From the announcement of the new Arkansas Baptist State Convention executive director to celebrating the first graduating class of the Arkansas Prison Initiative, Arkansas Baptists had a lot of news to share in 2023.
Here are a few highlights from throughout the year.
Dr. Rex Horne named ABSC executive director
Dr. Rex Horne has been named the new executive director of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention (ABSC).
The ABSC Executive Board approved the recommendation of the Operating Committee, which served as the search team, during a special called meeting held Tuesday, Oct. 10. The decision makes Horne the 35th executive director in the 175-year history of the Convention that began in 1848.
The executive director leads the ABSC staff in serving the needs of and assisting the Convention’s nearly 1,500 churches and encouraging missions cooperation among them. Horne has served as the interim executive director since December.
“I am deeply humbled and honored to be named the next executive director of the ABSC,” Horne said. “During these last 10 months, there have been a number of challenges met and steps taken that will have a positive impact on our future cooperative ministries. I will respect all our churches. I will assist and strive to encourage our pastors and their vision. I will listen, learn and lead optimistically in a time that is transitional but can also be transformational.”
Baptists serve, share Gospel in southeast Arkansas
Arkansas Baptists traveled from across the state to Monticello on Saturday, Oct. 7, to be the hands and feet of Jesus.
The One Day Acts 1:8 Missions Experience provides an annual opportunity for Arkansas Baptists to impact lostness in a specific area within the state. This year, the location was in southeast Arkansas.
More than 1,400 Arkansas Baptists registered to serve, and an estimated 210 people made professions of Christ.
Throughout the day, participants took part in 132 ministries, including block parties, medical and dental clinics, prayer walking, no-sale yard sales, food distribution and more.
Ritchie encouraged Arkansas Baptists to mark their calendars for Oct. 5, 2024, to participate in the next One Day Acts 1:8 Missions Experience in north Pulaski County.
ABDR provides hope, healing in aftermath of tornadoes
After tornadoes tore through Arkansas, leaving destruction in their wake on March 31, Southern Baptists donned their yellow shirts and caps and went to work providing help, healing and hope to those in need.
Areas hit by the twisters included Little Rock, North Little Rock, Jacksonville and Wynne.
Revival in south Arkansas sees more than 300 come to faith in Christ
More than 300 men, women and youth made professions of faith Aug. 27-30 during an evangelical event hosted in El Dorado called South Arkansas Together.
“The Lord just blessed it,” Liberty Baptist Association Associational Missionary Wade Totty said. “It was just remarkable what the Lord did during that time. There were 320 professions of faith that we’re aware of and numerous other decisions that were made as well. It was really good. We’re in the process of doing the follow-up now.”
The revival took place over four nights, with each night focusing on a different group. The lead evangelist all four days was Jay Lowder, founder of Jay Lowder Harvest Ministries, an organization dedicated to reaching diverse groups of people with the message of Jesus Christ.
Drover Cowboy Church connects with South Africans
Drover Cowboy Church’s final South African braai of the year on Sunday, Oct. 29, was a little different than usual as the worship and sermon portion of the event was led entirely in Afrikaans – a language of southern Africa.
The Harrisburg church began its South African braai ministry in the spring of 2022, reaching South Africans working on farms in the area through the H-2A program. According to U.S. Department of Labor, H-2A permits “nonimmigrant workers to perform agricultural labor or services of a temporary or seasonal nature.”
Arkansas BCM students spend spring break sharing the gospel
College students involved with Baptist Collegiate Ministry (BCM) ministries across Arkansas spent their spring break serving others and sharing about Jesus in various contexts across the country.
Participating in Beach Reach at Panama City Beach, Florida, 130 Arkansas college students and leaders. Beach Reach is a partnership between college ministries all over the nation to serve other college students on spring break. They utilize vans and buses to give free shuttles to students around town.
Camp Siloam: 100 years of smiles, salvations
God has used “the land of a million smiles” to change countless hearts for a century.
“It’s the centennial summer I had hoped it would be,” said Jason Wilkie, who came to serve at Camp Siloam as executive director with his family in 2010.
Camp Siloam has provided Arkansas Baptist churches an annual revival-like week of Christ centered worship, prayer and sermons for 100 years as of 2023.
Director of pregnancy care center helps bring hope to homeless
HopePlace Pregnancy Care Center in Warren has been ministering to women in crisis for the last 10 years. Director Wendy Curry says the center serves as more than just a pregnancy care center.
“We’re more of a family resource center where we embrace and love on the whole community. We serve lots of different people, all the way from those with unplanned pregnancies to helping the elderly and even those who are homeless, through our food pantry,” Curry said.
While Curry has been able to minster to the individuals in the past, she has noticed a recent growth in the homeless population which means that even more needs to be done.
Missions trip brings encouragement to Arkansas Delta churches
A group from the Arkansas River Valley Baptist Association in July embarked on a missions trip to the Arkansas Delta, bringing hope and encouragement to some of the churches serving the region.
Plans for the trip began to form in March following the Delta Vision Tour, where pastors and church leaders from across the state visited with and heard the hearts of Arkansas Delta church planters and pastors of established churches, including Shell Lake Baptist Church Pastor Dave McKinney.
Prison seminary cultivates missionaries behind bars
A prison seminary largely funded by Arkansas Baptists at the Varner Unit of the Arkansas Department of Corrections, a high security prison in Lincoln County, celebrated its first graduating class on Friday, May 12.
The 18 students, who are all serving life or long-term sentences for their crimes, donned graduation robes and caps as they accepted their bachelor’s degrees in Christian Studies from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary. A 19th student, who had his sentence commuted in 2020 by former Gov. Asa Hutchison, graduated on the Mid-America campus in Memphis during their spring ceremony.
Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary President Dr. Michael Spradlin said the prisoners as students are very motivated. He noted their cumulative GPA was 3.8, which he called “astounding.” The 19 men are “fully students, fully graduates,” according to Spradlin, suggesting their degree was no different than those who studied outside the prison fences.
“For them, this is a chance to do something with their lives while they are incarcerated. It is a chance for them to contribute and make a spiritual difference in people’s lives,” Spradlin said.
A groundbreaking was held Monday, Nov. 6, for a new prison seminary building at the Varner Unit.