Nate Adams started calling us “the big Baptist family” more than a dozen years ago. That’s how he thinks of the local church family. As he traveled the state visiting churches of all types and sizes, he met his family in all of them. And it’s a BIG family.
From those trips, he often returned to the IBSA Building in Springfield telling stories about people he met, and so many that he already knew. He often spoke of all these people as family.
It’s time for the family to gather again.
When messengers meet up for Thrive ’25, the IBSA Annual Meeting at the Crowne Plaza in Springfield Nov. 4-5, there will be many reasons to celebrate.
As with all Southern Baptists in 2025, we will mark the 100th anniversaries of the two pillars of SBC life, the Cooperative Program and the Baptist Faith and Message, both adopted at the 1925 convention in Memphis.
“The biggest reason for our celebration of this special 100th anniversary year, is that EACH year, our churches’ Cooperative Program giving together helps send and support more than 3,500 international missionaries, start hundreds of new churches, and train thousands of tomorrow’s pastors and leaders through six world-class seminaries,” IBSA Executive Director Nate Adams said.
“And all this Great Commission ministry is united in the sound, biblical doctrines expressed in the Baptist Faith and Message.”
We will also mark the 20th annual family gathering to be led by Adams. He will retire as IBSA Executive Director in early 2026. In addition to presentations and fond remembrances, the dessert reception will be all about pie. (Nate loves pie, so we will all be blessed!)
We may also see the car in which he traveled Illinois on many weekends, often with his wife, Beth, as his chauffeur. (If asked, would you have any idea how many thousands of miles that was?)
Come to Resource Central
With room at the Crowne, we will have an expanded Exhibit Hall, with an earlier opening time (noon on Tuesday). Our advertisers in this Illinois Baptist special section will all be there. Ministry and mission partners will be represented, plus seminaries and colleges. And in the center of it all, come to Resource Central. All the ministry resources of IBSA will be featured, with our staff on hand to offer insight for pastors and church leaders.
The art of leadership is often in asking the right questions. Our IBSA teams are skilled in asking questions that draw out insightful responses. The directors of church revitalization, leadership development (with students, collegiate, and women’s leaders), missions, and church planting will all be there, along with IBSA Camps and Illinois Baptist Disaster Relief.
“We will have multiple tables representing key ministry areas,” Associate Executive Director Mark Emerson said. “There will be examples of resources, information about events and training, and leaders who are leading well in these areas. They are ready to speak with you specifically about how we might assist your church.”
Two Pillars
Our special guest speakers are both from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. President Emeritus Dr. Chuck Kelley was a member of the blue-ribbon committee that revised our denominational statement of faith in 2000. On the platform at the Southern Baptist Convention in Dallas this summer, Kelley was joined by other pastors and theologians who urged doctrinal fidelity in an updated version of the Baptist Faith and Message. Today Kelley writes frequently about keeping the SBC focused on mission and anchored to its biblical moorings, even as we make the transition from one generation to the next.
Dr. Jamie Dew represents that next generation of leaders now at the helm. As Kelley’s successor at New Orleans Seminary, Dew is training young leaders to build on a century of steady support for missions, pastoral training, and gospel advance through the Cooperative Program.
Far from a well-known tune that need not be repeated, the CP song is new to a new generation. It must be rehearsed that it may be embraced. Dew brings new vitality to this call.
Make me a blessing
“Bless!” an Illinois Baptist friend says frequently, having picked up the abbreviated version of “bless your heart.” Well, it’s time to bless again.
As messengers prepare to come to Springfield for the Annual Meeting, their churches are invited to gather supplies for IBSA ministries, pack a box, and send it to the meeting for distribution across Illinois.
This is the fourth year for Boxes of Blessings. Compassion ministries such as Children’s Activity Center in East St. Louis, Pathways Counseling, Grace Haven Pregnancy Resource Clinic and Angels’ Cove Maternity Home in Mt. Vernon, and Baptist Children’s Home residential cottages in Carmi are all blessed by the annual collection.
These facilities need all kinds of supplies, including diapers, wipes, hygiene items to make personal care kits, half-gallon and gallon size Ziplock bags, toboggan style winter hats, gloves, and socks. Lots of socks.
A full list is posted at IBSAAnnualMeeting.org.
“When an item on the list is given to our partners, we are filling their storerooms with items they use to bless others,” said IBSA Missions Director Shannon Ford, who organizes the collection. “Our gifts empower others and are shared hand-in-hand with the gospel.”
More than 700 specially labeled boxes were distributed at associational meetings in September and October to be filled and returned in November. Churches may contact their local association to obtain a Blessing Box to fill.