Blog Archive

We had a great time in Minnesota visiting some of Sarah’s family. I took some info with me to see if I could get a few posts done while we were gone, but traveling with a one year old leaves one with little (read, no) spare time. It was a good trip, though, and we’re glad to be back in North Carolina.

I’d like to pick back up with some more analysis of the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force final report next week when my schedule gets back to normal. There are plenty of materials out there right now on the subject, so let me point you to some of those until then.

Between the Times continues to have some excellent posts on GCR matters. That’s the first place I’d point you to. They are also reposting articles from other places so have become an aggregator in some ways for pro-GCR thinking. (Think: Balance for Baptist Press)

Also, keep an eye on Baptist21, specifically Recent GCR Articles of Note.

I’ve noticed some anti-GCR voices becoming rather unreasonable in their criticisms of the task force and the report. This tells me they are worried that support for the report is too large for them to overcome. I won’t link to the discussion I’m talking about because I don’t want them to receive any more attention in light of their recent conduct.

I’m also trying to figure out the best way to continue with my analysis of the final report. I’m trying to decide whether to continue going component-by-component is the best approach or whether I need to take a different direction. I’ll think about it some more and have some new content next week.

The Southern Baptist Convention does not currently have a recognized mission statement. When the progress report was released, the call was made for us to rally around a “clear and compelling missional vision.” I think everyone agrees it would be good to rally around such a vision – but what exactly would that vision be?

We knew it was missional. We knew it should be compelling. But how clear could it be without a concise statement of this vision? The task force answered by providing the following sentence and asking the Convention to adopt as its official mission statement:

As a convention of churches, our missional vision is to present the Gospel of Jesus Christ to every person in the world and to make disciples of all the nations.

I didn’t see this coming but I think it is a good addition to the progress report. It’s concise, simple, and should be easy to memorize for anyone so inclined. There’s a lot packed into the one sentence.

“A convention of churches” recalls the centrality of the local churches of our convention – it is not the convention’s role to fulfill the Great Commission, but to assist churches in fulfilling it. “Our missional vision” calls attention to the need for us all to see our own contexts as mission fields. “To present the Gospel of Jesus Christ to every person in the world” encompasses both missional living at home as well as pioneer North American missions and the farthest reaches of international missions. “To make disciples” calls us to remember the priority of discipleship, not stopping at conversion, but the need for growing and maturing believers. “Of all nations” points to the heart of Southern Baptists in making the gospel known among all peoples of the earth.

This is actually a split of Component #1 in the progress report. So what was Component #1 in the earlier series of posts has now become components 1 and 2, and therefore rearranges the entire numbering system from all my previous posts. In other words, they made it all complicated for me trying to write these blog posts! But in all seriousness, I think they were right to separate the vision statement from the core values.

I’m happy with the statement as it’s presented. Could it be improved in some ways? There’s no doubt many will think they should have said it a little differently here or included something there. But I think it’s a good statement and worthy of our support. I hope it will help us channel our energy and resources even more as we’re reminded of our priorities.

A little less than a week ago, the GCR Task Force released their final report. The report is available in video format and in a full text version (available in either html or as a .pdf file). As I go through the report, I’ll mention pages numbers as shown in the .pdf file, so if you want to see the sections I’m describing, you can download this file to follow along.

Report Introduction
Pages 2-6 of the report gives an introduction to the report and a summary of why many think a Great Commission Resurgence is needed. It begins with a call to reclaim our identity for a new generation. The GCR Motion from the 2009 meeting in Louisville is reviewed along with a few words about the work of the task force (pg. 2).

Urgency
A section on the urgency of the Great Commission task is next, filled with statistics showing the vast numbers of people in the world who are lost and the billions who have little or no access to the gospel. There is great cause for concern in a world with 7 billion people and the most generous estimates put the number of followers of Jesus at 1 billion. 3.5 billion have never heard the gospel and 6,000 people groups are identified who have no Christian witness. Our own baptism numbers are down and our growth (or lack of) is nowhere near keeping up with population numbers. (2-3)

The report also details how a lack of funding contributes to our situation. Average Southern Baptists give 2.5% to their church, average churches give 4% to the Cooperative Program, average state conventions keep 63% of all CP money. The report calls for all of those percentages to increase in order to open the floodgates of funding to our SBC entities. so that they might not be hindered in helping us fulfill the Great Commission because of a lack of resources. (3-4)

A Theological Center
“A Great Commission Resurgence grows directly out of a Great Commission theology.” (pg. 4) A breath of fresh air! We often hear calls to cooperate in spite of theology; but there is the one way that gives us a true foundation for lasting fellowship and cooperation: a common theology.

