January 1, 2001
NYC called most strategic city
___NEW YORK--It has been called the "city that never sleeps."
AN ADULT volunteer at East 7th Street Baptist Church in Manhattan helps a student in the church's after-school tutoring program.
___And indeed, even a Texan would have to admit that New York City is like no other place in the country, if for no other reason than its size.
___The skyscrapers of Manhattan go on and on for block after block, making Houston and Dallas cityscapes seem like small caricatures.
___Each of the city's five boroughs--Queens, Brooklyn, The Bronx, Staten Island and Manhattan--are home to more people than most other American cities.
___New York is a city of big opportunity and big challenges. It could easily be considered the most strategic city in America.
___Baptists, however, are not big in New York. There are more than 100 Southern Baptist churches in the metropolitan area, but they are seeking to minister to about 18 million people, said George Russ, director of evangelism and ministry for the Baptist Convention of New York.
___To put it in perspective, the state of Texas has about the same population as New York City, and Texas Baptists count more than 6,000 congregations.
___Manhattan Pastor Taylor Field said Baptists in the South should think of making investments when it comes to ministry in New York. "Think of investing long term," Field said. "Think kingdom. You've got to invest in transformation over a longer period of time."
___A number of Baptists have done just that. "We have really great leaders here," Russ said, calling them some of the most committed people he has known. But still, there are "a lot of manpower needs."
___Larry Holcomb, a church planter in Queens, talked of the need for more Baptist workers in the nation's largest city. "No one will come to New York," he said. "The area where the need is the greatest, ... people refuse to go."
___Two million people live in Queens, and about 50,000 of them live within a six-block radius of the building where Holcomb's congregation meets.
___Baptists in the South need to ask themselves what they are afraid of in the city, said Loukia Tsouratakis, Baptist campus minister at St. John's University in Queens. "New York is so diverse, if they come from the South it's not like they're going to stick out."
___Ministry can be hard in New York mainly because the city has been void of a Christian witness for so long, Holcomb said. But when unchurched New Yorkers are around Christians, it is not difficult for them to become open to the gospel, he added.
___He is the only English-speaking Baptist church starter in the city. When Baptists come from outside the city to help, it offers real encouragement. "You don't feel like you're alone."
___Alone or not, Texas Baptists could find something exciting in New York. "There's something about being on the edge, where if God doesn't come through, nothing happens."
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