Dear faithful Baptist Messenger reader,

For more than 110 years, the Baptist Messenger has been informing, inspiring and connecting Oklahoma Baptists, as we seek to advance the Gospel together.

During those decades, God has used Oklahoma Baptists to share the love and Good News of Jesus with millions of people in our state and around the world. Through it all, the Baptist Messenger, as the flagship publication for Oklahoma Baptists, has sought to shine the spotlight on all God is doing.

The Baptist Messenger, in addition to its print edition, also has introduced a breaking news website (baptistmessenger.com), a Messenger Mobile app, a weekly podcast program, Spanish language articles, an award-winning blog and more.

Thanks to the leadership of Oklahoma Baptists, including our executive director and board of directors, the Baptist Messenger is undergoing an important update.

Starting in November of this year, the Baptist Messenger print edition will be presented as a monthly magazine, instead of a tabloid newspaper.

Why this move? A combination of strategic reasons and circumstances led to this. With skyrocketing postage costs, a move to a once-per-month publication saves tens of thousands of dollars per year in ministry dollars. Also, the current vendor that prints the twice-per-month tabloid Baptist Messenger print publication is discontinuing business, and there are no immediate alternative print options in the existing format. Finally, this strategic and timely move to a monthly magazine format will create an even more visually-appealing publication with additional content, photos and stories.

This monthly magazine will arrive to your mailbox and will require no out-of-pocket costs to you, Oklahoma Baptists. The full-color magazine will feature all of the great content you have come to rely on and love—missions stories, inspiring articles and photos, prayer points and features. All of the popular content like Walker Moore’s column and the crossword puzzle will be included in the Messenger magazine as well.

We understand with any updates, it is important to communicate. This move from a twice-per-month newspaper to a once-per-month magazine will save thousands of dollars, monies which will be invested in missions and ministry here in Oklahoma. Moreover, the magazine content will enable us to feature content that is even more impactful to the reader.

Jesus said, “… messengers are not greater than the one who sent them” (John 13:16), and that is true for us as a publication. We are just a reflection of you, Oklahoma Baptists.

We are so thankful to be able to publish content that we hope is informing and inspiring.

We hope you enjoy the new format of the Messenger magazine, coming to you in mid-November, along with all of the other content and stories available any hour of the day at baptistmessenger.com.

 

Sincerely in Christ,

Brian Hobbs

P.S. Check out this Q&A article for more information about the new Baptist Messenger coming in November.