Southern Baptists should “turn the world upside down” through evangelistic efforts, speakers told the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) annual meeting.
Four Southern Baptist pastors exhorted messengers to rally around SBC President Bobby Welch’s “Everyone Can! I’m It!” goal — baptizing 1 million new Christians between October 2005 and September 2006.
Fred Luter, pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church, New Orleans, recalled his first thoughts when he heard Welch’s “Everyone Can!” challenge: “How in the world are we going to do that? It is such a monumental challenge.”
Taking his text from Acts 1, Luter said Southern Baptists could learn from the story of a small band of early Christians who “turned their world upside down” for Christ. And they did it without the resources and advantages Southern Baptists have today — they were empowered by God with a new purpose and a new power, he observed.
Southern Baptists also will turn their world “upside down” when they are empowered by God, he added.
“We must be led and empowered by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will give us new power that will enable us to evangelize and to witness and to win the lost,” Luter said.
Others who expanded on the theme were David Cox, Welch’s co-pastor and chosen successor at First Baptist Church, Daytona Beach, Fla.; Gene Mims, pastor of Judson Baptist Church, Nashville; and James Walker, pastor of Biltmore Baptist Church, Arden, N.C. (Editors’ Network)
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