DALLAS – After sharing some of the results the North American Mission Board (NAMB) had seen over the previous year in an earlier presentation, NAMB president Kevin Ezell spent time during his Wednesday afternoon report to Southern Baptist messengers highlight the individuals and teams who make NAMB’s ministry possible.
“Pastors, your churches are making a real difference for the better in millions of lives,” said Ezell. “We have so much to be thankful for at the North American Mission Board in what we’ve seen God do this past year … Today, I would like to tell you what we are doing by sharing some of the people who make it happen.”
NAMB exists to serve pastors and churches, Ezell said, and aims to produce resources that support the work churches do to reach their communities, raise up disciples, and send out missionaries.
“Our number one resource is the incredible people that God has allowed us to assemble on the NAMB team,” Ezell said. “Over 6,000 missionaries and chaplains are on the front lines of that, and we are grateful for how they serve, sacrifice, and faithfully share the gospel every day.”
While some of NAMB’s staff are forward facing in the work of speaking, teaching, and training, Ezell acknowledged and thanked the others who “are behind the scenes” upholding the infrastructure that makes possible NAMB’s work that “supports and multiplies the efforts of pastors and churches as they evangelize, plant churches and compassionately minister throughout North America.”
“This is a 5-star team, and I am honored to lead them and serve with them,” Ezell said. “Each has an amazing heart for Christ, and I am privileged to call them my friends.”
Tim Dowdy serves as NAMB’s vice president of evangelism and served 37 years as a pastor before coming to NAMB, where he led one of the top baptizing churches in Georgia. Now, he leads a team comprised of JJ Washington leading the personal evangelism area, Shane Pruitt leads in next gen ministry, and Catherine Renfro leads in women’s evangelism.
“Tim’s heart is about sharing the Gospel and equipping as many people, pastors, and churches for evangelism as we can,” said Ezell. “He has gathered an incredible team to help with that.”
In the area of church planting, Vance Pitman leads those efforts as president of Send Network, and Ezell referenced the fierce spiritual battle church planting missionaries face in reaching North America.
“We have an incredible group of high-capacity church planters, but the enemy is doing everything he can to destroy these men and their families,” said Ezell. “That’s the reason Vance has gathered and surrounded himself with an incredible group of men who are leading out as we train, equip and sustain your church planters.”
Those leaders include, said Ezell, Bryan Loritts, Matt Carter, Tony Merida, Jose Abella and Travis Ogle.
Ezell thanked last year’s Great Commission Resurgence Evaluation Task Force for their recommendations, saying, “We will never stop searching for ways to make church plants healthier and stronger.”
The previous day, International Mission Board president Paul Chitwood and Ezell shared about Send Relief’s compassion ministry work. In Wednesday’s report, Ezell expressed gratitude for Jason Cox, who leads Send Relief’s international ministry, and Josh Benton, who leads national ministry.
“It is one of my great joys to see how NAMB and IMB have come together to see the compassion ministry footprint of Southern Baptists expand to have a worldwide impact,” Ezell said.
Doug Carver, a retired two-star Major General who served as Chief of Chaplains in the U.S. Army, now serves as the executive director of NAMB’s chaplaincy team, which oversees more than 3,000 chaplains.
“Doug served all over the world during his military days but now has a heart to build, equip and encourage the largest Protestant team of chaplains in the world,” Ezell said. “Doug has raised the standard of training and equipping to a quality we have never seen in Southern Baptist life.”
A few years ago, Trevin Wax joined NAMB’s team to facilitate the resources team and raise the level of the training materials and content designed to equip missionaries and churches to reach North America with the Gospel.
“He is one of the greatest minds, one of the greatest thinkers in evangelical life today,” said Ezell. “Trevin is not just a gift to Southern Baptists, he’s a gift to the entire Church. And no one is more committed to Southern Baptists. He knows our faith family, and he cares deeply about the future of this Convention.”
Serving alongside those leaders is humbling as they all come together to serve pastors and churches, Ezell said, and many more work behind the scenes to serve Southern Baptists.
Over the years, Southern Baptists have given more than $2 billion dollars to the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering. In 2024, Southern Baptists gave a record $74.7 million to the offering, and Ezell thanked attendees for faithfully giving to support missionaries throughout North America.
“That’s not just generosity. It’s conviction in action,” said Ezell. “I believe God is stirring something. The harvest is still abundant. But we need more workers. More planters. More pastors. More college students willing to go. More churches willing to send.”
In conclusion, Ezell encouraged pastors and the other church leaders in attendance not to rest in the work.
“Let’s not coast on a century of faithfulness. Let’s build on it. Let’s be bold. Let’s be urgent, and let’s be unified,” Ezell said. “Thank you for praying, for giving, for going, and for sending.”
After the report, Jordan Nelson of Morningview Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala., and Luke Holmes of Immanuel Baptist Church in Duncan, Okla., brought questions to Ezell.
Nelson asked about the compatibility of multisite churches with the doctrine of local church autonomy, and Ezell described churches with multiple sites as a single church with distinct church services in multiple locations.
The previous year, the Great Commission Resurgence Evaluation Task Force had brought recommendations to NAMB. Holmes asked Ezell about NAMB’s response to those recommendations, and Ezell thanked the task force again for its work, said that NAMB had considered how best to implement the input from the task force.