November 9, 2026
WARNER ROBINS, Ga. — Vance Pitman challenged Georgia Baptists Sunday night to seek a movement of God through prayer, obedience to Scripture, and a focus on advancing God’s Kingdom rather than simply growing individual churches.
Pitman, founder and president of Vance Pitman Ministries and a national mobilizer with the North American Mission Board, delivered the opening-night message of the 204th Georgia Baptist Convention Annual Meeting at Second Baptist Church in Warner Robins, preaching from Acts 14:19-23.
His message tied into this year’s “WIDE OPEN” theme, drawn from 1 Corinthians 16:9: “for a wide door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many adversaries.”
Pitman said he longs to see God move in this generation as He has in other places and times.
“I don’t want to just read about it in history,” he said. “I don’t want to just study it in seminary. I don’t want to just watch movies about where it’s happened in other places. I want to see God in our day, in our generation.”
Pitman said Paul’s experience in Acts 14, where he was stoned and dragged out of the city, shows that Christians should expect opposition when they move beyond the walls of the church to engage people with the gospel.
“When we seek God together for movement, you better know we have a real enemy,” Pitman said.
But even in the face of that opposition, Pitman said, Paul returned to the work of preaching the gospel and making disciples.
Pitman said the church’s response must begin with prayer.
“When you read the book of Acts, 26 times in 28 chapters you find the church praying,” he said. “They didn’t pray to open their meeting and close their meeting. Prayer was their meeting.”
Pitman said strategies and resources have their place, but they cannot replace dependence on God.
“I think the church in North America needs to remember again that apart from God, we are hopeless and we are helpless,” he said. “Prayerlessness is our declaration of independence from God.”
Pitman recalled the early days of planting Hope Church in Las Vegas, where his family moved 25 years ago.
Before launching the church, the team spent six months prayer-walking 50,000 households, surveying 20,000 of them, and praying through names in the Las Vegas phone book.
“We so knew that if God’s not God, we’re sunk,” Pitman said.
He said Hope Church recently celebrated its 25th anniversary and had baptized 564 people this year.
“For 25 years, man, we rode a wave of the favor of God in response to the prayers of His people,” he said.
Pitman then turned to the pattern of the early church.
“Our mission is not new,” he said. “Our mandate has not changed.”
He said the early church centered its work on the Kingdom of God rather than making missions one department among many.
“The goal was never to just grow a church,” Pitman said. “The goal was to see the Kingdom of God expand in cities and nations all over the world.”
Pitman pointed to Acts 14, where Paul and his companions preached the gospel in a city, made disciples, and appointed elders in churches.
"They didn’t start with a church service. They started with a city,” he said.
“What if we stopped thinking about ways to grow our church and we started thinking about strategies to engage our cities with the gospel?” he asked.
Pitman pointed to Revelation 5 and John’s vision of people from every tribe, language, people, and nation worshiping Christ.
“If you spend all the energy merely trying to focus on the growth of your church, you’re investing in that which is temporary,” he said. “But if you leverage your church for the expansion of the Kingdom in cities and nations all over the world, now we’re investing in that which is eternal.”
Pitman closed in prayer.
“God, may we embrace a biblical strategy,” he prayed. “May we be about engaging cities with the gospel and seeing disciples made and churches multiplied.”
“Lord, we ask You to open the door for Georgia wide open, that Your Kingdom may come, Your will may be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
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