This is the last of a two-part post of an interview with Gary Baldus, pastor of New Walk Church in Zephyr Hills, Florida.

General Baptist Ministries asked Gary several questions about his walk with Christ, his calling to ministry and church planting, the personal and ministry connections with General Baptists, and the ongoing work of New Walk Church.

General Baptist Ministries (GBM):  You served as Moderator/Host for the Mission & Ministry Summit in 2013. How did this experience impact you personally? How did it impact New Walk Church?

Gary Baldus (GB):  What an unbelievable experience!  Our church loved it.  They look back on that as one of the coolest things to be involved in that we have ever done by serving all those leaders who traveled to Florida.  It was like a New Walk Event.  We just watched our church rally to the cause. We told them, “We have all these people coming down and these are the General Baptist people who helped us get started.”  They just thought it was awesome that they could serve those people who had invested in New Walk from a distance.

GBM:  As you look to the future what do you see as the greatest challenges for our General Baptist network?

GB:  It all boils down to money and men.  Many are called and few are chosen.  God sifts through people and not all guys are capable to lead church work.  I have people tell me of their call so I give them ministry assignments.  It is not unusual that six months later they are crying because ministry is so hard and they quit.

GBM:  How did your connections with General Baptists aid in the construction of New Walk’s first permanent buildings?

GB:  Our building would not have happened if not for the General Baptist Investment Fund.  This was like when the Kingdom Expansion Campaign was involved at the outset.  This is a faith based thing for us so we had to have someone who believed in us to be the right kind of lender. We are going to spend the next 2-3 years on stabilization and taking care of things to maintain a healthy operational base but if it had not been for a group of people seeing the potential in New Walk we would probably still be in the YMCA setting up and tearing down every time we had a meeting.

We have a metal building with a few aesthetics but it is a first class facility that would not have been possible if others, General Baptist Investment Fund, and its investors, had not believed in us.

GBM:  You have coached dozens of other church planters. What is the one best piece of advice you can give to anyone considering that adventure?

GB:  I guess it would be:  Don’t do this unless you are really called.  Don’t do it because it is flashy or because you will make money or because it is the cool thing to do. Someone told me once, “I think I’ll try my hand at church planting.”  But I said to him, “What you have to do in church planting is cut your hand off.”  That’s true in any ministry work.  It’s not something you play games with. You don’t do it unless you are willing to give yourself to a life cause.  If you are going to get a church plant off the ground and get  it into something healthy you better be in it for the long run.  This is not to even mention the attacks of the Evil One that you can only endure if you are invested for the long haul.

GBM:  How does your family engage in ministry at New Walk?

GB:  We are all very involved.  For the longest time my wife went out to the Holiday Campus to lead the kid’s ministry every weekend.  Right now she helps me here at the main campus.  She looks behind the scenes and helps me see how we can realign the ministry for the next level.  My girls are very involved in kids’ ministry.  My oldest daughter is what they call a small groups teacher so she works with younger kids.  My younger daughter just started middle school and she is in our transitional ministry that targets fifth and sixth graders. We give them freedom.  They choose how they are involved.  They are also involved in our weekly student ministry.

GBM:  What has been your most rewarding ministry experience?

GB:  Well I just can’t tell you anything more rewarding than when someone gives their life over to Christ.  We had 107 new people come to our church this week.  We have an 80-something year old man from Illinois who made a decision for Jesus this week.  He had tears in his eyes.  He had been part of another church that taught him about religion but never introduced him to Jesus.  Also, I introduced my grandfather to Christ on his death-bed a few months ago.

A special thanks to Gary, his family, and staff for taking time to share.