WASHINGTON—Southern Baptist leaders, including two current Texans, have joined in the strongest effort to date by evangelical Christians to bring about comprehensive immigration reform in the United States.

Bryant Wright, president of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), and Richard Land, head of the SBC’s ethics entity, were among more than 20 Southern Baptist denominational leaders, academics and pastors who endorsed an “Evangelical Statement of Principles for Immigration Reform.” The Evangelical Immigration Table (EIT), a new coalition, released the statement signed by 150 evangelicals at a Capitol Hill news conference on June 12.

Signers also included Daniel Sanchez, missions professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and David Fleming, pastor of Champion Forest Baptist Church in Houston.

In the statement, the signers call for government leaders to work with the American people for a “bipartisan solution” on the controversial issue that:

• “Respects the God-given dignity of every person;
• “Protects the unity of the immediate family;
• “Respects the rule of law;
• “Guarantees secure national borders;
• “Ensures fairness to taxpayers;
• “Establishes a path toward legal status and/or citizenship for those who qualify and who wish to become permanent residents.”

The signers acknowledge efforts to repair what many of them describe as a broken system that has resulted in polarization and a misrepresentation of “each other’s positions as open borders and amnesty versus deportations of millions. This false choice has led to an unacceptable political stalemate at the federal level at a tragic human cost.”

While Land and other leaders of the Evangelical Immigration Table have been promoting comprehensive reform for several years, the statement marks a significant expansion of evangelical endorsers in a cooperative effort. Notably, Focus on the Family took a stance on the issue for the first time when its president, Jim Daly, signed the statement. The coalition includes evangelicals from both the left and right.

The EIT “is diverse in its formation, but it is unified in its biblically mandated vision to help create a better life for immigrants” based on its stated principles, Land said at the news conference. Land is president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC).

Sojourners President Jim Wallis, known for his left-leaning politics, pointed to the agreement between his organization and more conservative groups such as the SBC, Focus on the Family and the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE).

“That doesn’t happen very often,” Wallis told reporters. “An effort for immigration reform of this size and this diverse has never been attempted in the evangelical community.”

It appears there will be no attempt to move immigration reform in Congress this year. The political will does not seem to exist at either the White House or Capitol to pursue action on such a controversial issue before the November election. Yet, EIT members said it is time to promote reform.

“There may not be a vote on immigration reform in the Congress before November, but there are going to be a lot of votes in November,” NAE President Leith Anderson said at the news conference.

The positions of incumbents and challengers on immigration reform could impact the election, Land pointed out. He cited a Pew Forum survey that showed 70 percent of Americans said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who backs comprehensive reform.

“That tells me that it’s time for the politicians to understand that the country has changed on this issue, and they believe it’s well past time for the government to get its act together and to pass immigration reform that is in line with these principles,” Land said. “And we as evangelicals are here to say to both parties, ‘Get with it.’

“We are absolutely convinced that the country is ahead of its elected leaders on this issue—in both parties,” he said.

The pastor of a Southern Baptist church told reporters that immigration reform is “an urgent moral issue” for pastors and churches. About 30 percent of the congregation of Champion Forest Baptist Church, on the northwest side of Houston, is Hispanic, said senior pastor David Fleming.

“In churches across America, we deal with the challenges and the failures of our current immigration policy on a regular basis,” Fleming said. “The people most affected by the current policy are not anonymous to us. We know their names and their faces, their hopes and dreams, their gifts and their skills. We recognize their inherent value and their great potential as human beings.”

Sometimes, it is impossible to help those in the church who are caught in an immigration system that does not account for changes in their circumstances, Fleming said.

The EIT’s statement does not propose precise policies, and one speaker at the news conference acknowledged, “Much, much work remains to be done on the specifics.”

Tom Minnery, a senior vice president for Focus on the Family, said, “As difficult as it was getting all these signers together, the next step—getting politicians together—is a much greater task.”

The EIT heads—which include Land, Anderson, Wallis and six others—met with White House officials and congressional members June 12 and 13. It also is sponsoring radio ads in Colorado and Florida.
The June 12 news conference capped more than a year of preparation.

In addition to Wright, Land and Fleming, the Southern Baptists signing the EIT statement included Daniel Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary; former SBC President James Merritt; Durham, N.C., pastor J.D. Greear; Robin Hadaway, interim president of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary; Russell Moore, dean of the school of theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Steve Lemke, provost of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, and Daniel Sanchez, missions professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

The statement and the signers may be accessed online at evangelicalimmigrationtable.com/.

