As women’s ministry leader grows, she’s helping others do the same

Jocelyn Babilon became the women’s ministry director at Lakeland Baptist Church in Lewisville about a year ago. As she settled into the role, she began having conversations with those the ministry would serve.

“When I listened to the women, they were really wanting connection,” Babilon said, “but they were also wanting to learn more about what it actually looks like to follow Christ and to have a better understanding about what they believe.”

As those conversations were ongoing, Babilon said she was also having discussions with other women’s ministry leaders and with Laura Taylor, the women’s ministry associate for the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. It became a season of training for Babilon, who was looking for solutions to a challenge many churches face—connecting women to build multigenerational relationships, as well as developing leaders to serve as disciple-makers.

A pair of SBTC events helped Babilon along the way: the She Stands Women’s Conference hosted by Lakeland in the spring, and later, the Women’s Ministry Leadership Summit. Babilon said she was excited to learn that many of the ideas and points of emphasis God had already put on her heart were part of the training at each event. 

“I walked away with so many great ideas,” she said. “The way God just lined those things up was amazing.”

Connections are a key part of the strategy of the SBTC Women’s Ministry, which empowers women in their faith journeys and in the areas to which God has called them through fostering collaboration and growth. In addition to She Stands and the leadership summit, the SBTC offers Women’s Roundtable Conversations to share ideas between women’s ministry leaders and promote available resources. Roundtable Conversations will happen in multiple locations in 2026. 

There is also a more specialized focus for the wives of pastors through events such as the Come Away Pastor Wives Retreat and Pastor Wives Connection Nights. Those events, designed to offer encouragement and fellowship, connected more than 50 women from 48 churches this past year. 

“My goal for our SBTC’s women’s events is to encourage and equip women to grow in Christ and to be better equipped to minister to women in their churches and communities,” Taylor said. “We seek to provide opportunities for networking with other women to advance the gospel.”

That is what’s happening at Lakeland, where Babilon is seeing fruit as the women who serve on her team are doing the work of ministry in the areas of prayer, fellowship, discipleship, and more.

“Now that we’ve established all our roles, [our goal is] to equip our women to do these things well,” she said. “It’s been really great to watch. I’m just excited to see the way the women are growing in our church.”

—Jayson Larson