Dear Church Family,

Do you remember holding your candle at our final service?

Many of you were at our final service on December 21, 2025. That Sunday was not a funeral. It was a commissioning service. Yes, we were closing a church, but we made the commitment that day that we would grow the Kingdom as we closed our building. At the end of the service we lit candles to illustrate this commitment. One by one, our trustees, Legacy Board, deacons, and church family came forward to light their candles from the lamp that had represented our church. That light spread throughout the room as a representation of First Baptist Church Forest Park sending each of you out to wherever God would lead you. We also lit three large candles showing our commitment to steward the remaining resources of FBC Forest Park and ensure those resources would be wisely invested in The Kingdom. As we held our candles high, I asked you to notice something: even as the light representing First Baptist Church went out, the room was brighter than when we started.

On September 24, 2026 our Legacy Board gathered to approve our first major financial gifts. As we sat in that meeting, I found myself thinking about that moment. Those candles represented ministries we had not yet identified, opportunities we could not yet describe, and people whose lives we hoped God would touch.

Now, some of those opportunities have names.

It is my joy and honor to announce to you today that the Legacy Board unanimously approved $645,000 in Kingdom investments. I want to share where those gifts are going, the people we are honoring, and how these decisions carry forward what we celebrated in our commissioning service. This was only our first round of investments to be made. There is much more to come!

We began with the regular cooperative giving that has always been part of our budget. As a baptist church, it is part of our heritage to give to the efforts of the Cooperative Program recognizing we are stronger together than when we act alone. Our giving to those efforts has always been based on a percentage of tithes. Our first donations simply carried those percentages forward. 

Southside Baptist Network — $15,000

We approved $15,000 for Southside Baptist Network, continuing our longstanding partnership with our local baptist association.

Not only has FBC Forest Park always been part of a larger family of churches, but our church, led by Hoyt Farr, founded the original Clayton County Baptist Association. That association has grown over the years to include churches from 6 neighboring counties and is now known as the Southside Baptist Network. This gift continues our participation in that shared ministry and supports the work of the gospel in the communities around us.

Georgia Baptist Children’s Home — $15,000

We also approved $15,000 for the Georgia Baptist Children’s Home, continuing our church’s support for its ministry to children and families.

Caring for others has been woven into the life of our congregation for many years. We are thankful that resources entrusted to our church will continue expressing that care.

You will also remember that we gave a significant percentage of tithes and offerings to the Georgia Baptist Mission Board and the Southern Baptist Convention. Because this percentage would be a significant amount of money, we decided to focus our efforts by meeting specific needs instead of simply giving to the general funds. Those funds went to the efforts described below.

Georgia Baptist Mission Board Church Revitalization — $200,000

Our own journey taught us how much churches need someone to walk beside them through difficult seasons. We know what it means to seek help, wrestle with hard decisions, and try to follow the Lord faithfully when the path ahead is unclear.

The Georgia Baptist Mission Board is working diligently to meet these needs. They now have an entire department, led by P.J. Dunn, that supports and equips churches to face the challenges that come their way. This revitalization work is called ReFocus. When ReFocus first became available the GBMB expected 30 churches to sign up. 75 came forward asking for help. Wow! What an opportunity to make a difference! P.J. Dunn realized he needed more partners to walk with these churches seeking assistance. Those partners, or trainers, are called Pathfinders. We approved $50,000 to fund the process of training 50 Pathfinders. These 50 pathfinders will work closely with hundreds of churches, at minimal cost to the churches, over the next decade or more. In addition to training those Pathfinders, we donated another $150,000 to provide scholarships for at least 100 churches to participate in that process. 

We are making this gift in honor of Tony Stinson who led our church, and many other churches, through a season of great difficulty. Tony served as the transitional pastor for our church in the late 1990’s. He was instrumental in navigating FBC Forest Park through the challenges we faced during that period and did the work to set the stage for our next 25 years of ministry in Forest Park. He was also instrumental in guiding us through the decisions we had to make over the last few years. Tony has been a faithful friend of FBC Forest Park. It is truly an honor to recognize the revitalization work Tony did on our behalf by investing in the strengthening and revitalization of churches all across the state of Georgia. Thank you, Tony, for your love and leadership! 

Georgia Baptist Mission Board Pastor Wellness — $75,000

The Georgia Baptist Mission Board recognizes that the primary ministers of the gospel are the people who make up the local church. And healthy churches are led by healthy pastors. The GBMB’s Pastor Wellness department exists to love and support pastors, pastors’ wives, and other church staff as they live out their calling to shepherd the local congregations. Pastor Wellness, led by Chris Reynolds, provides conferences, retreats, support, networking, counseling, and the resources to meet a variety of other needs unique to pastors, church staff, and their families. In addition to meeting all these needs, Pastor Wellness is tasked with raising their own funds so that Cooperative Program giving (money intended for missions) is not spent in these areas. In response to this need we approved $75,000 for Pastor Wellness. This donation fulfilled the funding they needed for 2027 and allowed them to expand support for associate pastors and women serving in ministry.

