Houston Christian University International students, Ruth and Deborah Ortega, put their thinking caps on to pitch a business idea in a McNair Center for Entrepreneurship and Free Enterprise competition. The siblings won first place in PitchFest, a Shark Tank-like competition that allows students to pitch their ideas to a panel of judges with a chance to win funding to bring their ventures to life. They received a $1,500 check to fund their idea for a platform called “Oportunilab,” a job training and preparation service to equip individuals in their native country of Honduras with skills for in-demand jobs. “The issue in our home-country, Honduras, is that there are many companies offering job opportunities and there are many individuals looking for employment; however, there is a gap between the labor market demands and the preparation that many Hondurans have,” said Ruth, an HCU junior, pursuing a degree in business management. Her sister Deborah, an HCU freshman, is pursuing a degree in finance. The duo are no strangers to entrepreneurship. Their parents run multiple family businesses, including a screen-printing business that services one of the biggest clothing brands in Honduras. The sisters presented a polished business plan and concept to win the competition. The panel of judges included Elizabeth Lewis, former program coordinator of the McNair Center; Ed Borges, assistant provost for student affairs; and Ciro Calderon, an HCU senior.

Baylor University has been awarded a $2.48 million grant from Lilly Endowment through its Religion and Cultural Institutions Initiative to support a major expansion of the Black Gospel Archive at Baylor University Libraries. The award represents one of the largest foundation gifts to support Baylor Libraries and will underwrite an expansion of the Black Gospel Archive and Listening Center, create a four-year concert series and hire staff positions beginning in 2025, in addition to several other important projects aimed at furthering the goals of the BGA. “Lilly Endowment’s support for the next phase of the Black Gospel Archive represents a game-changing opportunity for the Baylor University Libraries,” said Jeffry Archer, dean of University Libraries, Museums and the Press at Baylor. “After 20 years of groundbreaking work to locate, preserve and make accessible America’s Black Gospel music heritage, this gift will propel the Black Gospel Archive to a new level of national visibility and further our understanding of the impact of African American worship on religious culture at large.” The Black Gospel Archive encompasses the Baylor Libraries’ numerous programs, projects, archival collections and resources that identify, collect, preserve and make accessible Black sacred materials. The archive was born from the Black Gospel Music Preservation Program, a nationally recognized effort that has preserved and made publicly available thousands of Black Gospel recordings since its founding in 2005. Learn more about the BGA and its programs on the Baylor Libraries’ website.

The annual MLK Walk at Dallas Baptist University, honoring the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., offers students, faculty and staff an opportunity to come together to walk in unity, reflecting on King’s message of equality and justice. The event will take place Jan. 20. The next day, DBU will kick off the spring semester with its annual spring Welcome Back party on Jan. 21. Many campus organizations will be featured, offering a chance to discover and learn about the diverse groups that make up DBU.

Hardin-Simmons University will host its 3rd annual Big Country MLK Prayer Breakfast at 7 a.m. on Jan. 20. The breakfast will be held at the Johnson Building on the HSU campus. Matthew Lubin, pastor of Macedonia Baptist Church, will be the guest speaker. The community begins its day in prayer and fellowship while enjoying a complimentary breakfast at the yearly event hosted at HSU. Attendance is free and open to the entire Abilene community. While RSVPs are not required, they are greatly appreciated. Kindly confirm attendance by emailing president@hsutx.edu.

The University of Mary Hardin-Baylor College of Visual and Performing Arts invites high school students considering a future in art or music to campus Jan. 24 for a full day immersed in the arts. The ArtsRush 2025 experience will include specialized activities and performances to inspire and expose prospective college students to the arts at UMHB. Attendees will have opportunities to meet faculty and current students, tour campus and experience many art and music activities on campus. The day ends with a public art exhibition of the work created throughout the day and musical performances. Check-in and breakfast begin at 8:30 a.m. in the lobby of the Baugh Center for the Visual Arts. Music participants should bring their own instruments. Registration is $30 and includes breakfast, lunch, snacks, a hand-screen printed t-shirt and a swag bag with UMHB-branded items. Registration is required for attendance. The last day to register is January 21. Visit www.umhb.edu/visual-performing-arts/artsrush for more information and to register.

LOS ANGELES—A four-person Texans on Mission team is in California working to multiply the ministry of churches and chart a long-term relief effort in the area devastated by raging fires.

“The situation here is heavy,” said Rand Jenkins, a team member and chief strategy officer for Texans on Mission. “We’re striving to find a way to multiply efforts to meet needs in the name of Christ.”

About 150,000 people have evacuated as a result of the fires already, and 50 mph to 65 mph winds are forecast in the area this week. More than 99 percent of those people have taken shelter with family or friends or are staying in hotels.

“Texans on Mission is partnering with local churches to meet needs,” Texans on Mission Chief Executive Officer Mickey Lenamon said in a letter to supporters. “As these families left their homes, they had no idea what they would return to. Even if their house isn’t burnt to the ground, it’s highly likely it will be so covered by ash that it will need rebuilding.

“Working through these church partners, the strike team is discovering ways to meet expanded physical, emotional and spiritual needs. The weight of the fire literally hangs in the air everywhere these families turn.”

Lenamon said the government has “designated regions that have been burned as hazardous areas and have significantly restricted access for safety.”

 “We expect our fire recovery teams will not get access to the area for at least four weeks. It may be longer. If you remember, there was a similar waiting period after the Maui fires,” he stated.

‘A beautiful image of the body of Christ’

Chief Mission Officer John Hall noted that Texans on Mission has been “working on these California church connections for over a year, thinking about how we could help them respond to a disaster. Now, the time has come.”

The local churches are saying: “We want you to train us how to do the fire recovery. We want to do this together” Hall said. “It’s a beautiful image of the body of Christ.”

Texans on Mission is focusing on an “area that is varied economically,” he said. “A lot of people, even more well-off ones, have had their fire insurance coverage dropped. Needs are and will be significant for a long time ahead.”

The Texans on Mission team now in California is working specifically on possible needs regarding water filters, meals, showers and laundry, and fire recovery.

“As we always do, we’re taking a step of faith,” Hall said.

Lenamon, in his note to Texans on Mission supporters, said: “We are early in this disaster. The situation is evolving each day.”

He asked people to pray specifically for:

• A swift end to the fires.
• Those who have been affected by the fires.
• Strength for the firefighters who are valiantly serving.
• The churches serving with Texans on Mission to minister to people impacted by the fires.
• The clear proclamation of the gospel.

To give financially to support Texans on Mission disaster relief, click here.

(RNS)—Bill McCartney, a former college football coach who became one of the most influential religious figures in American life during the 1990s after founding the Promise Keepers movement, died Jan. 10. He was 84.

“It is with heavy hearts that we announce the passing of Bill McCartney, beloved husband, father, grandfather, and friend, who left this world peacefully at the age of 84 after a courageous journey with dementia,” his family said in a statement.

