Retired Houston Pastor’s Birthday Party Continues to Make a Lasting Impact on New England Baptist Students

George Moore receives a plaque is for his service as Interim Pastor at Jersey Village Baptist Church in Texas

When many senior adults see a birthday approaching, their thoughts turn to retirement, rocking chairs, health issues, and time with grandchildren. When asked why he does not slow down at age 72, George Moore, a retired pastor who eschews rocking chairs, is reasonably healthy and enjoys thirteen grandchildren, said, “I can’t sit still. I’ve got to be active and engaged. I consider myself to be a people person.” When his seventieth birthday was imminent, he discouraged friends and family from giving gifts. Instead, he took a completely different approach that continues to make a lasting impact on New England Baptists.

A retired Baptist minister from the Houston suburb of Jersey Village, TX, Moore set up a giant tent and ten round tables in his driveway on June 24, 2021, his seventieth birthday. He fired up the grill and served barbecue to more than a hundred guests. While they chomped down on the slow-cooked meats, beans, potato salad, and desserts, he told them of his recent mission trips to Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine, and Vermont. Moore urged those present for the six-hour celebration to give generously to a missions purpose that is close to his heart. In response, they donated $12,550 for the Baptist Foundation of New England (BFNE) scholarship fund.

Moore’s friends, he said, “were very benevolent towards giving to the foundation. They were generous beyond my imagination. It shows what little faith I had.” When asked why he decided to dedicate his birthday party to the BFNE, he said he was simply following the example of others he knows who “used their birthdays for supporting worthy causes, and I thought that was a great thing to do. So, I asked people to give to the foundation and they did.” The average online gift was $25, but some guests wrote $1,000 checks. When they gave generously, they were intuitively following the Apostle Paul (Acts 20:35b) by “. . . remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

Terry Dorsett, the Baptist Churches of New England (BCNE) executive director, who also oversees the growth and strategy of the BFNE funds, had a profound influence on Moore when he once expressed his hope that there will be another Great Awakening in the United States starting in New England—in his lifetime. “I would love to see that happen. Even being a small, small part of that would just be wonderful,” Moore enthused about the possibility of another revival.

Dorsett and Moore were reflecting on the ministry of Jonathan Edwards, the pastor in Northampton, MA, who is widely regarded as Colonial America’s most important and original philosophical theologians. His preaching was partly responsible for the First Great Awakening. Dorsett expressed appreciation for the gifts from Moore and his friends who are helping university students and for his ongoing financial support of the BCNE annual budget.

“There are many options for your charitable dollars, but if you want to impact New England with the gospel, I know of no better option than the Baptist Foundation of New England,” the executive director wrote. “The BFNE specializes in helping partners [such as George Moore] find channels of giving that match their ministry passions to maximize their gospel impact in New England.” 

Some twenty years ago, when he was an ordained deacon at the Jersey Village Baptist Church, Moore says he felt “a burden for missions” while attending the church’s men’s ministry group.  After his wife, Lin, died in 2011, he earned a doctorate in worship studies at the Robert E. Webber Institute for Worship Studies, a graduate theological school in Jacksonville, FL. He then moved closer to the city and joined South Main Baptist Church, in the heart of midtown Houston.

Meanwhile, the Jersey Village church’s membership had shrunk from 1,000 people to approximately 300 and the church was experiencing financial stress. They decided to merge with Champion Forest Baptist Church, a large and diverse, multi-site megachurch in Northwest Houston, which ordained Moore as a minister and appointed him as the Jersey Village’s campus pastor and then as the discipleship pastor.

During those years, Moore felt “led by the Lord to go to one of the least churched areas [not counting Roman Catholic parishes] in the nation—and that’s New England.” A project manager for forty-one years for an engineering construction company, he traveled around the world including assignments that brought him to Alaska and Saudi Arabia, and he made many missions trips over the years but, he noted, “I never felt the calling like I did for New England.”

He then made “scouting trips” to Rhode Island and Vermont and encouraged, helped plan, and recruited participants for missions trips from Jersey Village to MERCYhouse, a church in Amherst, MA, that ministers to students from five colleges. During four visits, the Texas team refurbished parts of the church building. Leonard Prater, Jersey Village Baptist Church’s discipleship pastor, was the primary missions leader and Chuck Stollenwerck was the lead construction manager for the mission trips to Amherst.

In other summers he visited The Baptist Fellowship in Randolph, VT, and Calvary Baptist Church in Caribou, ME. Moore also preached at Lakeside Community Church in North Waterboro, ME, and Northeastern Baptist College in Bennington, VT.

A church in Maine once called Moore to be their pastor, but he declined the invitation because he needed to stay in Texas to care for his aging mother. Yet his love for New England ministry never diminished. “I would even take a church in New England today, but nobody wants a seventy-two-year-old [pastor.] The timing just was not right—yet.” If a New England church provides him with modest housing, Moore added, “I’m good to go!”

One summer when Moore was staying at the BCNE’s Luther Rice Lodge in Northborough, MA, he befriended Robert Smith of Decatur, AL, another widower who is a longtime supporter of ministry in New England. Smith continues to be Moore’s “spiritual mentor in the ministry” and traveling companion when they serve together in the region.

Moore chose to support the BFNE scholarship fund because his wife always supported education and was a high school math teacher after their four children were older. To honor his wife, he set up a $70,000 scholarship fund in her name in lieu of flowers at her alma mater, Lamar University in Beaumont, TX.

Later he helped create a scholarship fund at the Jersey Village church that, over a decade, grew to $200,000. The church’s endowed fund continues to give eight $1,000 scholarships a year to graduating seniors who have been active in the church for two years. He also endowed funds for each of his thirteen grandchildren and for the children of his nieces and nephews.

“All of my gifts are above my tithe,” he emphasized. “I teach my kids that you cannot outgive God.”

A Massachusetts native and a New England Baptist since 1970, Dan Nicholas is the BCNE managing editor

AN INVITATION TO PARTNERSHIP: To follow George Moore’s example, you may want to give a year-end, tax-deductible contribution to the Baptist Foundation of New England. Go online and contribute the cost of operating the BCNE for one hour ($125) or one day ($3,000), which BCNE Executive Director Terry Dorsett (tdorsett@bcne.net) calls “an excellent way to honor a loved one.” You may choose to mail a check by December 31 to the Baptist Foundation of New England, 87 Lincoln Street, Northborough, MA 01532. Thank you for your generous support.