This gift honors Milton Wood, Chad Ellis, and Stephen Robins. These three men served our church well during their time with us. Each of them not only shouldered much of the load of leading our church family, but also were very intentional about investing in others. Chad and Stephen continue to serve in ministry to this day, and Milton’s legacy will never be forgotten. It is our honor to recognize their service and their place in our church’s story by supporting pastors in need. 

This one is also personal for me. During some of our most challenging seasons, Pastor Wellness helped Emily and me through conversations, encouragement, and relationships that many of you never saw. I know how much it matters for a pastor to have someone to call and someone willing to listen.

Our church will now help provide that care for others who are serving congregations throughout Georgia.

After addressing our regular cooperative giving, we turned our attention to our designated funds. 

Hoyt Farr Scholarship Fund — $5,000

Much will be said about Hoyt Farr as we celebrate him in the coming days, but we begin with one of his greatest legacies. The Hoyt Farr Scholarship Fund has provided tuition assistance to many seminary students over the decades. We rounded up the remaining funds in this line item to $5,000.

Of that amount, $1,269 will help Sarah Stephens with her seminary tuition this semester, and $3,731 will go into an existing Georgia Baptist Foundation seminary scholarship fund to assist other students preparing for ministry.

It is meaningful to see the name of a pastor from our church’s history connected with people preparing to serve in the years ahead. What was planted in one generation continues to bear fruit in another.

Calvary Refuge Center — $250,000

Mission Forest Park has long operated out of a designated fund through our church. For generations, our church has cared for neighbors who needed food, encouragement, and practical help. All of these efforts were for the sake of the gospel and in the hopes of sharing the good news of Jesus. Through Mission Forest Park and our relationship with Calvary Refuge, many of you gave your time and energy to that work.

Up until this point, Calvary Refuge has been operating with only a women’s dorm and a men’s dorm. This made it difficult, and sometimes impossible, to safely serve families with children. They have been making plans for, and preparing, a third dorm called Holland Hall that will provide 44 beds in rooms appropriate for families with children. We approved $200,000 to help open Holland Hall, providing for renovations and initial staffing needs so Calvary Refuge can welcome families whose needs cannot be accommodated in the existing dormitories. With this investment, Calvary Refuge hopes to have Holland Hall open in January of 2027 -- several months ahead of projections! In addition to helping open Holland Hall, we made another donation of $50,000 to support improvements in their dining hall and kitchen, including much-needed flooring.

This gift of $250,000 is being made in honor of Helen Raulins who began serving those in need by bringing sack lunches to the church that she made in her own kitchen. She later expanded that ministry and began a clothes closet to meet additional needs. Helen could never imagine all that Gary and Ruth Goodman would do to build upon her efforts and grow the ministry to become Mission Forest Park. This ministry would become the cornerstone of outreach at FBC Forest Park for many years. After Gary’s passing, Ruth continued to grow the ministry with Val and Glenda Hemozkiy. Val spent countless hours planning and working on behalf of others through Mission Forest Park. We all heard him regularly say, “But by the grace of God go I.” It was out of that heart and love for Jesus these precious individuals and all the volunteers of Mission Forest Park served those in need in Forest Park. We, the Legacy Board, are proud to make this investment in Calvary Refuge in their honor. 

The Seed Company - Cambodia Translation Project — $85,000

Years ago Ms. Annie Lou Owens provided a substantial contribution to establish the Bible Fund at our church. This line item was used to provide Bibles all around the world, support other ministries with Bibles, and even funded the translation of The Jesus Film into a new language. We wanted to honor the history of this fund while also investing in an opportunity that would have lasting impact. The Bible Fund had approximately $35,000 in the line item. The Legacy Board unanimously approved adding to that $35,000 in order to donate $85,000 toward a Bible translation project in Cambodia through The Seed Company.

We learned through this process that Bible translations are expensive. We could not afford to fund an entire translation. But we could help get an existing project across a significant milestone. That is what we did here. Western Cham is a minority native language spoken in Cambodia. The translation of the New Testament has already been completed in that language. With our donation we are able to help finish the next stage in the translation: Genesis, Numbers, Joshua, Ruth, and Jonah. We will also help begin the translation work on Deuteronomy. The Seed Company expects to complete this phase of the project by the end of 2027. 