In March of 1990, not long after his University of Colorado Buffaloes missed a chance at the national championship by losing to Notre Dame in the Orange Bowl, McCartney hopped in a car with a friend, Dave Wardell. They drove from the university’s campus in Boulder to Pueblo, Colo., where he was scheduled to give a speech at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes banquet.

While on the road, McCartney talked about his concerns that American men were losing their faith in God, and as a result, the nation’s families were suffering. During that drive, the idea of Promise Keepers was born.

Within a year, McCartney had grown Promise Keepers from a relatively small group of followers to a gathering of 4,000 men at the University of Colorado’s basketball arena. Along the way, he also led the Buffaloes to a national championship after beating Notre Dame in a rematch.

Promise Keepers drew tens of thousands to events

A few years later, Promise Keepers was drawing tens of thousands of worshippers to arenas and stadiums around the country—and eventually more than half a million men to the National Mall in Washington in 1997.

The group’s prominence sparked a national debate about the role of faith in public life and the evolving relationship between men and women, especially in religious communities.

During Promise Keepers gatherings, McCartney preached a mix of traditional Christian gender roles, known as complementarianism—with men as the spiritual leaders of their homes and societies—and a softer, kinder approach to masculinity, where men did the dishes, listened to their wives and were known for kindness rather than toughness.

“A real man, a man’s man, is a godly man,” McCartney said in a 1995 press conference before a packed-out event in Washington, D.C., The Washington Post reported. “A real man is a man of substance, a man that’s vulnerable, a man who loves his wife, a man that has a passion for God, and is willing to lay down his life for him.”

Butler said McCartney’s message resonated with both evangelical men and women—as it portrayed what the movement hoped to be at its best—but often clashed with the broader culture, especially with those who saw the group’s message as an attack on women’s rights.

“The Promise Keepers speak about taking back America for Christ, but they also mean to take back the rights of women,” Patricia Ireland, then president of the National Organization for Women, told The Washington Post in 1997, when Promise Keepers was at the height of its popularity.

“Their call for submission of women is one that doesn’t have a place in either the pulpit or the public sphere in the 1990s.”

Promise Keepers also was known for opposing LGBTQ rights, which also made McCartney controversial.

Strong emphasis on racial reconciliation

But the movement also stirred dissension in Christian circles for focusing on racial reconciliation, often in blunt terms.

“Racism is an insidious monster,” McCartney said in a 1996 rally for clergy in Atlanta, in announcing Promise Keepers’ move to focus on issues of race. “You can’t say you love God and not love your brother.”

He preached a similar message the following year before the rally in Washington, linking religious revival in the country with racial reconciliation.

“The church has been divided, and a house divided cannot stand,” he said, according to Religion News Service reporting at the time.

The movement faltered in the late 1990s, in part due to a move away from stadium events to smaller rallies in more places, which led to financial woes, as the income from the stadium events had paid the organization’s bills for years.

Less than a year after the “Stand in the Gap” event at the National Mall, the group laid off most of its staff. A move to focus on racial reconciliation proved less popular with evangelicals than the focus on how to be a good dad or husband, with some Christian leaders labeling it as “divisive.”

The group went through several attempts to reinvent itself—including a partisan turn during the Trump era—but has long failed to regain its former influence.

‘A shift in the American religious landscape’

Paul Emory Putz, assistant director of Truett Seminary’s Faith & Sports Institute at Baylor University, and author of The Spirit of the Game, said that there had long been a connection between Christianity and football.

 But until McCartney, few sports figures from the charismatic movement in evangelicalism had much of a public presence. But McCartney, who had been part of a charismatic Catholic parish and called himself a “born-again Catholic” and was later part of a Vineyard church, brought that community into the sports world.

“He marked a shift in the American religious landscape where that form of faith became more mainstream,” Putz said.

Putz also said McCartney lived out his beliefs, leaving the University of Colorado in order to pay more attention to his family

Born Aug. 22, 1940, McCartney grew up in Riverview, Mich., where he played football, basketball and baseball in high school, before getting a scholarship to play football at the University of Missouri.

After graduating from Missouri in 1962, McCartney coached high school in Joplin, Mo., before becoming coach of the basketball team at Holy Redeemer High School in Detroit and then football coach at Divine Child High School in Dearborn, Mich.

His success at the high school level led to an assistant coach job at the University of Michigan. In 1982, McCartney, known as “Coach Mac,” was named the football coach at the University of Colorado, where he led the team to 10 winning seasons in a row and made the Buffaloes a national powerhouse.

He resigned as coach in 1994, in part due to his wife’s ill health. He would step down as leader of Promise Keepers in 2003 but returned for a while in 2008.

His last season with the Buffaloes was 1994, when the team went 11-1 behind a roster that included Kordell Stewart, Michael Westbrook and the late Rashaan Salaam.

That season featured the “Miracle in Michigan,” with Westbrook hauling in a 64-yard touchdown catch from Stewart on a Hail Mary as time expired in a road win over the Wolverines, according to The Associated Press. Salaam also rushed for 2,055 yards and won the Heisman Trophy.

Praised as coach and role model

A conversion experience in his 30s changed the course of McCartney’s life, his family said in announcing the former coach’s death, and led him to devote the remainder of his life to living out his Christian faith.

Former colleagues and players testified to McCartney’s impact on their lives as both a coach and a role model.

“Coach Mac was an incredible man who taught me about the importance of faith, family and being a good husband, father and grandfather,” Rich George, University of Colorado athletic director, said on the university’s website.

Alfred Williams, a star player for the Buffaloes who later went on to win Super Bowls in the NFL as a member of the Denver Broncos, also paid tribute to McCartney.

“His unwavering faith and deep love for his family were the foundation of his life—values that always mattered more to him than the game itself,” Williams posted on X. “Coach Mac will be forever missed and deeply loved by all who had the privilege of knowing him.”

McCartney has been mostly out of public view in recent years. His family announced in 2016 that he had been diagnosed with dementia and Alzheimer’s.

“Coach Mac touched countless lives with his unwavering faith, boundless compassion and enduring legacy as a leader, mentor and advocate for family, community and faith,” the family said.

“As a trailblazer and visionary, his impact was felt both on and off the field, and his spirit will forever remain in the hearts of those he inspired.”

McCartney remains the winningest coach in Colorado history, with a record of 93-55-5. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2013.

He was preceded in death by Lynne, his wife of 50 years, who died in 2013. Survivors include four children, 10 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Texans on Mission volunteers spent about two-thirds of last year—235 days—in the field, ministering to survivors of a variety of disasters.

Volunteers deployed 18 times to 25 sites. At one point in 2024, teams worked 131 consecutive days with eight overlapping deployments, offering help, hope and healing to people in need.

