Reverend Hershel Sizemore gained his Heavenly reward when he met his Savior face to face and heard the words he longed for the most, “Well done, thy good and faithful servant,” on the afternoon of June 5, 2022. He was 74 years old.

Some cancer patients can safely skip radiation or chemotherapy after surgery. That's according to two new studies exploring shorter, gentler cancer care. Researchers are looking for ways to precisely predict which patients can avoid unneeded treatment to cut down on harmful side effects and unnecessary costs.

WASHINGTON (AP) — WNBA star Brittney Griner is easily the most prominent American locked up by a foreign country. But the Phoenix Mercury player’s case is tangled up with that of another prisoner few Americans have heard of. Paul Whelan also has been held in Russia since his December 2018 arrest on espionage charges he and the U.S. government say are false.

NEW YORK (AP) — Atlanta shortstop Dansby Swanson has become the fourth member of the World Series champion Braves to go to salary arbitration. He is asking a three-person panel for $10 million while the Braves argued for $9.2 million.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — A passenger train has derailed in eastern Iran, killing at least 21 people and injuring 47 others. That's according to Iran's state-run IRNA news agency. The train operated by the state-run Islamic Republic Railway carried some 350 people as it traveled from Tabas, some 550 kilometers from Tehran, to the city of Yazd.

An article in The Christian Index in mid-May pointed out that the first glimpse that many young mothers-to-be in Moultrie get of their babies is via an ultrasound machine at the Hope House Women's Clinic. They see the developing facial features, the tiny arms and legs, and they fall in love, tossing aside any notion of ending their pregnancies. So, when the ultrasound machine at the Moultrie pregnancy center stopped working, Pine Grove Baptist Church in Moultrie wasted no time in donating the money needed to purchase a new one.

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran has turned off two surveillance devices used by U.N. nuclear inspectors to monitor the Islamic Republic’s uranium enrichment. Wednesday's decision further escalates the crisis over Iran's atomic program as the country's nuclear deal with world powers remains in tatters.

BERLIN (AP) — Authorities say a teacher was killed and nine people were seriously injured after a man drove a car into a German school group standing in a popular Berlin shopping district. Police said the man drove into people on a street corner at around 10:30 a.m. Wednesday before getting the car back on the road and then crashing into a shop window around a block further on.

BAKHMUT, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian forces battling Russian troops in a key eastern city appeared on the cusp of retreat. But the regional governor insisted Wednesday they are still fighting “for every centimeter” of the city. The urban battle for Sievierodonetsk testified to the painstaking, inch-by-inch advance by Russian forces as they close in on control of the entire Luhansk region.

It’s the inflation you’re not supposed to see. From toilet paper to yogurt to corn chips, manufacturers are quietly shrinking package sizes without lowering prices. It’s dubbed “shrinkflation,” and it’s accelerating worldwide. In the U.S., a small box of Kleenex now has 60 tissues; a few months ago, it had 65.

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Owliyo Hassan Salaad has watched four of her children die this year. A drought in the Horn of Africa has taken them, one by one. A drought in the Horn of Africa has taken them, one by one. Previously unreported data shared with The Associated Press show nearly 450 deaths this year at malnutrition treatment centers in Somalia alone.

NEW YORK (AP) — Major U.S. benchmarks are lower in premarket trading as broad concerns about interest rates, inflation and the war in Ukraine continue to weigh on investors. Futures for the Dow Jones industrials are 0.4% lower Wednesday and futures for the S&P 500 are down 0.3%.

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks rallied Tuesday as Treasury yields eased, but Wall Street remains wobbly as investors wait for more clarity on where interest rates, inflation and the economy are heading. The S&P 500 climbed 1% after bouncing back from an early loss of the same size.

ATLANTA (AP) — Guillermo Heredia gave Atlanta the lead with a home run to lead off the seventh, Ronald Acuña Jr. hit two homers and the streaking Braves beat the reeling Oakland Athletics 3-2. Kyle Wright recovered from a rough first inning to allow two runs in eight innings as the Braves extended their season-best winning streak to six games.

Key misunderstandings of the doctrine of local church autonomy have played a role in the mishandling of reports of sexual abuse at the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee. Some of the same misunderstandings were used to object to the Conservative Resurgence on the ground that it violated local church autonomy. As we implement necessary reforms in response to the Sexual Abuse Task Force report, we as a Convention will need to understand which proposed actions respect the autonomy of the local churches and which actions would fail because of that autonomy. To succeed at that task, we would all do well to look back at this historic statement of faith and to refresh our memories about what local church autonomy is and is not.

The SBC exists to advance the Baptist mission—their mission—and never to undermine it. To that end, we must be committed to the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture, zealous of the biblically-taught autonomy of our local churches, committed to confessional orthodoxy, and with an emphasis on evangelism and missions. That’s what makes us distinctively Baptist.

As we respond to our cultural, societal, educational, and benevolent responsibilities, let us not forget our original task. The primary responsibility of the SBC is to support our North American Mission Board and our International Mission Board so the world will understand that God has sent Jesus into the world. Remember the Mission!

DULUTH, Ga. – A group of Georgia’s top scholars have been awarded scholarships by the Georgia Baptist Education Commission. The Student Achievement Awards go to a select group of incoming freshmen who will be attending either Brewton-Parker College, Shorter University or Truett McConnell University.

FRANKLIN, Tenn. — In response to a tweet by Guidepost Solutions supporting the LGBTQ+ community, Southern Baptists should “immediately break ties with Guidepost Solutions,” said Randy C. Davis, president and executive director of the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board.

The widow and son of the man who wrote the 1983 article that inspired the original “Top Gun” are suing Paramount Pictures over its sequel, “Top Gun: Maverick.” In a complaint filed in California federal court Monday, Shosh Yonay and Yuval Yonay claim that the rights to Ehud Yonay’s story reverted back to them on Jan. 24, 2020. The lawsuit contends that Paramount, which produced and distributed the sequel, did not reacquire those rights before releasing the film in May.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Most Americans are open to a variety of denominations of Christian churches, including many people of other faiths or no faith at all. Americans have a wide range of opinions and impressions about Christian denominations, but most won’t rule out a church based on its denomination, according to a new study from Lifeway Research.

El ROCÍO, Spain (AP) — After a two-year hiatus forced by the pandemic, tens of thousands of pilgrims — many of them outfitted in tiered flamenco dresses, crisp riding suits and wide-brimmed Cordoba hats — descended on the tiny Spanish village of El Rocío to take part in riotously colorful and ancient festival, la Romería del Rocío, or the Rocío virgin pilgrimage.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has acknowledged that she and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell “could have used a better word” than transitory when describing the expected run of inflation in the U.S. economy. Yellen says she remains hopeful it will decline. But she told the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday that “I do expect inflation to remain high although I very much hope that it will be coming down now."

A team of Georgia Baptist leaders first visited Lima, Peru, in the fall of 2021. Our mission? To learn what a partnership with a church in the Lima region might look like.

MILAN (AP) — Italian agents have confiscated 4.3 tons of cocaine with a street value of nearly a quarter-billion euros (dollars) in the northeastern port city of Trieste, dealing a blow to Colombia's feared Gulf Clan in one of the largest drug busts ever in Europe. Arrest warrants were being executed for 38 people on suspicion of international drug trafficking in Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, the Netherlands and Colombia.