First person: The recent resurgence of Baptist associations
PIKEVILLE, Ky.—COVID-19 has changed so many of our association’s ministries this year. All of our regularly scheduled events were canceled. No free dental clinic. No VBS clinic. No mission trips. No free basketball camp. No Executive Board meetings. With all of the cancellations, one might think that there was nothing for the association to do. However, that would be a false assumption. As an associational mission strategist, I was...
Messenger Insight 399 – Insights from an Overseas Missionary Veteran
IMB Career Missionary from Oklahoma, Shannon Ford talks about insights from his 22 years of serving the Lord overseas and updates us about his current ministry and prayer needs. https://media.blubrry.com/messengerinsight/p/cdn.baptistmessenger.com/2020/10/13165538/Messenger-Insight-Shannon-Ford.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Download (27.6MB) Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Google Podcasts | Stitcher | TuneIn | Spotify |...
Socially-distanced Saw You at the Pole rally in Durant draws online crowd
DURANT—An estimated 2,000 students gathered in person and online for the Saw You at the Pole rally Sept. 23 at Durant, First. The annual rally happened the evening after the student-led See You at the Pole gathering earlier that day, as students from around the state met at flag poles of their schools or online to pray for their teachers and classmates. Twenty area youth pastors coordinated the evening event that included worship led...
OKC, Thrive Community launches during pandemic
“Chaotic action is preferable to orderly inaction”—Will Rogers. Church planting is chaotic in the best of times. Launching during a pandemic is taking it to another level. But when it comes to the Gospel, it is better to move ahead into the unknown than to sit and wait for certainty. Oklahoma City, Thrive Community had its first public service on Sunday, Sept. 13, at an Oklahoma landmark, the Will Rogers Theatre. The building opened...
Unhindered: Abbreviated Annual Meeting (Nov. 10) still poised to advance the Gospel
Like many aspects of this year, the 2020 Annual Meeting of Oklahoma Baptists will be unique. The event, which marks the 114th annual meeting of Oklahoma Baptists, which was previously scheduled for Nov. 9-10, will now take place as an abbreviated, one-day meeting. Messengers will gather on the afternoon of Tuesday, Nov. 10 at Broken Arrow, First (100 W. Albany Street) for the abbreviated annual meeting, a schedule which was recently...
Dare2Share LIVE encourages students to share their faith
Forty-four percent of Americans among 18-29 years olds do not identify with any religion, let alone Evangelical Christianity. In the last 10 years, teen suicide has gone up by 50 percent. One out of five students are bullied. Every day, 15,000 teens try drugs for the first time. Wall Street Journal statistics like these would be drastically different if students grasped the Gospel at an earlier age. Oklahoma Baptists, let’s burn these...
