2026 SBC Recap and Shirley Country Church Presentation

What is the SBC?

Structure

Autonomous churches that join together to voluntarily cooperate for the advancement of missions, the training of ministers, and other vital ministries.

SBC is not hierarchical; churches maintain their autonomy whether in the SBC or not.

If SBC churches are autonomous, then why be a part of the SBC?

We can do more when we cooperate together

Many of the ministries central to our beliefs and mission are too expensive, difficult, and daunting for most individual churches to accomplish effectively on their own:

Training, funding, sending, and protecting missionaries

Training ministers (i.e., running a seminary)

Running orphanages, disaster relief programs, ERLC, etc.

Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a program where Baptist churches of like faith could cooperate together to fund and oversee such ministries, while maintaining their autonomy?

The Cooperative Program

The Cooperative Program is Southern Baptists’ voluntary giving program where SBC churches pool their financial resources to support state, national, and international ministries.

When we take up an offering, we send a portion of our offerings out beyond our church to the Cooperative Program. That money is split almost 50/50 between our Arkansas Baptist Cooperative Program for ministries here in Arkansas, and the national level SBC Cooperative Program. I’m not going to talk about the Arkansas Cooperative Program right now—we can talk about that in October after the Arkansas Baptist State Convention happens.

Of the money that we send to the SBC Cooperative Program, here’s how that money gets used:

CP Heart Chart

We as SBC churches, vote and determine how the money that is sent to the CP gets used. So, the SBC doesn’t have authority over us as a local church, we actually have authority over the SBC and instruct them how to use the money that we send to the Cooperative Program.

8% of our budget funds the CP

How do we tell the SBC how to use the money? Through our voting processes at the Annual Meeting of the SBC.

Annual Meeting Recap

2026 Annual Meeting in Orlando, FL

11,692 Voting Messengers

5,785 Non-voting Guests

4,018 Churches Represented

3,667 Exhibitors

Total: 21,144 people in attendance

Purpose:

As a display of unity/solidarity in worship

To approve the budget

Hear updates from SBC Entities (IMB, NAMB, ERLC, EC)

Commission new missionaries

Give time for messengers to make motions/pass resolutions

Elect new officers to SBC Entities

Significant Items of Business

You’ve probably heard a lot about this first one in the media and on social media. Most of what you’ll hear in those spaces are either inaccurate or terribly biased and misleading.

The “Truth in Unity” Amendment, Albert Mohler

Al Mohler is the president of SBTS, and was a key voice in the conservative resurgence of the 1990’s. He was also one of the authors of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000.

The “Truth in Unity” Amendment, Albert Mohler:

A church shall be considered in friendly cooperation with the Southern Baptist Convention that: ‘6. Does not act to affirm, appoint, or endorse a woman serving in the office or function of a pastor/elder/overseer, such as preaching to the assembled congregation.’”

This is not a new belief, it is already reflected in our statement of faith, the Baptist Faith and Message, and churches have already been removed from the SBC for violating it.

Baptist Faith and Message 2000, VI. The Church: “While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor/elder/overseer is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”

So, this is not a new belief, this has always been the understanding of the majority of Baptists throughout our history. This simply amends the constitution so that it is more binding. This constitutional amendment does not strip churches that violate it of their building, their right to worship as they see fit, or anything. If a church violates this, they simply lose the privilege of exercising influence upon SBC entities through voting and such, as they rightly should. Churches must agree to abide by the constitution and beliefs of the SBC in order to participate in it. We have to have a common set of beliefs and procedures in order to govern our cooperation if we’re going to cooperate with other churches to plant churches and do missions. That’s what this is about. We desire unity, but unity must be rooted in the truth of Scripture.

This constitutional amendment has to be ratified again at the 2027 Annual meeting in Indianapolis by a ⅔ majority in order to take effect.

Mohler’s amendment was passed with a 75% majority. That’s a pretty overwhelming majority, which tells me that, on the whole, the SBC is pretty solidly united on this point.

Beware of what you read in the news on this. If you have questions about it, please talk to me, don’t just trust whatever you read online. I’ll make time later in our business meeting and afterwards if you have questions or concerns about this or anything else from the Annual Meeting.

