State Evangelism Conference

No one could put their finger on it, but several people acknowledged it.

“There is something different about this year’s evangelism conference.”

Yes, there was a new streamlined format for the 65th State Evangelism Conference — only four sessions instead of five, starting Monday night instead of Monday afternoon and simplifying it to speakers and music instead of combining them with a myriad of practical workshops.

Those items certainly impacted the feel of the event, but it’s more than that, said Sammy Gilbreath, director of the office of evangelism for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions (SBOM). “There’s something more, but I’m not exactly sure what it is.

“This was the most unique experience in all my time organizing these events,” he said as he looked out over a racially diverse, packed sanctuary a half-hour before the closing session was to begin.

While Dallas pastor and radio personality Tony Evans (see story, page 1) attracted nearly 1,700 people for the closing session — 1,350 people in the sanctuary and another 300-plus people in an overflow room nearby — attendance was strong for all sessions. The other sessions remained consistent with around 800 people.

Every piece seemed to fit together — the pastors were hungry and the speakers were encouraging, the music fit everyone’s tastes and the overall spirit “was sweet” — Gilbreath explained.

“The speakers came to serve and that was contagious,” he added. “There was a desire to make a difference.”

Beginning the conference on Monday evening truly made a difference for the pastors who attended, said Mike Northcutt, pastor of the host church, Eastmont Baptist Church, Montgomery.

Whether for the travel time or to have a few hours in the office Monday morning before coming to the conference, starting Monday evening took some pressure off of those desiring to attend, he said.

The conference provides “a shot in the arm,” Northcutt said. 

“Nobody can sustain a 100 percent focus on spiritual matters … but these opportunities remind us … and help us refocus on priorities.”

And Northcutt took the opportunity seriously. While he and his army of volunteers could be seen busily and joyfully assisting people and taking care of logistical issues in between sessions, Northcutt always found a spot on the front row during each of the sessions. 

He was not alone in his attentiveness and focus. Most of those attending the conference followed the same pattern.

From the opening welcome to the closing prayer, evangelism conference participants experienced a refuge from the distractions of life and ministry and had opportunity to worship, learn and be filled, Gilbreath said.

Mac Brunson, pastor of First Baptist Church, Jacksonville, Fla., headlined the opening night’s session. He focused on the believer’s commission through the illustration of John’s commission of John 20:30–31 in John 21.

The commission — taking the name of Jesus Christ to the world so they might believe in Him and have life — is priority, Brunson said.

“We do everything but what Jesus Christ called us to do,” he said. “We don’t have the priority of reaching people any more. It starts in the pulpit.

“Our priority must be sharing Jesus Christ.”

There also is a “deficiency of our mission,” Brunson noted. 

The Scripture passage describes professional fisherman who fished all night and didn’t catch anything until Jesus showed up.

“The deficiency in our mission is a lack of dependency on the One who commissioned us,” he said. “We are reaching less and less people every single year because there is no dependency on Jesus Christ

“We are doing a lot of things this day and time but we aren’t directly talking to people about Jesus. We’ll invite them to church. We just won’t talk to them about Jesus.

“There’s got to be in all of this a recognition of the sufficiency of the One who commissions us,” Brunson said.

Just as Jesus asked His disciples if they had any fish, “He asks everyone of us, do you have any fish? That’s uncomfortable.”

Also on the program Monday night was Jeff Crook, pastor of Blackshear Place Baptist Church, Flowery Branch, Ga.

Preaching from Luke 16, Crook challenged Alabama Baptists to “Get Louder” in sharing the gospel and urged pastors to lead the way.

“The best resource we have as pastors is our people,” he said. “When our people begin to see what moves our heart and fires us up, it will begin to fire them up as well.

“We must be intentional about evangelism and keep it in front of our people.”

Why? “Because hell is very real,” Crook said, noting there will be sight, hearing, feeling, memory, hopelessness and concern in hell.

“The things people see and hear will be very dark, perverted, evil, bad,” he said. “People will literally be crying out because of the torment they are experiencing. … (But) the hell of hells is to have your memory. … They will remember when they rejected the gospel. … I believe people in hell will remember by name silent Christians who fill our churches every Sunday.

“Hell is a fixed and final destination,” Crook noted. “All hope perishes … but there will be concern for others.”

Luke 16 details how the rich man in hell wanted someone to tell his family about Jesus “lest they also come to this place of torment.”

“What was a high priority for the rich man in hell seems to become a low priority for us,” Crook said. “It seems people don’t talk about evangelism any more. … Here we have a man in hell who has more compassion for the lost than some men who fill pulpits on Sunday.”

Whether it is because sin has silenced one’s witness or “we are too focused on ourselves,” either way “we need to repent … and resolve to get loud with the gospel.”

“Evangelism — you’ve got to make room for it. Make it a priority,” he said. “If you don’t, you won’t.”

Adam Dooley, pastor of Dauphin Way Baptist Church, Mobile, opened the Tuesday morning session with a sermon on the unlimited potential of grace using the story of Zacchaeus in Luke 19:1–10.

“(Christians) often act as if people will miss Jesus because they have sorted pasts, because they disappoint society or because we consider them unimportant,” Dooley said. “But God’s grace sees things that we don’t see. God’s grace covers things that we can’t cover. God’s grace is aware of people that we care nothing about.

“I’m convinced there is a desperate need to return to the pure unadulterated need of Jesus Christ. The gospel of Jesus Christ is not up for popular vote, not outdated and ineffective. The gospel is God’s primary means of changing lives.

“We preach the grace of God because God’s grace is available to every person … is aware of every person … (and) is adequate for every person,” Dooley said.

“We are often guilty of acting as if Jesus came to save the dignified and the qualified,” he said. “We act like that those we deem unimportant are not important to God.” 

