Fort Worth church unites around missional focus: “See ripe fields. Scatter gospel seeds. Celebrate God’s harvest.”

Jerimiah Smith, pastor of University Baptist Church in Fort Worth, got connected with Pave, the Texas Baptists revitalization strategy, after a referral from Christian Life Commission Director Katie Frugé. 

“Katie Frugé is a member of our church, and… somewhere in a conversation we had – she obviously knew a little bit about our church history – she recommended that I get in touch with Jonathan Smith,” explained Jerimiah Smith. “So I reached out to Jonathan, and we decided to set up a lunch.”

Over lunch in January 2025, Jonathan Smith, associate director of the Center for Church Health at Texas Baptists, explained the Pave program,, and “right away, it resonated and clicked” with Jerimiah Smith. 

From their conversation, Jonathan Smith determined that University Baptist Church was in “phase three of Pave” and invited Jerimiah Smith to join a February 2025 meeting of phase three pastors, where he began his Pave journey. 

After the meeting, he began gathering staff and church members “based on their experience, their age, how long they've been in the church and constructed what [he] felt like was a phenomenal team” to walk with through Pave. 

“I told the church… ‘We're going to discern together, and we're going to seek the Lord together. We're going to pray together,’” explained Jerimiah Smith. “That invitation to bring a team into the process in the conversation was natural for where we were already, and what we felt like God was leading us towards.” 

Jerimiah Smith and his team began focusing on defining a vision for the church, and after “a stretch of praying earnestly,” he felt a conviction from Matt. 9:35-38. 

“[Our vision is] all rooted in [Matt. 9:35-38], where Jesus is like, ‘Go, the harvest is plentiful. See these fields,’ that the world would define as helpless and broken, but he sees them as ripe. [Jesus] needs more laborers, so we want to go, and we want to scatter the hope of the gospel, and then it's God that produces that harvest, [and] let's celebrate what he does when we are faithfully sent and obedient to that sort of call,” said Jerimiah Smith.

Therefore, University Baptist Church’s vision became, “See ripe fields. Scatter gospel seeds. Celebrate God’s harvest.” 

Jerimiah Smith said the “fresh gospel-centered outside perspective” he received from Pave was “incredibly helpful” in the church identifying and setting  five-year, three-year, one-year and 90-day goals. He said identifying those goals “got us unstuck.” 

“[The Pave process] always felt prayerful. It felt authentic. It felt sincere,” said Jerimiah Smith. “So as a result, when [we] were shaping those [goals]... It was a spirit-led moment, several moments that felt like God's hand with the divine revelation for our team, that I think has emboldened us in bringing it to the church.” 

Training and sending laborers into the harvest 

Jerimiah Smith said, “the newest ministry that we just launched,” called “Field Training,” is centered around their missional focus, “See ripe fields. Scatter gospel seeds. Celebrate God’s harvest.”

“[In Field Training], we walk them through an intentional process of helping identify their field. Then we want to build them up. We want to equip them [for] the next step [which] is to be sent to scatter gospel seeds… then we want to gather around them, pray over them, bless them and commission them [on a Sunday morning], and send them out as laborers into the harvest,” explained Jerimiah Smith.

Once a household’s Field Training is complete and they are commissioned, Jerimiah Smith said he encourages “a certain level of accountability” by asking them to have “gospel moments each month and then share prayer [requests] with our church.”  

“[We ask] ‘What were the challenges? What were the things we're celebrating?” and continue to let that fuel this culture of prayer and this call to pray earnestly as we're being sent out,” said Jerimiah Smith. 

Jerimiah Smith said the church has held one Field Training so far, where 23 households, totaling “around 54 people” sought the Lord and had conversations with leadership to discern their mission field. He said, “5 or 6 households were like, ‘I know it already,’” and he is following up with the rest of the households personally “to say, ‘Let's talk more about what you've sensed [you’re calling is] so far.’”

“Our goal is to have 26% of UBC households sent as laborers into its harvest. So that would end up being about 47 households by the end of the year that we would love to see in this process,” said Jerimiah Smith. 

Jerimiah Smith said the church is planning to hold their first commissioning service on March 22 with “our first few households” and follow up with their next Field Training at the end of March.