Messengers to the 2011 Southern Baptist Convention in Phoenix, Ariz., approved a resolution on immigration reform that called for the advancement of the gospel of Jesus while pursuing justice and compassion. The measure urged the government to make a priority of border security and holding businesses accountable in their hiring. It also requested public officials secure the borders, and with secure borders, establish “a just and compassionate path to legal status, with appropriate restitutionary measures, for those undocumented immigrants already living in our country.” It specified the resolution was not to be interpreted as supporting amnesty.

Land has consistently called for comprehensive reform that includes a pathway to citizenship that would consist of such requirements as paying fines, undergoing a criminal background check, learning English, pledging allegiance to the American government, accepting a probationary period and going to the back of the line behind those seeking to enter the country legally.

VIDOR—When it comes to college ministry, the SBTC has broken the traditional campus-based mold, opting instead to base its efforts in local churches that are strategically positioned near college and university campuses.

A key part of the strategy is an internship program that helps place college ministers in churches, paying a portion of their salaries for up to one year and providing them with resources and training. Last year, First Baptist Church in Vidor hired Tony Romero as director of collegiate ministry through this program. And the internship yielded eternal dividends.

Already a member of the congregation, Romero traveled to Grapevine for an initial one-day training session then began a revitalization of the church’s ministry to students at nearby Lamar University in Beaumont. Over the year of his internship, First Baptist’s college ministry increased from eight to 30 students, with marked spiritual growth alongside the numerical increase.

Though campus-based college ministries can be helpful, “the SBTC is committed to helping places like First Baptist Vidor be the spiritual presence on the college campus,” Romero, a student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Havard School of Theological Studies in Houston, told the TEXAN. “… They want to see churches take it upon themselves to reach college students.”

The internship program began nine years ago and funds work at around five churches each year. In addition to providing interns with initial training, the SBTC provides ongoing ministry help throughout the program and holds interns accountable through regular progress reports.

“Tony has a heartbeat for [college ministry] and God is using him at Lamar to begin to do some things,” Lance Crowell, SBTC church ministries associate, said.

As director of collegiate ministries, Romero helped students engage Scripture by breaking them into small discussion groups during Bible studies. He also changed the format of prayer times, putting students in groups of two or three and having them pray for one another in personal, focused ways.

During the academic year, he visited the Lamar campus two days per week to promote upcoming activities and meet with students who attended Wednesday night Bible study. His evangelistic ministry utilized cards with pictures to help start conversations and encourage lost people to express their feelings about spiritual matters.

“A core group of students developed,” Romero said. “Now they know how to engage the [biblical] text. They know how to feed themselves from the Word, and they’re jumping at the bit, I believe, to be engaged in ministry 24/7.”

As the ministry grew, Romero realized that some students attending Bible studies might not be Christians. So he began a series of evangelistic lessons on the seven miraculous signs that Jesus performed in the Gospel of John. During each lesson, he asked the students what the passage taught about their needs and what it taught about Jesus.

A student named Matt attended every week and told Romero he wanted to believe in Jesus but couldn’t bring himself to step out in faith. Finally, after a lesson from 1 Peter about Christ’s death for sinners, Matt asked to talk with Romero. He confessed his fear that coming to Christ would require him to solve all of life’s most difficult problems on his own.

Romero told him, “I’m committed … to making sure that you never feel alone. And if there are any questions you have about what to do now, you can come to us. We’re committed to making sure that you understand where we’re going.”

At that, Matt said he was ready to move forward and committed his life to Jesus.

Romero said the SBTC helped make such ministry possible by sending him to seminars, helping him train other leaders, holding him accountable and allowing him to participate in webinars featuring respected college ministry experts.

“They’re not dedicated solely to the minister. They’re dedicated to the complete ministry,” he said of the convention.

In the end, the internship was so successful that First Baptist decided to keep Romero on staff and increase his salary after the SBTC stopped contributing to it.

“Because of the success of the ministry, the church is going to get behind this thing and own it,” Romero said.

For more information on the SBTC’s college minister intern program, email collegiate@sbtexas.com or contact Lance Crowell in the SBTC offices toll-free at 877-953-7282 (SBTC).

Cada año, en nuestro país, señalamos el tercer domingo en junio para honorar a nuestros padres. Es un día cuando reconocemos la importancia de un padre en la vida de una familia. La presencia de un padre y el respecto que los hijos deben darle es importante para cada hogar. La Palabra de Dios en Efesios 6:1-3 nos declara:

“Hijos obedeced en el Señor a vuestros padres, porque esto es justo, Honra a tu padre y a tu madre, que es el primer mandamiento con promesa; para que te vaya bien, y seas de larga vida sobre la tierra.”