When we asked The Seed Company how we could help we were presented with five options. The Western Cham opportunity became especially meaningful because of our relationship with Buna Heam. Many of you will remember Buna’s love for the Lord, love for his family in Cambodia, and his love for our church. Buna was very faithful to do everything he could to follow Jesus, but his journey was unique in that he never had a translation of the Bible he could read in his own “heart language.” Dale and Karen Wiggins tried for years to help Buna find a Bible in his native language. Unfortunately, that translation did not exist. That is why we were so eager to support this translation project for those who speak Western Cham in Cambodia. We are making this investment in honor of Ms. Annie Lou Owens, Buna Heam, and Dale and Karen Wiggins. Thank you, Anne Lou, for your investment in The Word and thank you, Dale and Karen, for your years of faithfulness at FBC Forest Park and all you did to love Buna. 

We are still following the Good Shepherd.

In our final service, we talked about the Shepherd who knows His sheep, calls them by name, and leads them. Sometimes He leads us down paths we would not have chosen. Our responsibility is to listen to His voice and follow Him.

Closing our church was a difficult path. These gifts do not erase the sadness of that decision or how much we miss gathering together. But they give us tangible reasons to be encouraged about what God is doing next.

At the end of the Legacy Board meeting, we called many of these ministry leaders and had the privilege of hearing them respond to news of your generous donations. There was gratitude, surprise, and emotion. I wish every one of you could have heard those conversations. Behind each gift are people who will receive help and ministries that will be better equipped to share the love of Christ.

And behind those gifts are generations of faithful people from our church.

Your giving, your service, your prayers, and your willingness to trust God through a difficult season helped make this possible. We are grateful for the opportunity to carry that faithfulness forward.

The Legacy Board still has work to do. Additional resources remain for future ministry investments. We will continue prayerfully considering opportunities and will keep you informed. Work also continues on the documentary preserving the stories of God’s faithfulness throughout our church’s 152-year history.

In the closing prayer of our final service, I said, “While this chapter is over, the story is far from done.”

Yesterday, we had the joy of seeing more of that story unfold.

Please pray for these ministries, for the people they serve, and for the decisions still ahead of us. And wherever the Good Shepherd has led you, keep serving. Keep sharing His Word. Keep letting your light shine.

The room is getting brighter.

With gratitude,

Elliott Yancey

Pastor - FBC Forest Park

Dear Church Family,

I wanted to share an update with you as we continue this unique journey together.

On Wednesday, July 1, we officially completed the sale of our church property. While our congregation formally concluded its ministry on December 21, 2025, many important details remained to be completed over the past six months. Throughout that process, we have continued to see God's faithful hand at work.

Many of you may wonder why this is our first public update since the church closed. The simple answer is that the sale of the property became much more complex than anyone anticipated. Throughout the process, we faced unexpected obstacles, particularly in our dealings with local government, that created delays and uncertainty. Because those circumstances were constantly changing, we intentionally chose not to make public announcements that we might later have to revise or retract. We believed it was best to wait until every detail had been finalized before communicating with you. While the process was often difficult, we remained confident that God was directing our steps. Thank you for your patience, your prayers, and your trust throughout this journey.

One of the greatest blessings has been watching the resources entrusted to our church continue to serve His Kingdom. Truck loads of furniture, audio video equipment, kitchen supplies, and other items have already been donated to five churches, our local baptist association, Calvary Refuge Center, a christian camp, a ministry in Haiti, and a christian podcast. It has been a joy to see these resources receive new life in ministries that are actively sharing the Gospel and serving others.

Many have also asked about the future of the building. I am thankful to share that the new owners have no plans to tear it down. Instead, they intend to renovate the property for office space and an event center. While its purpose will be different, we are grateful that the building will continue to be a significant landmark on Main Street in Forest Park.

The work of the Legacy Board is far from over. In the months ahead, these faithful men and women will be working closely with the Georgia Baptist Mission Board and other trusted consultants to prayerfully identify opportunities to invest the proceeds from the sale into churches and ministries that will faithfully use those resources to grow and multiply God's Kingdom. We are committed to being wise stewards of this legacy, and we will keep you informed as those plans develop.

I'm also excited to share that the Legacy Board has begun work on a documentary celebrating the 152-year history of our church. It will preserve the stories of God's faithfulness, the ministry of generations of faithful members, and the impact this church has had on our community and beyond. When the project is complete, it will be made available for everyone to enjoy.

Although this chapter has come to a close, God's work continues in new ways. For 152 years, He used this church to proclaim the Gospel, disciple believers, and serve our community. Today, through the ministries we have already been able to support and through the faithful stewardship of the remaining resources, we believe He will continue using the legacy of this church to strengthen His Kingdom for generations to come.

Thank you for your prayers, your encouragement, and your trust throughout this entire process. We are excited to begin sharing regular updates with you as the work of the Legacy Board continues. Please continue to pray for wisdom as we seek to honor the Lord with every decision. We look forward to keeping you informed in the months ahead and sharing the ways God continues to use the legacy of our church to advance His Kingdom.

With gratitude,

Elliott Yancey

Pastor