ORLANDO (FBW) – With only two weeks until the Feb. 1 deadline for petitions seeking to put a constitutional amendment to protect marriage on the November ballot, more than 300 pastors from various evangelical denominations gathered Jan. 16-17 for a last-ditch rally organizers hope will propel the amendment effort beyond the necessary 611,000 petitions to allow voters to ban “gay marriage” in Florida this fall.

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Because the campaign is at least 300,000 petitions behind (as of Jan. 17, about 190,000 petitions had been certified by the Florida Secretary of State’s office, although amendment advocates believe there may be tens of thousands of petitions being processed), the newly organized Florida Restoration Project held a Pastors’ Policy Briefing at the Rosen Centre Hotel in Orlando to “mobilize pastors and pews” for civic action – first for the marriage amendment effort and beyond on other matters of moral concern.

Several prominent Florida Baptists helped to lead the briefing – including Hayes Wicker, pastor of First Baptist Church in Naples and president of the Florida Baptist State Convention, and Ed Johnson, pastor of First Baptist Church in Ocala, while other Florida Baptist pastors participated in the event.

Speakers throughout the two-day meeting regularly referenced the deficit in needed petitions, noting that a “miracle” would be needed to meet the ballot threshold by the Feb. 1 deadline, while also noting the responsibility of pastors to educate their members about critical issues like same-sex “marriage.”

In an interview with Florida Baptist Witness after the conference, Wicker said, “We are shepherds of the flock and exert not only tremendous influence and leadership, but we speak the Word of God. And the truth of the Scripture is always that believers are Christian citizens as salt and light. I believe it’s absolutely essential that pastors not give an uncertain sound … for their people. Pastors have a moral obligation to call people to action. Faith without works is dead.”

Wicker, who gave a devotional drawing on principles of citizen involvement from the life of Nehemiah, decried pastors’ retreat from public issues “into our little fortresses … . I believe there needs to be a break-out spirit among pastors who are not afraid of standing up in a prophetic role.”

Darrell Orman, pastor of First Baptist Church in Stuart, told the Witness he came to the event even though he has aggressively promoted the petition effort in his church the last six weeks.

“I’m here because I believe in traditional marriage and have a deep conviction that we need to participate in the process,” Orman said.

Steve Moore, pastor of Walton Road Baptist Church in Port St. Lucie, told the Witness, “I think we have to take a stand. It’s a fight that has to be fought,” while adding that Christians should be careful to show the love of Christ when they advocate controversial public policy issues.

“This is not a [political] party issue. Rather, it is a moral issue,” Moore added.

John Stemberger, an Orlando attorney who is state chairman of Florida4Marriag.org, the coalition leading the petition drive, issued a call to action to the pastors, urging them to hold petition drives in their churches the last two Sundays of January and for each pastor to enlist five other ministers in the effort.

The “bad news,” Stemberger admitted, is that “we’re only about half way there” in the number of petitions. The “good news,” he added, was that “we are seeing the church come alive statewide like we have never seen it.”

Noting the precarious state of the petition effort, Stemberger told the pastors, “It’s very possible we can make this. It’s also very possible we won’t make it.”

Stemberger said that petitions should be mailed to the coalition’s office (4853 S. Orange Ave., Orlando, FL 32806). After Jan. 23, they should be hand-delivered to the respective county supervisors of elections offices. Florida has 67 counties. The phone number and address of each county's supervisor of elections can be found in the phonebook, Florida Baptist Convention legislative consultant Bill Bunkley told Baptist Press. Contact information also is available online at http://election.dos.state.fl.us/county/index.shtml.

Recalling the compromise of Christian pastors in Germany when Adolf Hitler rose to power before World War II, Lutheran pastor Laurence White told the Florida pastors that they cannot remain silent in the face of the homosexual lobby’s attempt to gain “gay marriage” in America.

“The Devil is a liar and it’s time we stopped listening to his lies in America and saw what is happening in our country for what it truly is – the soul of America is dying. And that death is facilitated by the apathy, the ignorance and the uninvolvement of America’s pastors,” said White, pastor of Our Savior Lutheran Church in Houston, Texas.

“This isn’t politics. This isn’t partisan. God is not a Republican. God is not a Democrat. God is not even an American, which may come as a something of a surprise [to some]. … The Lord God Almighty has established marriage as the life-long union of one man and one woman and that’s it,” he preached.

White said that one pastor at the event told him that he had “started a fire here,” to which he responded, “I hope and I pray that is true, that something significant has begun here.”

The pastors’ briefing was organized by White and David Lane, a California public relations executive, and modeled after their similar efforts undertaken to promote the adoption of state constitutional marriage amendments in Texas (in 2005) and Ohio (in 2004).

Lane and White hastily organized the Pastors’ Policy Briefing in early December after concluding a successful campaign in Texas that had resulted in more than 100,000 newly registered Christian voters who helped the state overwhelming adopt its marriage amendment – with only one of the state’s 243 counties voting against the initiative to limit marriage to only one man and one woman.

White told pastors Jan. 17 the Florida event was organized following a meeting with Allen Bense, speaker of the Florida House of the Representatives, who spoke at the event. Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Belleview, and member of First Baptist Church in Belleview, was later named state chairman of the Florida Restoration Project.

Several other state representatives spoke during the two-day meeting, all of which were Republicans, except for Democratic Rep. Wilbert “Tee” Holloway. Florida Senate President Tom Lee, R-Brandon, who is also a candidate for Chief Financial Officer of Florida, and Sen. Daniel Webster, R-Winter Garden, a member of First Baptist Church of Central Florida in Orlando, also spoke at the meeting.

Other speakers at the event included David Barton, president of WallBuilders, Tony Perkins, president of Family Research Council, Mat Staver, president of Liberty Counsel, and Rod Parsley, pastor of World Harvest Church in Columbus, Ohio.