During the month of September, ask your pastor and church leaders to share the videos that will be distributed by the Baptist State Convention of Michigan for the September State Missions Offering. Please, share them in your small groups and worship services. Share them online through your social network. Some of the amazing stories, below, will be seen on those videos.
Greater Grand Rapids Area – A young married couple received the heart wrenching news. She has cancer. They were told to prepare for the worst. Call in Hospice. Make arrangements. But wait, they recalled, “Didn’t God call us to start a new church in the area of Grand Rapids?” This heroic couple, while battling cancer through surgeries and treatments, invited friends to join them in planting a new church. They didn’t offer them salaries. They invited them to sacrifice. Friends resigned from lucrative jobs. Some moved back into their parents’ homes to save money. A church planting movement erupted in Michigan because this couple refused to ignore God’s call.
Greater Flint Area – An older church in the Greater Flint area was on life support. The few remaining church members were grieving, anticipating the worst. But, associational leaders and local pastors intervened before the doors were closed. A time of transition prepared this tiny congregation to restart with a new vision. The North American Mission Board, the Baptist State Convention of Michigan, the local association, and local pastors created a coalition intent on launching this church on a new mission. The church was able to call a new pastor to lead them into a new future because Michigan Southern Baptists give to the Cooperative Program and the September State Missions Offering.
Upper Peninsula – One of our missionaries in the UP reported that two hundred Native American youth, from all over the country, gave their lives to Christ at a Midwest retreat. Those teenagers moved from believing in a Creator to believing in the Crucified and Risen One. Our Native American missionary, serving in the UP, has been moving eastward from his homeland of Oklahoma creating new congregations in his wake. He is currently creating new congregations in the area of Sault St. Marie. God is doing something amazing among the First Nation Peoples. How do I know? Another church planter is burdened for Native Americans in the Lower Peninsula. A church in Greater Detroit for years has been serving Native Americans on an island in one of the Great Lakes. Three individual ministries are coming together to create a movement.
Greater Detroit Area – I watched a public school teacher weep as we created a video of a new church planter. She knew him in his early days as a high school student and a track star. Years ago, she poured her life into his life encouraging him to stand out rather than blend in with others. Her investment as a Christian in the public school system paid off. This young man is a popular preacher. He’s raising a family in Detroit. He receives offers from around the nation to become the pastor of established churches. Yet, he hangs on to his call to start a new church in the Greater Detroit area where he grew up because God laid a call on his life. This young church planter and his family depend on the love, prayers, and contributions of Michigan Southern Baptists.
Michigan Southern Baptists, your offerings change the world.
Cooperative Program – All year long and every time you give to your local church a percentage goes to missionaries in Michigan and around the world. Your gift cuts the cost of education for 20,000 students training for missions and ministry in six seminaries throughout our nation.
September State Missions Offering – During the month of September, I hope 100% of our churches will dedicate 5-10 minutes during each worship service to feature the State Missions Offering. Please . . .
Watch the videos
Pray for our missionaries within the state
Give generously
September’s four Sundays or thirty days will make a difference if we will watch, pray, and give. Miracles are happening all over Michigan. Please, join the movement.
For free downloadable resources to promote the State Mission Offering, visit www.bscm.org/smo.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tony Lynn is the State Director of Missions for the Baptist State Convention of Michigan. Before coming on staff at the BSCM, Tony served as lead pastor for more than six years at Crosspoint Church in Monroe, Michigan. He and his wife, Jamie, also served with the International Mission Board in Africa and in Europe.