Dr. Tom Cheyney, Executive Director of Missions
Dr. Tom Cheyney serves the Greater Orlando Baptist Association as their Executive Director of Missions. Prior to coming to GOBA, Tom served at the North American Mission Board in the Church Planting Group as the Team Leader for the Resource Delivery Team. Tom is a nationally recognized conference leader in Church Revitalization, Church Planting, and Church Health. Tom has taught on five continents and is an Oxford University Distinguished Scholars Student from Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is married to Cheryl and they have two children Ashleigh and Drew. Drew serves as the Youth Minister for Bethlehem Church in the Athens, Georgia area. Ashleigh serves the Greater Orlando Baptist Association as its Administrative Assistant to the Director and as the Design Editor for all of GOBA's publications.
Tom's primary responsibility focuses on leading GOBA’s 272 churches and missions to reach central Florida for Christ. Dr. Cheyney’s major emphasis is four fold: 1) seek to revitalize our churches around central Florida that are in need of Church Revitalization and Renewal. 2) Continue to plant healthy new testament churches utilizing various models across the four counties which GOBA ministers. 3) Work to increase the number of language missions. 4) To develop new and existing leaders through the Greater Orlando Adventures in Leadership (GOAL) Peer Learning Groups.
Additionally, Dr. Cheyney is the Founder & Directional Leader of the RENOVATE National Church Revitalization Conferences and leader of the RENOVATE Church Revitalization Coaching Network where he mentors pastors, churches, and Directors of Missions in Church Revitalization and Renewal. He serves as the Executive Editor of The Church Revitalizer Magazine, which is the only national publication on Church Revitalization in North America.
Dr. Cheyney has written over 5000 print or audio resources, guidebooks, or books for pastors, church planters, and lay leaders. His most recent books include:
The Seven Pillars of Church Revitalization and Renewal (2016), Slaying the Dragons of Church Revitalization: Dealing with the Critical Issues that are Hurting Your Church (2017), The Church Revitalizer as Change Agent (2016), The Nuts and Bolts of Church Revitalization (2015), Preaching Towards Church Revitalization and Renewal (2018), Thirty-Eight Church Revitalization Models for the Twenty First Century (2014), Church Revitalization in Rural America: Revitalizing the Heartlands (2018), Spin-Off Churches: How One Church Plants Another (2008), Life After Death: A Strategy to Bring New Life to a Dead Church (2019).
Tom is a nationally recognized conference speaker and a frequent writer on church revitalization, church planting, new church health, and leadership development. Dr. Cheyney serves as an adjunct professor of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City and Anderson University in South Carolina where he teaches at the doctoral level for Church Revitalization seminars.
Dr. Cheyney has a goal to bring back to health 75 churches and plant an additional 150 new churches through GOBA’s churches in the next fifteen years.