“The many disasters last year stretched us,” said David Wells, Texans on Mission disaster relief director. “But our volunteers didn’t bat an eye. They would work hard, think they were about to get some rest and then have to go right back out again.

“That’s commitment. It’s commitment to our Lord and to serving people who are experiencing terrible needs. It is amazing to watch these men and women at work.”

Texans on Mission volunteers contributed more than 15,000 volunteer days—about 128,000 volunteer hours.

They presented the gospel about 350 times, resulting in 63 recorded professions of faith. Volunteers distributed 1,125 Bibles and more than 100 evangelistic tracts, and they made more than 4,800 personal contacts.

“We’ve had great years of service in the past,” said Mickey Lenamon, Texans on Mission chief executive officer. “But last year stands out for the cumulative impact accomplished in helping people and leading them to Christ.”

Volunteer teams prepared more than 200,000 meals and distributed 54,000 bottles of water.

‘We made ourselves available to God’

Heavy equipment operators logged more than 4,850 hours, and chainsaw crews completed 1,157 jobs.

Texans on Mission volunteers completed more than 100 tear-out jobs—removing soaked sheetrock and damaged flooring—after floods, as well as 120 mold remediation jobs. They sifted through the ashes of homes consumed by fire more than three dozen times, helping homeowners reclaim lost keepsakes.

They performed more than 50 structural demolitions and cleared 87 sites after disasters, in addition to covering more than 50 buildings with temporary roofing.

Texans on Mission teams washed about 3,600 loads of laundry for volunteers and about 2,000 loads for the public. They provided access to showers to more than 6,400 volunteers and 5,600 others at disaster sites.

“Some people like to talk about the good old days,” Lenamon said. “But these are the good old days for us.

“We have made ourselves available to God and for service through his churches, and that willingness to serve means God keeps raising us up to help others.”

With additional reporting by Ferrell Foster of Texans on Mission.

When Serenity Center, a residential 12-step rehabilitation center in West Texas, experienced extended power outages in 2021, Primera Iglesia Bautista in Plainview stepped in to help, not fully realizing they would be forging a long-term partnership that would benefit both organizations.

Pastor Jonathan Silva explained the owner of Serenity Center, Paul Walker, is a member of the congregation. Walker reached out to Silva when it became apparent an extended power outage from an ice storm in 2021 would require alternative accommodations for the residents.

Approximately 35 men, women and children would need a place to stay. The church stepped in to provide them a place for about three weeks.

Additionally, church members cooked for their guests and brought food and clothing items, as needed, while powerlines to the center were being repaired.

While the residents only temporarily called the church “home,” the Serenity Center has continued an arrangement of shuttling residents to Primera Plainview on Sunday mornings for worship and on Wednesday nights for a discipleship group.

“They take about two trips, back and forth” Silva said. “One for the men. Then they’ll go back for the women with the children.”

The cooperation between the two organizations has been fruitful, Silva explained. Last year the church observed 24 baptisms. Twenty of those were of individuals from among the group who attend from Serenity Center.

Some choose to stay

Some who have completed the 12-step program, have chosen to remain in Plainview so they can continue to serve with the church.

One of several newer members who came to the church by way of Serenity Center, Xandrea Pierce, has become a vital member of the church. Silva said he tries to give her plenty of opportunities throughout the year to share the story of how God is working in her life.

“Now she’s about three years strong,” coming to the church, he continued, explaining she lived in Lubbock before, but decided to stay in Plainview.

Pierce, whom Silva noted the congregation lovingly calls “Sister X,” said she’d made six attempts with Serenity Center in 2022 to beat her addiction. But on the seventh attempt, she noted, “God went with me,” meaning she allowed God to go with her that time, she explained.

All of the first attempts, she didn’t really want to be there, but wanted to give up and leave, Pierce noted. Eventually, her mother had told her she couldn’t come back home.

Serenity Center offered her several extensions to complete the program. Pierce recalled every time an extension was offered, she sensed God asking, “Will you trust me?”

The first time she got an extension, and she heard God ask, “Will you trust me,” Pierce said, “I just blew it off.”

The next time she got an extension, when she heard God asking if she trusted him, she ignored it again.

The third time an extension was offered, Pierce recalled when she “heard God ask, ‘Will you trust me,’” she gave him a different answer. This time, “I thought, ‘You know what, God, I’m going to trust you,’” Pierce explained.

Not long after her decision to stay until she completed the program, Pierce began going with the group to church at Primera Iglesia. A man from Serenity sang in church the first week she visited.

She’d always loved to sing, she said, so Pierce began singing at the church, too.

But after she sang a few times, Pierce said, “Something in me said, ‘I should get baptized.’” Silva asked her if she wanted to become a member, and she joined the church, she fondly recalled.

“And in March, it’ll be three years that I’ve been clean and three years that I’ve been attending the church. And I sing at the church,” she said.

Pierce noted at other churches she knows, there’s always been at least one person in the church who “turns their nose up” at addicts. But she’s never felt like her past had any bearing on her treatment at Primera.

“Everyone there welcomes them (addicts) with open arms. They welcomed me with open arms. And everyone that goes there, they welcome them with open arms. And they don’t treat anyone any different.”

Pierce said she loves that about her church, noting that quality of being welcoming and the ministry of the church are what has kept her there.

Observable impact

Silva, who has pastored the church since 2020, said the partnership with Serenity Center has made an impact on his congregation.

“I believe the desire for servanthood has really hit another level compared to where we were at,” he noted.

“Seeing the growth that each individual member has had and their contributions—we have individuals who sign up for donuts or breakfast burritos on Sunday mornings, and we never have a problem looking for help.”

Silva noted everyone in the congregation is eager to help and to serve. After baptisms, the congregation hosts a church meal.

“That desire has really built over the years. So, I would say that growth has really come from these encounters that we’ve had over the years,” Silva said.

The community has noticed Primera’s commitment to Serenity Center, too. The first two years of the partnership, “things were pretty quiet,” he said, with the congregation just going about its regular commitments to ministry.

But as Serenity Center residents have completed their stays with the center and reentered the workforce in the past year and a half, word has spread about the church’s care for this population.

Silva estimated at least five first-time visits a year are a direct result of the church’s ongoing partnership with Serenity Center. He’s spoken with community members who’ve shared how their new employees who’ve completed the 12-step program and remained active in their churches are excitedly sharing their faith.

 “There’s a spark beginning to take place,” Silva said. “That’s what I’m really focusing on next year is really just bridging—that you go out and make disciples. I’m really excited about that.”

Primera is a small congregation, with about 25 members, Silva noted. But with Serenity Center, worship services run about 55. They are a big part of the church, Silva noted.

Baptist conventions, councils and associations representing thousands of churches were among the groups who urged Indian President Draupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi to act decisively to stop violent mobs who have targeted Christians and other religious minorities.

