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HALLSVILLE—Trebor and Taylor Webb had a problem.
Not long ago, they were working to persuade their insurance company to approve coverage for a medication needed by someone in their family. After several months of wrangling, they were left frustrated and without resolution.
It was a problem they knew needed prayer.
The Webbs decided to share their struggle with those attending the Wednesday night prayer meeting at Mulberry Springs Baptist Church, asking their brothers and sisters in Christ to join them in crying out to God for help. Before long, God provided a way for the family to receive the medication they had been seeking, leading the Webbs to report a simple but powerful message back to the prayer meeting the following week:
“God did that.”
Mulberry Springs has had a mid-week prayer gathering for years, according to Senior Pastor Danny Warbington. But over the past year or so, Warbington and other church leaders felt compelled to broaden the scope of their prayers and ask God to do things only He can do—including drawing the lost to be saved.
God continues to answer those prayers. On a recent Wednesday night, two women came forward and gave their lives to Christ. Both were baptized at the same meeting a week later. They are among the more than 80 people who have been baptized since Mulberry Springs moved into its new sanctuary a little more than a year ago.
‘God, what do you want us to do?’
Warbington, who recently marked his 20th anniversary as pastor of the church where he was saved and baptized in 1989, said the movement of God that Mulberry Springs is experiencing doesn’t make sense—at least geographically. The church is located on a rural farm-to-market road about 10 miles from Longview and about the same distance from the much smaller communities of Hallsville and Harleton.
“We’re just out here in the middle of nowhere,” Warbington said, “but way out here in no man’s land, God has just moved miraculously.”
The vibrant season Mulberry Springs is experiencing grew out of a time of reflection, Warbington said. Through that process, he and other church leaders realized that moments in the life of the church intended to create spiritual intimacy had often become mechanical and routine. Prayer times were filled with plenty of petitions but far less praise. In some instances, seeking had taken a back seat to strategy.
As leaders pondered what to do next, they asked themselves a question: “What does God want?” Warbington recalled. “Not what do we want, but what does He want?”
“The vision we had was good, but I feel like the Lord needed to revamp the vision to where we could reach the people He wants us to reach,” Warbington said. “I like routine—I’m a routine guy—but it almost became like we were trying to do what we knew to do week after week instead of asking God what He wanted us to do.
“When God transitioned us out of what we thought we needed to be doing to what He wanted us to do, it revolutionized everything. The floodgates have been opened and I hope He doesn’t close them.”
A culture of connection
Several shifts have happened at Mulberry Springs over the past couple years. One involves its deacon ministry. About a year ago, the number of deacons was increased to 22, and each one was assigned 10-12 families to minister to that make up a congregation of about 500 regular attenders. Deacons regularly check in with their families, eat and fellowship with them, and give reports back to the larger deacon body and church staff when necessary. New families that join the church are automatically assigned a deacon. Warbington said the shift has been “transformational.”
Chris Morris, who has served as a Mulberry Springs deacon for about a year, said the deacon family ministry has contributed to a culture of connection among church members. It has not only helped church leaders bond with members, but as they become part of one another’s lives, they often end up branching out and connecting with others, creating a ripple effect that has strengthened the church’s ministry and unity.
“It’s been very powerful,” Morris said. “We’re seeing more people joining [the church] and staying, I think, because we’re seeing more people getting connected. It’s an awesome thing to see, and it has definitely made an improvement in our church.”
Another major shift has centered on prayer, which has been woven into the foundation of all the church’s ministries and efforts. Each Sunday morning, every man in the church is invited to come forward, as well as the sons in the room, to open the worship service in prayer. And on Wednesday nights, which is seeing a larger number of people engage, the prayer meeting begins with each person seeking personal consecration and what is on God’s heart first. Warbington then leads the congregation’s prayers to focus on three things:
- That Mulberry Springs would be more discipleship-oriented;
- That it would be community driven; and
- That it would be more mission-minded, locally and around the world.
Warbington said church members recently returned from a mission trip to Pakistan, where the gospel was shared often and hundreds were saved. “But we really want our people to understand the need to be on mission every day, because if you can’t go across the street to see your neighbor, you may not go to a foreign country,” he said.
On a recent Wednesday night, Warbington said he was approached by a woman attending the prayer meeting with her husband.
“Pastor Danny,” she said, “the Lord is about to do something here.”
It’s the kind of expectation Warbington said Mulberry Springs members are expressing more often as the church commits to prayer, to evangelism, and to helping those they reach grow in their faith so they can reach others with the gospel.
“There’s an excitement out there that God’s going to do something miraculous today,” Warbington said. “We feel like we should teach that in our prayer service, that we should remind our deacons about that, and that in everything we do, there should be an expectation that God desires to move.”
