By Lane Corley, Louisiana Baptists church planting strategist
The Georgia Barnette State Missions Offering is one of our best tools for planting the next generation of churches in Louisiana, and I have benefited from the GBO as a church planter myself.
The Georgia Barnette Offering allows us to offer free training to all our church planters which helps strategy development. It also can provide anywhere from 10 percent to 25 percent of an initial startup budget of a new church plant over the course of about three years.
A lot of times that makes the difference in whether a church planter or sponsor church says, “Yes, we can do this project” or “We need to wait.”
With the urgency of the moment for people to be saved in our state, this is a great tool to help churches say, “Yes,” and church planters to say, “Yes,” to planting churches and sharing the Gospel.
Named for the first executive director of the Woman’s Missionary Union, the Georgia Barnette Offering’s annual Week of Prayer is set for Sept. 10-17. The theme for this year is “Why Wait, For They Are Ready” inspired by John 4:35. This year’s offering goal is $1.7 million.