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East Texas church finds its footing through Regenesis revitalization process
When John-Daniel Cutler was called to pastor Emmanuel Baptist Church in 2021, the church began to experience growth after a season of decline. With that growth came new challenges, but all things considered, the church was trending up.
Yet something still didn’t feel quite right to Cutler and other church leaders.
“I felt like God was clearly moving,” Cutler said, “but we were without clear direction and purpose as a body.”
While attending a dinner during the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention Annual Meeting in 2022, Cutler first heard about a revitalization process the convention had introduced earlier in the year called Regenesis. It seemed to offer help Cutler felt Emmanuel needed to “fully embrace what God had for us.”
Several years ago, a Lifeway Research study revealed that more than 80% of Southern Baptist churches are plateaued or in decline. Regenesis aims to reverse that trend, helping churches identify their unique purpose and determine their God-given vision to multiply disciples of Jesus.
“I felt like God was clearly moving, but we were without clear direction and purpose as a body.”
So far in 2025, 61 churches have completed Regenesis cohorts, which meet over a series of months, while another 92 churches representing 191 church leaders have attended Regenesis One-Day events. The process is also being piloted in Nevada and Puerto Rico, where the SBTC is engaged in strategic partnerships.
Emmanuel began its Regenesis journey in 2023 with a diverse leadership team of three men and three women from the church representing relatively new members and others who had been there more than 40 years.
“Perhaps the greatest ‘aha’ moment was simply the realization that we had no intentional process for replicating disciples who would make disciples,” Cutler said. “We were doing many wonderful things but had never truly considered if they were helping or harming our disciple-making process.”
Cutler said the Emmanuel team also identified “an unhealthy membership process” that led it to design a new members class to better help them understand what it means to be a church member. Sixty percent of the church’s current membership has completed the class, as well as visitors who decide to join the church.
The renewed focus on purpose has started to spread to other ministries of the church, Cutler said, making them more effective at accomplishing the Great Commission.
“As we continue walking through the lessons and tools we received through Regenesis,” Cutler said, “we are excited about what God is continuing to do and will do through us to reach our community with the gospel of Jesus Christ.”
