October 2, 2026
Georgia Baptist churches of every size are seeing people come to faith in Christ, and pastors say the growth is coming not from elaborate programs but from faithful preaching, persistent prayer, personal evangelism, and churches willing to celebrate every baptism as a work of God.
From Ocilla to Manchester, Albany to Dexter, pastors of smaller and normal-size churches say the Lord is at work as congregations embrace a renewed urgency to share the gospel and disciple those who respond.
"The remarkable increase in baptisms across Georgia over the past four years is a testimony to God’s work through local churches," said Steve Foster, the Georgia Baptist Mission Board's evangelism catalyst. "This momentum isn’t driven only by our largest congregations—it is being fueled by faithful, mission-minded pastors and everyday churches of all sizes who are passionately reaching the people in their communities with the Gospel. We’re grateful to see more lives being transformed through Christ each year."
Baptisms at Ocilla Baptist Church, said Pastor Billy Stephens, have jumped from three in 2023 and five in 2024 to 36 in 2025. Attendance also has climbed, Stephens said, with the church now averaging about 270 on Sundays.
Stephens, who has served at Ocilla Baptist since 2018, said the growth has come through years of steady gospel work.
“We just need to be faithful sowers,” Stephens said. “You always reap what you sow, but you never reap when you sow, and you always reap more than you sow.”
That steady sowing has included a growing men’s ministry that meets at 6:30 a.m. on Tuesdays. Stephens said the ministry began with a small group of men and now averages 67 each week for Bible study.
The impact has spread beyond the men who attend. Stephens said that changed lives among men in the church have influenced friends, wives, children, and families.
“There’s no bells or whistles,” he said. “We just teach the word of God, and we invite people into it. And when the word of God changes people’s lives, and the Spirit of God moves, then that’s attractive to people.”
Ocilla Baptist has also worked to build a culture that celebrates baptism. When someone is baptized, Stephens introduces the person and tells the congregation to shout the person’s name. When the person comes up out of the water, the church stands, claps, and celebrates.
“We’re not going to allow the world to outcelebrate what we’re doing because this is more important than any touchdown that’s ever been scored,” Stephens said.
At Macedonia Baptist Church in Manchester, Pastor Mike Jones said the church had no baptisms in 2023, three in 2024, and eight in 2025. On Easter Sunday this year, the church baptized eight people and had 173 in attendance.
Jones said much of the momentum grew out of Who’s Your One and a renewed emphasis on helping church members share the gospel personally.
The church has a strong youth ministry, with 45 to 65 students on Wednesday nights. Jones said youth workers had often sent children to him when they wanted to talk about salvation or baptism. He challenged them to see those moments as opportunities for personal evangelism rather than simply handing them off to the pastor.
“You’re missing one of the greatest blessings of your life if you continually send them to me,” Jones said he told them. “How about doing this yourself?”
Jones began training youth workers in personal evangelism, and the effect began to spread.
“I love getting to share with individuals the greatest news ever told,” Jones said. “But I love to see it when the rest of the congregation gets it. Because when they get it, you’re going to see growth take place in the church.”
Vacation Bible School also helped fuel the church’s evangelistic momentum. Jones said more than 100 children attended VBS last year, and 28 made professions of faith. Not all were from Macedonia, he said, but he contacted their pastors, and about 22 of those children have been baptized.
Jones said the baptisms have energized the congregation.
“They’re pumped up,” he said. “They are so excited about it because they haven’t got to see it in such a long time.”
Pastor Dean Long at Liberty Baptist Church in Albany is seeing signs of renewal in a church working through transition. Long, a bivocational pastor, came to Liberty after the former pastor died. The church had two baptisms in 2024 and six in 2025.
Long said he has emphasized practical discipleship, calling the church to love God, love neighbors, love one another, and apply faith in everyday life. The church also has increased its emphasis on prayer and started Gathering at the Table, a monthly meal and fellowship time after morning worship on the first Sunday of each month.
The church has faced challenges, including the loss of its pianist and worship leader. But Long said one man stepped up to help and told him, “I’ve been sitting in the pew for 15 years, but since you’ve come, I’m not a pew sitter anymore. I’ve been challenged to be a functional member of the body of Christ.”
