SCBaptists are on a mission to give and go like never before. 

At the 2024 South Carolina Baptist Convention Annual Meeting, Executive Director-Treasurer Tony Wolfe announced the Give+Go initiative. “SCBaptists are giving it all we’ve got in 2025,” he said.   

Southern Baptists have pooled their resources together through the Cooperative Program since 1925. The Cooperative Program is a unified funding plan that allows churches to work together to send missionaries around the world, plant churches in North America, educate pastors through seminaries and universities, and do state mission work. This collaborative approach allows congregations of all sizes to participate in a work that would be difficult for any one church to accomplish on their own. “We cooperate because our message is urgent, our commission is great, and our time is short,” Wolfe said.  

Combatting Concerning Trends  

Wolfe shared that Give+Go is a holistic initiative that challenges SCBaptists to increase evangelistic engagement and Cooperative Program investment in 2025. He emphasized that this initiative comes at a pivotal time for SCBaptists “to reverse two concerning trends in our state.”  

First, he said, “Our best research tells us that 80% of South Carolinians are completely disengaged from any evangelical church within our borders.” This means that “four out of five of our family members, friends, and coworkers are most likely spiritually lost,” he said. According to Wolfe, this is especially concerning because “15 years ago, that number was 75%.”   

Second, Wolfe said that “while individual SCBaptists are giving more sacrificially to God’s Kingdom work through their local churches, SCBaptist churches are giving less and less through the Cooperative Program.” Further, he shared that about 400 SCBaptist churches give “nothing at all” through the Cooperative Program.  

Wolfe emphasized that the cooperative work of SCBaptists is powered by the Holy Spirit but that it is “fueled by the sacrificial giving of cooperating churches.” In order to meet the growing needs and opportunities, he says SCBaptists must reverse these trends.   

Launching Give+Go Initiative  

In practice, Wolfe shared that the Give+Go Initiative is a “concerted, church-based, evangelism strategy across our state to go and tell.” The two-fold initiative involves a variety of resources, events, videos, curriculum, and more to equip SCBaptists in sharing the Gospel and strengthening their cooperative mission. “SCBaptists are a generous people,” Wolfe said. “I believe that every resource we need to accomplish the mission that God has entrusted to us is already ours in Christ Jesus.”   

The Give+Go Initiative effort involves equipping 500+ churches with clear evangelistic outreach plans, launching a statewide media campaign to share the Gospel with 10% of South Carolinians, and expanding regional “Harvest Events” for various groups. SCBaptists have seen great success with student “ONE Night” events, which are high-energy evenings of worship, games, and teaching to engage middle and high school students. In 2024, over 5,500 students heard the Gospel at ONE Night events, with 481 making decisions for salvation. The idea is to expand these events into children’s, women’s, and men’s events across the state.  

Additionally, pastor cohorts will focus on evangelistic encouragement, and an increased Annual Church Profile report rate will help celebrate and track engagement across SCBaptist churches.   

To increase Cooperative Program investment, SCBaptist will aim to foster a culture of celebration for churches sacrificially giving through the Cooperative Program, encouraging churches to reengage or increase their commitment. Resources will include monthly Cooperative Program stories, videos, graphics, and a digital kit for promotion, along with a free four-week curriculum series for all age groups to deepen understanding of the shared mission and cooperative impact of SCBaptists.  

100 Years of Cooperation  

Launching this initiative in 2025 coincides with the centennial of the Cooperative Program. At the SCBaptist annual meeting, Southern Baptist Convention President Clint Pressley said, “This year is 100 years of cooperating. It is a celebration, an anniversary, and a miracle.”  

Wolfe posed a question to messengers and guests at the annual meeting, asking, “Will our hearts be opened again to the value of the entirety of our Baptist missional ecosystem, or will our generation see the retrenchment of our mission in South Carolina and around the world?”  

“Let’s give it all we’ve got in 2025,” Wolfe said, “so that our neighbors and the nations might come to know God through the Great Commission cooperation of SCBaptists in our generation.”