More than 400 individual Christian leaders and 30 church groups sent the appeal the last week in December, calling on the president and prime minister to order the “swift and impartial investigation of incidents against religious minorities.”

“Rising hate speech, especially from elected officials, has emboldened acts of violence against Christians. Mobs disrupt peaceful Christian gatherings and threaten carol singers with impunity,” the letter to the president and prime minister stated.

The message to Murmu and Modi noted the Religious Liberty Commission of the Evangelical Fellowship of India reported more than 720 incidents targeting Christians in 2023 through mid-December, and the United Christian Forum, which operates a toll-free helpline for Christians facing persecution, reported 760 incidents through the end of November.

“Alarmingly, during this Christmas season—a time for peace and joy—at least 14 attacks were carried out against Christian gatherings across India,” the letter stated. “It saddens us deeply that almost all political leaders from the highest in the Union government and the states have chosen not to condemn them.”

The letter noted the misuse of anti-conversion laws by Indian states have led to the unjust arrest and harassment of more than 110 ministers.

Continued violence in Manipur

It also pointed to an ongoing crisis in the northeastern state of Manipur, where more than 250 people have been killed, at least 350 churches have been destroyed, and thousands have been displaced since May 2023.

“The wounds of divided communities run deep,” the letter stated. “Manipur yearns for healing and reconciliation.”

In Assam, the Magical Healing (Prevention of Evil) Practices Act, 2024, along with the Drugs and Magic Remedies Act, have been used to arrest more than a dozen pastors, church workers and other Christians, the letter noted.

The letter also noted while Hindus are permitted to distribute and sell the Bhagavad Gita or other religious literature on street corners and in marketplaces, “Christians are routinely beaten up if they distribute the Bible, or even a small part of it.”

Other systemic issues raised in the letter include “perpetuating historic injustices” through exclusionary policies denying Scheduled Caste status to Dalit Christians and demanding that Christian tribes be removed from the Scheduled Tribes list, undermining their constitutional protections.

In addition to urging top government officials to investigate incidents targeting religious minorities, the letter also called on the president and prime minister to:

• Issue clear guidelines to state governments about protecting constitutional rights to religious freedom.
• Initiate regular dialogue with representatives from faith communities.
• Protect the constitutional right to freely profess and practice one’s faith.

“We appeal to you, Honourable President and Honourable Prime Minister, to ensure equal rights for all, fostering an environment where every Indian feels safe, respected, and free to practice their faith.”

Broad-based endorsement

Endorsing groups included the Angami Baptist Church Council, the Arunachai Baptist Churches Council, the Chakhesang Baptist Church Council, the Evangelical Baptist Church of Odisha, the Fellowship of Naga Baptist Associations, Madras English Baptist Church, the Manipur Baptist Convention, the Nagaland Baptist Church Council, North Bank Baptist Church Association, the Nyishi Baptist Church Council, Rongmei Baptist Church Association, Tangkhui Naga Baptist Convention, Tangsa Baptist Churches Association, the Deccan Association of Telugu Baptist Churches, the Western Odisha Baptist Churches Council and the Western Sumi Baptist Akukuhou Kuqhakulu.

Other groups include the Church of the Nazarene, the Council of Evangelical Churches in India, the Evangelical Church of God, the Federation of Catholic Associations of the Archdiocese of Delhi, the National Christian Council, the National Church of India, the Synod of Pentecostal Churches and the United Christian Forum.

Individuals included Zelhou Keyho, general secretary of the Nagaland Baptist Church Council, and J Chiranjeevi with the Council of Baptist Churches in India.

Wissam al-Saliby, president of the 21Wilberforce human rights organization, expressed concern about violence in India and affirmed Christians in India for their appeal to the nation’s president and prime minister.

“21Wilberforce is very concerned by the constant communication of incidents of violence we receive from friends and partners in India,” al-Saliby said.

In December, Christians celebrating Christmas in Odisha state were attacked, he noted. Videos posted online showed women who were accused of religious conversion being tied to a tree and beaten.

“I’m grateful that the Christians in India are speaking up and engaging with their government,” al-Saliby said. “21Wilberforce is coming alongside them and supports their efforts to bring about religious freedom for all and a more inclusive and tolerant society.”

DALLAS—Leaders from the Baptist General Convention of Texas and the North American Mission Board agreed in principle to a clear path forward for providing church-starting resources and support for BGCT churches desiring access to NAMB resources.

The two-hour meeting at the BGCT’s Dallas office on Jan. 8 marked the culmination of numerous meetings and discussions between pastors and organizational leaders since Julio Guarneri, Texas Baptists’ executive director, initially reported on NAMB support for BGCT-sponsored church starts in Texas during his address to the May 2024 BGCT Executive Board meeting.

Representatives from NAMB and the BGCT previously came together on Aug. 15 in Dallas.

NAMB’s trustees and the BGCT’s executive board will review the arrangement at their respective February meetings.

While some details still are under discussion, the revised agreement emphasizes four areas:

• The use of “white label” Send Network church starting resources for BGCT churches who desire them. “White label” means taking the branding off of an item so another entity can affix its own branding to the product. Details of how this will happen in this context will be worked out between the two entities.

• The disposition of NAMB’s $300,000 annual church starting grant for BGCT-sponsored church starts.

• Access to church planter training events for BGCT churches.

• Improved communications with pastors, churches and associations who relate to the BGCT.

The agreement clarified Send Network planting, training and coaching materials will continue to be made available to BGCT churches that support the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 and desire to use them, bolstering the resources already on offer through the existing BGCT church starting process.

These resources will afford additional tools and assessment opportunities to BGCT churches that affirm the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 and want to start BGCT churches in Texas that affirm the Southern Baptist Convention’s statement of faith.

Agreement on new arrangement

While the BGCT will continue to receive an annual grant of $300,000 from NAMB, moving forward, the dollars—which previously were split with $200,000 for evangelism and $100,000 for church starting—will be allocated exclusively for church starting.

The BGCT will request the funds on an as-needed basis for each church start in accordance with BGCT’s and NAMB’s church starting funding policies and procedures.

The NAMB funds will be made available through the BGCT to church planters who complete either the Send Network or a similar church starting assessment. Only BGCT churches that align with the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 and have given to the SBC Cooperative Program and Annie Armstrong Easter Offering the previous year will be eligible for the NAMB funding. Churches planted through these funds will affirm the Baptist Faith & Message 2000.

Churches that do not meet NAMB’s criteria but do meet the BGCT’s criteria will continue to have access to the same BGCT funding they’ve previously received.

In September, the BGCT Executive Board passed a recommendation from the Missions Funding Council to increase the maximum amount that may be approved for any new church start from $75,000 to $125,000 to further resource new BGCT-sponsored church starts.

