Saturday Night on Bourbon Street: Day 1 (June 16, 2012) of the Southern Baptist Convention in New Orleans

Logan, Rachelle and I arrived in New Orleans Saturday evening at 9:00 p.m. After freshening up a bit and a late supper, Logan and I made our way to Bourbon Street to do some street interviews. We asked a couple of questions about the Southern Baptist Convention and the potential name change to Great Commission Baptist Convention. We were not surprised that nobody had heard of the Southern Baptist Convention, nor were we shocked that most people associated "Great Commission" with paying some kind of fee. What struck home to both my son and me was the vast and utter lostness of the people on Bourbon Street. We sit in our comfortable churches, gather in our convention halls for annual meetings, and focus in on doctrinal differences by issuing various white papers on traditional Baptist beliefs. Yet, while we pontificate and bloviate, men and women outside our doors are dead on the inside and living in a virtual hell. I entered Bourbon Street wanting to know what people thought of the SBC -- I left Bourbon Street two hours later realizing it makes absolutely zero difference what people think about the SBC. As long as we Southern Baptists think more about our Convention than we do the kingdom of Christ, we will focus on the politics of our convention and less about the power of the Christ to change lives. People didn't want to talk with me about the SBC, but they sure wanted to talk about the difference between religion and a relationship with Christ. Some were hostile. Others were attentive. Logan and I both learned a great deal. You'll see snippets of our evening on the embedded video below. Monday evening I will post a brief video blog previewing the Southern Baptist Convention.