We are united in believing that Jesus is the only way to be delivered from God’s wrath and that all those who don’t believe in him stand condemned. We are united in believing that unreached people must hear the gospel in order to be saved. We are united in believing our mission is to take this gospel to the ends of the earth and to everyone on this planet we are capable to reaching.

The report calls us to rally around this biblical understanding of reality and our purpose here. For a Great Commission Resurgence, theology is not to be abandoned or ignored, but becomes a new and more solid foundation for cooperation and mission.

“We will be ready to do whatever it takes to see a Great Commission Resurgence change our priorities, reshape our plans, and fuel our lives for God’s glory.” (5)

A New Missional Vision
Along with the gospel as our theological center, we also agree that the local church has “primacy and centrality.” “The New Testament identifies the church as the central instrument of the kingdom of God.” (5) The task force rightly sees the Great Commission as something churches must own themselves and stop thinking of the convention as the place where we outsource the work.

Because the local church is central, the task force issues a call for churches to rally around “a new missional vision.” (See “Missional Described” for further explanation.) “Each individual congregation must accept the responsibility to reach their village, community, town, or city with the good news of Jesus Christ.” (6) So our churches must begin to view their own setting as a mission field and all Christians as missionaries.

These two aspects, a theological center and a new missional vision, come together to form the root form the the rest of the report grows. Here’s a good summary statement from page 6:

All of our Baptist work beyond the local church must exist solely to serve the local church in this mission. This is true for every Baptist association, state convention, and the Southern Baptist Convention. None of these exists for itself – all exist for the churches. Every pastor must be a missionary strategist, and every church must be a missionary sending center. Every congregation exists to replicate itself and to plant other Gospel churches. Every entity of Baptist work must exist to serve our churches in this missional vision.

A Work of God Needed
Just before getting to Component #1, the task force saw fit to remind us that we are dependent on God for seeing any real fruit from this movement: “So, how can we make a Great Commission Resurgence happen? In truth only God can bring this about.” (6)

After walking through the introduction, it’s hard for me to understand the criticism that the report is heavy on structural changes but light on recognition of the need for spiritual renewal. The task force has clearly set the stage – a theological center and missional vision that provide for both spiritual and structural renewal.

Before I embark on a journey through the final draft of the GCR Task Force’s report, here’s a summary of the series I did on the progress report. Even though the final draft has come out, most of these summaries still apply. I’ll point back to them in parts of the next series, but here’s a list of the articles in the series on the progress report:

Component #1: A New Attitude (supplemental post: Missional Described)
Component #2: Reinventing NAMB
Component #3: The IMB Without Limits
Component #4: Stemming the Tide of Duplication
Component #5: The CP Loses Its Monopoly
Component #6: Breaking the 50% Barrier

Look for the new series on the final report over the next week or two.

Yesterday morning, the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force released their final report in preparation for the SBC Annual Meeting in Orlando next month. I am excited about the report and want to go through it in some detail soon. But for now, I’ll provide some information and resources.

The report and videos may be viewed at the Great Commission Resurgence website, http://www.pray4gcr.com/. You can read the report or watch a video where Ronnie Floyd presents the report. They’ve posted an additional short video to be shown in churches about the GCRTF’s work. You can see it below.

A Great Commission Resurgence from GCR on Vimeo.

Other Resources
The Biblical Recorder printed a Baptist Press news release that is a good summary of the report. It may be the quickest way for you to get an overview of the report.

I also wanted to point you to a post at Southeastern Seminary’s all-star blog, Between the Times, written by Steve McKinion. Steve makes the case that the Great Commission Resurgence movement is the direct descendant of the Conservative Resurgence movement of the last few decades.

Update
Here are two others takes on the report, one positive and one negative:

For a positive assessment , see “Penetrating the Lostness”: One Enthusiastic “AYE” for the GCR Report! at SBCImpact.

For a predictably negative negative view on it, see My Take on the Final GCR Report at Les Puryears’ blog. I’ll probably interact in detail with Les’ criticisms in an upcoming post because they seem representative of most people who dislike the report. I link to it here so you can stay well-informed.

On the eve of the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force’s final report, here are some of my thoughts on the last section of the progress report.