The $300,000 NAMB grant supplements the approximately $3 million given through the Texas Baptists Cooperative Program, Mary Hill Davis Offering for Texas Missions and donor-directed funds the BGCT annually invests in church starting.

The agreement also notes NAMB and BGCT leaders will “explore the possibility of conducting [Church] Planter Pathway training events” for BGCT churches and church starters and work together to ensure “pastors, churches and associations have reliable, true and updated information as to how BGCT churches can relate to NAMB.”

Noe Treviño, director of the Texas Baptists Center for Missional Engagement, and George Ross, Send Relief’s regional director for the South Region, will work to discuss and plan future training opportunities and resource sharing.

NAMB president Kevin Ezell already is scheduled to host a series of information sessions with BGCT churches in areas including Dallas/Ft. Worth, Austin, Houston and West Texas to connect with pastors and association leaders and clarify partnership opportunities.

Guarneri expressed his appreciation for the collaborative effort and its importance for Texas Baptists churches.

“I’m so pleased with the outcome of this process and look forward to working under this renewed agreement in the days ahead,” he said. “While things have changed in the denominational landscape at multiple levels, what hasn’t changed is the need to work together to reach people with the gospel in Texas and North America. It is vital that Texas Baptists churches have clarity on how they can be supported in church starting.”

Support, he said, is available to any church affiliated with the BGCT that meets the appropriate requirements.

“The BGCT is a diverse family of churches that include those who align with the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message, those who align with the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message, or similar Baptist confession of faith,” Guarneri said.

“All of these have access to assessment, training, coaching and funding from the BGCT as long as they meet the criteria set forth [by the BGCT] and follow the process.”

Guarneri also pointed to the implications of the arrangement for churches singly aligned with the BGCT that desire to partner with NAMB.

“This agreement specifically addresses churches that desire to have access to NAMB resources, including assessment, training, coaching and funding through the BGCT,” Guarneri said.

“It ensures Texas Baptists churches who meet NAMB requirements and desire to start new congregations receive all the support available while remaining singly aligned with the BGCT.”

Ezell shared optimism about how the new arrangement can boost church planting efforts in Texas.

“NAMB exists to serve Southern Baptist churches, and I believe this updated agreement with the BGCT will strengthen those efforts in Texas. I appreciate the time Julio and his team have taken to work through these details,” Ezell said.

“This is a great example of Southern Baptists coming together and working together for the sake of the gospel.”

Participants in the agreement discussion

Guarneri and Ezell were joined by the following attendees: Rusty Shuler, NAMB’s church relations mobilizer; Jeff Williams, senior pastor at First Baptist Church in Denton; Pete Pawelek, senior pastor of Cowboy Fellowship of Atascosa County; Chad Edgington, senior pastor at First Baptist Church in Olney; Tom Howe, associate director of the Texas Baptists Center for Missional Engagement and director of the Texas Baptists Church Starting Team; Dan Newburg, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Devine; Noe Treviño, director of the Texas Baptists Center for Missional Engagement; Heath Kirkwood, Texas Baptists Executive Board chair and lead pastor of First Baptist Church in Lorena; Craig Christina, Texas Baptists associate executive director; Ronny Marriott, Texas Baptists president and pastor of First Baptist Church in Richardson; Ward Hayes, Texas Baptists treasurer/CFO; and Sergio Ramos, director of Texas Baptists GC2 Initiative.

NAMB’s trustees are scheduled to meet Feb. 3-4 in Long Beach, Calif. The BGCT Executive Board will hold its winter meeting on Feb. 17-18 in Dallas.

Ongoing partnerships

In addition to the church starting arrangement, BGCT and NAMB are continuing to partner to produce Crossover Dallas, the evangelistic effort held in conjunction with the Southern Baptist Convention taking place on June 8-11 in Dallas and the Send Relief Ministry Center in Laredo.

More than 1,000 individuals heard gospel presentations when Texas Baptists and NAMB partnered for Serve Tour Brownsville held Oct. 11-12 in the Brownsville area.

“The Texas population continues to grow at a fast rate, and the proportion of people in our state who do not know Christ as Savior and Lord is also growing,” Guarneri said. “We must urgently multiply our efforts in church starting as we seek to strengthen a multiplying movement of Great Commandment and Great Commission churches in Texas and beyond.”

Guarneri said the BGCT is “committed to doing our best to help churches plant churches so that we can win Texas for Christ.”

BGCT churches started more than 30 new churches through the BGCT’s church starting process in 2024.

Hannah Hopkins, a senior at East Texas Baptist University and Texas Baptists’ 2024 Prestidge Endowment Music & Worship Scholarship recipient, transferred to the school in spring 2023 with a passion to lead worship.

She’d heard the original song “New Day” performed by Lampsato, ETBU’s worship band, and wanted to audition to be a part of the group.

Chris Smith, director of Lampsato and professor of worship leadership at ETBU, said Hopkins “impressed us with her audition.” That same day, she was invited to sit in on a Lampsato practice, where she said she “felt really at home.”

Encouraged by her experience at the band’s practice, Hopkins inquired about changing her degree plan from music education to worship. Smith said it was “the Lord’s providence” that Lampsato provided her an opportunity to pursue her passion for worship.

“She [joined Lampsato] the next spring, and she just fit in immediately with our culture, with the friend group,” Smith said. “She’s just an extraordinary student, an extremely talented musician, and so even though she was a transfer student … it feels like she’s always been here.”

Creating “Clothed”

Each academic year, Lampsato works on a recording project, complete with “a couple of covers, maybe an original or two,” that is recorded and released on music streaming platforms in the spring. Smith said the purpose of the recording project is to allow students to exercise their creativity.

“We really encourage students [that] this is a place to write original music, to be creative. When we think about scientists saying the universe is constantly expanding in all directions, I think it’s because being a creator is an attribute of God. He cannot not create, and when we create, we are acting in the image of God,” said Smith.

“So while we certainly don’t shy away from covering other great worship songs at all, I really try to push a creative element into this [project].”

In March, the band started to toss around ideas for an original song to add to their most recent project.

“I just started thinking to myself, ‘Man, I really wish I could write a song.’ I’ve always wanted to do that. And I’ve always prayed that that would be something that the Lord might gift me with, but I’ve just never been able to. So, I just thought to myself, ‘I’d really like to write a song,’” said Hopkins.

She started brainstorming song ideas and remembered one she’d written down previously. This idea would become “Clothed,” the original song she led at Texas Baptists’ 2024 annual meeting in Waco.

“When I got the idea for ‘Clothed,’ I was reading this daily Bible reading plan … and I was in Genesis three, and when I read Genesis 3:21, it said that the Lord took garments of skin and clothed Adam and Eve.

“This was after they sinned in the Garden, and I was like, ‘Man, that’s amazing that God—we turned away from him and we made ourselves enemies to him—and literally the first thing he did was seek out Adam and Eve in the garden and clothe their shame … and gave them that grace that they needed,” said Hopkins.

