pastors Archives - Baptist & Reflector

REMEMBERING YOUR LEADERS: A BIBLICAL MANDATE

October 14, 2019

By Steve Holt
Church Services Director, TBMB

Remember your leaders who have spoken God’s word to you. As you carefully observe the outcome of their lives, imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7, CSB)

October is Pastor Appreciation Month. Since the early 1990s, church members have been encouraged to recognize the sacrificial service of their pastors in some tangible way during the month. While we should always seek to encourage and pray for our pastors, Pastor Appreciation Month is a great reminder to let our leaders know how much we love them. [Read more…]

DOVER PASTOR NOT ‘PRONE TO WANDER’

October 11, 2019

By David Dawson
Baptist and Reflector
ddawson@tnbaptist.org

Melvin Dunaway delivers a message at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church, where he served as pastor for 45 years. The church, which recently held a special service to celebrate its 100-year anniversary, called Dunaway as pastor when he was a young preacher who had only preached about a dozen sermons.

DOVER — Melvin Dunaway initially assumed he would only last about seven days at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Dover.

Turns out, his estimate was a little off — by about 16,500 days.

Dunaway recently announced his retirement after serving as Pleasant Grove’s pastor for 45 years — a tenure that spans nearly half of the church’s 100-year history.

“After I preached that first Sunday, I thought, well, they won’t want me back any more,” said Dunaway with a little laugh.

The church did indeed want him back the following Sunday … and the one after that … and ultimately, for the next half-century.

“Every member (at Pleasant Grove) has done nothing but love me,” said Dunaway. “And I loved them right back.” [Read more…]

SERMON OR SOLILOQUY? THOUGHTS ABOUT PREACHING

September 25, 2019

By Larry Robertson
Pastor, Hilldale Baptist Church, Clarksville

Larry Robertson

I love to hear Shakespeare filtered through the story-telling flair of Andy Griffith. In his rendition of Romeo and Juliet, he paused to explain the meaning of a soliloquy. He said, “A soliloquy is where you kinda look a way off and kinda talk to yourself. They used to do that a whole lot back then …”

Honestly — and I’m a little embarrassed to admit this to you — I learned the meaning of soliloquy from Andy Griffith. But, hey, I’ve never forgotten it!

As a preacher, I need to ask myself every time I preach whether I’m giving a sermon or a soliloquy. Am I talking to someone or to no one? Do I envision an audience on the other end of my words or do I “kinda look a way off and kinda talk to” myself? [Read more…]

PASTORS, WIVES LEARN ABOUT BALANCING MINISTRY, MARRIAGE AT CONFERENCE

September 10, 2019

By Diana Chandler
Baptist Press

Joe and Pennie Wright lead a conference for pastors and wives through their ministry with the Bivocational and Small Church Leadership Network.

NASHVILLE — Happily wed to his new bride Pennie, Joe Wright didn’t want to travel without her in his role as executive director of the Bivocational and Small Church Leadership Network (BSCLN).

“When I interviewed with the BSCLN and they offered me the position, I shared with them, ‘This is a burden on my heart. A lot of ministers are struggling. I’m a newlywed, I’m happy and I want my wife to go with me, ’ ” Wright told Baptist Press in describing a new BSCLN conference for pastors and their wives.

“And they said, ‘Joe, will you buy her plane ticket?’ ” Wright recounted. “And I said, ‘I will, I will.’ They said, ‘Then she goes with you wherever you go.’ ”

The Wrights’ story segues into “The Pastor’s Wife and The Other Woman: Balancing Your Marriage with Your Ministry,” a conference available at no fee to Southern Baptist churches, associations and conventions. The conference, adaptable to a single evening or two days, is designed to encourage and equip pastors and their wives to manage their ministerial and personal lives in harmony.

“I believe the greatest vulnerability for the modern minister is not in his church work, but in his home life,” said Wright, a former Tennessee Baptist pastor and director of missions for Dyer Baptist Association, based in Dyersburg. “And if Satan can injure him at home, he will cripple him at work. [Read more…]

GETTING PERSONAL

July 25, 2019

Brentwood pastor shares about his mom’s disease in his new book about Alzheimer’s, dementia

By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector
lwilkey@tnbaptist.org

Mike Glenn, lead pastor at Brentwood Baptist, poses with a stack of ‘Coffee with Mom’ — the book he wrote about his mom’s battle with Alzheimer’s.

BRENTWOOD — As a minister for more than 40 years, Mike Glenn walked through the valley of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease with many families over the years.

But he admits that until you face it personally it is truly hard to understand what a family goes through. “Caring for someone with dementia or Alzheimer’s disease is totally consuming,” said Glenn, pastor of Brentwood Baptist Church, Brentwood. [Read more…]

LEGAL CHALLENGE TO HOUSING ALLOWANCE ENDS

June 26, 2019

Baptist Press

DALLAS — The legal challenge to the constitutionality of the ministerial housing allowance is over — for now.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) announced June 14 it would not appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court its March judicial loss.

The decision concluded the latest effort to gain nullification of the allowance that is part of a 65-year-old federal law. [Read more…]

TBMB LEADER DISCUSSES PASTORAL BURNOUT

May 20, 2019

By Lonnie Wilkey
lwilkey@tnbaptist.org

Randy C. Davis

FRANKLIN — As the calendar rolled from April into May, TBMB leader Randy C. Davis reflected on the burden he feels for pastors and ministers who suffer from burnout.

In his monthly Radio B&R podcast (see Episode 30 here), Davis commented on the TBMB board of directors meeting held April 30 at Thompson Station Church. Actions included the formation of a special task force to study sexual abuse prevention and response and the purchase of property adjacent to the Baptist Campus Ministry facility at the University of Tennessee-Martin. See story in this issue. [Read more…]

10 WAYS MINISTERS CAN MAXIMIZE VACATIONS

May 14, 2019

By Randy C. Davis
TBMB President & Executive Director

Randy C. Davis

I love vacations, but I have to work at them. I have trouble “turning off” the ministry mode.

When my youngest daughter was about 11, she said, “Daddy, I bet these folks hate to hear you’re on vacation.” When I asked her why, she said, “Because they know one of them is going to die.” There were too many vacations cut short or at least interrupted because the girls’ pastor-daddy had to go home to conduct a funeral. They never turned bitter, and even now remind me of the fun we had on family vacations, but I could have handled those times better as a pastor and a father. [Read more…]

ESSENTIALS TO LOOK FOR IN A PASTOR

May 6, 2019

By Johnnie C. Godwin
Contributing Columnist, B&R

Pastors come and go in the lives of churches, but each one is critically important to the church. Pastors are God’s gift to a church and appointed by the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 4:11; Acts 20:38). Each real pastor has one essential at the heart of his calling and his role.

Yet, many churches search for a pastor with minimal requirements instead of on the essential requirements. I believe I know what is required of a pastor; because I get it from the Bible. Let me share it with you. [Read more…]

Brentwood pastor shares about his mom’s disease in his new book about Alzheimer’s, dementia

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