In the current system, half of the funds that reach the national level of the cooperative program go to the International Mission Board. This rightly reflects that our primary reason for cooperating together as a convention is for the purpose of getting the gospel to the ends of the earth.

In order to show an even greater emphasis on international missions, the GCR task force has recommended that this percentage be increased from 50% to 51%.

The text of Component #6:

We believe in order for us to work together more faithfully and effectively towards the fulfillment of the Great Commission, that a greater percentage of total Cooperative Program funds should be directed to the work of the International Mission Board. Therefore, we will ask Southern Baptists to support this goal by affirming an intention to raise the International Mission Board allocation for the 2011-2012 budget year to 51%, a move that is both symbolic and substantial. At the same time, we will ask Southern Baptists to reduce the percentage allocated to Facilitating Ministries by 1% as part of our initial effort to send a greater percentage of total Southern Baptist Convention mission funds to the nations.

Note the language that says this increase will be both “symbolic and substantial.” They say it will be substantial because, though one percent doesn’t sound like much, when we’re talking about a budget of just over 204 million dollars, it does mean a lot of money. To be specific, we’re talking about just over two million dollars going to the IMB from this change alone. That is a substantial increase, even for an organization with a budget of over 317 million when the IMB is being forced to suspend some programs and hold trained missionaries off the field because the money is not there to send them.

In my opinion even more important than the substance of the increase is the symbolism of the fact that, as the report states, “for the first time, in our history, more than one-half of all monies that come from our churches through the SBC cooperative program will go to the reaching of the nations.” In recent years, when percentages have been altered, the IMB was left out of those entities receiving an increase. It seemed like they had reached the magic number, the invisible ceiling of 50% and they would never see an increase in that number.

So I am very thankful that the task force is recommending we do away with this limit. In future years, as giving begins to increase again, I hope it will climb even further (growing at a slightly faster rate than other entities). Or, in case of a continued decline, I also hope the numbers can be adjusted so that the decline is absorbed in other areas rather than international missions.

Where Does This 1% Come From?
If the IMB portion is increased by one percent, that percentage point must be cut somewhere else: Facilitating ministries, according to the report. That means the Executive Committee. Luckily, part of component #4 was eliminating CP promotion and stewardship education from the role of the Executive Committee. That reduction of responsibilities paves the way for the IMB increase.

You can imagine those in and close to the Executive Committee haven’t been too pleased with what will amount to a significant reduction in their budget. In fact, some have claimed this change will “gut” the work of the Executive Committee. Do you hear that sound? It’s the sound of millions of Southern Baptists weeping because the work of the Executive Committee is so near and dear to their hearts. They just can’t bear to see it “gutted.”

Now that you’ve stopped laughing, it shouldn’t take you long to realize that this kind of change is exactly what the GCR Task Force was called to do – make recommendations to get more of our money to actual ministries while spending less on things that aren’t necessary. That means some painful cuts in some areas that may be doing good work, but just are not essential to our mission.

I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s final report. It should be released by 9:30 Eastern time on the website http://www.pray4gcr.com/.

Along with Component #2, this section has generated the most controversy. It calls for a new category of missions giving to be reported by SBC churches. Currently, there’s only one way for churches to give officially to the SBC: (1) Send a check to the state convention. (2) Let them keep as much as 2/3 of the money you send. (3) Have about 1/3 (average 36.55%) forwarded on to the national level cooperative program, which is often advertised as the face of the CP.

Because of this “overhead” at the state level, many churches have opted to withhold part of their would-be Cooperative Program gift and send it instead directly to ministries they want to see flourish. So a church might send money directly to the IMB, NAMB, or one of the seminaries, or a NAMB-affiliated church plant, but that money doesn’t “count” as CP giving.

Here’s the text of Component #5:

We believe in order for us to work together more faithfully and effectively towards the fulfillment of the Great Commission, we will ask Southern Baptists to reaffirm the Cooperative Program as our central means of supporting Great Commission ministries; but in addition, we will ask Southern Baptists to celebrate with our churches in their Great Commission Giving that goes directly through the Cooperative Program, as well as any designated gifts given to the causes of the Southern Baptist Convention, a state convention or a local association.

So instead of the Cooperative Program gifts being the only measure of how much a church “participates” in the SBC, that will become only a part of the measurement – that is, if the GCR task force recommendation is adopted. It will be CP gifts plus any direct giving to SBC causes totaled together for the new category of “Great Commission Giving.”

