Association helps area Baptists do more

About 40 Baptist churches in Macon and four surrounding counties are part of the Mid-State Baptist Association.

The Rev. Garry Goodin has served the last three-and-a-half years as its executive director — or as is more commonly known, its association missionary.

“I don’t know an exact date, but the association has existed since Baptist churches began agreeing to work together here in the 1800s,” Goodin said. “Basically, the Mid-State Baptist Association is a group of local churches working together to do things they couldn’t do by themselves, such as food ministry. That’s something most churches would like to do but something many churches would find hard on their own. Keep in mind, the average U.S. church has from 60 to 100 or so members and the same is true (of churches) in our association. Some are larger, some smaller. But together they can do some things better than they can apart.”

Food ministry is one thing they do together in the association. Goodin said the Mid-State Baptist Association’s Storehouse Ministries allows partner churches to give food to hungry families and individuals. The ministry gets food through the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Middle Georgia Food Bank programs and through financial and food donations.

It follows USDA guidelines, which means Storehouse volunteers can give food to people with valid photo IDs and Social Security cards. Interested persons call the Storehouse food number, 478-750-9114, and make an appointment to pick up food at the association’s Napier Avenue location on Tuesday mornings.

In the meantime, Goodin said partner churches and their members are busy donating, gathering and sorting food, packing boxes, doing clerical work and accomplishing other unseen chores before a team of 50 volunteers comes each Tuesday “to smile and give boxes away.” He said some churches provide counselors and others send workers to do follow-up visits with anyone who chooses to pray to receive Christ.

“The food ministry is probably a more public face ministry of the association, but there’s a lot more we do,” Goodin said. “Most of our ministry is to churches and church members. We’re here to help new churches start and all our churches — young, small or large — succeed in their mission.”

Goodin said help ranges from use of the association’s copy machine and a bounce house and sound system that can be borrowed for events to its lending library and many training courses to equip pastors and leaders.

“I talk with pastors and leaders every day,” he said. “I talk with established pastors, young pastors, pastors who are planting new churches, youth pastors — all kinds of pastors and leaders. The common thread is to help them, and to help them help one another, to do what God has called them to do. Someone said everyone wins when a leader gets better. My role is to help leaders be better leaders. That’s the most rewarding thing about what I do.”

Goodin, a Florida native, said he has served churches in Florida, North Carolina, Louisiana and Texas as a youth pastor, a college pastor and a lead pastor. He has served the last nine years as an association missionary and came to Macon from Tallahassee, Florida.

Goodin attended college at the University of Central Florida and seminary at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas.

Though he said most churches in the Mid-State Baptist Association would consider themselves part of the Southern Baptist Convention and the Georgia Baptist Convention, he said that’s not a requirement to be part of the association.

“Our requirement is basically agreement with Baptist doctrine, not association with a certain Baptist organization,” Goodin said. “In fact, you don’t even have to be Baptist to come to many of our events or leader’s lunches or training sessions we put on. Or to one of the four pastor’s luncheons we have each month. We have a very broad invitation. It’s important. It’s important for pastors to fellowship, listen to one another and pray for one another. They need opportunities to network and share together.”

Another way Goodin said the association helps churches work together to serve is by being part of construction teams that travel and work throughout the state, nation and world “in the mission field of church construction.”

He said teams, under the name Builders for Christ, build churches and related buildings with volunteers providing labor and paying their own fuel, transportation, food and lodging expenses. Volunteers also work locally with Rebuilding Macon.

“The Bible says we’re to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and to love our neighbors as ourselves,” Goodin said. “The association assists churches in seeing needs in our community and helping to meet them. We partner with other agencies in lots of ways.”

In addition to the Storehouse and Builders for Christ, other services and ministries within the Mid-Sate Baptist Association include leadership roundtables, internships, collegiate ministries, aid to church planters, pastoral and leadership search team training, church visitor feedback ministry and training for Sunday School teachers and small-group leaders.

“Teaching is an important aspect in a church and there are many kinds of teachers,” Goodin said. “Helping teachers be effective is a big thing we do. A quote from 50 years ago says listening is not learning and telling is not teaching. I encourage teachers to bring teaching alive with practical tips and — above all — by having their listeners become doers of God’s word. Why not do what you’re teaching? If it’s loving their neighbor, why not take the class to give food to those in need or cut an elderly person’s grass? You learn by doing and the Christian life is something you do — not something you just know.”

All-in-all, Goodin said the association is something of a repository and a means of networking pastors and churches for service.

“If we had kind of a goal and vision it would come from the question of how can we help churches of all sizes, strengths and weaknesses connect with one another and the community to demonstrate the love of God. How can we help churches be successful and do what they’re each called to do?”