Oakhurst Baptist Church

We celebrate the 20 years that Karen Bryant Shipp has led Oakhurst Baptist in experiencing connection to music, one another, and God’s work for justice in God’s world!

Get a glimpse of our All-Church Retreat in Hayesville, North Carolina and listen to this reflection by our retreat leaders, Marty and Robin Anderson!

Listen as Rev. Brandon T. Maxwell, Dean of Students and Vice President for Student Affairs at Columbia Theological Seminary, reflects on the mysterious John 6:51-58 text, where Jesus talks about the bread of life.  

“I need a break. I need to take a step back. I QUIT!” If you heard these words from your favorite hero or athlete, how would you see them? Or from a community leader, clergy, or advocate you most admired? What if one of the major prophets uttered those same words and walked away, would… Read more »

Just as the disciples on Palm Sunday had no clue that they were about to experience Jesus’ death and resurrection and the miraculous appearance of the Holy Spirit, so we in the early days of Covid had no clue as to what would lie ahead. What do we know today that was hidden from us… Read more »

Listen as Oakhurst member Melissa King Rogers preaches from Hawaii! Together, from around the globe and right here in Decatur, Georgia, we will worship God and seek God’s guidance in creating a more loving and just kin-dom of heaven here on earth!

This Sunday, we celebrated our first hybrid worship service with some people in-person in the sanctuary and others joining us via Zoom. What a wonderful day it was! Listen as Pastor Melanie Vaughn-West encourages us in these new days.

With less than two days of advanced warning, we began virtual worship services on March 15, 2020. Virtual worship truly surprised us with the ways it provided intimacy, connection, and true community across Atlanta and our world.

We were blessed by former members living all around the country and the globe, joining us for worship. We were blessed by grandparents getting to worship with their geographically-distant grandchildren for the first time! We were blessed by local members, long absent from the sanctuary because of sickness or lack of mobility, suddenly worshipping with us again. We were blessed with a wonderful class of new members who might not have ever found us, had we not been online.

After taking his newfound knowledge back home and being rejected, Jesus claims, “A prophet has little honor in his hometown, among his relatives, or on the streets he played in as a child.” What does this brief story say to us about embracing transition and transformation? Are we so afraid of it in ourselves that we also scoff at others who dare to try? Listen as Pastor Lauren Colwell looks at this episode in the life of Jesus and questions what it means for us.

As we pass 600,000 Covid deaths in the United States, as we sit with those who mourn the loss of their beloveds, as the virus rages on in India, Cuba, the Philippines, and Brazil, how do we stop acting like everything is okay all the time? How do we be present to our individual, communal, and global grief, in a way that is authentic and has true integrity of emotion? And then, how do we not become so completely immobilized by it that we can continue to tend to those who are hurting?

Listen as Pastor Melanie Vaughn-West reflects on this passage, and how we move forward together as people who are called to share one another’s burdens, as well as the burdens of the world.