IN FOCUS Keep the faith

At abbreviated Annual Meeting, churches urged to press on

Decatur | The soulful notes of a saxophone started the 114th Annual Meeting of the Illinois Baptist State Association, a familiar tune drifting through the sanctuary doors at Tabernacle Baptist Church. Holy, Holy, Holy!

Lord God Almighty.

Worship pastor Chris Gregg played the 1861 hymn—a reminder of God’s sovereignty over the earth. Over his people. Over a pandemic.

“2020 is not the year that we imagined,” said IBSA Vice President Heath Tibbetts. The pastor of First Baptist Church in Machesney Park presided over the Annual Meeting with President Sammy Simmons in quarantine due to possible exposure to COVID-19.

Outside, messengers had their temperatures checked before entering the building. When they greeted friends—some they hadn’t seen in months—hugs were replaced with elbow bumps. Decals on the floor reminded meeting attenders to social distance. One item in the giveaway bag was a cloth face mask.

The 2020 Illinois Baptists gathered in Decatur weren’t the first to meet during a pandemic. The 1918 Annual Meeting was postponed twice before Baptists finally met, despite the ongoing Spanish flu pandemic. Notes from that meeting refer to the disease not by name but only as “the pestilence.”

Their pandemic had a different name, Tibbets said, but the effects and the feelings are the same.

So is the determined reliance on God displayed by Illinois Baptists then and now. “Pivot and Persevere” was the meeting’s theme, chosen to reflect the strategy shifts required in 2020 and the faithfulness of Illinois Baptists to stay on mission. But another theme emerged during the 4-hour meeting: the power of family encouragement.

The joy of being together, especially after months apart, was evident in the hallways even as attenders tried to keep their distance. It was apparent at a cookie break hosted by IBSA’s camps, where friends briefly pulled down their masks to eat and chat. And you could hear it during worship. Attendance was lower than in recent years, but the singing seemed louder. Led by an enthusiastic group of Illinois Baptist worship leaders, the crowd declared Christ’s victory over death. They sang about living hope.

Nothing has happened that is a surprise to God, Tibbetts said. “And whether we know it or not, he has prepared us for this challenge.”

Caution and confidence

At Tabernacle Baptist Church in Decatur, specially created floor decals reminded Annual Meeting attenders to socially distance.

Despite challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 meeting proceeded as a 4-hour, one afternoon event Nov. 4, with the theme “Pivot and Persevere.”