Preparing for Sundays is a large part of a pastor’s job: scheduling events, planning sermons, and making sure everything ‘goes as planned’. While church routines are well-known, God asked Pastor Jamie Grisham of Compassion Church in Dixon, TN (Tennessee Valley Conference), if He, God, could lead. What has happened since then is nothing short of a miracle.
Nearly 20 years ago, Jamie surrendered to the call of ministry and pastored his first church in Kennett, Missouri. In 2007, he sold everything- his business and 5,500-acre farm- to enter ministry full-time. He planted his church in 2010 and has been its lead pastor since. His wife, Jill, leads their Women’s Ministry, The Vine. Jamie’s oldest daughter, Kalee, attends and is on staff at Southwestern Christian University (Bethany, OK) and is also the Kids’ Director at Passion Church (Bethany, OK). Their daughter Abby is a junior at a Nashville College, and their youngest, River, is in 1st grade.
Pastor Jamie Grisham, his wife, Jill, and their children
Just this summer, Jamie and Jill, took their annual ‘retreat’- a time to reflect on the previous year and pray for the future of their conference and church. At 4 AM one morning, God woke Jamie and told him to begin writing. What came out included “I’m done going through the motions.” “I’m done with church as usual.” “I’m done with greet, preach, dismiss, repeat.”
Instead, God said, “Focus on me.”
“If God tells me to do “blank,” I’m going to do it,” Jamie shares. And in August, the time had arrived for change.
On their scheduled baptism Sunday, 22 people arrived to be baptized. The service started off normally, but during worship “something was just special in the air,” Jamie remembers, and the Lord spoke to him again. Disregarding the ‘order of service’, Jamie went to the stage and gave an altar call, a call of repentance. At that time, 120 people gave their life or rededicated their life to Christ, and the baptism tank was reopened. Jamie encouraged everyone: “The Lord is speaking- if you’ve never been water baptized, please. We have clothes for you.”
Jamie left the stage, and nothing happened.
He knelt, praying, trying to follow God’s voice and lead, and all of a sudden, the congregation began to clap. The first person to go forward got in the tank with their church clothes on, and a line began to form. By the end of the service, 101 people had been baptized.
The first spontaneous baptism on August 20, 2023, at Compassion Church in Dixon, TN
After this first weekend, there was a buzz throughout the city. The church staff met and decided they would continue to leave the tank out at each service. The next week, 91 people were baptized. The next, 51. The next, 41. The next, 51, and so on.
Throughout these months, people experienced physical healing and evidence of speaking in tongues. One young girl who chose to give her life to Christ had struggled with a hip defect since birth. Just two weeks later, she went to a pre-operation appointment when the doctor told her mom, “We can’t do the surgery.” Of course, she wondered why, and the doctor said, “There’s nothing wrong. Her hip is completely fine.”
There has been revival and repentance with no plan to change the agenda. Jamie is letting God lead his services, and with over 400 baptisms in just 2 months, it is clear that God is moving in Dixon, TN, and not just at Compassion Church. Another PH church, as well as a Baptist church are experiencing similar miracles with 230 baptisms between them in just one day.
Pastor Jamie Grisham, Compassion Church in Dixon, TN
Jamie also mentioned Matthew 9:17 “Nor is new wine put into old wineskins; otherwise, the wineskins burst, and the wine spills and the wineskins are ruined. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, so both are preserved.”
“In order to follow tradition and routine, we’ve pushed Jesus out,” Jamie declares, and he encourages God’s people to be willing to break out of our old ways, and move out of the way so God can move in. God is no respecter of churches- the denomination does not matter. What matters is that people are finding Him, and if we position ourselves in his Word, God will pour Himself out and into us.
Along with pastoring Compassion Church, Jamie was recently elected as Conference Superintendent of Tennessee Valley Conference. In all of his roles, Jamie is wrapped up in God.
“We cannot discount what God is doing just because of the building it is happening in. We must see what God is doing and look past everything else,” Jamie declares.
