I N I S T RY GOSPEL M
ENDS NEWS & TR
Rite of passage: Brain fog & SPORTS
& MISSIONS Walker Moore M I N I S T RY
President Emeritus of Awe Star Ministries Email | walker@awestar.org @WalkerDeanMoore
OX O L Bthe O T H Recently, I was watching morning news when C R U H C a doctor came on, reporting that one of the down
sides of isolation from friends and family during this pandemic has been a condition called “brain fog.” I have noticed some subtle difference in certain friends of mine during this pandemic, and I thought I needed to learn a little more about this condition. If I understood the brain fog is identiS I E Dcorrectly, S I Fdoctor CLA fiable by S a dulled memory and lack of focus. This knowledge didn’t help me, since that describes almost everyone in my age group. More than half of our conversations begin with “Do you remember what’shis-name? You know, the kid who rode his bicycle to school every day? The one who had two older sisters?” “OH! I know the one you’re talking about; the kid who lived E Sto the grocery store.” I Cdoor V Onext We are all nodding our heads. We know the kid being described; his name is on the tip of our tongues, but after about a half-dozen head nods and a couple of “hhhmms,” none of us have enough brain cells connecting to come up with a name. The conversation quickly switches to another important topic: “Where would you like to eat?” “Oh, I would love to go to that place with the great senior adult luncheon special. You know the one I am talking about, the one down on Main Street. What is it called?”
“Bob.” TA I N M E N T “No, it’sEnot called E RBob.” NT “Bob is the kid who rode his bicycle to school.” And everyone suddenly remembers. “Yeah, yeah; that’s it!” Just an average day of conversation with my peers. The doctor went on to say that this brain fog will & unable to think P L E and have you feelingPunlike E Oyourself clearly. I am not a hypochondriac, N E WbutS as soon as H C R U H C they were describing these symptoms, I knew I had brain fog. I thought it was just being a senior adult, the byproduct of getting older. I am sure glad that we have identified the culprit that causes my dulling memory, lack of concentration and feeling unlike myself. As I try to figure out how long I have had this condition, the more I think about T U Rit,Ethe more I L U C & S W E realize: I had N it before the pandemic. This condition began when my wife and I started having children, and the more children we had, the more pronounced the brain fog. You can see it in every parent’s life: the digression when brain fog takes over. First Child: If the pacifier falls on the floor, you put it away until you can go home and sterilize it. Second Child: When the pacifier falls on the floor, your squirt if off with some juice from the baby’s bottle. Third Child: When the pacifier falls on the floor, you wipe it off on your shirt and pop it back in. First Child: When the child swallows a coin, you rush them to the hospital and demand x-rays. Second Child: When the child swallows a coin, you carefully watch for the coin to pass. Third Child: When the child swallows a coin, you deduct it from their allowance.
First Child: You take to your child to Mommy and Me play time, Gymboree Play and Music classes and Baby Story Hour. Second Child: You take to your child to Mommy and Me Play Time, Gymboree Play and Music. Third Child: You take your child to the supermarket and the dry cleaners. First Child: Parents start reading and studying my book, “Rite of Passage Parenting,” learning how to raise capable, responsible, self-reliant adults. Second Child: Parents finish reading my book, “Rite of Passage Parenting.” Third Child: What book? Sooner or later the brain fog will creep up on you. It could be children; it could be the loss of a job, a death or just getting older. The fog will come. No one can see into the future; we don’t know what tomorrow will bring, let alone the next minute. In the blink of an eye, your whole world can change, and without guidance, these changes can leave you with brain fog. But Jesus knew these times would come into all our lives. That is why He came, so we can have light. He gave His Word as a lamp to guide us. Here are three verses to help you. “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Ps. 119:103, NASB). “I am the light of the world: he who follow me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life” (John 8:12). “I have come as Light into the world, so that everyone who believes in Me will not remain in darkness.” (John 12:46). Got fog? Take Jesus and His Word, and you will have light.
Local mission stations help advance the Gospel Ever Borunda Oklahoma Baptists Hispanic Ministries Ministry Partner
Baptists have been known for their evangelistic zeal and for their willingness to go to the uttermost parts of the world to take the message of Jesus Christ to lost people. Historically, Baptists have been willing to take the Gospel to the big cities, and also to the smallest of towns. One of the things that made Baptist the largest evangelical denomination in North America was the willingness of faithful men who served as church planters, and pastors, while working as farmers, store owners, teachers, bankers, etc. In the early 1900s, Oklahoma Baptists were blessed to have among them such a faithful man. His name was R.C. Howard, who served most of his ministry as a bivocational pastor. As the pastor of Oklahoma City, Kelham Avenue, Howard was a man of vision, but also a man of action. He understood the need for the local church to engage in what can be considered the two arms of discipleship in the local church: Gospel outreach and the equipping of leaders. In his book “How to Establish and Conduct Local Mission Stations,” Howard gives a brief history of how God led Kelham Avenue to start 23 local mission stations in 22 years throughout Oklahoma City. He did not create an elaborate plan to mobilize vast amounts of people and resources to take the Gospel to a new community. He was focused on how the Spirit of God was leading him, but he also paid attention to the needs that church members brought before Him. He wrote how sometimes he would see an empty building in an area of the city where there was no church and would take the opportunity before his congregation, so they could begin a new work in that area. Other times, church members would ask him to start a Sunday School class in their homes
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where they could invite their neighbors and reach the kids on their street with the Gospel. He would visit the new community and would find a handful of people who would help teach the basic doctrines of the Christian faith. It was that simple. I am amazed every time I read Howard’s story. Members of Kelham Avenue were ordinary Christians doing the work of evangelism and discipleship in new communities, trusting in the power of the Holy Spirit to win souls. It is similar to what the New Testament church experienced. As people became believers, they went to their communities, told others about Jesus, were baptized, and then they told people what Jesus had done for them. That is exactly how the church grew and how the Gospel eventually reached us. As a denominational leader, I am afraid that many times I tend to complicate things. I feel that if I am not keeping up with the latest trends in church planting or preaching or ministry in general, that I cannot be effective. The reality is that we do not need superstar pastors and keynote-worthy church planters to advance the Gospel in Oklahoma. All we need are faithful pastors who can lead their churches to look beyond their immediate surroundings and realize that the church can extend its reach far and wide through the use of local mission stations. It does not require lots of money to begin a new work in a new community. It does not take seminary trained men to go into these new communities to share the Gospel and to teach new Christians the
April 15, 2021 | The Baptist Messenger | www.baptistmessenger.com | Gospel Ministry
basic doctrines of the faith. It doesn’t even take more time out of the church member’s busy week to be able to help in the new work. We just need to be willing to adjust the weekly meeting times and events of the church. I am neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet. I am not even Facebook friends with a prophet, but I can confidently say that, unless churches adopt a simple model similar to what Pastor Howard and Kelham Avenue did in the 1900s, we will not see the Gospel advance in our state in the way we so desire. If one church was able to start 23 new works in 22 years, imagine what Oklahoma Baptist could accomplish if every Baptist church in the state decided to start one local mission station per year. As my friend and brother in Christ, Terry Rials told me once, “Do we want to see God move in a mighty way? Let’s put up the sails and wait for the wind of the Holy Spirit to blow through our land.”
