It’s hard to believe, but this year’s annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSCNC) is only three months away. Planning for this year’s meeting has actually been going on for many months as a group of North Carolina Baptists who make up our Committee on Convention Meetings began meeting in January with convention officers and some convention staff to pray and seek God’s direction for our time together this fall.

It’s hard to believe, but this year’s annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSCNC) is only three months away.

Planning for this year’s meeting has actually been going on for many months as a group of North Carolina Baptists who make up our Committee on Convention Meetings began meeting in January with convention officers and some convention staff to pray and seek God’s direction for our time together this fall.

Through all of the prayerful planning and discussion, the theme of “God’s Great Work” emerged as a central focus for this year’s annual meeting, which will emphasize the Great Commission to go and make disciples and the Great Commandment to love God and neighbor.

I hope many North Carolina Baptists will make plans now to join us for this year’s annual meeting on Monday and Tuesday, Nov. 11-12, at the Joseph S. Koury Convention Center in Greensboro. I look forward to seeing old friends and making new ones at the annual meeting each year, and this year is no exception.

Although we gather together to conduct important and necessary convention business, our annual meetings include rich and moving times of worship, as well as encouragement from God’s Word. This year’s meeting will include a celebration of what God has done and is doing in our state related to church planting. The special church planting celebration on Monday evening will include a time to pray for and commission church planters. In conjunction with the service, state convention President Steve Scoggins, pastor of First Baptist Church of Hendersonville, will preach on the annual meeting theme of “God’s Great Work.”

On Tuesday evening, Ronnie Floyd, the new president and CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention’s (SBC) executive committee will preach during a special worship service designed to equip, encourage, inspire and challenge us in the area of personal evangelism. This service is being developed around the “Who’s Your One?” evangelism initiative and emphasis that’s taking place across the SBC. If you haven’t identified one person in your life who needs to know Jesus, I hope that you will select someone to pray for, share the gospel with and invite them to trust Christ as their Savior and Lord.

During the annual meeting, we will also share an update on the progress that we’ve made in fulfillment of the “impacting lostness through disciple-making” strategy that was implemented in 2014. In addition, the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission will conduct a panel on preventing and responding to sexual abuse in the local church as part of the many breakout sessions that will be offered over the course of the two days in Greensboro.

And don’t forget to come early and attend the annual N.C. Baptist Pastor’s Conference on Sunday and Monday, Nov. 10-11.

You can find more information about this year’s annual meeting and pastors’ conference by visiting ncannualmeeting.org. The site will be continuously updated with additional information between now and the time we meet in November, so be sure to check back regularly for updates.

Again, I hope to see you in Greensboro this November.

“Jesus said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” — Matthew 22:37-39 (NKJV)