Pastors, church planters and ministry leaders gathered for the second annual Send Network Arkansas Day to explore how churches can work together to share the gospel, make disciples, and plant churches across Arkansas. 

Hosted by Send Network Arkansas, the event featured keynote teaching, breakout sessions, prayer and opportunities to connect with church planters serving throughout the state. 

Tim Wicker, Send Network director for Arkansas, opened the gathering by describing Send Network Arkansas as a partnership between the North American Mission Board and Arkansas Baptists designed to help churches plant churches across the state. 

For Wicker, church planting is rooted in a conviction he encountered as a college student while reading C. Peter Wagner’s Church Planting for a Greater Harvest.  

“Church planting is the most effective means of evangelism under heaven,” Wicker said, recalling Wagner’s emphasis on the effectiveness of church planting in terms of time, resources, energy and focus. 

“If you think about it, as a young college student, when I read that, I thought, ‘That's what I want to be a part of,’” Wicker said. “I want to be a part of helping expand the kingdom of God through evangelism, through church planting, so that when we get to heaven, we will see people from every tribe and nation and tongue.” 

Wicker challenged attendees to consider how their churches and ministries could become more deeply involved in church planting. 

“Until all of Arkansas hears,” he said, describing the vision of seeing communities throughout the state come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. 

Wicker emphasized that church planting is about more than establishing another worship service. 

“It's about evangelism. It's about taking the good news of Jesus Christ to a lost and dying world,” he said.  

A Great Commandment missionary 

Mark Dance, executive director of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention, delivered the keynote address, drawing from Acts 8 to challenge pastors and church planters to become what he called “Great Commandment missionaries.” 

Dance said the Great Commandment and Great Commission should not be viewed as competing priorities. Instead, the Great Commission flows from the command to love God with all one's heart, soul, mind and strength and to love one's neighbor as oneself. 

Dance said Great Commandment missionaries are motivated by love for God and, like Philip in Acts 8, are willing to go where God sends them. Philip traveled to the road leading to Gaza, approached an Ethiopian official reading Isaiah, explained the Scriptures and pointed him to Jesus. 

“Great Commandment missionaries will go anywhere, anytime,” Dance said. They also, he added, will “love anybody.” 

Dance encouraged pastors and church planters to remain grounded in prayer, the ministry of the Word and their own walk with Christ. He also challenged them to equip church members to share their faith rather than treating evangelism as the responsibility of ministry professionals. 

The call to ministry, he said, begins with love for Jesus – the same love that motivates believers to go and make disciples. 

“He is the one who will give you the motivation to go anywhere, anytime, and love anybody,” Dance said. 

Equipping churches for the missionary task 

Arkansas Baptists Church Planting Strategist Jay Ham followed Dance by connecting the keynote’s emphasis on going to people with the missionary task emphasized by the North American Mission Board. 

Ham described a church-planting approach that begins not with launching a worship service but with engaging the community with the gospel, making disciples and then planting a church. 

As people come to faith, Ham encouraged planters to have a clear picture of the kind of disciple they hope to develop and a plan for helping people grow rather than simply creating a menu of programs. 

He described the process as a continuing cycle: engage the city, make disciples, engage the city and make disciples. The church is planted as God develops the work. 

“God doesn't need you to plant a church,” Ham said. “He said, ‘I will build my church.’ … What He's asked you to do is to share the good news of the gospel and make disciples.” 

The event also included breakout sessions focused on church planting, evangelism and discipleship. A “Meet the Planters” session connected attendees with church planters serving across Arkansas and provided opportunities to explore potential partnerships. Prayer cards with information about Send Network Arkansas planters also were available. 

For a church planter monthly prayer calendar, click here. 

For more information, email snaroffice@absc.org.