MACON, Ga.— Georgia Baptist leaders gathered Tuesday, Aug. 9, for an Executive Committee meeting marked by clear gospel focus, encouraging ministry reports, and steady financial news. Thomas Hammond, executive director of the Georgia Baptist Mission Board, repeatedly pointed the room back to the Convention’s twin priorities: strengthening pastors and strengthening churches. “The church-strengthening team has these areas of ministry that are really designed to connect with your church, to resource, and to also train and serve in any capacity needed, whether it’s discipleship, evangelism, or music and worship and missions,” he said.
Brady Howard, vice chair of the Administration Committee and senior pastor of Glen Haven Baptist Church, opened from 1 Corinthians 15, urging pastors to remember the eternal weight of their work. He acknowledged ministry can feel unseen and opposed, but anchored the room in Paul’s promise: “Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
Hammond spotlighted progress in next-gen ministry, saying it was “so encouraging to see all the things that we’re doing to reach the next generation.” He pointed to the work of NextGen catalyst Chris Trent and the success of camps, along with efforts in music, worship, and college ministry.
He continued, “With BCM, we’re on 40 campuses. We desire to be on over 70, and we’re going to continue to grow that ministry.”
He walked leaders through a multi-year plan to replace aging BCM buildings with developer-funded, mixed-use facilities at Georgia Southern, Georgia Tech, and the University of Georgia. At Georgia Southern, he explained, “This building is going to have capacity for over 300 students for worship. They’ll have 82 units for student housing, 120 beds. Where we have BCM, they’re actually going to be students living above it. We don’t have to pay a penny for water, electricity, security, cleaning, all of that’s taken care of, and we have a state-of-the-art facility for the students that will be going to Georgia Southern.”
Similar projects are queued for Tech and UGA, with additional campuses expressing interest. Hammond noted that proceeds will be placed “in this quasi endowment, quasi meaning that it’s not locked in for eternity, but it is designated for a particular cause or purpose.” He outlined how annual returns could fund BCM scholarships for mission trips, campus outreach events, and facility upgrades, calling it “an encouraging word about possibilities of how God could use this money.”
Shorter University President Don Dowless offered a campus snapshot filled with prayer, discipleship, and mission trips, and celebrated that five football players have recently come to Christ. He told of a student who arrived as an agnostic but through studying the New Testament confessed faith in Christ. “What is a soul worth? Everything,” Dowless said.
Shannon Watson of Baptist Retirement Communities of Georgia said one 94-year-old resident recently went whitewater rafting and afterward summed up the ministry’s mission: “He thought he was coming to die, to live out just the last years of his life. He did not realize that he was coming there to live.”
Penfield Addiction Ministries Executive Director Donnie Plummer reported 45 baptisms and 26 conversions this year, acknowledging the deep trauma most clients carry. Plummer explained that, “Eighty to ninety percent… have experienced some sort of serious trauma in their lives, whether it was molestation as a child, physical abuse, or abandonment.” But, he testified that as residents encounter God’s love, “their communication starts to open up, they start smiling and laughing and enjoying each other’s company and understanding that they’re not alone.” He reminded the room, “Yes, we have failed at times, and it hurts. But we also understand that we are not God. We only work for Him.”
Worship and music catalyst Rhon Carter celebrated a packed Surge Music Camp at Shorter (425 participants from 107 churches), 14 professions of faith, and 30 students sensing a call to ministry. “God is at work across Georgia through worship and music,” he said, noting ongoing Zoom mentoring for called students and new cohorts for leaders.
Looking ahead to the annual meeting, Steve Browning, president of the Georgia Baptist Convention and lead pastor of First Baptist Alpharetta, emphasized the theme “Everyone, Everywhere.”
“Yes, it is a business meeting,” he said, “We will have business to do, but we’re going to be very, very focused this year on the theme. If we’re going to reach everyone across this state, it’s going to take every Georgia Baptist across every corner of the state.” He highlighted the first-ever all-day evangelism conference on Monday, encouraged churches to “fill every slot” for messengers, and called for prayer. “A convention in a meeting has never changed a life. However, when the presence of God chooses to touch a convention or a meeting, it changes lives for eternity.”