Elections

SBC President Elect:

Willie Rice, Pastor of Calvary Church, Clearwater, FL

SBC Vice Presidents Elect:

1st VP: Craig Carlisle, AL

2nd VP: Allen Murray, NC

Disability Ministry

Task Force appointed by messengers last year brought its report

Disabled individuals often struggle to feel welcomed in church. Churches often lack the training, resources, staff, and facilities to serve them well.

2 in 7 families have an individual with a disability, but that is not reflected in church attendance.

SBC Messengers approved a recommendation from the task force to create resources through Lifeway and our seminaries.

State of the SBC (2025)

46,608 Churches (-268 from 2024; -0.57%)

12,331,954 Members (-390,312 from 2024; -3.07%)

These stats don’t tell the full story and always lag behind baptisms and weekly attendance.

263,075 Baptisms (+12,432 from 2024; +5%)

Graph of Baptisms

5 consecutive years of growth in baptisms; first time in 75 years!

4,460,910 Avg. weekly attendance (+3.63%)

International Mission Board (IMB) Report

New missionaries sent this year: 63

Foreign missionaries: >3,500 (plus 3,600 MKs)

Heard a portion of a gospel presentation: 1.6 million people

Had an opportunity to respond to Christ: >795,000

New believers: ~145,000

Baptized: >68,000

New churches planted: >2,400

Received some discipleship training: >282,000

Leaders trained: >84,000

North American Mission Board (NAMB) Report

NAMB missionaries: 2,898

Churches Planted: 792

Chaplains: 3,094

Gospel Presentations: >109,000

Professions of Faith: >19,000

Baptisms: >2,700

Seminary Reports

Six SBC Seminaries funded by the CP (All give 50% off discount to SBC members):

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (Louisville, KY)

Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (Fort Worth, TX)

Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (Kansas City, MO)

Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (Wake Forrest, NC)

New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (New Orleans, LA)

Gateway Baptist Theological Seminary (Ontario, CA)

SBTS has added an online PhD program and maintains a full campus of on-campus students.

MBTS has exploded with growth in recent years, as has SEBTS

While other mainline seminaries are struggling, declining, and even closing, all six SBC seminaries are doing extremely well.

Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (TEDS) in Chicago, one of the most famous and prestigious seminaries in America, is closing.

“In the 1980s, [Princeton Theological Seminary] enrolled about 900 students, but as of Fall 2023, the seminary enrolls approximately 276 FTE students.” (For comparison, the smallest of the six SBC seminaries, Gateway, had 530 FTE students that same period and the largest three SBC seminaries each had over 1,800 FTE students.)

SBC seminaries have a combined total of over 25,000 students between the six schools

All six SBC seminaries are in the top 10 largest seminaries (by head-count). SBC seminary students account for almost 20% of all seminary students in the US.

(https://www.logos.com/grow/hall-top-seminaries-by-enrollment/)

All six SBC seminaries are firmly committed to conservative Baptist doctrine.

North Central Baptist Association (NCBA)

Not under the SBC in any way, doesn’t receive Cooperative Program funding. We give directly to the NCBA.

Examples of NCBA ministries: The Worship Initiative, Local Conferences, Weekly Pastor’s prayer meeting, Shirley Country Church Plant.

Key Takeaways:

Baptisms and Church attendance are on the rise!

The SBC is doctrinally strong.

The SBC Seminaries, mission agencies, and other entities are doing well.

SBC Membership remains a concern. Pray for deeper engagement amongst church attendees.

CP Giving is strong, but inflation has reduced the value of dollars given.

Pray for our missionaries.

Thank God for the opportunity to be a part of advancing his Kingdom!

Prayer

Earlier I mentioned the North American Mission Board (NAMB), and talked about how they do church planting and evangelism efforts here in the USA. In fact, if you were part of our evangelism training class, the Three Circles Method and the resources I got to teach that were from NAMB.

Well, today, we have a special treat. Instead of hearing me talk about NAMB, you’re going to get to see precisely what NAMB does. Ty and Theresa Hervey are here with us this morning, and Ty is going to come now and give us some information about the church that they’re going to be planting soon in the Shirley area. So, please welcome him as he comes and shares about their ministry this morning, and please be thinking and praying about how you and our church might be able to help them in this local mission project!