Arkansas Baptists have proven that they believe in the power of cooperative missions and that they believe in the importance of working together to reach the lost right here at home. In 2023, Arkansas Baptists for the second year in a row set a record for giving through the Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering with $1,874,000. This total is up $50,000 from 2022’s record giving.
The Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering and Week of Prayer for state missions takes place the second full week of September each year. Most churches use the resources provided by the Arkansas Baptist State Convention during this week to promote the various ministries of Dixie Jackson and lead people to pray and give to support these ministries. Other churches promote and support Dixie Jackson throughout the year or through their annual once-a-year missions offering.
However your church may choose to give, you are making a difference in the lives of thousands of people here at home in Arkansas. Money raised through the Dixie Jackson offering goes to support ministries like Arkansas Baptist Disaster Relief, pregnancy care centers, hunger ministries, medical/ dental clinics, prison seminary, church planting, One Day missions events, Christian Women’s Job Corp, missions training events, camps, and numerous other ministries.
Here are just a few of the numbers reported from the ministries of Dixie Jackson in 2023:
- 976 babies saved from abortion and 111 professions of faith through partnerships with pregnancy care centers.
- 9,800 gospel presentation and 200 professions of faith through hunger ministries.
- 1,344 participants and 210 professions of faith through the annual One Day missions event.
- 13 medical/dental clinics resulted in 137 salvations.
- 40,000 meals prepared, 3,350 contacts and 83 professions of faith reported through Arkansas Baptist Disaster Relief efforts.
Every dollar given to the Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering helps RESOURCE and MOBILIZE Arkansas Baptists to SERVE and REACH people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Churches of every size and shape came together to contribute to the largest Dixie Jackson offering in our history. The churches below make up a sample of the over 900 churches that participated in the offering in 2023.
Damascus Road Cowboy Church
Church size: 125+
2023 Dixie Jackson Total: $8,315
Damascus Road Cowboy Church (DRCC) in Damascus was planted in 2017 by Three Trees Cowboy Church in Wynne. As a church plant, DRCC and pastor Jeff Deckard experienced first-hand the impact of Arkansas Baptists’ giving through the Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering.
Deckard says the financial support the church received from Dixie Jackson (DJ) was instrumental in getting them started. “They helped supplement some of my expenses so that the church wouldn’t be burdened by that for the first couple of years. That really gave us a good start to getting our church up and off the ground and taking that financial responsibility off them [the church members].”
The church does not take up an annual offering for Dixie Jackson. Instead, they started doing a monthly contribution to DJ. Deckard says they felt like this was the best way for their church to contribute. Every time they do a financial report, the church hears about the importance of giving to state missions. “Dixie Jackson is one of the ways we support missions,” Deckard said. “The reason we do that is because of our history where they helped us get started. We want to supply that for somebody down the road, whether it be a non-traditional church, a traditional church or whatever it might be.”
Northside Baptist Church
Church size: 25
2023 Dixie Jackson Total: $12,140
Pastor John Compton has served as bivocational pastor at the Northside Baptist Church in Eudora for two years. Compton says they are a smaller member church with an aging congregation. The pastor is the youngest member at age 53. Compton says they may be small in number (about 20-25 regular attendees), and they may not be able to get out and do as much as they would like to, but the church cares about missions and wants to be involved in seeing the Gospel shared across the state and around the world.
Compton is proud of his Northside family and the fact that they have always been a giving and loving church with a heart for missions. Their heart for missions and missions giving has grown each year. The church recently made a commitment to be even more involved in missions through a renewed emphasis on giving. Proving that it’s not the size of the congregation that matters, in 2023 the church nearly tripled their 2022 DJ offering of $4,700.
Even though they can’t get out and serve like they used to, the church knows that they can make an impact through praying and giving. “While they would really love to go on a mission trip, they really can’t get out and do,” Compton says. “And so, the best way that we can support missions in the state at our age is by giving to those who can go and do and just letting God work through that.”
Boundless Grace
Church size: 200+
2023 Dixie Jackson Total: $16,492.81
Boundless Grace Baptist Church (BGBC) is located in Rogers. Josh Ramsey serves as bivocational pastor of this church he helped plant back in 2011. Ramsey said when they started, the decision was made that the church was going to tithe from what was given to the church. Since church members were asked to tithe, he says it only made sense that a tithe would be given from total offerings given to the church. So, they began the process of determining where that money would go.
“We said let’s start seeing what areas we think are really impacting with the Gospel and getting the Gospel message out. And through that we came up with a list of four or five areas and Dixie Jackson was one of those,” Ramsey said.
The church chose the Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering because they saw the impact that the ministries of Dixie Jackson were having on lostness as the gospel was taken to all areas of the state. Ramsey says they see Dixie Jackson as a chance for the church to participate with other churches regularly in reaching all areas of the state with missions. “I am a believer that pulling money together is better than individuals trying to do things on their own. We do stuff on our own, but there is power in numbers.”
For resources and ideas on how to promote the Dixie Jackson Arkansas Missions Offering in your church, please visit www.absc.org/dj