By Mike Ebert

ALPHARETTA, Ga. – Moving forward in his mission to shift more Southern Baptist resources to areas of North America with the most widespread lostness, North American Mission Board President Kevin Ezell announced new missionary placements for several states in the northeast United States that have until now lacked a full-time missionary fully funded by NAMB.

“Every state should have at least one full-time missionary before any state has 20,” Ezell told trustees. The new missionaries will serve as church planting catalysts with a goal of assisting with the starting of four churches a year in their states and helping nearby existing churches with evangelism efforts.

His comments came in an address to North American Mission Board trustees who met May 15-16 in Alpharetta.

Michael Lewis, pastor of First Baptist Church of Plant City, Fla., talks with host Larry Wynn about how his church keeps evangelism a priority throughout all of the church's ministries—beginning with a vision that every man, woman, boy and girl in Plant City would have a chance to hear the gospel at least once from someone in the congregation. Wynn is vice president of evangelism for the North American Mission Board.

By Shauna Pilgreen

SAN FRANCISCO – A few years ago, I could sense that something was stirring in my husband’s heart. It was evident in his preaching. I could hear it in his voice. The pieces came together when Ben asked me to pray about church planting. With a deep breath and a wavering trust, I answered him, “I’ll do that. I’ll pray. Give me a few days.”

I began to think about how good we had it. We had a nice home in a safe neighborhood. Ben was in a good situation at the church where we served. The senior pastor was a mentor who poured daily into Ben. We loved our church. Our friends. Our sons were in a great school, and we were within driving distance to family. We even had season tickets to Silver Dollar City! Was God calling us to give all that up? I began to pray.

By Kathy Litton

ALPHARETTA, Ga. – Recently, I had to take a taxi to catch an early morning flight. At the ridiculous hour of 4:15 a.m. the driver was unfortunately quite chatty. After discovering I lead a ministry to pastors’ wives he asked me, with a fair amount of curiosity and skepticism, “Why do pastors’ wives need ministry?”

He had little contact with church culture so I found myself awkwardly grappling for an appropriate reply. It was sort of painful. Finally, he helped me out. “I get cabbies,” he said. Thank you driver, you summed it up for me.

By Adam Miller

ALPHARETTA, Ga. – Having enough missionaries to support the Southern Baptist effort to impact lostness in North America will require more intentional missionary development, Kevin Ezell told viewers of a May 1 live webcast.

Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board, said beginning in 2013, this missionary development system will provide a way for students (high school, college and seminary) interested in ministry to gain experience through summer/semester missions, internships and apprenticeships that will provide hands-on experience in North American missions.