Dooley urged Alabama Baptists to use every opportunity possible to share the gospel.

“All people will be much more open to the gospel if we are just aware of their presence and their needs,” he said. “I’m not saying encouragement is a substitute for the gospel, but encouragement is a segue for sharing the gospel.

“Does it ever surprise you how much we lean on the grace of God and how unwilling we are to share the grace of God? … Everyone wants to receive grace but not everyone wants to share grace with others.

“I’m convinced one reason our heart doesn’t burn with evangelistic fervor is because we get caught doing the good things but not the best things. We get trapped doing ministry with people who don’t have a spiritual bone in their body,” he said.

“No one signs up to play referee with a bunch of bickering Baptists and yet isn’t that often what we do? 

“You are never more like Jesus than when you are seeking to save that which is lost. God is seeking to save sinners, and we are His hands and we are His feet.”

Frank Page, president and CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Executive Committee, shared about “An Irrecoverable Moment” from John 4:7–30, referencing the Samaritan woman at the well and her encounter with Jesus.

“Christ came to her and it had implications for her past, present and future,” Page said, noting salvation frees one from his or her past, alters his or her present and changes his or her future forever. 

“These moments come in every life … and in the lives of churches. God is dealing with the saved even to do something significant for the Kingdom.

“You can get it right or you can get it wrong,” he said.

“We put up these manmade barriers as if God can’t cross them. We waste a lot of time in God’s church dealing with things we should never waste His time about,” Page said. 

“I want to challenge you … if you have backed away from a passion of sharing Christ … that today you’ll renew that passion. … The world is desperately in need of an irrecoverable moment with Christ.”

Preaching from Matthew 9, Larry Wynn, vice president of evangelism at the North American Mission Board (NAMB), outlined the “have tos” in reaching ones community for Christ.

“I don’t care where God has planted you, if God has placed you there it is the right location. There are no insignificant locations in the eyes of God,” he said.

“If God can move in the first century where there was no building and no budget … God can move in our church today,” Wynn said.

So, what do you have to have?

1. An obedient spirit.

“You’ve got to do what God says,” he said. “There is not a harvest problem; there is a labor problem. 

“If we are going to generate laborers, He doesn’t say to find the latest and greatest program. I believe in doing programming, but programs without the power of God will never bring lasting results. If programs would win the world to Christ, Southern Baptists would have won the world many years ago.”

At the same time, “you cannot separate prayer from evangelism,” he said. “If there’s anything we need in our church today, it is to fall on our face and ask God to give us a burden like anything we’ve had in years gone by.

“It is the Holy Spirit who brings revival.”

2. The eyes of Christ.

“We need to see people the way Jesus sees them,” Wynn said. “Do we really see the multitudes? One of the reasons we don’t see God move is that we are more concerned about what goes on among us as Christ followers than those who don’t know Christ. 

“We are too concerned about things that don’t matter, things that are not going to make an eternal difference whatsoever.” 

3. A heart that loves people the way Jesus loves them.

“You (and your church) are not on people’s radar unless you love them with a compassion and love Jesus Christ,” Wynn said. “The world is not looking for us to be fake, it is looking for us to be real.

“We must have Your mind, obey You,” he prayed. “We must have Your eyes, see the way You see. We must have Your heart, love the way You love.”

Wynn also challenged Alabama Baptists to pray a similar prayer.

“Don’t pray this prayer if you want to remain the same and look at church the way you have always looked at it,” he said. “It will mess you up.

“When you start caring about them and spending time building a relationship with them, God will open incredible doors to share with them.”

Thomas Hammond, formerly with NAMB and now vice president for convention advancement at the  Executive Committee, encouraged pastors to take a fresh look at their churches.

Preaching from Acts 3, Hammond shared the story of the lame man begging at the temple gate and how he walked for the first time when Peter encouraged him. Peter saw the need, got involved and stepped out on faith, Hammond said. 

“Imagine what (the temple gate) looked like … sounded like … the smells. It was anything but beautiful,” he said. “People walked by this every day … and some ignored them. … [Those walking by] had grown deaf to their cries.

“Sometimes we walk by and just don’t see it any more, but on this particular day Peter walks by … a very familiar sight … and fixed his eyes on [the lame man].”

‘In the name of Jesus’

Pentecost had just happened and Peter was seeing his world with brand new eyes, Hammond said. “He is compelled to do something.

“Peter reaches down his hand to help [the lame man] up. He believed he was about to walk,” he explained. “When Peter is reaching down his hand, he’s doing it in the name of Jesus.

“Peter was nothing but a conduit of the power of God,” Hammond said. “If you are the body of Christ, aren’t you hooked up?

Phil Hoskins, pastor of Higher Ground Baptist Church, Kingsport, Tenn., urged Alabama Baptists to return the Holy Spirit to “his rightful place in our lives.”

“When we allow the Holy Spirit to anoint the preaching, teaching and music, lives will be changed,” he said. “When the Holy Spirit is allowed to breathe across our congregations one more time, I assure you … business will pick up in the house of the Lord.”

Preaching from Acts 2, Hoskins said, “Many Christians do not know what it is to be filled with the Holy Spirit … but … if the disciples could not perform their work apart from the filling of the Holy Spirit, how much more do you and I need it? 

“When the wind of the Spirit is allowed to move among His people, gone with the wind will be those sins that hold back revival and the power of God in our lives,” he said.

The wind of the Spirit will carry away cowardice in witnessing, coldness in worship and contention in the walk, he noted.

Leading music during the evangelism conference was Roy McNiel, minister of music for Gardendale First Baptist Church. Providing special music was Eastmont Baptist’s choir and music evangelist from First Baptist Church, Atlanta, Daniel Crews.