Sunday Highlight: July 18

Most of our prayer times focus on missionaries planting new churches. But today we want to focus on the opposite: What happens when churches die?

Every year hundreds of Southern Baptist churches close up and die. Often the congregation gets older and stops being evangelistic. Attendance drops. Contributions dwindle. The doors close for good. But these days many churches are being brought back from death or near death. Our North American Mission Board has a whole program of restarting churches that are expiring.

Starke, Florida, is a town inland from St. Augustine. That’s where Cornerstone Baptist Church had died. Was it truly dead. Yes — the building sat empty and unused for two years. Then local Baptists tried a replant. They called Joey Hay to come restart the church. People began attending the newly reborn church. A year later attendance was averaging 60 each Sunday. A dead church was thriving.

Our church supports our North American Mission Board and missionaries like Joey through our Cooperative Program giving. That includes restarting dead churches. Think about it: Our Lord knows a lot about coming back to life! Bringing a dead church back to life is not difficult for Him!