Shepherding Thoughts

by Pastor Ben Francis

Welcome to Shepherding Thoughts: An inside look at a Southern Baptist Pastor's comments on navigating popular topics in Christianity and Religion.

What Does an Elder Do?

New Testament Elders: God’s Shepherds Part 3: What Does an Elder Do? From our brief survey of the 3 biblical titles used for the office...

Sexual Abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention

SBC 2021 in Review: Part 5 Sexual Abuse in the SBC The Story Breaks... In 2019, The Houston Chronicle Newspaper ran a series of stories...

The “Dirt” of Life

Did you know that buckets make dirt? You read that right. Buckets make dirt. In his essay, “The work of Local culture,” Wendall Berry...

Who Can Be an Elder?

New Testament Elders: God's Shepherds Part 2: Who Can Be an Elder In our first post, we looked at what an Elder is according to the...

Critical Race Theory and Race Relations

SBC 2021 in Review: Part 4 Critical Race Theory and Race Relations Race continues to plague the SBC just as it does the wider culture....

Southern Baptist Convention: Presidential Uncertainty and Factionalism

SBC 2021 in Review: Part 3 Presidential Uncertainty and Factionalism One of the reasons why this year’s meeting was so well attended was...

What/Who Are Church Elders?

New Testament Elders: God’s Shepherds Part 1: What/Who is an Elder? In this series of posts, I want to explore what the Word of God says...

What is the Southern Baptist Convention?

SBC 2021 in Review: Part 2 What is the Southern Baptist Convention? In one sense, the Southern Baptist Convention consists of churches...

The 2021 Southern Baptist Convention In Review…

Many things were swirling as messengers from thousands of Southern Baptist Churches made their way to Nashville, Tennessee for the 2021...