FRANKLIN — Directors of Tennessee Baptist Mission Board adopted a record goal of $2.7 million for the 2023-24 Golden Offering for Tennessee Missions and approved seven other recommendations including a revision to the GOTM Process and Guidelines that would eliminate the following guideline: “GOTM funds are NOT provided for the salary of TBMB staff or Tennessee WMU staff.” Tennessee Baptist leaders Clay Hallmark and Randy C. Davis each brought reports

FARMERSVILLE, Texas — SBC president Bart Barber has announced his appointments to the 2023 Committee on Committees. Riley Prather, pastor of Green Valley Crossing, Putnam, Conn., will lead the committee as chair, and Cassie Stanteen from First Baptist, Clinton, Miss., will serve as vice chair. “As a lifelong Southern Baptist, I am thrilled to play a part in helping the SBC keep the Gospel at the center and to remain

Baptist and Reflector SEYMOUR — Corey Cain, pastor of First Baptist Church, Seymour, was elected to serve on the newly formed search committee tasked with seeking a new president/CEO for the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention. Cain was in Dallas on May 1 during the special called meeting in which EC members rejected the nomination of former EC chairman Jared Wellman. Cain is one of five Tennessee Baptists

KNOXVILLE — May 22, 2022 will forever be etched in the memory of Keith Vaughan, pastor of Valley Grove Baptist Church in Knoxville. That was the day of what he now refers to as “The Breakdown” occurred. He recalled walking into his office on that Monday morning. “Nothing really happened that doesn’t normally happen on a Monday in a Baptist church,” he said. “But for some reason, all of a

STANTON — Weaving through a maze of nearly 200 folding tables, Ben Cowell and Alan O’Quinn went on an unscheduled prayerwalk on the morning of April 14.  The two men —  Cowell, senior pastor of Brownsville Baptist Church, and O’Quinn, a deacon at BBC — zig-zagged their way around the sprawling pavilion located in the middle of BlueOval City, praying passionately for the luncheon that would be held about an

THOMPSON’S STATION — The first young adult conference sponsored by the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board went as well as anyone could have expected, said Ryan Keaton, emerging generations specialist for the TBMB. The conference at Thompson Station Baptist Church drew 180 registrants from 35 churches, Keaton said. Keaton said his desire is for an annual young adult conference along with regional conferences. The conferences can be a resource for churches

NASHVILLE — Many first responders sprang into action in the aftermath of the tragic shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville on March 27.  Among them was Sgt. Andrew Ivey, chaplain coordinator for the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) and a North American Mission Board (NAMB)-endorsed chaplain. “I would describe it as extremely difficult,” said Ivey, a deacon at Temple Baptist Church, White House. “There was a lot of grief,