Texas Baptists will honor nine churches at the Baptist General Convention of Texas annual meeting in Frisco for their giving to the Cooperative Program unified missions budget. Five churches will be recognized for top giving in categories based upon church size—Green Acres Baptist Church in Tyler; First Baptist Church in Grapevine; First Baptist Church in Canyon; First Baptist Church in Wheeler; and First Baptist Church in Charlotte. The BGCT will recognize four churches for top giving among ethnic congregations—Cornerstone Baptist Church Killeen in Harker Heights; Chinese Baptist Church in Houston; Iglesia Bautista Stonegate in Alice; and Vietnamese Baptist Church in Houston.
Prestonwood sells satellite campus in Dallas. Four years after announcing bold plans to return to its Dallas roots, Prestonwood Baptist Church of Plano closed its Dallas campus, which is being sold to a nondenominational charismatic megachurch. Robert Morris, founding pastor of the 36,000-member Gateway Church in the Dallas/Fort Worth metropolitan area, announced Oct. 17 the purchase of the campus, its sixth, near I-635 and Hillcrest Road in Dallas. Prestonwood, a Southern Baptist Convention megachurch led by former Southern Baptist Convention President Jack Graham, purchased its Dallas campus in 2011 for a reported $18 million. It held its final service there Oct. 18.
Baylor regents OK golf practice facility. Baylor University’s board of regents approved the first phase of a planned golf practice facility near campus for Baylor’s nationally recognized men’s and women’s golf teams. Regents announced the golf practice facility will be named in honor of Billy Williams and his family of Naples, Fla., who provided a multimillion dollar gift for the project. The practice facility will be located on a 14-acre site on University Parks Drive next to the Willis Family Equestrian Center and will include an on-site practice course, a driving range and a clubhouse. Fundraising for the project is ongoing. In 2013, Williams and his wife, Elaine, provided the lead gift for the Williams Family Soccer and Olympic Sports Center, which opened this fall and houses Baylor’s soccer program and other Olympic sports. They also previously established two endowed athletic scholarships at Baylor.
We seek to connect God’s story and God’s people around the world. To learn more about God’s story, click here.
Send comments and feedback to Eric Black, our editor. For comments to be published, please specify “letter to the editor.” Maximum length for publication is 300 words.