October 13, 2026
GIBSON, Ga. — Fellowship Baptist Church in Gibson has more than doubled its Sunday attendance in the past year, and Pastor Jonathan Rosier says much of the spiritual energy is coming from teenagers who returned from summer camp determined to share the gospel.
The 226-year-old church has grown from about 85 on Sunday mornings a year ago to an average of 220.
Rosier, Fellowship’s bivocational pastor since 2025, said the church had been praying for God to work.
“We were diligently praying and asking the Lord to do something, and He did it,” he said.
Folks had been trickling in over the last year, but Rosier knew the Lord was up to something when young people from the church returned from Centrifuge Camp at Erskine College in Due West, South Carolina, on fire for the Lord.
Seventy-two young people from two churches attended the camp, about half of them from Fellowship. Among the group were 35 decisions, including rededications and first-time professions of faith.
“I've seen kids come back on a high from camp, and unfortunately it'll last a month or so, and then it kind of dwindles off. That's how it happens more often than not,” Rosier said. “But these kids have still not come down. They're still going.”
That was two months ago.
The enthusiasm has followed them back to school. Glascock County, a rural, tight-knit farming community halfway between Milledgeville and Augusta, has approximately 3,000 residents, including about 680 in Gibson. The county is small enough that its students attend school in one building, Rosier said.
“These kids all interact with each other every day,” he said. “They went to camp together. They got on fire for the Lord together.”
A local teacher who attends Fellowship told Rosier she had seen several teenage boys sitting together in the lunchroom reading the Bible and students sharing the gospel in the hallways.
That same energy was evident during the church’s Aug. 9-13 revival.
“The first two rows of the church every single night were all teenagers. Not a single adult told them to sit there,” Rosier said. “Bibles open, notebooks in hand, taking notes, marking verses, and interacting with the preacher. They were locked in and engaged every night.”
About 200 people attended each night, Rosier said, with teenagers making up roughly a quarter of the crowd. Some attendees had to sit in overflow seating in the fellowship hall.
“We had kids coming in there in football uniforms and softball uniforms,” he said. “They were leaving practice early.”
Rosier said people from several generations responded during the revival.
“I stood there a lot of nights and wept standing at an altar because I couldn't believe what I was witnessing and getting to take part in,” he said.
There were two professions of faith and three rededications during the revival.
Rosier said he has experienced powerful movements of God before, but never anything quite like what he saw that week.
“There were people in the altar I would have never imagined getting up out of the seat,” he said.
Tim Batchelor, associational mission strategist for the Kilpatrick and Hephzibah Baptist Association, has watched Fellowship change over the years. He said it was one of the first churches where he spoke after becoming strategist 17 years ago. At the time, only 12 to 14 people were attending regularly.
Batchelor said Fellowship grew steadily under retired Pastor Tommy Harwell and that Rosier has been a good fit for the congregation, allowing it to retain its unique culture while investing his energy and heart in outreach.
“Over the years, they have cultivated a spirit of prayer and have avoided conflict that has so often wounded the witness and ministry of many churches,” Batchelor said. “As a result, the church has become a haven for folks who have been hurt.”
Fellowship draws people from Gibson, nearby Mitchell and Edgehill, and surrounding areas. Rosier said there are many unchurched people in the area.
Much of the church’s recent growth has included young families. The average age of attendees is between 30 and 50, and Rosier said reaching children and teenagers is a priority.
The church has thriving youth and children’s ministries on Sunday nights. Rosier, 30, said churches must fight for children, some of whom do not have a safe place at home, disciple them, and teach them that there is hope in Christ.
“We've got to operate in just as much excellence in running our youth ministry as we do running a Sunday morning worship service,” he said.
Fellowship recently added a Sunday night adult discipleship class so parents can also be discipled while children and teenagers are in their own ministries.
“Bring the adults in there, let them sit in the back of the sanctuary, let them be part of that worshiping to music,” Rosier said. “And then when the teens go to their small groups, I take the adults to the fellowship hall.”
Rosier said making young families a priority has been central to Fellowship’s growth.
The young people are also showing the rest of the church that loving and studying the Word is something to embrace openly, he said. They raise their hands in worship, sing at the top of their lungs, and share the gospel wherever they go.
“I don't care who's looking. I love my God, and I'm gonna worship Him,” Rosier said.
He said someone later told him he had seen young people from the revival at a gas station at 11 p.m. telling people about Jesus.
“God showed up and showed out that week,” Rosier said.
The growth is also creating practical challenges. Fellowship has plans to build a new sanctuary and fellowship hall.
“We're trying to move as quick as we can without getting out ahead of God, but God is way out ahead of us now,” Rosier said.
For Rosier, however, the goal is not simply to accommodate more people. He hopes the spiritual hunger he has seen among the church’s young people will continue and spread throughout the community.
“There’s children, teenagers, and young people in the community that need to be reached for the Lord and need to know that there's hope in Christ,” he said. “As long as we still have breath in our lungs, we still have a purpose for the kingdom. There's still work to do.”
Rosier pointed to Galatians and its call not to grow weary in doing good.
“In due time,” he said, “you will reap a harvest.”
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