Browning shared how a gospel conversation at his gym ended with a young man trusting Christ. “We sat down and had a gospel conversation, and at the end, I asked… ‘Hey, Jackson, is there any reason why you wouldn’t want to give your life to Jesus Christ right now?’ He said, ‘I can’t think of a reason.’ I said, ‘Well, come on then, let’s do it.’ And right there and right then, that little café at our gym, Jackson became a follower of Jesus Christ.” Browning added, “We say all the time that there are 7 million lost people in the state of Georgia,” but “as of last Friday morning, that number is down by one. And it’s going to take a lot more conversations just like that one, to reach people all across our state.”
Evangelism catalyst Steve Foster traced the Evangelism Initiative through more than 30 listening sessions and summarized it in four words: pray, engage, sow, harvest. He emphasized that “every church praying for lost people” is the foundation and expressed hope that “in the next two or three years we might stand up and say, we have baptized more people as Georgia Baptists than we have ever baptized in the history of our convention.”
Hammond placed the initiative in perspective: “You can look at the evangelism initiative. It’s two words there, equip and engage. The mission board is not going to reach anybody. We come alongside the Georgia Baptist Convention, 3,500 churches strong, 1.4 million people. And our desire is to resource and encourage, that’s our desire, to strengthen pastors and strengthen churches.” He described equip efforts such as a “game plan for evangelism,” an updated “invite plan,” and guest services training. On engage, he likened media efforts to air support: “These will be things like ads on commercials, social media, on any device. We can put the gospel all over these things, but we have to have a plan to do this. And now we have the resources.” All of it, he emphasized, “is undergirded by prayer.”
Beth Ann Williams, lead strategist for Georgia Baptist Women/Mission Georgia, reminded messengers that September’s State Missions Offering fuels Mission Georgia’s frontline work in foster care, literacy, addiction recovery, and disaster response. “This year our theme is Missions in Motion, and our goal is $1.5 million,” she said. Citing urgent needs such as 59,000 homeless children and 1.38 million adults struggling with addiction, Williams said, “That is why we have Mission Georgia so that we can step into these issues… not just to check off and make ourselves feel good because we’ve done something good in our community, but to share the gospel of Jesus Christ.”
Hammond urged churches to promote the offering widely.“The offering is designed to help your people become more aware of the needs that are in the community,” he said. “It just helps people become more informed and more aware of ways in which they can make a difference. And then they’re going to want to not only just give money to this, but they also want to give their lives to it as well.”
Administration Committee chair Chris Humphries, senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Bainbridge, recognized the ribbon cutting for the board’s new administration facility in Alpharetta. Hammond added that the new building includes a retreat suite for pastors and staff, and invited pastors to take advantage of the opportunity. “If you want to come and do a three-, four-, or five-day retreat working on a sermon series, or you want to get away and just say, I’m going to just pray, spend time in the Word, this is what this area is designated for. There’s no charge at all for this, and we would love to have you to come and be a part of that.”
Dr. John Waters, lead pastor of First Baptist Statesboro and chair of the newly formed Georgia Baptist Relations Committee, presented a guidance document for trustees of Georgia Baptist Convention institutions, which the Executive Committee adopted by vote. Waters explained that the committee, created at the 2023 annual meeting, exists to “facilitate and strengthen the working relationships” between the Convention and its institutions while respecting trustee governance. The guidance document, developed over many years with input from legal counsel and leaders, clarifies the roles, responsibilities, and fiduciary duties of trustees elected by Georgia Baptists to serve the Convention’s seven institutions, including its universities and retirement communities. Waters emphasized that trustees “are our trustees,” entrusted by the churches to ensure institutions remain faithful to their mission, and said the document is designed to provide both content and a framework for training so trustees understand the gravity of their role.
GBMB CFO Ty Salter thanked the Finance Committee and reported that GBMB has been operating in the black since 2021. “Thank the Lord that we’re doing so well,” he added.
Salter reported that Cooperative Program receipts are 3.5% below last year at this point, but total income is up about 2.75% thanks to other gifts and investments. Significantly, expenses are running 8.4% under budget.
Stephen Fountain, chairman of the Executive Committee and pastor of First Baptist Church of Buford, celebrated that “the sale of the Sugarloaf property is behind us, and the money’s in the bank.”
Hammond celebrated the response to this year’s SPARK Conferences. Three gatherings have already been held, each with remarkable turnout. At Rock Springs, 639 people from 78 churches attended. Brewton-Parker in Mount Vernon hosted 720 participants representing 103 churches. Most recently, the Albany event drew 747 attendees from 94 churches and four associations.
“Thank you,” he told the gathered committee members, “for your faithfulness, not only in your church, but also in your faithfulness and commitment to serve and to reach Georgia together.”
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