Some people may have thought Southern Baptists were biting off more of the Big Apple than they could chew with their Paint the Town project. But nearly 2,000 volunteers from across the country proved any skeptics wrong.
“Paint the Town is proving to be what I call the doorway to the soul of the city,” said Gary Frost, director of missions for the Metro New York Baptist Association. “Southern Baptists are perceived by many in the Northeast to be fundamentalist Bible-thumpers. This project really allows us to be seen as who we are: compassionate people who love Christ and each other.”
By the time school started the first of September, Southern Baptists had spent two months painting the interiors of nine schools in the Bronx, one in Harlem and two on Long Island. Less visible are the hundreds of New Yorkers’ lives changed as a result of connecting on the subways and streets of the nation’s largest city with Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) volunteers.
‘Lasting impact’
“Only on the other side of heaven will we see the lasting impact these volunteers are having on New York City (NYC),” said Roy Mallory, volunteer Paint the Town project foreman. “I know directly there have been at least 200 who have professed Christ that we’ve heard about, and we haven’t begun to get our data back.” The question, “What are you doing here?” is an open invitation to share the news of God’s love for all people, said Mallory, a member of the Atlanta-area First Baptist Church, Woodstock.
Benjamin Moore paint company donated 2,000 gallons of paint, which was enough to complete two schools, and made additional paint available at reduced cost.
But painting the schools — as daunting a task as that can be, when hallways sometimes are 125 feet long and ceilings in school gyms 30 feet high — is only a part of Paint the Town. The summer included six block parties and 25 sports camps, even a Twin Towers mural painted on the side of a building. And each school was “adopted” by a local church.
Paint the Town is part of New Hope New York, a Strategic Focus Cities evangelism and church-planting thrust sponsored by the North American Mission Board (NAMB), now in its second implementation year in NYC.
“Our [school] superintendent is impressed, so we’re hoping Paint the Town will spread across New York City,” Mallory said. As summer draws to a close, plans already are being made to continue Paint the Town next year, said Shane Critser, associate director of New Hope New York.
“It went so well this summer,” Critser said. “We saw God moving. We saw teachers, principals and parents welcome us, and people being reached with the gospel.” (BP)
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