WACO—Texas Baptists are engaging in new outreach opportunities with people groups in Texas and beyond, Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Director David Hardage reported to the convention’s annual meeting.
“As you know, Texas is a changing state, becoming very diversified, and we can talk about that in a variety of ways,” Hardage said. “Culture and ethnicity are at the top of the list.”
In response to the growing refugee population in Texas, Leonid Regheta joined the BGCT staff to oversee Project:Start, a refugee resource center serving 30,000 refugees in the Vickery Meadow area of Dallas.
A refugee himself, Regheta understands the immediate needs immigrants have when they arrive in the United States. Through Project:Start, refugees are connected with resources such as clothing, food and housing.
“We want these refugees to know Jesus Christ as their Savior,” Hardage said.
Another ministry emphasis aimed at reaching Texans with the gospel is the unApologetic conferences, providing churches with information on how to contend for faith in an ever-changing culture, Hardage said.
“We want to remove the hurdles to evangelism,” said Leighton Flowers, who will oversee the conferences. “Through the art of persuasion, we are appealing to the heart and the mind. It helps people understand why we believe what we believe.”
More than 147 unreached people groups live along the Amazon in Brazil. To reach people in this region, Texas Baptists entered into an agreement with Brazilian Baptists, Hardage reported. Through the new Missionary Adoption Program, churches can co-sponsor an indigenous missionary in the Amazon, along with a partnering Brazilian church.
Hardage introduced special guests Vanderlei Marins, president of the Brazilian Baptist Convention, and Fernandao Brandão, executive director of the Brazilian National Mission Board. Jair Campos, originally from Brazil, will work with the BGCT to help connect churches with missionaries.
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“We hope you will prayerfully consider how your church can support a missionary in Brazil, the Amazon and beyond,” Hardage said.
He also introduced staff members working in cross-cultural mobilization and in music and worship.
“It’s going to take more ways and more people to reach the world for Christ than what we are doing now,” Hardage said.
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