Sometimes

Some of you know that I have told the truth.  However, as I was told, it is not about truth, but about money.

I am still very (shaky, very shaky) confident that truth will come out.  I am grieve to the heart that there is an organization out there that is willing to put part(?) of its $136,405,846 endowment to work keeping the truth from Texas Baptists (and I am not talking about the BGCT).  I cannot ever  let Texas Baptist know whose salary this organization has been paying and how they have done it .   Hopefully,  other people ask them why they did this.

I just don’t care to fight this thing anymore.  I doubt the process will work.

Each and every person I have mentioned in this blog I have either faced, offered to face, or would gladly face again, and would say what I have said here to their faces.  None of my critics has ever, I repeat, ever done so with me.

This is good West Texas philosophy:  It is easy to put up with the bovine when you are standing on the truth (until it gets up to your neck).  I don’t have to change my story.

I really cannot understand some of my critics.  I cannot understand how anyone could support mismanagement, misappropriations, lies and manipulations, and out and out openly immoral, vulgar behavior.    This is not about doctrine or polity but about honesty.  What has happened is reason for sack cloth and ashes.

I am ending this blog.

There are other blogs out there who will provide much better leadership in days ahead.  This blog has had its purpose.  It has shown how blogs can be used as smooth stone against a Goliath.  When this blog closes,  it will have  accomplished the majority of its goals.  I am thankful for what has been accomplished.

For those who helped and have been helped, thank you for letting me serve.

A Good Weekend at the Gardens

This past weekend, the Karate club we sponsor participated in a Japanese Fall Festival.  It was an incredible  opportunity for ministry.

I had great fun putting on a mawashi and giving a lecture and demonstration in Sumo, the national sport of Japan.  After the demo I would quickly change from my mawashi to my gi in order to direct the demonstration done by our Karate club.  Both the students of the Seibukan group and the Tora Kai Shito Ryu group did very well.  We did kata, self defense, weapons demonstration and broke lots of bricks and boards.  Brain Farmer, sensei was amazing.  He is a great person and a wonderful partner of mine in the Karate club.

Still, the part of the weekend that excited me most was our Kakura Kirishitan (Hidden Christians of Japan) booth.  At this display we put up an old Japanese scroll with John 15:5 on it, handed out historical tracts about the persecution of Christians by the Shogunate and how the faith survived under the most hostile of conditions.  We also showed the movie, Good Soil, which is a dramatic account of the early days of the persecution of the church.   We were able to share our faith with over thirty people who wanted to know more about the Christian faith.  Hundreds more took the brochure.  Many said they were please to see a Christian group show an interest in this culture.  I feel certain we will be able to do this again.

Gosh, it was great to focus on ministry  in this fashion.

Oh, by the way, the whole ministry project probably cost us about $300 to reach out to about 3000 people.  A very satisfying  couple of days.

A Very Interesting Post

http://holyagnostic.typepad.com/holyagnostic/the-frito-bandito/

Waiting, but………

I have learned things these last two weeks that have made me angrier than ever about a certain situation.  I cannot blog about these things because of the threat I have received.  Yet, my anger and outrage is tempered by the work that now is being done.  If this effort fails or succeeds, I have given it my best.  I can finally see an end.

Oh, about that threat, I have been asked what it was about and who did the threatening.  I will publish (it came in email form) the threat as my last blog just before I take down this site.  It will be interesting to see how people respond.   I feel it is only right for Texas Baptists to know who made the threat, what the threat was about, and why.  However, until a later date, the communication will not be divulged.

And yes, this blog will come down within the next year I hope.  This blog had a purpose and that purpose will either be achieved very soon or that purpose will never be achieved.   This blogger has no desire to be an ongoing “voice” in Texas Baptist politics.  I have no desire to be a Currie (politically, morally, or spiritually) and try cram my theology or “historic fabrications” down people’s throats.

