Medley Urges American Baptists to Go Forward from Centennial
VALLEY FORGE, PA (ABNS 06/25/07) -- American Baptist Churches USA, preparing to celebrate the denomination’s centennial, opened its annual General Board meeting here this week with a celebration of its history and current mission work.
General Secretary A. Roy Medley told the board’s first plenary session that “on the occasion of our centennial celebration, God is calling us to ‘arise and shine’ and be the hands and feet of Jesus.”
Medley addressed about 100 board members and staff on Sunday night in Washington’s historic Shiloh Baptist Church, before the denomination’s Biennial convention and its “Centennial Day” next weekend.
“It is an awesome thing to recall,” he said, “that 100 years ago, here in Washington, our spiritual predecessors gathered to create the Northern Baptist Convention. Here at this century mark, we gather to recall God’s faithfulness, and a century of ministry that has been expansive, prophetic and evangelistic.”
Other speakers described the church’s response to Hurricane Katrina and to the tornado that leveled Greensburg, Kan., earlier this year. Board members also looked to the future by honoring pastors and congregations of a new group, the American Baptist Congregations of the Southwest and Hawaii.
Medley traced briefly the history of American Baptist Churches USA, noting that,“Over the years we have been instrumental in planting and strengthening congregations. We have been in the forefront of welcoming immigrants and planting churches among them, and offering needed ministry and advocacy, whether they be Scandinavian, German, Italian, Haitian, African, Asian or Latino.
“We participated in founding the Baptist World Alliance, the World Council of Churches, the National Council of Churches, and most recently Christian Churches Together, because we believe in the unity of the church and cooperative ministry with other Christians.
“At this beginning of the second century of this body, this movement, this denomination, this family, this band of sisters and brothers, this community of disciples, we look to a future that will be marked by significant opportunities for ministry and that will call for ongoing significant change.”
Medley also described his visit in April to the Republic of Georgia, and noted that there are now about 60 Baptist congregations in that country. Worship there “was rich,” he said, “whether in the cathedral, in a chapel, in the ruins of an ancient church, or on a mountaintop.”
He concluded by thanking the board members “for your commitment to the body of Christ and its expression called American Baptist Churches. Thank you for the gift of your talents, wisdom, resources, skills and prayers in leading us into this second century of our life.”
The honoring of pastors and congregations in the new group marked the denomination’s effort to encourage congregations that chose to remain American Baptist following the withdrawal of the Pacific Southwest region a few months ago. Pastors honored with their congregations were Dr. Alonso A. Cooper, University Avenue Baptist Church, San Diego; the Rev. Stanley A. Crews, Monte Vista Baptist Church, Phoenix, Ariz.; Dr. Joseph H. DeRoulhac, First Baptist Church, Redlands, Calif.; Dr. William E. Godwin, University Baptist Church, Palm Desert, Calif.; the Rev. José T. Guerra and the Rev. Chuck Shawver, Living Hope Baptist Church, Bakersfield, Calif.; the Rev. W. James Kilinsky, One in Christ Church, National City, Calif.; and Dr. Warren H. Stewart, Sr., First Institutional Baptist Church, Phoenix.
Board members also voted to commend Coach C. Vivian Stringer of Rutgers University for her Christian witness during the controversy over remarks about her basketball team by radio personality Don Imus.
American Baptist Churches USA traces its origins to a split with churches in the South before the Civil War. Northern churches continued in an informal association for more than half a century through their societies for publication and for home and foreign missions. A call in 1906 by the Chicago Baptist Association “for more denominational unity” led to the formation of the Northern Baptist Convention in Washington’s Calvary Baptist Church on May 16-17, 1907. Many of this week’s board meetings are being held at Calvary.
The denomination’s first president was New York Gov. Charles Evans Hughes. It later renamed itself the American Baptist Convention and then American Baptist Churches USA.