After America’s Got Talent winning magician Dustin Tavella dazzled a crowd of more than 6,000 Southern Baptists on Monday (June 12) at the annual Send Luncheon, Kevin Ezell learned he shouldn’t quit his day job quite yet as a Southern Baptist missions entity leader.
Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board, joked that he thought Tavella’s act didn’t look that difficult and decided to give it a shot. While Ezell wasn’t able to successfully guess a license plate number, he still helped pull off a few “magic” moments. One of those moments included providing a new wheelchair-accessible van for a Louisiana couple who had taken in three children — two of whom were severely disabled — in addition to their four other children.
NAMB presented the new van to Bruce and Danielle Watson during its annual luncheon event, which was held prior to the Southern Baptist Convention Annual meeting in New Orleans. In addition to spotlighting missions efforts throughout North America, the event typically features special acts of kindness to those experiencing various hardships.
The Watsons were just one of several memorable moments highlighted during the luncheon, held at the city’s convention center. The gifts, Ezell noted, are paid for through private donations and do not include Cooperative Program or Annie Armstrong Easter Offering dollars.
The Watsons’ story
For the Watson family, the last few years have been especially difficult.
Bruce, a bivocational pastor for First Baptist Church Jeanerette, has gone through some layoffs in the oil industry. He now has multiple jobs, one of which includes beekeeping, in addition to helping his wife, Danielle, care for their family.
In 2016, Evan, Chris and CiCi came to live with the Watsons after their mother suffered a heart attack and was no longer able to care for them. Both Chris and CiCi were born with severe cerebral palsy.
And then last year, tragedy struck.
“On Easter Sunday night of last year, Chris’ stomach quit working — and we didn’t realize he was having trouble breathing. I rushed him to the emergency room, and they put him on a vent right away. Two weeks later he passed away.
“It’s tough saying goodbye to somebody that you’ve poured all this love and time into,” Watson reflected. “It’s been a real challenge. But through everything God has blessed us above and beyond what we have ever imagined.”
The couple was moved to tears when Ezell presented them with the new van, which can fit a wheelchair to allow the family to ride together in one vehicle.
And the new van came just in time, Ezell said.
The Watsons shared with Ezell backstage that a part on the current van went out a couple weeks ago, and they found out that part had been discontinued.
“They just told me that,” Ezell said, “so I had to wait 30 minutes to tell them [about the new van].”
Surviving storms
Ezell unveiled another surprise when he asked a woman in the crowd, Trina, to share her story.
Trina works for the company that catered the lunch. She shared that she is a cancer survivor and a single mom with three children — one in college, one entering her senior year in high school and another in middle school.
When Ezell asked her where she was living, she was overcome with emotion and was unable to answer the question. Putting his arm around her, Ezell shared that NAMB had reached out to her company and asked them to share the name of an “incredible” staff member.
“When we asked your company, who was one of the most incredible people they know … they said you,” he told her. “They said as you went through your surgeries, you didn’t miss one day of work, you never complained.”
Ezell continued, “I want you to know there are thousands of Southern Baptists that love you. … We have some very generous pastors here who want to help you get on your feet and pay to move you into an apartment with your kids and pay the rent for that first year to help you get on your feet.”
Trina shared some advice she gave her son while teaching him to drive one day in a rainstorm.
“I said, ‘You’re gonna drive through it. Keep going.’ I made him drive 30 minutes.” The sun eventually came out. She then told her son, “You can’t always stop when things get bad or the weather is nasty. You have to keep going.”
Reaching college students
During the luncheon, Ezell and Vance Pittman, president of Send Network, interviewed two pastors, Dean Inserra and Rob Warren, who lead churches that focus on reaching college students for Christ.
Since 2010, Ezell noted, more than 130 college churches had been planted in the United States.
“That’s the good news,” Ezell said. “The challenging part is there are 21 million college students on 4,000 campuses. That’s why we must go. We’ve got a start, but we must go … to college campuses to reach the next generation.”
Inserra, pastor of CityChurch in Tallahassee, Florida, shared about the church’s efforts to reach college students and help equip them to plant churches. Inserra started his church of mostly college students back in 2007. Since then, the church has realized the need to continue focusing their efforts to reach students as its congregation gets older. He encouraged pastors to avoid trying to reinvent themselves to reach students.
“They see right through that,” he said. “Don’t think you have to pretend you’re younger and become cooler. They’re hungry, and they don’t realize what they are longing for is the Word of the God.”
Rob Warren, pastor Doxa Church of Madison, Wisconsin, shared about his church’s efforts to reach students for Christ at the University of Wisconsin.
“There is only a handful of universities that have more than 5% of any type of Christian ministry, and so we would consider that an unreached people group,” he said. “We have to go.”
He noted, “Reaching college students and doing college ministry is not going to be super helpful to building your budget, but it is gonna be helpful for building the Kingdom.”
Pitman also talked to Tavella, the former missionary turned magician. Tavella shared about his heart for ministry and how he spent six years after graduating from high school serving in orphanages and prisons and helping people escape drug addiction.
Tavella’s family regularly attended Hope Church in Las Vegas in 2021, where Pittman was pastor at the time. Tavella’s family moved to Las Vegas after he won AGT and opened a show there.
“One of the things I’ve learned is the power of listening,” Tavella said. “It’s easy to throw money at something. It’s harder to actually know the needs, because knowing the needs takes knowing the person — sometimes we’re too busy to take the time to know people.”
To view more photos from this event, click here.