Yes, TBC still needs to be monitored, closely.  I fear those who still support it are like a cancer that will destroy the body before it dies.  Those who make up the elitist of the TBC are every bit as dangerous to the future of the BGCT the Pressler/Patterson coalition was.  These folks will try to continue their control through the VP offices.  They will not run anyone against Lowrie but they are campaigning as hard as ever for the VP slots.  Samurai still cares but there are several good blogs out there that can take over the watchdog role.  My calling was never to become a pseudo-journalist, denominational bureaucrat, a board hopping elitist or Baptist power broker of any kind.   Three decades of Baptist battles has been more than enough for me.   The last seven have been horrible.  I am so thankful that the church I serve is isolated from this.  This blog is mine and mine alone.  I would venture that 99% have never read this blog nor would even know its name.

So I wait.  I wait for the truth.  I wait for what is right.  I wait because I do believe that God has not abandoned the issue.  I wait because someone who really cares and cannot be undone with a wink and a nod is working hard to make the wrong right.  It is hard to wait,  but then again the Lord never said this would be easy.  We will wait and we will still blog carefully staying within constraints placed upon us as until these constraints require us to violate our conscience.   This we will not do.   Texas Baptists have a right and a need to know.  You most certainly will not get the truth from the Baptist Standard.  You will get a sanitized, dressed up version-a $400k Ken/David Currie version- this you can be assured (Whenever I read an article in the Standard from now on it may have the name Ken Camp, but you wonder who really wrote the story.  The Standard sold its journalistic integrity for a bowl of David Currie approval).

Money may be the god of this world, but it is NOT God of this house!

Great Blog Lee

Lee Saunders has a great insight on Mark Knox statement.

http://deepintheheart.wordpress.com/2009/10/19/baptist-standard-tbc-must-reinvent-itself/#comment-7462

The Selective Memory of Marv Knox

I went to the Baptist Standard site and found what I believe to be a work of editorial fiction.

“Thanks to TBC, our state convention has not endured the upheaval and redirection that afflicted the national convention and many other states. Our state convention stands as a bastion for historic Baptist principles, such as soul competency, the priesthood of all believers, local church autonomy, the primacy of Jesus, and the separation of church and state. We have had Hispanic, African-American and female presidents. Thank God and TBC, our strong and vital institutions have neither fallen to fundamentalism nor forsaken our convention.”

It was not TBC, at least not the David Currie TBC that saved the BGCT.  The BGCT was saved by Baylor University and its network.  It was Phil Strickland, Herb Reynolds, Phil Lineburger and John Baugh who defeated the takeover boys.  Currie was pretty much their gopher who put the work on those who worked for him and then claimed their work for himself when it succeeded and blamed them when he messed it up.  The way David treated Charlie and others who worked for TBC was shameful.

No, the Boy self-named crazy horse was pretty much just stage dressing for the giants.  Is it any wonder that TBC is now monetarily and morally bankrupt.  Those who gave it legitimacy are gone.   Even its wannabees are looking for a new honey pot.

I cannot tell if Marv Knox is being forgetful, trying to be funny or needs to have a blood test.  What TBC has done in recent years is to support the reign of King Charles, destroy the ministry of those who would not support their leftist fundamental leanings, and force historic candidates down our throats (the “historic” African American literally read the convention out of existence and then comment how he did this out of ignorance- some example of our historic Baptist principals) while weakening the BGCT.

Rick Davis stood up to Currie and company (and don’t think for an instant TBC will be any different once it is “re -visioned”,it will still have the groupthink that it has had for the last several years) and got 20% of the vote with a 45 minute campaign.   The “historic” woman candidate (and I have no trouble with a woman being president) only won by a slim margin and Currie has not be cooperative with our current president whom Currie has tried to control (and whom Currie did not pick).

Either Marv or Ken Camp even went as far as letting David Currie determine what news about TBC should be printed (I really wonder who wrote the editorial? I mean it has Currie’s style and substance-less rambling to it.).  The way the Baptist Standard has declined makes one wonder if Texas Baptists will ever get a true NEWSPAPER or are we stuck with a mouthpiece for those who are slowly but surely destroying what Texas Baptists are really about.  The selective memory of Marv Knox needs to be challenged.

So True a Comment

I found this comment on another Baptist blog.

When the Greeks got the gospel, they turned it into a philosophy.
When the Romans got it,
they turned it into a government.
When the Europeans got it,
they turned it into a culture.
When the Americans got it,
they turned it into a business.
(I added another line, but decide that someone
would think I was writing about them so I
took the line out but it will edited back
in the next 5 months. Hopefully sooner than later*)

- Unknown

*Parenthesis portion added…….

