The North American Mission Board Church Planting and Ministry Center

New Orleans has long been called the “The City That Care Forgot”; we believe that church planting and compassion ministry can change that to “The City That God Transformed!” God is at work here in New Orleans and we are excited about the opportunity for gospel multiplication through church planting, compassion ministries, and student investment in one of the most unreached and broken cities in North America.

Over ten years ago, the North American Mission Board began the Send City initiative focusing resources on large metropolitan areas in North America where there was little gospel presence. With over a million people in the greater New Orleans area, along with incredible diversity both demographically and religiously, New Orleans was chosen to be one of those cities. Over the past ten years, we have seen the Lord use the stewardship that Southern Baptist have entrusted to us to bring people to Christ, plant multiplying churches, and to serve this city through many storms and trials. New Orleans is a hard place to do gospel ministry in, but the Lord has been faithful to use us to expand his kingdom here through the faithful witness of Southern Baptists.

Here in New Orleans, our work consists of three crucial parts. First, through Send Network we seek to help churches plant churches everywhere in our city for everyone. Currently, we have over 20 church plants that have just crossed the five-year mark. Second, through Send Relief we seek to meet human needs in the name of Jesus. We do this through partners like the Baptist Friendship House and disaster relief efforts. Finally, through our evangelism initiative, we help equip churches with resources to help everyday believers live on mission. This goes even further here in New Orleans. Recently, our work has expanded with the opening of our new NAMB Church Planting and Ministry Center. In partnership with NOBTS and Leavell College, we have a state-of-the-art meeting space here on the campus of NOBTS in the Fred Luter Jr. Student Center. In this space, we host a variety of events and conferences for both NAMB and NOBTS such as mission teams, faculty meetings, and even seminary classes. Our space is used to serve churches of the SBC.

At New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, we believe there is no better place to learn and do missions than New Orleans. Students who attend New Orleans will be trained in a post- Christian and cross-cultural context while serving alongside some of the best church planting practitioners in North America. We believe students who are trained and equipped for church planting in New Orleans, can plant churches anywhere in the world.

Contact

nambcenter@nobts.edu


Meet the Team

George Ross

Send Network Regional Director, South Region

NAMB Church Planting Center Director

Sara Michel

Send Network South Regional Specialist

Assistant to George Ross

Ashley Spivey

Send Network South Region Administrator

Hannah-Ruth Ross

Team Assistant, New Orleans Church Planting Center

Jimbo Stewart

NAMB Replant Specialist

NOBTS Adjunct Professor

"Mobilizing local churches as Sending and Supporting churches to plant churches and love the people of New Orleans, believing the gospel has the power to transform a city that care forgot." Church Planting in New Orleans requires long term, strategic partnerships. There are tremendous opportunities to partner in God’s kingdom mission to evangelize the lost, disciple the saved, and plant multiplying churches that will impact New Orleans and the world.

Local Church Plants in the Greater New Orleans Area

  • Jesucristo Para Las Naciones
  • Harvest Church
  • Next Level in Christ Church
  • Garden City Church
  • Iglesia Bautista La Vina
  • Family Church
  • Renew Church
  • Celebration Church- Lower St. Bernard Campus
  • Faith Baptist Church
  • Celebration Church Mandeville
  • Greater New Orleans Chinese Church
  • The Church at Michoud
  • Connect International

Contact

If you are a student looking to join a local church plant please contact:

Ryan Rice, New Orleans Send City Missionary

RRice@namb.net

If you are a student looking to join a local church plant, please reach out to The NAMB Church Planting Center on campus or contact one of the local plants directly


Meet the Team

Ryan Rice

Send City Missionary, New Orleans

Ben Beland

Send City Team Assistant, New Orleans

Mission

Send Relief is the compassion and mercy ministry arm of the North American Mission Board. Our goal is to equip churches to meet needs, providing an opportunity to build relationships and change lives by communicating the truth of the Gospel. We serve New Orleans by mobilizing teams to serve local partners and churches, and by providing ongoing support to ministries across the city focusing on areas such as poverty, human trafficking, refugee and international ministry, foster care and adoption, healthcare, and local community partnership.