Long also pointed to the baptism of a man who wandered into Liberty one Sunday after visiting two other churches whose services had already started. After the service, Long met him at the back door.
The man was shaken and had tears in his eyes.
“Everything you said was for me,” the man told Long.
Long had wrestled that morning with changing the message he had planned to preach. He did not preach the sermon he originally intended and later said he was thankful he listened to the Holy Spirit. The man was saved and baptized.
Long said he has tried to be transparent in his preaching, telling members he is preaching to himself as well. The church recognizes the urgency of revitalization, he said, and is eager to grow and change.
The past several years at Dexter Baptist Church, Pastor Jeremiah Sluss said, have been a lesson in sowing seed and waiting on God’s timing.
Dexter saw eight baptisms in 2023 and seven in 2024. After a slower stretch in 2025, Sluss said the church has seen nine baptisms and 11 people join the church over the last six months.
“What we have seen over the last few years, especially this last year, is that we are getting out of God’s way,” Sluss said. “There has been more of an emphasis on simply preaching the Word, being faithful to the Word, and letting the Holy Spirit work in hearts.”
Sluss said the church has emphasized fellowship, encouragement, and a family-like culture where believers live life together. He said the church has tried to move away from a “me” mindset and stay focused on a “we” mindset.
Dexter also has focused on teaching members to take the gospel with them wherever they go. Brad Marchman of the Georgia Baptist Mission Board has provided evangelism training sessions at the church, helping members see that people are not saved only during Sunday morning worship.
“They are saved at home, at the workplace, over a cup of coffee, as they take the Gospel with them and share it,” Sluss said.
Prayer has played a key role. At Wednesday night prayer meetings, Dexter uses a dry-erase board to list prayer requests and the names of lost people. When someone whose name is on the board is saved, that person's name is erased as a visible sign of answered prayer.
The church also has sought to serve outside its walls by helping widows, serving meals, cleaning yards, doing landscaping, cutting trees and limbs, and visiting homes.
One of the most significant developments came through Pablo and his wife, Lynda. Pablo is from Honduras, and Lynda is from Mexico. Sluss said Dexter had not previously seen much diversity, but the church came alongside Pablo during a medical journey and baptized him last October.
Pablo died a little more than a month after his baptism, but Sluss said God used his life and funeral to open doors for gospel ministry among Hispanics in the community. Dexter now has a bilingual service and has seen Hispanics attend, accept Christ, be baptized, join the church, and begin serving.
Sluss said another baptism that affected the congregation was Brock, a man who had served at Dexter and even taught Sunday school. Brock had believed he was saved and baptized as a child, but after hearing a sermon online, he became convicted that he had never truly repented of his sin and trusted Christ.
Sluss said Brock’s story opened eyes in the church.
“I fear there are many people sitting in churches each Sunday, just like Brock, who think they made a decision, know all the right church things to do and say, but have never truly been saved,” Sluss said.
Across the four churches, the pastors described different methods and different contexts, but the common themes were clear: preach the Bible, pray by name, equip members, celebrate baptisms, and keep the focus on people who need Jesus.
"The encouraging increase in baptisms across Georgia reminds us that churches do not need large budgets or complicated programs to make an eternal impact," said Foster. "The churches seeing people come to Christ have created a culture of evangelism—praying for lost people by name, equipping believers to confidently share the gospel, and intentionally inviting others to church while sharing the life-changing story of what Jesus has done in their own lives. When God’s people live on mission every day, God continues to change lives."
For Sluss, seeing people baptized changes the spiritual atmosphere of a church.
“A fire will spread with a little wind,” he said.
When people are saved and baptized, Sluss said, the church begins to look outward instead of inward. Small matters fade, and the need to get the gospel to unsaved people becomes clearer.
Stephens expressed a similar conviction. He said the story at Ocilla Baptist should not be about him, but about Jesus and the power of the gospel.
“We are just so thankful,” Stephens said. “I know that the gospel changes lives, and so we’re just trying to be distributors of the gospel. That’s it.”
“These stories are a reminder that every Georgia Baptist church has a mission field right outside its doors,” said GBMB Executive Director Thomas Hammond. “Whether a church averages 50, 150 or 500, the call is the same: make disciples, share the gospel and trust God for the harvest. I am grateful for pastors and congregations who are faithfully sowing gospel seed in their communities.”
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