I was crawling through the Truett Seminary chapel archives and came across a message from Paul W. Powell, offered November 5, 2013. Here is a link to the video, and here is a link to the audio. I wish I had an easy way to embed the files, but Baylor’s hosting service doesn’t provide code I can easily integrate into my site. The message is titled, “Learning from the Long Walk.”
Brother Paul was pastor of Green Acres Baptist Church in Tyler, Texas for seventeen years, my home church. Paul baptized me and, years later, preached the charge on the occasion of my ordination on April 10, 2005 at the First Baptist Church of Allen, Texas, pastored then and now by the Reverend Chad Selph. Paul died at the age of 83 in December of 2016.
While digging around the internet doing a little bit of background research on Paul, I came across a 2005 “Pastoral Letter” he wrote while serving as Dean of the George W. Truett Theological Seminary. Here’s a quick story he told:
Baptists are people of the Book. The Bible is the rule and guide for our faith and practice. We have a Baptist Faith and Message, but it is not a creed. No one has to sign it; no one is forced to subscribe to it. It is simply a statement of what Baptists generally believe.
We claim no creed but the Bible. Several years ago Richard Jackson gave me a Bible that had embossed on the front of it in gold letters, “The Baptist Faith and Message.” He had it right.
One more reason I will continue to be a fan of Paul’s.
Scroll up and listen to his message. It’s gold.
