TOBEY PITMAN, national missionary with NAMB serving in community ministry, living on the North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain. Pre-Katrina was director of the Brantley Center for the homeless near downtown New Orleans. By TOBEY PITMAN New Orleans is an historical, primary missional target for Southern Baptists. This truth has played out in many ways dating all the way back to 1845, the founding year of the SBC. New Orleans was one of three reasons forwarded for creating the Domestic Mission Board (now NAMB). Southern Baptists have loved New Orleans and have made Kingdom investments through church planting, missionary appointments, ministry centers, Associational missions, LBC missions, SBC Annual Meetings and Cross Over Evangelism, a hospital, a seminary, and now disaster response. Katrina served to refocus denominational thought on New Orleans. This is demonstrated in the huge number of volunteers that came immediately and have continued to leave footprints and heart prints here for five years. The incredible amount of money given for Katrina relief through NAMB Disaster Relief is a reliable barometer of how Southern Baptist people felt about New Orleans. In a sense, Katrina reminded Southern Baptists of our roots, our … [Read more...]
Katrina’s volunteers led people to God
By MARILYN STEWART, Regional Reporter NEW ORLEANS – Jose Mathews, pastor of Discipleship Baptist Church in New Orleans East when Hurricane Katrina hit, lost everything in the storm – home, possessions, church. Then things got worse. Before his family had time to process the loss, Mathews suffered a stroke, lost his mother, and then his son. With a faith strengthened through trial, Mathews recognizes that God worked through the storm. Today, Mathews is the pastor of the growing Circle Baptist Church in Baker. “Katrina was the catalyst for moving me from the city I grew up in - a city I said I would never leave - to a city where God was already working,” Mathews said. “I didn’t go looking for God, but found God already at work where he put me.” Volunteers who served in New Orleans after the storm agree with Mathews that while “nobody wanted Katrina,” God has used the storm to change lives and ministries across the nation. A NEW HEART FOR ALASKA Michael Dupree, Rabbit Creek Community Church of Anchorage, Alaska, didn’t understand at first why people didn’t start life over someplace other than New Orleans. After two trips to the city, Dupree came to appreciate the importance of “home.” “Katrina, for me, was a huge eye … [Read more...]
NOBTS: Katrina’s fury; God’s mercies
By GARY D. MYERS, NOBTS Communications NEW ORLEANS (BP)--Many of the visible marks left by Hurricane Katrina five years ago have been washed away by time and hard work, but the impact of the storm continues to affect New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Despite deep pain and challenging circumstances, the seminary community overcame. NOBTS President Chuck Kelley has seen those who went through the storm emerge with a deeper faith in God and an unflinching, stubborn commitment to be witnesses in the city and region. On Aug. 29, 2005, Katrina slammed ashore just east of New Orleans, leaving a path of destruction stretching from New Orleans to Mobile, Ala., and as far north as Meridian, Miss. Initially it seemed that New Orleans escaped the worst of the storm, but multiple levee failures left 70 percent of New Orleans underwater. The seminary was not spared. Sixty percent of campus housing received significant damage. Only two weeks into a new semester, the seminary’s primary task of training ministers was put on hold. Main campus students fled to 29 different states; the faculty was scattered to nine states. The healing process began quickly. Southern Baptists showered the displaced seminary community with financial … [Read more...]
Displaced Catholics find new home with Baptists
By DIANA CHANDLER, Regional Reporter CHALMETTE -- St. Bernard Baptist Church has a mostly new body of believers since Hurricane Katrina, many of them former Catholics displaced from their parishes after the storm. Paul Gregoire, who has led St. Bernard Baptist for nearly 28 years, had baptized 12 former Catholics into the congregation as of August. That’s sizable, considering the church draws about 35 people on Sundays. “Almost everybody is new,” Gregoire said. The church’s aging congregation of about 75 believers was permanently displaced by Katrina. Outside of his family of four, only five others were Baptist when they joined the congregation, which has also drawn Lutherans and Presbyterians. Gregoire is uniquely suited to minister to the group, having converted from Catholicism at age 30. He takes Catholics through the transition by focusing on relationship evangelism and setting a good example. “I want them to have a personal relationship with Jesus,” Gregoire said. “That’s what I was missing as a Catholic was a personal relationship with Jesus. I want them to not depend on me to do worship service.” Gregoire said he is excited about restoring the congregation that is about half its pre-Katrina size. He currently … [Read more...]
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