Joint worship service on Nov. 10 includes two distinct Baptist groups

By Tammi Reed Ledbetter
November 3, 2015
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HOUSTON–Two groups of Baptists meeting in Houston during the second week of November will come together for a joint worship service, Tuesday, Nov. 10. Champion Forest Baptist Church will host in their facilities the separate annual meetings of the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention (SBTC) Nov. 9-10 and the Baptist Missionary Association of Texas (BMAT) Nov. 10-11.

Five years ago the two groups approved “a working ministry relationship,” noting their shared affirmation of a high view of Scripture and basic Baptist distinctives. That led to a common commitment to evangelize the state and serve the Lord through cooperative ministries.

Wes Pratt, pastor of the BMAT-affiliated Northside Baptist Church in Conroe, will deliver the message that evening after reports are presented by Jacksonville College President Mike Smith and Texas Baptist Home President Eddie Marsh, representing the two BMA institutions that SBTC funds. The worship team of the SBTC-affiliated West Conroe Baptist Church will lead music along with the choir from Jacksonville College.

SBTC has supported two of the institutions founded by the Baptist Missionary Association over the past decade. The two-year Jacksonville College began receiving funds in 2004 and the Texas Baptist Home in Waxahachie signed an affiliation agreement in 2005.

With autonomous churches spread across the U.S. in 32 states, the Baptist Missionary Association was founded in 1900 by 45 churches that left the Baptist General Convention of Texas over a perception that the board structure might override the sovereignty of local churches. Based in Waxahachie, BMA counts 452 Texas churches in its membership.

TEXAN executive editor Gary Ledbetter wrote nearly a decade ago of the “good unity story” that had emerged in the state through a burgeoning relationship between the Baptist Missionary Association of Texas and the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention formed in 1998.

“For about a hundred years the Baptist Missionary Association and the Southern Baptist Convention went their own ways in the specifics of missionary support,” he explained. “Southern Baptists have been more centralized in their support of various denominational causes than have Missionary Baptists.

“In Texas, we are once again finding ways to work together,” Ledbetter added, describing “biblical and godly” unity around “specific ministries with others who substantially agree regarding faith and practice.”