Church health a statewide issue

As the director of the Hebron Institute of Church growth, I travel around Georgia and the southeast speaking in churches and providing training in church growth principles. For the past two years I, too, have been saying the same thing Jimmy Draper, president of LifeWay Christian Resources has said.

Thank God there are some exceptional, healthy, growing churches in Georgia and the Southern Baptist Convention, but they are few and far between. Unless we are willing to look at the cold, hard facts, adjust our course, and move into the 21st century with first century power, we are going to be insignificant in the world.

What do we need?

• We need a statewide center for church health to develop leaders and coordinate the best of Georgia Baptist and Southern Baptist resources to assist churches that just need some direction.

• We need healthy, growing churches to partner with other churches to assist them in growth.

• We need pastoral leadership training.

• We need to expand our Sunday School/Open Groups ministry and the Office of Evangelism to work with our Ministry Resource Consultants and healthy churches to develop church health centers across the state based in healthy growing churches.

• We need lots of prayer.

• We need fresh, bold approaches based on sound biblical principles.

• If only 15% more of Georgia Baptist churches were growing by 105 a year, we would break every record in baptisms and church growth ever set.

Thank God for the visionary leaders in our state convention. However, our state office cannot do it alone. We as Georgia Baptists can impact our state, but we must analyze, prioritize, strategize, and evangelize. We are, by the way, in the 21st century. The message does not change, but the methods must!