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Celebrating Southern's 'heritage'
October 13, 2003
By Bryan Cribb

Prominent preachers to help celebrate 150 years of Kingdom service

Three of Southern Baptist’s most prominent leaders will help The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary celebrate a legacy of nearly 150 years of faithful service to the Kingdom of Christ during the seminary’s fifth annual Heritage Week Oct. 13-17.

Three chapel addresses from Southern Baptist Convention leaders O.S. Hawkins, R. Albert Mohler Jr. and James T. Draper respectively will highlight the week of preaching and commemoration.

“We are inheritors of a great tradition. Like every generation before us, we must take up this heritage for a new day,” Mohler said. “For Southern Seminary, Heritage Week is an opportunity to look back to our heritage while looking forward to the challenges and opportunities God now puts before us.”

Heritage Week coincides with several other important events in the life of Southern Seminary. The trustees of the seminary will gather for their semi-annual meeting during the first part of the week.

On Thursday, the seminary will host a Christian women’s luncheon, featuring Mary Kassian. And the week will close with the seminary’s Preview Weekend, when prospective students and their families visit the campus as they seek God’s will and calling on their lives.

Hawkins will kick off the week with a chapel message on Tuesday. Since 1997, Hawkins has served as president of the Annuity Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. He has preached for more than a quarter of a century and was formerly pastor of First Baptist Church, Dallas, Texas.

Mohler will deliver the special Wednesday chapel address at 10 a.m. in Alumni Chapel.

Mohler stressed the importance of remembering Southern Seminary’s heritage in remaining faithful to the Gospel call as exhibited by the seminary’s founders.

“We truly stand on the shoulders of giants,” he said. “With them, we make our commitments to biblical authority, bold witness and faithful service.”

Draper will close the week with a Thursday chapel message. He serves the president of LifeWay Christian Resources, the publication and education arm of the Southern Baptist Convention.

The Christian women’s luncheon will offer women an opportunity to hear Mary Kassain, one of the nation’s leading speakers on women and the church and founder of Alabaster Flask Ministries. The luncheon is at 11:30 a.m. in Heritage Hall. A wife and mother of three children, Kassian has written three books: Women, Creation, and the Fall; The Feminist Gospel; and In My Father’s House.

Each of these events add up to an “amazing week,” Mohler said.

“I believe it is important for an institution to have a focus period of emphasis that reminds us who we are and why we are here and what we’re all about,” Mohler added.

And students should make every effort make the most of the opportunity, he added.

“Students will get out of it what they put into it,” Mohler said. “Given the opportunity, students should clear their calendars and bring their friends to the morning services and all the other events that they can attend.”

 

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