Sins of omission are every bit as bad as the sins of commission.

A Time for Patience

Patience can be  a very difficult teacher especially when one has spent so much time waiting.   Disappointment after disappointment can make patience almost unbearable.  Again, I said almost.  Knowing there are those whose motivation is the Kingdom, gives one a stronger grip on patience.

I have learned the difference between the church and those who make their living because of the church.  That difference is righteousness.  I am so glad it still exists.

For those monitoring this blog, get some rest.  This will be the last entry till sometime next week.  God bless you.

A Letter from a Friend

For those looking for more BGCT revelations, not today.

This letter is from a real friend who happens to be incarcerated.  In fact, this person has been incarcerated most of their adult life.  I had the privilege to tell him about Jesus and to baptize him when Jesus became his Savior and Lord.  About five months after he had joined our church and was baptized, another charge was filed against him in Tyler.   The charge had to do with something long before I met my friend.  He knew he was going back to jail.  That was almost four years ago.  He is called the Rev at his unit.  He has a low number and so has respect.  He is a strong Christian and a courageous man.  He can take care of himself.  He ministers to the church I serve by writing letters (which are sermons).  This is what he wrote to me:

Adversity reveals our level of faith.  When hardships come our way, do we respond, “God I trust you to bring me through this” or do we tend to say, “I’m doomed and there’s nothing anyone can do!”

God once sent a storm on the Sea of Galilee to teach Jesus’ disciples a lesson on faith.  Jesus had said to his men, “Le us cross over to the other side (Mark 4:35)”, and they should have taken his statement as a sure sign that he expected a safe trip.  When a terrible windstorm threatened the boat, they panicked.  the terrified disciples asked Jesus, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are perishing?”  How many times have we said the same thing?  ”Don’t you care Lord that this is happening to me, or don’t you love me enough Lord to do something about this hardship?”

Jesus rebuked the wind and immediately a great calm settled on the lake.   He then turned to his disciples and said, “Why are you  so fearful?”

“How is it that you have no faith?” (Mark 4:40)

God has given to each of us a measure of faith (Romans 12:3), and He expects us to use it to overcome our fear.  Fear always accompanies adversity;  in fact, a degree of fear is what makes us something in adversity instead of just another experience.  Fear causes us to project the very worst that can happen-that we will never recover, that all hope is lost, that we will never again enjoy some treasured thing.

Faith tells the opposite story.  Faith says that God is in control and that all things work together for our good (Romans 8:28).  Faith says that we will recover  and that our final state will be better than anything we have experienced thus far.

Allowing adversity to call your faith to action rather than into question is our task.  Adversity reveals areas in which we need to act in faith, not fear.  When hard times come, say to yourself “Now is the time to use my faith in a new way.”  The more you use your faith, the greater it grows.  Amen.

This was written  the first week in October.  It was just what I needed to hear.  Knowing where my friend is and how long he has been there, what he has faced, make his words very powerful indeed.  He blesses me with his exhortations.

Yes, I Do Hear the Noise

One of the news media in our area reported that some people who attended a recent U2 concert in a new arena were disappointed because they could not hear the words of the song through the noise.  I can just image how frustrating it is to not be able to hear the words by Bono, “the way of love”.

So much noise.  Still there is love.  Not a one sided love.  Not a love  forced nor deceived, but a love that is transparent and truthful, painfully truthful.  It is important that our expressions, our passions, our beliefs, and our experience based on public and verifiable information can/and if by belief in justice must, by our constitutional freedom still be freely spoken or written.  To be silent about what one deeply believes is wrong to me  and is sin.  It is a matter of honor.

But tomorrow I will have breakfast with a brother and friend and visit a prisoner.  I will study the Word and pray.  I will answer any call anyone in my church makes to me.  I will be there anytime they need me and they know that.     I do love them.  I will teach a class and end in prayer and some who have never prayed before will pray with me.  This is what I do.

Please as you gather tonight with those whose habit and even passion is Wednesday evening prayer, please pray for me.  I do want your prayers.

On my own personal time, I blog.  My heart compels me.