The Stone Mountain Baptist Association of Churches will celebrate its 175th Anniversary on Thursday  at the Emmanuel Community Church in Conyers. 

Keynote speakers for the 7 p.m. session include Dr. J. Robert White, Executive Director the Georgia Baptist Convention, a fellowship of 3,600 churches statewide, and Dr. Kevin Ezell, President of the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, a fellowship of 46,000 churches across the United States and Canada. (See pictures) 

Music will be presented by the Jubal Tones, an a cappella group of ministers of music from across the state from Georgia Baptist Churches and the Emmanuel Community Church Choir.  

The Association is home to Georgia Disaster Relief Feeding Unit #11F, which has 630 volunteers and is the first responder unit for Georgia. The unit’s  most recent deployment was last year during Hurricane Sandy. Over 100,000 meals were served to storm victims. During Hurricane Katrina, the unit served 800,000 of the one million meals served by Georgia Baptist. The unit is also home to Bold Mission Builders, the largest builders group in the state with over 400 volunteers.

A full description of the activities for the entire afternoon can be found at the Association’s website, www.stonemountainbaptistassociation.org. The Stone Mountain Baptist Association, led by Dr. Larry Cheek, Associational Missionary, has offices in Conyers.

Today, the Stone Mountain Baptist Association consist of 96 churches in east metro Atlanta, engaging 23 languages: Haitian (French Creole); English; Spanish; Hmong; Korean; Romanian; French African; Amerck (Ethiopia); Indian (Hindi); Nepali; Somalia; Swahili; Tagrinia (Eritrea); Urdu (Pakistan); Farsi (Iran, Afghanistan); Sudanese; Tamil (Indian); Kunama (Ethiopia);  Arabic; Kirundi; Kurdish; Burmese; and Russian.  Of these churches, 48 are Anglo, 32 are black and 15 are language congregations.