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‘Crossover Triad’ to kick off SBC annual meeting


ALPHARETTA, Ga.(BP)–Greensboro, Winston-Salem and High Point, N.C., will be blanketed by Southern Baptist volunteers Saturday and Sunday, June 10-11, when “Crossover Triad 2006” comes to the area the weekend before the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Greensboro (June 13-14).

Thousands of volunteers representing hundreds of SBC churches will cover the three-city area, taking the Gospel outside church walls and into the streets. The campaign is jointly sponsored by the North American Mission Board, the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina and the Southern Baptist churches of the Piedmont, Pilot Mountain and Central Triad Associations.

North Carolina’s “Piedmont Triad” area includes about 1.5 million people in Greensboro, Winston-Salem, High Point and the surrounding areas. Geographically, it lies between North Carolina’s mountains and its coast, and is a significant crossroads for national travelers — easily accessed by Interstates 40 and 85.

“Many wonder why –- with the nearly 200 churches and missions in the three cities -– Southern Baptists will plan and execute such an intensive evangelistic effort,” said Don Smith, national coordinator for Crossover. “It’s because more than 200,000 persons in the Triad have no church relationship.”

Crossover is a comprehensive campaign to reach a significant segment of that unchurched population, said Smith, who added that about one-half of North Carolina’s 8 million people are unreached by the Gospel. Another Crossover goal, he said, is to plant 19 new churches in the three-city area.

Crossover events, Smith said, will include witnessing by college students on area campuses; sports clinics designed to teach basketball, baseball and football skills; block parties with food and games, hosted by participating churches; door-to-door witnessing; and “Kindness Explosion”, an effort to present the Gospel through random acts of kindness.

Crossover activities will also include evangelism teams carrying the Christian message to high-crime areas where gangs, drugs and prostitution are common; an international festival to be sponsored by area ethnic churches; the arrival of Christian bikers, who will ride their Harleys into town and share the Gospel; and a rodeo sponsored by a “cowboy church.”

Since Crossover originated during the SBC annual meeting in Las Vegas in 1989, nearly 37,000 persons have prayed to receive Christ during the annual event. Thousands have participated as Crossover volunteers, and dozens of new Baptist churches have been started under the program, Smith said.

In connection with last year’s SBC annual meeting in Nashville, Tenn., Crossover 2005 recorded more than 2,500 professions of faith, recruited almost 7,000 volunteers, and enlisted the support of 243 Tennessee churches.

For additional information about Crossover Triad 2006 or to register as a volunteer, visit www.crossovertriad.org.
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  • Mickey Noah