By Baptist Message staff ALEXANDRIA, La. (LBM) – Organizers of this year’s Louisiana Baptist Pastors Conference in the facilities of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church, New Orleans, hope to remind participants, Nov. 13, about the joy of ministry. “Over the last three years of the COVID season, there has been much talk about persevering and not growing weary which is very important,” Pastors Conference President Michael Wood, also pastor of First West, told the Baptist Message. “We want to shed light on what an incredible honor it is to have joy in serving Christ. Each guy will have a different element to share on the theme of joy.” The program will begin, 9:30 a.m., with music led by Nate Jernigan, assistant professor of music and worship, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, and others from the seminary, and messages by Leroy Fountain, an LBC church health consultant, and David Allen, professor, Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary, Cordova, Tenn. After lunch, the conference will continue, 1:30 p.m., with an afternoon session featuring messages by Ryan Rice, pastor, Connect Church, Algiers; Dean Inserra, pastor, City Church, Tallahassee, Fla.; and Clay Smith, pastor, Johnson Ferry Baptist Church, Marietta, … [Read more...]

By Brian Blackwell, Baptist Message staff writer BATON ROUGE, La. (LBM) – The Student Missionary evangelism strategy, launched in early August, is a guided, school-year-long training program for students to learn how to be intentional about being an evangelist on campus. Sixth to twelfth graders are commissioned by their respective churches to reach their classmates for Christ. Then each student is matched with a coach who will help him or her to grow in Christ and develop the skills needed to share Jesus with their classmates. Additionally, the student will have at least four prayer partners who will adjust their intercessions according to monthly updates from the student. Steve Masters, coordinator of the program and director of the Louisiana Baptist Collegiate Ministry at LSU, said he hopes many churches will partner with students and help foster a foundation of discipleship that will carry on past high school. “Many seniors have checked out of their faith and student ministry involvement by the time they reach the final year of high school,” Masters told the Baptist Message. “The best place to reach students is our schools. If we can walk beside our students, we can better help reduce that rate and help them reach … [Read more...]