February 9, 2025
Editor’s note: This is one of a series of articles commemorating the 200th anniversary of the Georgia Baptist Convention, which will hold an annual meeting Nov. 13-15 at Warren Baptist Church in Augusta. Congregations can register for the annual meeting here.
AUGUSTA, Ga. – In terms of security, churches have come full circle since the formation of the Georgia Baptist Convention 200 years ago.
It was normal in frontier Georgia for armed sentries to stand watch outside church buildings, always on the lookout for signs of trouble.
“They had a well-defined enemy,” said Charles Jones, a historian and newspaper columnist from Athens. “Today, with all that’s going on, another well-defined enemy has emerged.”
With 23 separate fatal church shootings over the past two decades, including one in Texas that killed 26 people, armed security teams are again the norm at houses of worship.
Lifeway Research, which has kept a running tally on church shootings, said four fatal church shootings have taken place in 2022.
According to a Lifeway survey, 80 percent of Protestant churches now have some type of security measures in place when they gather for worship. And numerous parachurch organizations, including the Georgia Baptist Mission Board, offers security training to church leaders.
Some churches train their own members to provide security. Others hire private security firms or keep armed police officers on site.
Jones said in early Georgia, settlers routinely carried their guns everywhere they went, including to church.
“A congregation of people in one place with no defense would have provided a prime opportunity for attack,” he said.
For that reason, settlers typically built churches in places that provided the longest views possible.
Carl Chinn, a Colorado-based church security expert, said today’s pastors often think the odds are slim that they’ll ever face a security threat.
“They’re absolutely right,” Chinn told Lifeway Research. “But if their congregation does face a serious threat, the odds won’t matter much.”
Jones said Georgia’s early settlers wouldn’t be surprised by security precautions being taken by modern church leaders.
“They lived in an era when you had to be prepared,” he said.