Hopkins noticed a theme of being clothed throughout Scripture.

“I feel like I hear that a lot in the Bible that God clothed us in different ways, and I started thinking of, you know, he clothed the lilies, and he clothed us in righteousness. And, he clothed us in glory in Revelation. I was thinking through all those things, and I just thought, ‘Man, that would make a good song,’” Hopkins recalled.

She said she had never written a song before, so she “didn’t think anything of it.”

“I heard my friend [who was a songwriter] say one time: ‘If you ever have an idea, just write it down. You might come back to it one day.’ So I did. I wrote it down, and I wrote the Scriptures down that I thought of, and I left it alone for a couple of months until the song kind of came to fruition later,” said Hopkins.

Since “nothing had really come up” for an original song for the recording project, Hopkins decided she was going to try to write “Clothed.”

“I just started typing it out on my notes, trying to figure out the words to this song. I spent that day in class and the next day in class, and I wrote the whole thing in my Notes app on my phone while people were chatting back and forth,” Hopkins explained.

The next week, Hopkins played the drafted song for Smith. He said, “There was so much potential from the very beginning,” and suggested that it be added to the project.

 “It wasn’t long after that we played it for the band, and they were just in love with it, but we had to refine it a little more. So we’re in rehearsal, we got out a big whiteboard, and we’re writing down lyrics. ‘What’s another way we can do this phrase’ or those kinds of things,” explained Smith.

“We spent several weeks just tracking the song in our rehearsals, and then several weeks into the summer creating some final mixes until we felt like we got it just right so we could release it on Spotify and YouTube. Then, we debuted it at our student-led night of worship back in the spring on campus, where all of our worship bands come together.”

A reminder of God’s provision

Lampsato was invited to lead worship at Cliff Temple Baptist Church in Dallas in April, where Hopkins first led “Clothed.”

In February, Tom Tillman, director of Music & Worship at Texas Baptists, had extended the invitation for the band to lead worship at Texas Baptists’ annual meeting in Waco.

Tillman heard “Clothed” at Cliff Temple and spoke highly of the song, so Smith was confident it had to be included in their setlist for annual meeting.

Hopkins said she was “excited and touched by people’s engagement” with her song at the annual meeting.

“I never expected people to enjoy it this much or relate to it this much. You know, you’re your own worst critic, and so I didn’t ever expect it to get the exposure that it got. I just expected it to be Lampsato’s recording song and then move on from there. But people just really grabbed onto it, and I was shocked,” said Hopkins.

Hopkins said she is “so glad that the Spirit is working through that song,” and she’s “impressed with how God is using it,” because it was “the Spirit who gifted [her] with the song.”

“I tell everyone that it was not me who wrote that song. I’ve never written a song before, so I’m pretty convinced that it wasn’t me who pulled this song out. I’m pretty convinced that it was just the Holy Spirit speaking through the Scriptures to me and giving me those words,” said Hopkins.

Tillman said annual meeting attendees were “obviously really moved by the song,” as he received positive feedback after Hopkins led the song.

“It was a proud moment for me, since this was the year Hannah had received the Prestidge music scholarship that helps worship studies majors at Baptist universities prepare for leading in the church,” said Tillman.

Smith said the reception and feedback from attendees who connected with “Clothed” is “one of the highlights of [the song’s] existence.”

“We heard so much positive feedback,” both in person and on social media, Smith said. The song has been streamed more than 1,000 times on YouTube and Spotify.

Hopkins’ hope is that “Clothed” would serve as a reminder of “God’s provision for us and how he keeps his promises from the very beginning.”

“He’s going to provide for our spiritual needs, and he has since the beginning of time. He hasn’t failed to do that yet, and he won’t,” Hopkins said.

Smith said he hopes the song communicates the “unbelievable message of the gospel” and shows that “God is still inspiring creative people.”

“You know, the Scriptures say sing a new song. So, to let people know that God is still inspiring people of all ages, of all genders, to write for his glory, I would love for people to take that away,” Smith said.

He said the song’s creation shows the fruit of Texas Baptists’ investment in the worship program at ETBU. Smith hopes Texas Baptists recognize students “are learning the gospel, and it is being proclaimed through our program.”

Hopkins said her Lampsato bandmates were a “very integral part of making this song” and of her “journey as a worship leader.”

“If I had to [summarize] what Lampsato is into one sentence, it’s really just a family of believers with a common goal of leading God’s people into worship, and I think that it’s a really special thing to be a part of,” Hopkins said. “To get to do that is such a privilege.”

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and several other religious groups filed a brief Jan. 6 challenging a Louisiana law that mandates displaying the Ten Commandments in public school classrooms.

“When the government mandates the posting of a preferred version of a religious text to hang on each classroom wall, it is acting beyond its authority,” said BJC General Counsel Holly Hollman.

In contrast, Kelly Shackelford, president and chief counsel for First Liberty, defended the Louisiana Ten Commandments mandate.

 “Placing this historic document on schoolhouse walls is a great way to remind students of the foundations of American and Louisiana law, and it fits perfectly in the history and tradition of America,” he said.

Requires posting in every public school classroom

HB 71, signed into law by Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, requires every elementary, secondary and post-secondary public school in the state to display an approved version of the Ten Commandments in every classroom.

Roake v. Brumley, a lawsuit brought by nine Louisiana families with children in public schools, asserts HB 71 violates both the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.

The families are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Louisiana, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom from Religion Foundation.

In mid-November, a federal district court issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the implementation of the law.

However, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill asserted the decision applied only to five districts named in the suit and instructed other districts to implement the mandate.

The matter now is before the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is scheduled to hear the case in New Orleans on Jan. 23.

The law has ramifications beyond Louisiana. After HB 71 was signed into law last summer, Texas Gov. Dan Patrick pledged to pass a similar bill in the Texas Legislature in 2025.

Joining the BJC in its brief opposing the Louisiana law are the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the General Synod of the United Church of Christ, along with Jihyun Oh, stated clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A., and Sean W. Row, presiding bishop and primate of the Episcopal Church.

Violation of the First Amendment

In their brief, the BJC and others express their belief “the Ten Commandments represent the original law handed down by God to Moses, with explicitly religious instructions,” such as worshipping God alone and observing the Sabbath.

“HB 71’s posting requirement ensures that these religious instructions will be conveyed continuously, without exception, to every student in Louisiana’s public schools through their formative years,” violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, the brief states.

The brief also asserts “HB 71 grants preferential treatment to a single version of the Ten Commandments,” noting at least four distinct versions and ordering of the commandments—Jewish, Catholic, Lutheran and general Protestant.

“No single religion owns the Ten Commandments, nor can any single denomination claim authority over their proper translation or interpretation,” the brief states. “There are multiple versions of the Commandments, and theological debate continues among (and even within) different denominations about the correct translation and interpretation of the Commandments.

