The theme for the 2015 annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention in Columbus, Ohio, will be “Great Awakening: Clear Agreement, Visible Union, Extraordinary Prayer,” according to SBC President Ronnie Floyd.
Floyd, pastor of Cross Church in Springdale, Arkansas, requested that the Committee on Order of Business commit the entire Tuesday evening session to a time of prayer and worship.
“Can you imagine the impact of Southern Baptists coming together in clear agreement and visible union at one place at one time?” he asked during the committee’s meeting in Nashville on September 24.
“It will be an amazing thing for God’s people to unite in extraordinary prayer for revival and spiritual awakening,” he said.
Defining “extraordinary prayer,” Floyd said, “Whatever your ordinary prayer is like, just do a little more—that’s extraordinary.”
Drawing from Jonathan Edwards’s 1747 book, An Humble Attempt to Promote Explicit Agreement and Visible Union of God’s People, in Extraordinary Prayer, for the Revival of Religion and the Advancement of Christ’s Kingdom on Earth, which some revivalists believe helped spawn the First Great Awakening in America, Floyd has issued a “Call to Columbus,” challenging Southern Baptists to converge on Columbus to transact the business of the Convention and to engage in the “most important business of all”—beseeching “the throne of grace for revival and spiritual awakening.”
The annual meeting schedule will follow the Tuesday evening format of the previous two years. No other business will be presented or discussed, according to committee chairman Andrew Hebert, pastor of Taylor Memorial Baptist Church in Hobbs, New Mexico.
“I believe the annual meeting in Columbus will be a milestone in the life of the SBC,” Hebert said. “Our time together will be laser-focused on prayer, awakening, and the mission to which God has called us.
“The meeting will climax with a Tuesday night national prayer gathering of Southern Baptists for the next Great Awakening led by our president, Dr. Ronnie Floyd. If you are a Southern Baptist or any other believer who cares about the future of the church, our nation, and reaching the world for Christ, you will not want to miss this,” he said.
Julio Arriola, global worship pastor at Cross Church, will lead in worship. The 2015 annual meeting will be June 16–17 in Columbus, Ohio.
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