The Birmingham Metro Baptist Association has helped foster two unique church relationships in the past few years, and both congregations were represented at the Revive Summit, held Sept. 12–13 at Hope Community Church in Birmingham.
As a longtime member of McElwain Baptist Church in Birmingham, Terry Thrailkill was part of the vision team that brought about the congregation’s new birth as Hope Community Church.
“There were lots of challenges,” she said. “We had 30 or 40 faithful people and a large building. We prayed for God’s direction for our church.”
McElwain members called Mark Clifton, senior director of replanting for the North American Mission Board, as interim pastor in 2020. This was about the time the congregation celebrated its 125th anniversary.
“It was the COVID year,” Thrailkill said. “Mark preached online for us for several months and met with our team on Zoom before we could actually sit down and brainstorm about our future.”
Good memories
Richard Phillips, also a longtime McElwain member and part of the vision team, reminisced as well.
“Earl Potts was a great pastor,” he said. “He baptized me, and then he married my wife and me. We just celebrated our 60th wedding anniversary, so I’ve been here a long time. I was treasurer for 40 years.”
Phillips said McElwain had no mortgage and was paying its bills but realized the congregation wasn’t reaching the community as it once did.
“One idea we discussed was finding a young congregation that might move into our building but this didn’t work out,” he said. “Then Mark found that Shades Mountain Baptist Church (in Vestavia Hills) was interested in an adoption, and we began to talk.”
After the adoption process was formalized, Phillips said Shades sent a cadre of volunteers to help, and a number were young families who actually lived in the area.
“They sent us a great pastor too,” he said. “Jacob Simmons has done a great job here and we love him.”
Being open
Phillips said the initial discussion was about a five-year partnership, but he understood the agreement is open-ended.
“I think the idea is that the relationship will end at some point, but I’m not sure when that will be,” he said. “It’s been a wonderful thing for our church.”
Jody Baker serves as minister of education and administration at Hope Community, and has been part of the McElwain congregation for 42 years.
“We wanted to grow in this community, so we had to surrender a few things we were comfortable with,” she said. “But we’re excited about what God has in store for us.”
Eric Smoke, member of Faith Church in Midfield, said the birth of his church from the mother church, Fairfield Highlands Baptist Church, was “the work of God.”
“Fairfield Highlands realized they weren’t reaching their potential, so we began discussions with them, culminating in our church being established last year as primarily an African American church,” he said. “We’re grateful that the gospel is still being shared in the community because of the legacy and love of the mother church.”
Guiding churches
Smoke explained that Birmingham Metro Association helped guide the new church and other churches have helped.
“We’ve partnered with Mountain Brook Baptist Church (in Birmingham) for ministry, and we’ve had volunteers from the Hispanic ministry of First Baptist (Church) Fultondale,” he said.
Smoke’s wife helped start the food pantry at Faith and this ministry has grown.
“We’re now a ‘client choice’ ministry with shopping carts,” he said with a laugh. “This means people have more freedom to choose what they need, and we’re grateful that this ministry is touching our community.”
Josh Cook, church revitalization specialist for Birmingham Metro Association, said there are many possibilities for unique relationships in area churches, including adoption, fostering and replanting.
“One of our churches is talking now with another congregation in Leeds about a fostering partnership,” he said. “We’re happy to begin these conversations and assist as we can.”
Cook can be reached at 205-599-3245 or by email at joshc@bmbaonline.org.
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