Hoy en día los hogares están en guerra. Cada vez más vemos que nuestros hijos están alejándose de la cosas de Dios. Muchos niños ya no están asistiendo a ninguna iglesia y las estadísticas dicen que muchos jóvenes que están en nuestras iglesias cuando se van para la universidad ya no regresaran a la iglesia o a las cosas de Dios. La influencia de un padre en la familia es de suma importancia. El padre debe de ser honrado por sus hijos y el padre de cada familia también tiene una gran responsabilidad sobre ellos.

Tres cosas que un padre de una familia debe hacer para impactar, reforzar y afirmar la vida de sus hijos.

1. Impactar la vida de nuestros hijos con palabras. Padres hay que hablar con los niños. Hay que hablarles de las cosas de Dios, de la Biblia. Hay que decirles como Dios ha obrado en nuestras propias vidas y compartir esas experiencias con ellos.

Deuteronomio 6:1-2 dice:
“Estos, pues, son los mandamientos, estatutos y decretos que Jehová vuestro Dios mandó que os enseñase, para que los pongáis por obra en la tierra a la cual pasáis vosotros para tomarla; para que temas a Jehová tu Dios, guardando todos sus estatutos y sus mandamientos que yo te mando, tú, tu hijo, y el hijo de tu hijo, todos los días de tu vida, para que tus días sean prolongados.”

2. Impactar la vida de nuestros hijos con nuestras vidas. La manera como vivimos será un reflejo directo de lo que nuestros hijos aprenderán y serán. Ellos están mirando nuestras vidas, escuchando nuestras palabras y quieren ser como nosotros. Ellos son como esponjas absorbiendo cada hecho que hacemos y cada palabra que digamos. El ejemplo que le damos a nuestros hijos es muy importante. Debemos ser una Biblia viviente para ellos. Nuestros hijos deben ver en nuestras vidas que estamos caminando con Cristo y haciendo la voluntad de nuestro Padre Celestial.

3. Impactar la vida de nuestros hijos con nuestro tiempo. El problema número uno de los padres de hoy es que no tienen tiempo para los hijos.  Invertimos tiempo para el trabajo porque es necesario para sostener a la familia pero lamentablemente no apartamos tiempo para estar con nuestros hijos.
Es importante que los padres hagan tiempo para estar con sus hijos. Esto requiere planificar actividades con nuestros hijos de antemano y ponerlo en el calendario, se trata de hacerlo intencionalmente.

Un joven abogado que tuvo mucho éxito dijo una vez:
“El regalo más grande que yo jamás he recibido en toda la vida fue un regalo de navidad. Mi padre me dio una caja pequeña y dentro estaba una nota que decía, ‘Hijo mío, este año el regalo que yo te daré será de darte 365 horas, una hora cada día después de la cena. Esta hora será tuya. Podemos hablar de cualquier cosa, podemos ir a cualquier lugar, o jugar cualquier juego que quieras. ¡Esta hora será exclusivamente para ti! ’ Mi padre no sólo cumplió con su palabra, pero cada año después él renovaba esa promesa conmigo. Y fue el regalo más grande que jamás había recibido en toda mi vida.  Esa hora a través de los años que estuve con mi padre impactó mi vida para el bien y ahora soy lo que soy.”

La influencia de un padre sobre sus hijos vale mucho. Hay que tomar tiempo para estar con nuestros hijos e instruirlos bien para que ellos puedan hacer decisiones correctas para sus vidas y andar por los buenos caminos. Padres recuerden, el único que puede dar propósito a la vida de sus hijos es Cristo Jesús.

Is America a Christian nation? It’s a lively conversation in which we spend a lot of time defining terms and extrapolating from the comments of our nation’s Founders. This is not a yes/no question. Still, I’m going to plant my flag with the “yes” side as long as you’ll let me explain.

Have you ever been in a place where much of the conversation takes place in a language you don’t understand? You might get a lot from context so that you know that the people are talking about auto repair rather than animal husbandry but you miss a lot of the details. If you have a basic understanding of the language spoken but are not proficient, you get a bit more but still miss the humor, nuance and subtleties of the conversation. You have a child’s understanding of what is going on. That seems to me to be a good metaphor for American citizens who have no basic familiarity with the Christian Bible. Our laws, art, literature, theatre, figures of speech, and customs are completely mixed with concepts from the Bible. You can be an engaged part of the American conversation having never read a word of the Koran or Book of Mormon, but you are a novice American if you do not know anything of the Book upon which Western civilization is significantly based.

