EDITOR’S NOTE: Brandon Moore serves as a church revitalization network specialist for the Missouri Baptist Convention.
Every church leaves lasting ripple effects in its community. Healthy churches resound for God’s glory and the good of their communities by showing and telling the truth of the gospel in everything they do. Unfortunately, many unhealthy or dying churches send a different kind of message.
If they lack holiness, they tell the world that God is not holy and sin isn’t a big deal. If they lack unity, they tell the world that God’s love isn’t powerful enough to overcome our differences. If they lack urgency in mission, they tell the world that embracing the gospel is just not that important.
No church intends to send that kind of message, yet as so many churches continue in decline – 48 percent of MBC churches – and more than 900 SBC churches close their doors each year, many are sending exactly this kind of message.
But there is hope. Every church can resound in a fresh and powerful way for the glory of God and the good of its community. The God of the gospel is a revitalizing God. He is capable of and devoted to reviving the dying.
This is why we have developed the Resound Network — formerly, the Missouri Baptist Revitalization Network — to catalyze a movement of revitalized and replanted churches resounding for the glory of God and the good of communities.
Built on gospel partnership among associational leaders and pastors, the Resound Network is convinced that both strong and struggling churches can resound in new and greater ways by joining God in His work of renewing His people as healthy worshipers, family, and missionaries.
With five zones across Missouri, the network consists of zone teams led by Missouri Baptist directors of missions (DOMs) and pastors with quality training and experience in a variety of contexts. Zone teams are equipped to engage churches in a process to discover and pursue God’s path to resound once again. Additionally, the network seeks to equip leaders for revitalization and replanting through a variety of opportunities such as associational cohorts, summer internships, and more.
Over the next five years, we are seeking to accomplish two major goals:
1. Engage 250 churches in the network process, 50 partner churches across the state, and three network teams in each zone.
2. Equip leaders by establishing a synergistic leadership pipeline that discovers, develops, and deploys revitalizers and replanters throughout Missouri.
To learn more and consider how you can join the movement, visit us online at resoundnetwork.org or mobaptist.org/church-revitalization. There you’ll find more information about our process, partnership opportunities, and more.
Also, DOMs, pastors, and lay leaders are invited to join us during the MBC Annual Meeting for the Resound Network Panel on Oct. 26 at 9 p.m. for discussion and Q&A with experienced leaders regarding the biblical principles and current issues in revitalization and replanting. Every attendee will receive a free book and be entered to win one of several sets of revitalization and replanting resources.