Weaned from "conferences"
NO TASTE HERE FOR"CONFERENCES"
Recently, Brother Ian Elsasser, stated in a comment --
"These gentlemen are really into conferences. How many more before the year concludes?"
I have just this morning been reading of a "Conference" at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary where a reported 1,400 attendees were spiritually entertained by Mark Driscoll, C. J. Mahaney, Bill Brown, and Daniel Akin. It was evidently focused on confronting modern "culture" with the Gospel.
The thought occurred to me, "What if all these 1,400 attendees met early in the morning, had a short time of prayer, then spread out all over the area and actually confronted people with the Gospel? Wouldn't that be better than simply listening to a number of lectures on certain subjects?"
I was "weaned" from "conferences" many years ago. I can't even remember the last one I attended, it has been so long. Nowadays, I would not walk across the street to attend a "conference," much less pay a fee to attend one. The only thing I can think of that I ever learned at "conferences" was that there is very little to learn at "conferences" other than their relative uselessness. They generally simply furnish a scenario for sitting, eating, gabbing, and in most cases buying materials.
I have never heard of a "conference" where those in attendance just got together briefly for prayer, then fanned out to spread the Gospel in a community. I know that such effort has been done to some degree at the large national Baptist conventions, but not by all the messengers in attendance. This effort by some at the conventions was the best thing about the conventions, in my opinion.
I no longer attend "conferences," and have turned down invitations to speak at them. I just think they are generally a waste of time and money. Today, we have "conference speakers" who apparently "make a good living" going from place-to-place for "conferences." They seem to be somewhat "professionals" as "conference speakers," and their names keep turning up on programs promoted by flyers, advertisements, internet sources, etc.
I would like to see someone stage a "conference" where the only purpose was to have several hundred or thousand Christians make a special evangelistic effort in a community, and report back the results at the end of the day. The conference could perhaps conclude like the Northfield conferences sponsored by D. L. Moody years ago, with a baptismal service for those who had made professions of faith.
That would be a conference worth attending.
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posted by Bob L. Ross @ 2:19 PM
3 Comments:
KBH Comments
Submitted to: pilgrimpub@aol.com
Maybe you should have a blog post where you don’t post to the blog, but instead pray and go share the gospel. That’s about how much sense this post makes.
You said, “I have never heard of a "conference" where those in attendance just got together briefly for prayer, then fanned out to spread the Gospel in a community .....I would like to see someone stage a "conference" where the only purpose was to have several hundred or thousand Christians make a special evangelistic effort in a community,”
Of course you’ve never heard of that kind of conference, because be definition it would not be a conference. I’d like to see a basketball game that not a basketball game or a speech that’s not a speech.
Of course we don’t call those things conferences, we call them evangelistic crusades or campaigns. For example, the Crossover campaign, takes place every year in the SBC and prior to dozens of state conventions every year to share the gospel. We had one in my town just a couple years ago.
This post is very revealing. It shows that the bar is getting lower and lower in regards to what passes for substantive criticism. Being critical does not equal thoughtful.
KBH
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I have heard of two conferences where they did just what you said: prayer and evangelism. The first was hosted by Times Square Church (NYC) and David Wilkerson down in Birmingham, Alabama. They did preach but they also sought the face of God and went out sharing the gospel. The second was hosted by Way of the Master in Atlanta, GA last year with Kirk Cameron, Ray Comfort, and others and they preached the Word and went out evangelising.
EVANGELISTIC
REVIVAL MEETINGS
In years gone by, Baptist churches often conducted two "Revivals" a year, sometimes as long as two weeks. During that time, a special effort was made to evangelize and win lost souls. This effort was successful in bringing many souls to salvation.
Over time, "Revival Meetings" were abandoned, and were replaced by the "conferences" wherein there is rarely any effort made to evangelize and reach the lost in the community. The conferences seem to be designed to "feed the sheep" rather than find the lost sheep.
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