Furthermore, even the nut of truth found in non-Christian worldviews has its source in the God who made us. Ignorant people talk as if the enlightenment of human reason has no source. Why do you think mathematics works or gravity functions in some predictable way? Our Maker is a rationale person who reveals himself in an ordered and purposeful creation. The fact that we can discern some of that is wonderful but the ability is not something we invented. Neither is the interaction between the various elements within creation that we study so diligently something for which we can take credit.

Enlightenment? Sure, our Founders were children of their day. They were optimistic about man’s ability to discover how the universe worked. Optimism has its source in the God who reveals himself, who approves of progress and who made man like himself in important ways. And light always has a source, doesn’t it?

Those most offended by the fact that our nation is a melting pot of cultures overwhelmingly based on Christian assumptions are those who are most offended by the gospel. Groups like the Interfaith Alliance or Americans United just disdain the biblical practice of Christianity. Their piecemeal efforts, in concert with more honest atheist groups, to purge our culture of references to Christianity are disastrous. You cannot purge a culture of a worldview that is arguably religious; you can only switch one religion for another. Name it what you like but the pale universalism of liberal Christians and the materialism of atheists both have the essential elements of religion—just not those of Christianity. For an illustration of a religiously atheist state, feast your eyes on the Soviet Union or People’s Republic of North Korea. For an example of the current state of Christian liberalism, toss a dart toward the map of Western Europe. I don’t see anything we want in any of those places.  

We are not a Christian nation in the sense that the Bible should be our law book or that God is our king. That has been tried many times over the centuries and it does not work. It cannot work unless God has chosen a people, given them a system of laws, and determined to guide them in detail. That nation is not the United States of America. Our own American experiment to build Jerusalem in New England’s green and pleasant land was a bit hard on Baptists and other dissenters. State religion always, always, always results in corrupt religion and bad governance. Show me an example of a truly state church and I’ll not show you a nativity scene on a court house lawn but rather cemeteries or prisons or stocks or whipping posts occupied by people who merely disagreed.

Neither does our Christian heritage imply that professing Christians should be, by definition, preferred as leaders. A president or governor with a credible Christian testimony can be a great blessing to those he governs, to the degree that he daily fears the God who appointed him to the office. And, I’d add, to the degree that he knows how to do the job. We’ve weathered for years and without complaint leaders who checked a box “Christian” but meant it only in the, I’m-not-a Buddhist-or-Moslem way. We elected them because we believed them to be the best candidate being offered. It’s silly to vote for an otherwise unqualified candidate because we like his denomination (remember Jimmy Carter?), or to reject one because we find his religion, though not his viewpoints, strange.

Our Christian heritage implies a few things. First, we have a place to start that many other nations do not. Of course we are less devout culturally than our great grandparents, but the influence of our heritage makes us an exceptional country for this day. Rather than argue about Thomas Jefferson’s faith, we can build on the remaining influence of biblical Christianity in our day to encourage mercy and justice in our communities. Some of the ways in which Christianity is built into the structure of our culture can help people recognize the gospel when our churches or neighbors tell the rest of the story.

Second, it implies a stewardship. In Acts 16:37 and elsewhere Paul called on his Roman citizenship as a way to further the gospel. Peter didn’t have that card to play; neither did most of that first generation of Christians. We live in a country where Christianity is not only tolerated but freely exercised and relatively familiar. As a part of that heritage, we also have the freedom to exercise the full rights of citizens. We can, so we should do. An American-citizen-Christian who can but does not vote is not only an ungrateful citizen but a disobedient Christian, I think. Not only that, I’d go on to say that Christians who do not attempt be informed values voters are also missing the admonition to be salt and light in a nation in which we have an amazing amount of influence.

Third, it implies that the liberty we experience here should never be limited to Christians. It is in our best interest—we who come from a tradition where our spiritual ancestors were persecuted for preaching without permission—to ensure that no man, nor our government, should attempt to coerce the conscience of any man. Christianity is the source of our principles but should not be the legally preferred religion of our nation. One of the most likely challenges we will see in our lifetimes is the move on the part of our government to provide tolerance of specified religious practice rather than liberty. Tolerance has parameters. You can believe what you like but perhaps one day you will not be allowed to preach or teach certain biblical precepts. Worship as you wish but you cannot run your business according to your doctrine. That is exactly the question at issue with the contraceptive mandate being forced on religious institutions by our department of Health and Human Services. When a person or entity can grant or withhold religious freedoms, “liberty” is no longer the right word for our condition.

