Above: Mark Croston shares principles from his book ‘Big Results: Black Church Life & Sunday School’ with workshop attendees in a similar conference in Oklahoma City in March.
TULSA—Organizers of the Big Results Conference have big plans for a gathering on Oct. 28-30 at Tulsa, Gilcrease Hills. The Lifeway-sponsored event will focus on the needs of churches serving the African American ministry context. The three-day conference will offer keynotes and breakouts on various topics related to Sunday School growth.
A conference attendee takes notes during the March conference.
The keynote speaker for the event will be Mark Croston, Lifeway national director of Black church ministries. Croston explained that the purpose of the conference is to equip pastors and key church leaders, so they can work together to grow the small group ministries of the church.
“In my work with Lifeway, serving churches across the country, I have found that one thing pastors consistently want is training,” Croston said. “And we provide many training opportunities for them. But often, if the pastor gets the training, it’s hard to get other leaders in the church to benefit from it. The Big Results Conference is an opportunity for pastors to get training and bring their key leaders along with them, so they can also be trained.”
Walter Wilson, African American ministry partner for Oklahoma Baptists, said the conference would offer time for fellowship, worship as well as ministry equipping.
“The African American churches in our state convention are based mostly in Oklahoma City and Tulsa,” Wilson explained. “We wanted to connect the people from our churches in both locations, so that they can fellowship and grow together. Without good leaders, we will never be able to grow our churches.”
Marlon Coleman, pastor of Muskogee, Antioch, and Tiller Watson, who pastors Tulsa, Turn Church, will also bring messages from the Word during the weekend conference.
A night of praise will be observed on Friday evening of the conference. The Oklahoma African American Inspiration of Praise worship band will lead worship in song throughout the gathering.
Breakout topics include Kingdom Agenda, The One Thing, Leading an Effective Women’s Ministry, Big Results Leadership and Big Results Sunday School.
Wilson said churches that want to attend but have financial needs would be reimbursed travel and registration fees.
For more information, to pay the $30 per church registration for the conference and to secure hotel reservations visit oklahomabaptists.org/african-american.