Ways to Partner

  • Get plugged in serving through a local partner such as Baptist Friendship House, Crossroads, or Baptist Community Health Services. Local ministries need local church partners – consider mobilizing a consistent volunteer or giving partnership from your church through Send Relief and a local ministry.
  • Schedule a mission trip. Find more information and trip availability here. Our trip options include both Vision Trips (a 1-3 day trip to get a taste of NOLA ministry and discover how you can take the next step in partnership) and Mission Trips (a 4-6 day trip with hands-on work serving local churches and ministries). The goal of all our trips is that participants would be challenged to live on mission in all of life and to replicate some aspect of compassion ministry in their hometown.
  • Acquire knowledge and skills through scheduled training. We leverage local pastors and leaders to provide compassion ministry training in areas such as contextualization, tradecraft, human trafficking, homeless ministry, and church partnership.
  • Prepare for disaster response. Send Relief partners with Southern Baptist Disaster Relief for natural disaster recovery. We partner with SBDR to provide volunteer training, and channel resources and volunteers through existing SBDR pathways to provide hope and help quickly after a crisis.

Contact

Email Josh Durnell at jdurnell@sendrelief.org for more information.


Meet the Team

Josh Durnell

Send Relief Ministry Coordinator, New Orleans

Abbey Guidry

Journeyman, New Orleans

Multiplication Pipeline

The Send Network Multiplication Pipeline is designed to help churches raise up the next generation of missional servant leaders. The Pipeline includes simple assessment tools and a user-friendly online training system to equip participants for ministry in a post-Christian context. The Multiplication Pipeline Training has three levels of module-based content related to developing church planters, church planting teams, and missional leaders. The training will help students develop in areas such as spiritual formation, biblical knowledge, missional living, evangelism, missional leadership, disciple-making, ministry call, models of church planting, and more.

Course Credit

New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary is offering up to 25% of a degree for graduate students and 18 hours for undergraduate students participating in the Multiplication Pipeline Training. Students should contact the NAMB & NOBTS Church Planting Center to enroll in Pipeline Courses. The Pipeline Training Coach facilitates the class using the NAMB Pipeline Training material through their local church or ministry site.

Graduate

Semester 1

Mentoring in Gospel Ministry (3-6 hrs)

Evangelism (3 hours)

Discipleship & Spiritual Formation (3 hrs)

Semester 2

Mentoring in Gospel Ministry (3-6 hrs)

Church Leadership and Admin (3 hours)

Teaching or Preaching Practicum (3 Hours)

Undergraduate

Church Ministry Practicum (3 or 6 hours per semester, up to 3 semesters, 18 hours total)

Approved NAMB/NOBTS Mentoring Sites

The content of the Multiplication Pipeline Training can be completed for course credit through an approved Multiplication Pipeline Site that meets the NAMB Guidelines.

For approval of a New Site please use contact information below.

  • FBC Cumming (Cumming, GA)
  • FBC Tuscaloosa (Tuscaloosa, AL)
  • Stetson Baptist Church (DeLand, FL)
  • Taylor Road Baptist Church (Montgomery, AL)
  • Refuge Church (NOLA)
  • Lakeshore Church (NOLA)
  • Williams Boulevard (NOLA)
  • Celebration Church (NOLA)
  • Gospel Hope Church (Atlanta, GA)
  • The Well Church Network (Alabama)
  • Metairie Church (NOLA)
  • Franklin Avenue Baptist Church (NOLA)
  • Connect Church Algiers (NOLA)
  • Faith New Orleans (NOLA)
  • Northwoods Church (Evansville, IN)
  • FBC Decatur (Decatur, AL)
  • Nettleton Baptist Church (Arkansas)
  • FBC Montgomery (Alabama)

Questions

Contact The NAMB + NOBTS Church Planting Center at jspivey_contractor@namb.net .


Meet the Team

Jay Spivey

Mobilization and Pipeline Specialist

Church-Planting-Course-Schedule.png