Friends, it sounds sometimes as though we believe there is a legal remedy for the spiritual condition our nation. There is not. Yes, there is often a legal remedy for injustice or certain sorts of immorality. And I agree that some righteous things are worth fighting to preserve, families to name just one. Our nation is made up of people, some Christian as we would define it, and most not. Our nation can become more or less “Christian” according to who our people are—more Christians equals more “Christian.” Our culture is indeed based on Christianity because of the role the Bible played in defining Anglo-Saxon customs, and American customs specifically. Our laws are influenced by Christianity but there is no one-to-one correlation between biblical precepts and the laws of our land. Our government is not Christian, nor should it be, even if a large number of Christians serve in leadership positions. We have never given our government the right to determine religious doctrine or dole out permission for religious practice. Our government is in place to protect the rights we already recognize as the inherent possession of all men.

As I hinted at earlier, I think we spend too much time trying to guess at what our Founders thought in their private minds. I love history a lot; and the best way to enjoy history is to read the stories of those who lived through significant events. I enjoy the insights that we get into the hearts of those important people who’ve gone before. But it is their deeds that become most significant for the present. I am interested in what John Adams thought and even why he did what he did, but what he did is ultimately what matters. That is what we live with. Our Founders built a nation out of the culture that birthed and taught them—a Christian culture. Some of them understood the manifold mischief that coercive religion had caused during the whole history of mankind. They founded a nation, complete with a basis for laws unimagined, that would not abridge even unpopular ideas published, spoken, or religious in nature. They understood that officially mandated ideas or speech or religion are the enemy of liberty.

It is a vexing reality, but our liberty to practice Christianity is safe only if it exists alongside that of others to trumpet the worst ideas ever conceived. Especially we should understand that in this day when many opinion-makers consider biblical Christianity one of those worst ideas.

I was startled to see the rifles wielded by the local ROTC students as they marched down the aisle of my home church in 1970. Turned out the guns weren’t loaded, but my familiarity with firearms was too limited to have known the difference. Garnering the prized position as the American flag bearer for the annual Vacation Bible School processional was one thing, but unleashing an unexpected unit of soldiers-in-training as part of the morning worship service seemed a bit much at the time.

In the cultural context of America’s Vietnam era, our church set in a university town had some who viewed the inclusion of patriotic music as a defense of military intervention during an unpopular war. Still, the majority of the crowd tearfully sang “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” grandly accompanied by a pipe organ.

Penned by abolitionist Julia Ward Howe, a Unitarian who wrote the lyrics for federal troops in 1861 at her pastor’s suggestion, the words “mine eyes have seen the glory” was a Union battle cry. But that didn’t prevent Robert Coleman of First Baptist Dallas from including it in his Popular Hymnal in 1918, extending the tune’s circulation among Southern Baptists.

Just as I look forward to the incorporation of Christmas carols in worship services each December, the Fourth of July often prompts the singing of patriotic songs I enjoy like “America the Beautiful,” “God of Our Fathers,” “My Country ‘Tis of Thee,” or even “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

Many who plan music for our services would wince at including anything so secular, concerned that the focus must remain on the worship of God, not the concerns of man. Certainly, we’d find the Marines Hymn theologically flawed with its belief that “if the Army and the Navy ever look on Heaven’s scenes, they will find the streets are guarded by United States Marines.” I bet there’s a church in Texas that rationalizes singing Lee Greenwood’s more recently composed song “God Bless the U.S.A.” in light of the terror of little more than a decade ago.

The “love it or leave it” sentiment expressed the ‘70s and the renewed patriotism post 9/11 should be tempered among believers with a Great Commission heart that yearns to see our religious liberty extended to all people—wherever they live. We need to be careful when our patriotic zeal causes us to question why anyone would leave the freedom we enjoy to carry the gospel to people who hate or mistrust Americans.

If the selection of worship music really is all about the words we sing, then a holiday theme can be productive. “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” doesn’t just proclaim a love of God’s creation in our geographic borders, it reminds us of the Author of liberty to whom we sing and honor as our King. “America the Beautiful” reminds us of the mission of those who traveled to America in search of freedom and begs for God’s grace in dealing with the flawed nature of man that requires “liberty in law.”

While most churches will have to forgo the trumpet fanfare I enjoyed as a child when singing “God of our Fathers,” the hymn credits God with providing an “ever sure defense.” It was composed for America’s centennial at a time when most who sang it had endured the Civil War and needed the reassurance that “in this free land by thee our lot is cast.”

Sports fans only sing the first stanza of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” but the fourth verse of our national anthem praises “the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation” and reminds us to be sure that our cause is just, declaring “in God is our trust!”

So when the thoughts of our citizens are turned toward our nation’s freedom, how about giving them something to sing about by honoring God through a patriotic hymn?