The Communications Committee has now set up a separate website (now defunct) with a list of FAQs and a form for submitting your questions online. That's one less excuse for not submitting questions. You don't even have to leave home now. So submit those questions! Flood them with questions -- legitimate questions. Be respectful and non-confrontational in your remarks, but let them know if you still have unresolved questions! It's the process we've been given, and if we don't follow the process they're just going to say it's a handful of disgruntled members who have questions. This is your opportunity to prove them wrong!
Thanks to googleguy for bringing this to our attention.
Friday, November 17, 2006
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Good morning all -
This is not my intent to create any kind of stir, but I'm still questioning the credit card fiasco...
My question is -
Did the Pastor or any other card holder ever repay the Church for any charge(s)? If so, when and where was the charge made and when was the repayment made by the staff member.
Just my two cents...
partoftheflock,
Put the question on the supplied form and submit it to the committee!
Dear New BBC Open Forum -
I'm not a member of Bellevue, but I have a suggestion. Now that the Communication Committee has a website to address the questions your members have internally, why not stop posting unverified information and only accept member's questions/followed by the communication committee's response to the question.
The headers on top of the Saving Bellevue site are classic half-truths - maybe the amounts of the charges are true as listed - but the purpose and people involved could be totally different. Take for instance the Ruth Chris example: over $400 seemed like a lot of money for one meal, but when the Committee's website lists that Dr. David Jeremiah and Charles Billingsley were among guests for the dinner and that the average cost per person ended up being in the $30 range. This seems more reasonable to me for a dinner on a special occasion showing hospitility to those visiting your church.
As a Southern Baptist minister in Tennessee who enjoyed a visit to your church this week at the Tennessee Baptist Convention - I would hope that you would consider stop publishing anything for the whole world to see until you are sure it is ENTIRELY true.
Just a humble suggestion. I am looking to your church's members to stop hurting one another - to get united behind your great pastor while looking toward our Savior Jesus - and get on to leading our convention and nation to bow down on our knees and pray for revival. America needs it more now than she ever has! A lost world is looking to you for hope and the rest of the church is looking toward you to help lead our nation to repentance and revival.
During a break between one of our sessions at the Tennessee Baptist Convention, I went out into the courtyard in front of your church and prayed for your congregation. As a prayed, I saw the Bible verse etched above your main entrance - "Send forth Thy light and Thy truth." - Psalm 43:3
Bellevue Baptist Church, it's time to stop fighting amongst yourselves and focus totally on sending forth His light and His truth - the Gospel that so many who are lost and dying need to hear.
Scott Foshie - Associate Pastor
Bear Cove Baptist Church
Sparta, Tennessee
NBBCOF,
You can copy my post from Communicatuions Committee thread that I posted earlier this week if you want to.
You also have my permission to print anything I've sent you via email.
thanks, karen
dsf,
Thanks so much for your concern, prayers and visiting us today. Please look at savingbellevue.come today. There are new allegations of the misuse of the church credit card. Our pastor stood in our pulpit and lied to his congregation (listen to the Sept. 24, 2006 informational meeting) when he said he has not used the church credit card ever, not once.
The Ruth's Chris dinner is resolved (although it was pretty cheap per person considering the prices at that particular restaurant). The stuff we're talking about today is new.
As a minister of the Gospel, would you be willing to go to Pastor Gaines yourself on these issues? Maybe you will be able to make some headway.
God Bless You and your church,
Karen Turk Marshall
Hi Karen,
I'm not suggesting that you don't ask questions. I just think that it's best to not put information about your church out on the internet for the whole world to see until you are sure of the whole truth. As I understand it, you have forms to fill out, a weekly time to ask committee members questions, and a website is now online where you can ask questions.
I looked at the new allegations on the Saving Bellevue site. Again, the way the allegations read are disturbing. Even if the charge amounts are true - how do you know that they are for the reasons listed on the website? Please hear me - I'm humbly asking all of you to be sure of ALL the facts - not just part of them - before you rush to judgement on what actually happened.
I am the first person to support integrity in the church and with God's men - I try to be above reproach myself in the ministry God has called me to (and I make mistakes!). But let's make sure that we're straight on the whole truth as brothers/sisters in Christ before we get online and post things that can be used to convict God's men before they are even tried.
I want to stay out of this debate as much as possible because it is an internal church matter at Bellvue that ultimately you must deal with between you and God. But I thought it might help you to see how an outsider views what's going on and how it can affect your church's witness.
Love in Christ,
Scott
dsf,
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and your respectful demeanor. I don't have time to adequately address everything you said, nor would I attempt to, but let me repeat, for the benefit of those who may have just tuned in, that this forum is not affiliated in any way with the savingbellevue.com site nor "they" (it's actually a "he") with "us" except for mutual links on our pages. So while we may discuss things in this forum that appear on that site, no one here wrote the "headlines" or the stories there.
NBBCOF
dsf, I guess the Ruth's Chris dinner may seem to be no big deal to you since you said it was in the $30 range. But BBC says it was $49.79 per person. Would you agree that that is really the $50 range? Note: BBC said it was $39.63 before tax and tip. Can you see how they spin things? Now you are saying $30 when really it was $50.
And why Ruth's Chris? My family has never eaten there because it's too expensive. The people in charge of BBC obviously have lost touch with the lifestyle of most of their members. There is no accountability.
AVERAGEJOE--
You said, "And why Ruth's Chris? My family has never eaten there because it is too expensive."
Our family never has eaten there either for the same reason. You are VERY correct in saying that they are out of touch with some of their members--in more ways than this one.
They have been doing this with the Lord's money (our tithes) as though it is THEIR own money. I would have preferred it if they had taken some hungry, needy people to dinner to show the love of Jesus to them. Better yet, I wish they had gone to some poor, sweet elderly lady's home and taken her out for the day to show Jesus' love to her and to show her that we are a caring church body.
I wish they would take a bunch of the money we have saved up and go around the city doing good instead of storing up in the storehouse when our lives might be required of us before the day is over.
Thank you...Dee
Karen posted: The Ruth's Chris dinner is resolved (although it was pretty cheap per person considering the prices at that particular restaurant). The stuff we're talking about today is new.
REPLY: this has been part of the point all along. this Ruth's Chris deal is one issue MANY on the blog and others were going crazy about. it was one of the BIG problems and points. We have now found out the "facts" were way off. the number of people at a meal that like that changes things does it not? you through a meal that actually happened and add some mis-information to it and everything becomes different.
1. why don't you and others think this same thing can be the case for many of these terrible "issues"? why?
2. have you and others said you were sorry to Brother Steve and all involved about accusing him of things you have already been proven to be wrong about?
i will be honest. when this is all over, I think there is going to be a pretty large group of people with egg on their face and that will need to say they are sorry.
i would also agree there are many on both sides that will have to make things right. we have all made mistakes during this time.
averagejoe posted: dsf, I guess the Ruth's Chris dinner may seem to be no big deal to you since you said it was in the $30 range. But BBC says it was $49.79 per person. Would you agree that that is really the $50 range? Note: BBC said it was $39.63 before tax and tip. Can you see how they spin things? Now you are saying $30 when really it was $50.
REPLY: here we go again. will this stuff end? they are not trying to spin anything. $50 @ Ruth's Chris per person including tax and tip is good. I find NOTHING wrong with it what so ever. nothing. Bellevue has been taking guests to nice places to eat for years and years and years. but you complain now, how convenient. several reasons for Ruth's Chris. it is a great place to take guests. private rooms and quite. they also take reservations. many many places no longer do that. to be honest, I do not need to go any further, because this is ridiculous
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