Chris Martin

Executive Director/Treasurer – Chris Martin HPBC 2021 Annual Meeting Report for November 2020 – November 2021

Congratulations on 79 years of cooperative gospel ministry across Hawaii, the Pacific, and Asia!

Mahalo to you, Hawaii Pacific Baptists, for allowing me the honor and privilege of serving you as your Executive Director/Treasurer for the past eight years. As of January 1, 2022, begins my ninth year, Wendy and I remain humbled at the marvelous things Christ is doing in us and through us together. My prayers are that our sharpened focus on the gospel and our efforts toward biblical unity will propel us into the year ahead. Together, we are much more able to accomplish God’s Kingdom works laid out before us to fulfill. In these Kingdom plans, we must give our very best efforts.

In following through with plans and schedules, 2021 proved to be equally daunting as 2020. Yet, across our network of churches, God has been faithful through the challenges we faced. This past year, we experienced victories while enduring sufferings. However, through each circumstance, God allowed us the grace to persevere and remain true to his plans without compromising or quitting on his unique designs. His powerful presence led us to continue to search for creativity and authenticity as we rose to the obstacles ahead, knowing that He would be more than sufficient for our strength.

Although we may continue to battle with pandemic-based issues surrounding us, like lingering unemployment, loss of friends and family, and assorted restrictions, our opportunities for proclaiming the hope of Jesus Christ have never been more needed or pronounced. Our message will always be unchanging, applicable in every situation, rising above the chaos of our nation and the world. The unmerited grace of God flows through the message of salvation in Christ alone for the hopeless in every location, reaching to every corner of our great convention of churches. We have experienced his mercy upon us through the stories of redemption, restoration, and baptisms from churches across the HPBC during the most pressing days of this pandemic. Give God the glory!

Despite the difficulties, God brought several encouraging moves to our convention in 2021. Your HPBC Executive Board diligently developed three initiative areas to enhance and enrich every HPBC church in one of these moves. Through theological, leadership, and missional development initiatives, the Cooperative Program gifts from HPBC churches will directly resource avenues of local church growth and development better than ever before. This strategy comes from a deep-rooted desire for the churches of the HPBC to be empowered to develop self-directed ministries according to God’s leading, without undue influence from others.

We respectfully embrace the involvement of others in assisting our efforts to reach our regions with the gospel of Jesus Christ but not at the expense of the contextualized designs needed to deliver the truths of God’s word in our communities and nations. Through these initiatives, your Cooperative Program dollars will fuel the growth of local leaders, the mobilization of local missionaries, and the placement of local ministry personnel while increasing our support of the national level work of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Together, we will pour into the coming generations to empower pastors, leaders, missionaries, seminary students, lay-leadership, and more to advance the churches and ministries of every Hawaii Pacific Baptist church. Our legacy, spanning the past seventynine years of cooperative work, brought us to this moment in time; the next seventy-nine years will build upon the past with a God-given strength and power from our churches as we have never experienced before. Now is our time to make a difference for God’s Kingdom with a bright, intense view of the future. Give God the glory!

Also, in 2021, God provided additional blessings through our Southern Baptist Convention’s cooperative endeavors on the local, national, and international levels. The HPBC’s standing across the SBC is strong and vibrant in many ways, especially as we engage our communities and territories with the support of our SBC partners. Through renewed relationships with the North American Mission Board, the HPBC stands to move forward in evolving ministry opportunities surrounding our churches, such as homelessness, human trafficking, and multiple social needs. Our partnership with the International Mission Board advances daily with combined church planting, mission outreach, and mobilization efforts. Working in coordination with our SBC seminaries, our local students receive world-class theological training while opening opportunities for the world to gain experience in our unique settings. GuideStone and LifeWay are exploring new ways to resource and support our churches and leaders, pushing past the boundaries of traditional assistance into new and exciting methods. God is at work in opening ways for us to bring the gospel to every element of life throughout our convention. Give God the glory!

As always, your HPBC staff team exists to serve you in pursuing God’s excellent plans for your ministry. Allow us to assist you as God unfolds his direction in your service. As the fully functioning body of Christ, he will use us all together to reveal his will and accomplish his goals. Contact us for anything you may need our support and assistance with as we combine our strengths to fulfill his desires. God is working throughout our churches to bring glory to his name and to exalt the name of Jesus Christ – Give our King the glory!

Please allow me to encourage you as this current season of suffering continues: “For this reason I kneel before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named. I pray that he may grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power in your inner being through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. I pray that you, being rooted and firmly established in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and width, height, and depth of God’s love, and to know Christ’s love that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us — to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” -- Ephesians 3:14-21 (CSB)

Please be in prayer for each other and strive for ways to support each other, knowing that God will bless our unity in Christ, centered in the truth of his word. Blessings to you all. Aloha.