“Through HB 71, the Louisiana legislature declares a victor in this debate by selecting a ‘correct’ version to be imposed on every child in the Louisiana public school system, regardless of their religious beliefs.”

‘State-sponsored religious indoctrination’

Furthermore, the brief asserts a mandate requiring public schools to post the Ten Commandments creates “unavoidable state-sponsored religious indoctrination,” and it “imposes religious instructions on captive audiences” in classrooms.

“For Amici and other Christians, the Bible is holy and authoritative. Reference to its teachings provide direction for believers in daily life,” the brief states.

“Religious communities meet regularly to interpret and understand those religious teachings. It is not the province of the state to supplant that education.”

A separate amicus brief opposing the Louisiana Ten Commandments mandate was filed by the National Council of Jewish Women and 19 other groups representing Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.

Their brief asserts the law privileges the Protestant interpretation of the Ten Commandments at the expense of other faiths. The brief also argues the law pressures students to venerate a text that may be distinctly different from what is taught in their religious communities.

WASHINGTON (RNS)—A prestigious group of mourners, including a slate of current, former and future presidents and vice presidents, assembled in the Washington National Cathedral on Jan. 9 for the state funeral of President Jimmy Carter.

They celebrated the life and legacy of the peanut farmer-turned-politician from Plains, Ga.

Carter’s casket, which had been lying in state at the U.S. Capitol since Tuesday evening, was welcomed at the door of the snow-covered cathedral by Episcopal prelates including Mariann Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington.

“Let us also pray for all who mourn that they may cast their care on God and know the consolation of his love,” Budde prayed from the Book of Common Prayer, her robes billowing in a frigid wind.

‘Most enduring attribute: Character’

A short time later, President Joe Biden offered his eulogy for Carter. The president noted when Carter ran for national office in 1976, then-Sen. Biden was among the first to endorse his candidacy. Biden said he was drawn to what he called Carter’s “most enduring attribute: character, character, character.”

Biden, like many who spoke at the state funeral, highlighted the importance of Carter’s faith, saying it overlapped with broadly held American ideals, including that “we all are created equal in the image of God.”

“Jimmy held a deep Christian faith in God … faith as a substance of things hoped for and evidence of the things not seen,” Biden said. “Faith founded on commandments of Scripture: Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy mind and all thy soul, and love thy neighbor as thyself. Easy to say, very, very difficult to do.”

The spoken tributes to Carter, which included eulogies written by Carter’s predecessor and his vice president and delivered posthumously on their behalf, were interspersed with music.

In a testament to Carter’s long life and broad spectrum of allies, both the living and the dead shared reflections on a legacy of leadership, which one eulogist referred to as “a miracle.”

Besides “Amazing Grace” and the U.S. Navy hymn “Eternal Father, Strong to Save”—Carter was a U.S. Naval Academy graduate—the crowd heard a rendition of John Lennon’s “Imagine” by Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood.

Looking on somberly from the front pews were Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and recently reelected Donald Trump.

Several of their spouses, including Melania Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, were also in attendance, as was former Vice President Mike Pence, who served under Trump, and current Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost her own presidential bid in November.

Seated nearby were foreign dignitaries, such as Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh, the brother of King Charles III, and Justin Trudeau, outgoing prime minister of Canada.

Joshua Carter, Jimmy Carter’s grandson, first addressed the gathering from the pulpit, recounting the late president’s history of teaching Sunday school—a tradition, he said, that began when Carter served in the Navy before his classes became a fixture of his time at Maranatha Church in Plains, a Cooperative Baptist Fellowship church where thousands have come to hear his weekly lessons. A longtime Southern Baptist, Carter disavowed the convention in 2000.

Carter outlived two who left tributes behind

Carter, who died at age 100 as the longest-lived U.S. president, had outlived many of his contemporaries. As a result, sections of the program were delivered by their descendants.

Steven Ford, President Gerald Ford’s son, read a tribute his late father wrote about Carter, detailing the warm friendship the two forged over the years despite being rivals in the 1976 election.

“God did a good thing when he made your dad,” Ford said to Carter’s children sitting in the front of the cathedral.

Ford explained that his father and Carter jokingly agreed to deliver eulogies at each other’s funerals, a promise Carter made good on when Ford died in 2006. Steven Ford said it had been left to him to return the favor.

“As for myself, Jimmy: I’m looking forward to our reunion,” he said, reading his late father’s words. “We have much to catch up on. Thank you, Mr. President. Welcome home, old friend.”

Ford was followed by Ted Mondale, a former Minnesota state senator and son of Walter Mondale, Carter’s vice president.

Reading a tribute written by his father, who died in 2021, the younger Mondale said: “I was also a small-town kid who grew up in a Methodist church where my dad was a preacher, and our faith was core to me, as Carter’s faith was core to him. That common commitment to our faith created a bond between us that allowed us to understand each other and find ways to work together.”

‘Brought integrity to the presidency’

Stuart Eizenstat, a former White House adviser, also addressed the power of Carter’s strongly held religious beliefs, saying they “brought integrity to the presidency” in the wake of the Watergate scandal and discord over the Vietnam War.

Eizenstat said Carter’s faith also “respected other religions,” noting he was the first president to light a Hanukkah menorah and hosted a Shabbat dinner at Camp David for the Israeli delegation while negotiating the historic Camp David Accords.

Carter’s religious values, Eizenstat said, “gave him an unshakable sense of right and wrong, animating his support for civil rights at home and human rights abroad.”

He added, grinning: “Jimmy Carter has earned his place in heaven, but just as he was free with sometimes unsolicited advice for his presidential successors, the Lord of all creation should be ready for Jimmy’s recommendations on how to make God’s realm a more peaceful place.”

Guided by love for neighbors

Jason Carter, another of Carter’s grandchildren and a one-time Georgia gubernatorial candidate, also spoke. Noting Carter and his wife Rosalynn spent more of their lives outside the halls of power than in them, he reflected on his grandfather’s dedication to the biblical edict to “love your neighbor as yourself,” and how it informed his work with the Carter Center, which observes democratic elections around the world and has helped eradicate disease.

“I believe that love is what taught him and told him to preach the power of human rights, not just for some people, but for all people,” he said.

“It focused him on the power and the promise of democracy, its love for freedom, its requirement and founding belief in the wisdom of regular people raising their voices, and the requirement that you respect all of those voices, not just some.”

He also recalled Carter’s efforts to broker peace between Israelis and Palestinians that resulted in the Camp David Accords, and his more controversial advocacy for the Palestinian people.

“His heart broke for the people of Israel,” he said. “It broke for the people of Palestine, and he spent his life trying to bring peace to that Holy Land.”

‘Something of a miracle’

Andrew Young, a pastor, aide to Martin Luther King Jr. and congressman before serving as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. under Carter, was the last to offer thoughts on Carter’s life.

