Clarifying the call and uniting around His mission

Luke records what took place after the Jerusalem council met. They sent letters to the churches and the churches were encouraged, resulting in the continued advancement of the gospel.

That is what we desire to happen after our Texas Baptists Annual Meeting in Waco. Our prayer is that when messengers return to their churches, they will be encouraged and that the gospel will continue to advance.

My first Texas Baptists Annual Meeting as executive director is behind me. I am so thankful for the 2,030 registered messengers and guests who participated. I am thankful for the way in which our speakers unpacked the theme “His Kingdom Agenda” based on Luke 4:18-19. I am thankful for our worship leaders, our officers, our staff, our workshop presenters, our panelists and all our volunteers. I believe King Jesus was honored!

I had the privilege of delivering my first executive director’s report to the convention. Taking our cue from Jesus’ declaration of his ministry agenda in our theme verse, we have been considering what it means to us as Texas Baptists in the immediate future.

Our convention has held its purpose in Article II of our constitution since 1886. It reads,

“The object of this Convention shall be to awaken and stimulate among the churches the greatest possible activity in evangelism, missions, Christian education and benevolent work and enterprises; to cultivate a closer cooperation among the churches and promote harmony of feeling and concert of action in advancing all the interests of the Redeemer’s Kingdom.”

The last phrase encompasses so much as we consider the vastness of His Kingdom. During the past year, I met with a group of staff leadership, convention officers, the chair of our executive board and some pastors from across the state, along with some consultants, to reflect on how we can live that out over the next couple of years. The following is the result of the work of this group.

Our missional theme is “strengthening a multiplying movement of churches that live out the Great Commandment and Great Commission in Texas and beyond.” We would like all Texas Baptists churches, whether in Texas or in other states, to be GC2 churches.

The values that will guide our decisions, our direction and our strategy reflect our identity as a biblically-faithful, gospel-centered, historically-rooted, future-thinking, beautifully-diverse, servant-hearted and kingdom-collaborating people under the Lordship of Christ!

The GC2 pathway is two-pronged. It includes serving churches and strategic partnerships. We will strive to customize our resourcing of churches depending on their life-cycle stage. Whether churches are in the planting phase or ready to thrive, expanding or multiplying, Texas Baptists wants to come alongside and strengthen this movement of GC2 churches.

If churches are going to be multiplying Great Commandment and Great Commission congregations they need to have strategic connections to other churches, with other leaders, and with like-minded kingdom entities. Currently, Texas Baptists relate to twenty-four institutions in Texas and about thirty national and international networks and boards. The purpose of these kingdom relationships is to connect churches to prayer, giving, going and sending opportunities.

At the conclusion of my report, we had representatives of eight national and international Baptist networks on stage to sign celebrations of partnership. They were the National Baptist Convention of Mexico, the Brazilian Baptist Convention Mission Boards, the National Baptist Convention of America, the Ukraine Baptist Convention, the Baptist Convention of Argentina, the Baptist Union of Scotland and the Baptist World Alliance. We announced that we are working on a partnership with the Glocalnet church planting network.

I’m thankful for Craig Christina, associate executive director, Sergio Ramos, director of the GC2 initiative, Noe Treviño, director of our center for missional engagement, and Ray Malone, associate director of GC2, who have and will continue to facilitate these kingdom partnerships.

Currently, there is one Baptist church for every 3,668 people in Texas. When you factor in projected population growth and the rate of churches that close every week, if nothing changes by the year 2050 there will be one church for every 16,357 people. A multiplying movement of GC2 churches is not an option. It is a must! We must reach the nations in Texas and the nations beyond Texas (Acts 1:8).

Our prayer is that God will help us to unite around His mission. We do not want to get distracted or sidetracked from the main thing. Texas Baptists continue to uphold the Lordship of Christ, the authority of the Scriptures, the autonomy of the local church, the priesthood of believers and kingdom collaboration for the sake of the gospel.

Our beautiful diversity includes various cultures, languages, geographies, worship styles, sizes and even what version of the Baptist Faith and Message the local church affirms. Our Texas Baptists family includes churches that affirm the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message, the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message or any other similar Baptist declaration of faith. All of these are welcome as long as we rally around His Kingdom Agenda. Will you be a part of this movement? I pray so!