office. Gaines recalled that his predecessor at Bellevue — the late Adrian Rogers — once said, “That office (SBC president) should seek the man rather than the man seeking the office.” “That was a good statement,” Gaines agreed. [Read more…]

By Connie Davis Bushey
News Editor, Baptist and Reflector

HENDERSONVILLE — When Mike Pennington, director of missions, Bledsoe Baptist Association, began helping Cragfont Baptist Church, Castalian Springs, it was in trouble. He tried to assist the congregation for several years but it was still declining in attendance and could not meet its financial obligations.

Then he approached First Baptist Church, Hendersonville, whose senior pastor, Bruce Chesser, agreed to try to lead his church to help Cragfont.

Now, just four years later, the new Creekside Fellowship, which meets in the former Cragfont facility, is drawing about 130 people to Sunday morning worship and is a healthy church, agreed Pennington and Bruce Raley, executive pastor, First Baptist, who led in the process. [Read more…]

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector

JACKSON – Nashville native Jim Henry has a love for deacons that grows stronger with each passing year.

From the surgeon who shined the shoes of his prayer group members at First Baptist Church, Orlando, Fla., to the small group of deacons who “had his back” at a rural church in Mississippi during days of racial tension in the 1960s, Henry knows his ministry has been made easier by deacons who held to the servant model of leadership. [Read more…]

By David Roach
Baptist Press

ST. LOUIS (BP) — Tennessee pastor Steve Gaines will be nominated for president of the Southern Baptist Convention, Georgia pastor Johnny Hunt announced today (March 9).

“When Steve Gaines shared his prayer journey he and [his wife] Donna had travelled, I was touched by his clear call to allow himself to be nominated,” Hunt, pastor of First Baptist Church in Woodstock, Ga., wrote in a news release stating his intention to nominate Gaines during the SBC annual meeting June 14-15 in St. Louis.

“Steve struggled with this nomination as he has always believed this office should seek the man,” Hunt continued. “With such a passionate desire for spiritual revival in our churches and nation, and knowing him to be a man of deep intense prayer, it brings joy to my heart to nominate Dr. Gaines.” [Read more…]