Randy C. Davis

By Randy C. Davis
TBC Executive Director

I’ve noticed a growing verbal trend that makes me uncomfortable to the point that it deeply concerns me. Someone will toss out the Cooperative Program’s unofficial motto, “We can do more together than we can do apart,” but with a mildly sarcastic tone. My concern is with the veiled attitude behind the sarcasm that guts the statement of meaning and reduces it to a cliché.

Well, we really can do more together than we can do apart and we’ve got 90 years of history to support the reality of that statement. The success of cooperative giving is a fact, not a cliché.

For 90 years, Southern Baptists have depended on the Cooperative Program to be the financial engine that fuels our Great Commission vision. As a result, together we’ve generously given to extend the gospel around the world. Together, we’ve ministered to millions of the world’s suffering people through benevolence ministries. Together, we’ve prepared untold thousands of ministers for the gospel ministry through Christian education. Together, we’ve seen God accomplish through us more than we could have ever imagined or dreamed. [Read more…]

By Randy C. Davis
TBC Executive Director

Randy C. Davis

I can imagine W.C. and Mildred Golden sitting at a candlelit table over 114 years ago working tirelessly to write letter after letter to Tennessee Baptists. The flicker of light probably danced across the materials spread out before them waiting to be slid into an envelope and sent out with the following day’s mail.

The Goldens wrote hundreds of letters and mailed hundreds of packages containing promotional materials calling Tennessee Baptists to pray for Great Commission work across our state. Can you imagine being so passionate about accomplishing a God-sized vision that you’d be willing to do whatever it took to see the task through? There were no typewriters, no computers, no Facebook accounts or Twitter feeds; just a desire to mobilize Tennessee Baptists to see God’s Kingdom come to Tennessee. [Read more…]

By Randy C. Davis
TBC Executive Director

Randy C. Davis

There’s a homeless man who lives in Chattanooga tucked under a towering overpass. He abused crack cocaine and alcohol. Physically, his life was a wreck and heading for death. Spiritually, he was heading for hell. But about a year ago, someone navigated quarry stones, briar bushes and the threat of personal harm to share the gospel with him.

Today, “Tree Man” Smith is clean and sober, and is a missionary because he is taking the gospel to others ranked among society’s outcasts.

There’s a Mexican man living just south of Knoxville who never read a Bible and never heard the story of Jesus. Actually the only time he really ever heard Jesus’ name was when it was taken in vain. He lived just outside the Bronx, in New York, for more than 20 years, but he heard the gospel on a visit to Knoxville during a neighborhood dinner in a trailer park. Conviction hit hard and grace descended quickly. He was baptized on a rainy July Sunday afternoon in a lake near Oak Ridge. [Read more…]

By Randy C. Davis
TBC Executive Director

Randy C. Davis

There are churches everywhere in Nashville.

Let’s take a ride. For instance, nine large churches sit adjacent to Franklin Road in a two-mile stretch if you drive north from Old Hickory in Brentwood. If you drive south another two or three miles through Brentwood you can add another five large churches, bringing the total to 13 just in that one short stretch. Travel that distance east to west and you can add probably a dozen more. Expand the circle to the greater Nashville area and word is there is easily more than 1,000 churches. It begs the question: Do we really need any more churches?

The short and emphatic answer is … yes! [Read more…]