Referring to Carter as “something of a miracle,” he related that when Carter enrolled at the Naval Academy, the future president requested his roommate be the Black midshipman at the school.

“But that was the sensitivity, the spirituality that made James Earl Carter a truly great president,” said Young, who also previously served as head of the National Council of Churches. “James Earl Carter was truly a child of God.”

“Jimmy Carter was a blessing that helped to create a great United States of America,” he said, adding, “He may be gone, but he ain’t gone far.”

‘Did justly, loved mercy, walked humbly’

As the event concluded, Carter’s casket was slowly removed from the cathedral by members of the military, ending a multiday string of events and services in Washington, D.C., meant to honor the late president. The casket will return to Georgia for a final, private funeral at Maranatha Baptist before he is buried alongside his wife at their home.

In his eulogy, Biden blessed Carter’s final southern journey, pairing one of Carter’s favorite Bible passages—Micah 6:8—with one of the current president’s favorite hymns: “On Eagle’s Wings.”

“As he returned to Plains, Georgia, for his final resting place, you can say goodbye in the words of the Prophet Micah, who Jimmy so admired until his final breath: Jimmy Carter did justly, loved mercy, walked humbly,” Biden said.

“May God bless a great American, a dear friend and a good man. May he be raised up on eagle’s wings, bear you on the breath of dawn, make you to shine like the sun, and hold you in the palm of his hand.”

AMARILLO (BP)—South Sudanese attending All Nations Worship Church, a ministry of Paramount Baptist Church in Amarillo, know the pain of those displaced by the war in Sudan, which has created the greatest humanitarian crisis globally.

Paramount Missions Pastor David Preston, who copastors All Nations with Paramount Missionary in Residence Danial Habte, heard the families’ stories long before he heard of Empower One, a gospel humanitarian outreach aided by Southern Baptist Send Relief to help those fleeing the war.

“Through my ESL (English as a Second Language outreach) I just remember … South Sudan becoming a country on its own (in 2011), just the war and the torture, it has really never ceased.” Preston said.

“A lot of them have had family in that area that are from South Sudan or just across the border, some in Sudan. They’re feeling that weight because of family still in the area, or close relatives that have dealt with it directly.”

Preston met Matt Jones, Empower One’s director of biblical education and pastoral care, who told him of a connection with Send Relief that would allow him to provide aid directly to the location he had in mind, impacting those at the center of the Sudanese families’ concern.

“We sent some money to do some food relief. Went through Send Relief, and yet Matt was able to guide that,” Preston said. “I’m so thankful for that connection and I’m thankful for what we’re doing.”

Grant benefits families in several refugee camps

Empower One secured a $100,000 grant from Send Relief in December 2024 in support of a proposed $336,000 project to support households in several South Sudanese refugee camps for six months, said Zach Potts, Empower One’s South Sudan liaison.

With the $100,000 grant, Empower One will support 1,460 households through February, Potts said, providing sorghum, beans and mosquito nets, hopefully helping the families rebuild their lives.

Empower One encourages churches to support outreaches to Sudanese refugees, either through Send Relief or directly through Empower One.

“It’s been forgotten,” he said of the war in Sudan, “and national and international attention is going to Ukraine and Israel. This is not just another small tribal skirmish in Africa. This has impacted well over 10 million people, predominantly mothers and children.”

Send Relief gave $68,000 to Empower One last year for food distributions, Potts said, citing three church plants, 392 professions of faith and 173 baptisms among the nearly 20,000 people the money supported with food and nonfood items.

Potts will visit Malakal, South Sudan, in February, he said, for the grand opening of an Empower One church multiplication center, where the ministry will work to train 30 church leaders and plant five house churches every year until Jesus returns.

“The fact that it’s right there in the middle of this refugee situation seems like a good opportunity,” he said.

In the civil war that broke out in April 2023 between the Sudan Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese Armed Forces, President Joe Biden accused the RSF and their allied militias of genocide Jan. 7.

The Biden administration cited systematic murders of men, boys and infants based on ethnicity; targeted rapes and brutal sexual violence against women and girls based on ethnicity; and the targeted murders of innocent civilians fleeing for safety.

Estimated death tolls vary widely in the ranges of tens of thousands. Nearly 700,000 face the worst famine in Sudan’s recent history, and more than 30 million need humanitarian assistance, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in announcing sanctions against the RSF.

Of the estimated 12 million who are displaced, based on numbers from the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, about 1 million of them have sought refuge in South Sudan. There, the U.N.’s 48 aid partners have received only 24 percent of what is needed to adequately serve those in need, the refugee agency said last month.

Preston is thankful for Empower One’s work in South Sudan not only to support refugees, but also train ministers, plant churches and spread the gospel there. He and Habte hope to travel to South Sudan to witness the work, he told Baptist Press.

Todd Condell Hamilton Sr., retired missionary and pastor, died Dec. 17 in Houston. He was 96. He was born Oct. 11, 1928, in Cleveland, Ohio, to Perry E. Hamilton and Adeline Condell Hamilton. He attended Baylor University, where he met his future wife, Doris Winn Hamilton. He later went on to earn a doctorate in education from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He spent the first 15 years of his ministry serving churches in Louisiana before he and his wife answered God’s call to international mission work. He served 27 years at the Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary in Baguio City. As a professor, his teaching focused on preparing men and women for church work, and he also wrote many training materials used by individuals who did not have the opportunity to attend seminary. His ministry in the Philippines also included spending most Sundays visiting small barrio churches, advising and counseling the local pastors. He participated in baptisms in nearby rivers or the South China Sea, taking seminary students and often one of his children with him. When the Hamiltons returned to the United States from the Philippines in 1989, he continued his ministry, serving first as pastor at Southern Hills Baptist Church in Copperas Cove. He also was interim pastor at several Houston area churches, taught part time at the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary extension in Houston, and finally served as the English-language pastor and acting senior pastor of a Chinese congregation. Until his death, he was a frequent volunteer at University Baptist Church, serving in programs such as Vacation Bible School and GriefShare. The last five years, he sang “Happy Birthday” by phone to hundreds of University Baptist Church members on their special day. He was preceded in death by his beloved wife of 65 years, Doris; a sister, Cara Wingert; and a brother, Perry Hamilton. He is survived by son Todd Hamilton Jr. and his wife Carol; son Scott Hamilton and his wife Mendy; daughter Ginger Westley and her husband Michael; daughter Joy Bradbury and her husband Robert; seven grandchildren; 10 great-grandchildren; and one great-great-grandchild. A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Jan. 19 at University Baptist Church, 16106 Middlebrook Drive in Houston, with a reception following in the church’s chapel. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorial gifts to the Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary, mailed to James D. Chancellor, 1230 Garvin Place, Louisville, KY 40203.