When Jim Glidewell speaks of recognizing opportunities to reach people for the Lord, he uses himself as an example. As Glidewell tells the story, a former Baptist church about a mile and a half from his office in southwest Michigan is now used as a Hindu temple.
“I used to drive by there and see a church corrupted by Satan and think the people who built and paid for that church must really be upset with how it is being used,” he said.
Then a member of a church in an association he serves as director of missions asked him to meet a friend — a Christian from India who felt called to work with Hindus.
“I learned that we have more than 2,000 Hindus right here in Kalamazoo. It is the largest language group in the county,” he said. Today efforts are under way to reach the Hindus, but Glidewell remembers how he first saw a building’s misuse, not people who needed the Lord.
This reminds Glidewell that his task is to help Michigan’s Southwestern and South Central Baptist associations reach more than 750,000 residents with the gospel.
“A lot of our members reflect the culture. Universalism is too strong a term, but many think God will work everything out in the end,” he said.
A related issue is that many members act as if the church is not their responsibility. “It is the pastor’s church or the state convention’s or the North American Mission Board’s. It is hard for our people to realize it is their church and they are responsible,” Glidewell said.
Recently Glidewell joined an International Mission Board representative in visiting many churches in the associations. “That made a difference for many. They began to understand the Acts 1:8 challenge to go into all the world,” Glidewell said.
“But I have not seen a sense of ownership about work in our own area — the idea that this is our work to do — that I see when the churches talk about sharing the gospel in other places,” he added.
Still good things are happening.
Temple Baptist Church, Battle Creek, became concerned about a nearby mobile home park with the highest number of police calls of any location in its township. The church secured a mobile home in the park and turned it into a chapel.
Shortly after the church began working there, police commented that the number of calls had dropped dramatically.
This summer, a partnership missions team from Cherokee Baptist Association in Alabama will work with Temple Baptist in that mobile home park.
In St. Joseph, Niles Avenue Baptist Church meets in a building listed on the national historical registry. But the church runs about 20 in worship.
When Glidewell asked another church in Southwestern Association to let its associate pastor gain some preaching experience by speaking at Niles Avenue Baptist, he had no idea that the associate pastor had attended that church as a child.
Now the associate pastor is pastor of Niles Avenue Baptist and the church is coming back to life, Glidewell said.
New work is also starting. In Dowagiac, where a non-Southern Baptist pastor led a Southern Baptist church to disband a few years ago, a church plant is planned for this summer.
In Hastings, a partnership missions team from Alabama’s East Cullman Baptist Association did door-to-door visitation in 2008. Now the groundwork is laid for a new church plant.
Glidewell ticked off a long list of “hot spots” where evangelical work is needed, many in counties where there is no Southern Baptist witness. He also expressed appreciation for East Cullman Association, his associational missions partner. Five Alabama teams worked with Glidewell in 2008, and several more projects are planned for this year.
A team from Michigan worked in East Cullman as the association concluded three years of tent revivals in various parts of its county. Michigan volunteers also spoke in several East Cullman Association churches.
“When we share with each other, it doesn’t create the mind-set that someone else, maybe someone from Alabama, will do the work for us,” Glidewell observed. “It creates the mind-set that we are partners working together to reach people for the Lord.”
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