Reorienting rhythms around praying earnestly 

Jerimiah Smith said cultivating a culture of “being a praying church” informs University Baptist Church’s Pave journey. 

“I shared with the church when we were looking at Acts 3, where Peter and John are on the way to the temple, and they meet this beggar [who]asks for healing. One of the things that I said to the church was, ‘What I love about this is that it tells us in Scripture that they're on the way to the temple to pray,’ and I asked, ‘When was the last time you were just on your way to pray?’” explained Jerimiah Smith. “So, we started to develop that [culture], and I think [Acts 3] helped position us to be ready for a [prayer] focus.” 

He said this past summer, the church restructured their Sunday mornings to “reorient our rhythms” around prayer.

“We start at 8:45 in our chapel for prayer, then we move into our 9:30 worship service, and then we move into Bible study from there,” said Jerimiah Smith. “So for us, Sunday morning is, now, we start in prayer, seeking the Lord and asking for the Lord's Spirit to come, to lead and soften our hearts, and it's those prayers that then fuel our worship, and then it's our worship that informs our study.”

Jerimiah Smith shared a story of a friend and church member who demonstrated seeing ripe fields, scattering gospel seeds and allowing prayer to be her destination when a friend of hers, who was Muslim, asked for prayer from University Baptist Church. 

“[My friend’s] friend was concerned about her daughter, who just had some health concerns, and she was reaching out to my friend to say, ‘Do you think somebody could pray [for us]? Yes, we're Muslim, we know y'all are Christian, but we would just love anybody to pray for my daughter,’” explained Jerimiah Smith. 

Jerimiah Smith said, “we would absolutely be willing” to go to her home and pray with her. Then one Sunday morning, he received a text from his friend, as he was entering the 8:45 a.m. prayer time, saying, “[My Muslim friend is] on her way to church right now.” 

“I was so grateful because I was like, ‘There are people already here that are on their way to pray. I don't have to go pull somebody out from a classroom. [Prayer is] what we're here to do. We're ready.’” So [my friend] brings her [Muslim friend] to the prayer time and we pray over her,” said Jerimiah Smith.

After the prayer time, she stayed for the main worship service and Jerimiah Smith “invited the congregation to come down [front at the end of the service] and pray over this Muslim family that had come to our church seeking prayer.” 

He said it was a moment “you couldn't orchestrate.” 

“To me, [this] is a story that shows you a friend who has seen a field that God has called her to labor… who had faithfully scattered the gospel for years and built that relationship, brought her into our church and our culture of praying earnestly. That then allowed us to bless this family in a way that we never would have before, and we got to celebrate and give praise to God,” explained Jerimiah Smith. “It was one of the coolest things I've seen since I've been [Pastor] here.” 

A Great Commandment and Great Commission church in action 

Looking ahead to what’s next in his Pave journey, Jerimiah Smith said one of his team’s three-year goals is to implement “The Upside Down Church” Pave principle, where “our structure and our programs are condensed so that they support the mission” rather than “swallowing up the mission.” 

He said their five-year goal matches their missional focus, and as each church household defines their “Acts 1:8,” he hopes that seeing ripe fields, scattering gospel seeds and celebrating God’s harvest” becomes “second nature.” 

Jonathan Smith said, “This is what a Great Commission and Great Commandment church looks like in action.” 

“Jeremiah Smith and the Vision Team from University Baptist Church have developed an exceptionally creative new direction that will empower not only individuals, but entire families to be mobilized for local and global ministry and mission,” said Jonathan Smith. 

One year into their Pave journey, Jerimiah Smith said, “[Establishing our missional focus has] created a synergy and a focus that unites, that excites, that encourages, that clarifies.”

He encouraged pastors that Pave is “worth your time and personal investment.” 

“[Pave] is a spirit-led experience,” said Jerimiah Smith. “What you're going to find is not a program, but you're going to find people that have a heart for the gospel, that have a heart for the church, that have a heart for pastors, in particular.”

He challenged pastors to get involved in Pave and “watch God take over and do things that you couldn’t have imagined or planned if you had tried [revitalization] another way.” 

Visit txb.org/pave to learn more about Pave and how it can be a resource to your congregation.