In its report, the presbytery’s resolution team wrote, “Team members have worked actively with the Denominational Relations Committee and session of First Presbyterian Church to reach an agreement regarding the sharing of personal property and assets of the congregation to provide for the continuing ministry of the congregation to be dismissed and the congregation which will remain. The team has also provided pastoral care to the continuing congregation. The team is delighted to be able to report that a settlement agreement has been reached.”

These verses teach that no unconverted person--regardless of whether he is predestined in any sense to any destination--has the spiritual ability to respond to the gospel by his own free will. This is at variance with the denial which necessarily implies everyone--and "not only a select few"--has the ability to repent and believe.

Pop culture has rediscovered serpent handling as well. A New York Times best-seller called A Land More Kind Than Home revolves around a snake-handling church. Its author, Wiley Cash, said people want a sign that God is real. “Everyone wants to believe that God has given them some kind of providence.”

In essence, I believe that those who have published “A Statement of Traditional Southern Baptist Understanding of God’s Plan of Salvation” are concerned by the rise of Calvinism among Southern Baptists at all levels of convention life, from local churches all the way down to various institutions and agencies. PREAMBLE (PART B) Though I am... Continue Reading

Second Presbytery is made up of churches in UpState South Carolina (Greenville-Spartanburg and environs) along with the entire state of Georgia. Erskine College and Seminary and the headquarters of the denomination are located within the bounds of the Presbytery which adds a bit more interest to their docket from time to time.

While there are and have been Calvinists in the SBC, the statement points out that the majority of Southern Baptists do not embrace Calvinism and even the few who do tend to modify its teachings

As Southern Baptists prepare to install their first black president, observers disagree on how much clout Fred Luter will have in a denomination closely identified with high-profile figures such as the newly reprimanded Richard Land.

Although I would love for everyone to read Scripture the way that I do, I am content to live within the SBC under the doctrinal umbrella of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 and to cooperate with my less-Calvinistic brothers and sisters who are willing to do the same.

"I think the hearing went very well today," Lorence stated. "We are cautiously optimistic that Judge Preska will issue a permanent injunction against this policy that New York City has and allow religious groups to be able to use public schools on the weekends and weeknights on the same terms and conditions as everybody else."

 In Madison, the core group who started the five-year-old Madison Heights Church decided not to include the word Presbyterian in their name but instead to put the acronym PCA at the end. PCA stands for Presbyterian Church in America……new Baptist churches often omit the word Baptist because it carries a stigma. “Baptists are generally considered... Continue Reading