Passages | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction

Free E-mail Newsletters:

RSS Feed | More Feeds | RSS Help

Home > 2008 > April

Christianity Today, April, 2008 |

Passages

Ted Haggard exits spiritual restoration program, remembering David F. Wright and Ruth Stafford Peale, and more news.

posted 3/18/2008 09:51AM

Related articles and links |

1 of 1

Resigned • Wade Burleson, senior pastor of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Enid, Oklahoma, from the trustee board of the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board. An outspoken critic of the board, particularly its 2006 decision not to appoint missionaries who use a "private prayer language," Burleson was censured in November 2007 for blogging about his disagreements with fellow trustees.

Died • David F. Wright, professor emeritus of patristic and Reformation studies at the University of Edinburgh's New College. He was 70. The editor and author of numerous scholarly works, Wright was called a "powerful voice for Bible-believing scholarship" by former student and prominent Presbyterian minister Ligon Duncan.

Died • Ruth Stafford Peale, cofounder and chairman emeritus of Guideposts magazine and wife of the late Norman Vincent Peale. The author of several books, including A Lifetime of Positive Thinking, Peale died at her home in Pawling, New York. She was 101.

Exited • Ted Haggard, former president of the National Association of Evangelicals and pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, from his spiritual restoration program. Haggard was dismissed from New Life for sexual immorality in November 2006. New Life's trustees said in a statement that Haggard's restoration remained incomplete and that he should not return to vocational ministry. According to the statement, Haggard will continue an accountability relationship with pastor Tommy Barnett of Phoenix First Assembly of God in Arizona.

Awarded • Bob Fu, president of China Aid Association, with the 2007 John Leland Religious Liberty Award. Given by the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the award honors the former Chinese house-church pastor and leader in the country's student democracy movement for "courageously defending the right of all people to exercise freely their religious faith." Fu currently lives in Midland, Texas.

Related Elsewhere:

Christianity Today earlier covered Burleson's resignation.

The Scotsman had an obituary for David F. Wright. Several tributes were posted online.

Ruth Stafford Peale has a tribute site.

The Ted Haggard news was widely covered.

China Aid Association has more on Fu's award.

1 of 1

April 2008, Vol. 52, No. 4

E-mail this page

Write CT

Print this article

Post a comment

Reader Reviews are below

Subscribe to Christianity Today and get 3 free trial issues. No credit card required.

Please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery. Offer valid in U.S. only.

If you decide you want to keep Christianity Today coming, honor your invoice for just $19.95 and receive nine more issues, a full year in all. If not, simply write "cancel" across the invoice and return it. The three trial issues are yours to keep, regardless.

Click here for international orders

2-for-1 Gifts!

[Reader Reviews]

Average User Rating:

Howard Brant (SIM-Kenya)

Posted: March 18, 2008 1:55 PM


I fear for Ted Haggard. Many of us can remember another well known TV evangelist who fell in moral disgrace -- took himself out of discipline and wound up going right back to the same thing all over again. Haggard seems to have spurned his opportunity to display the grace of submission to spiritual discipline. He will be the looser.

Dr paige-Patric Samuels

Posted: March 19, 2008 10:10 AM


We pray for our Brother Ted Haggard, as we know that the price to serve the Lord is high and the cost in public office is high too. We pray among other not to put you on blast, rather, to ensure that you submit to spiritual council and holistic wellness, in your life and family. God is the potter and he can put you togather again

Tim Burgess

Posted: March 18, 2008 3:31 PM


Jim Bakker submitted to an accountability relationship with Tommy Barnett of Phoenix First Assembly of God in Arizona. He was able to turn his life around. Let's pray that this happens with Ted Haggard as well.