Now there are some people who really, really don’t like this recommendation. After all, can’t we all just get along, cooperate, and let some people in a budget meeting somewhere determine where our missions giving is spent?

The reality is that some churches don’t feel like they can allow the CP to be their primary way of supporting missions. It’s a sad day when churches are giving around the Cooperative Program precisely because of their commitment to the Great Commission.

Important Only for the Change in Attitude It Represents
While I do support this recommendation, I think, in actuality, it accomplishes little. Churches who want to give around the CP are going to do it anyway, regardless of whether or not it “counts” on their church profile. There may be a few who see this as an endorsement of other giving methods and decide to pull back CP support, but that number will be small.

The reason Component #5 matters is that it shows a acknowledgement by the convention that we are going to respect churches who choose a different giving formula than the one assigned by their respective state conventions.

When pastors like Bryant Wright lead their churches to decrease CP giving and forwards that same amount directly to the IMB, is he to be celebrated or chastised? I think that should be celebrated. And so, apparently, does the GCR task force.

I was able to make the trip to Southeastern yesterday with a few other pastors from our association. We went for the Baptist21 Great Commission Resurgence Task Force panel. The discussion was a question and answer format (questions being sent in ahead of time) for task force members. Danny Akin, J. D. Greear, and Al Gilbert were there live with Ronnie Floyd joining by live video feed. Johnny Hunt joined by pre-recorded video (pictured below), as did Al Mohler.

The panel addressed some common concerns that have been raised by the progress report, as well as some statements made by those opposed to the recommendations that have been made. The panel was pretty aggressive in going after what they feel are some misconceptions about their recommendations. They said strongly that their work will not adversely affect work in pioneer states, in fact the whole purpose is to get more resources to areas like that.

They said those who make the charge that the task force’s work is political and ignores the need for spiritual awakening have missed a significant part of what the task force has called Southern Baptists to do. (The first 1/3 of progress report focused on this area.)

There’s a lot more I’d like to mention. I may go through and give some more detailed descriptions in a later post.

Baptist21 has said they’ll get the video up on their site as soon as its available. I’d look for it in the next day or two and I’ll update this post with a link to it when its available. I really recommend you watch it if this is an issue you’re concerned with.

UPDATE: Video is now available at: http://www.baptisttwentyone.com/?p=4026

In the meantime, check out these two reflections from two people who were also there. Norman Jameson of the North Carolina Biblical Recorder gives a fair and detailed take on the session here. Alvin Reid gives some of his thoughts on revival movements and the role the Great Commission Resurgence and Baptist21 are playing in Southern Baptist life.

Duplication of ministry is one of the greatest causes of inefficiency in the Southern Baptist system. It stems from good intentions. Each group wants to have a well-rounded, helpful ministry. Over the years, state conventions, for example, add different ministries but very rarely shed any. There’s constant addition. “Hey! We can do THAT too!” seems to be the normal mode of operation.

Let me give an example from our state. I hope it won’t step on too many toes, but I think its a perfect example of what I mean. Over the last few years, the state WMU has moved out of our state convention offices in order to avoid state convention leaders’ influence over the organization. (The state convention was too conservative for the liking of WMU.) Also, issues with appointment of trustees have led Baptist Retirement Homes and the BSCNC to part ways as well.

These were two fairly prominent organizations the state convention had been involved with, and now no longer was. So what did they do? See it as an opportunity to shed some layers of organization? Take the opportunity in a time of declining budgets to downsize? From a standpoint of mission and vision, did they see it as a chance to narrow the focus of what the state convention does? None of the above.

Instead, the BSCNC started two new ministries so they could continue to be involved in women’s ministry and senior ministry. NC Baptist Aging Ministry had a budget, as a new organization, of over $900,000 in 2009 and of $800,000 in 2010. That’s right around 2.3% of the entire state convention budget. Now this is not to discredit the work of NCBAM or Embrace. I’m confident they have great people involved and do a good job with their respective ministries. But that is not the point!

Maybe we don’t have to be involved in every possible ministry. Maybe we could just leave women’s ministry to some groups out there who are already doing women’s ministry well and simply put our churches in contact with those groups! Maybe it’s not the job of a state convention to teach our churches how to have exercise classes for senior adults. Again, there’s no doubt a lot of good has been accomplished by both of these groups. And I’m sure the people working with them are wonderful. The real question is: Are these essential to our mission?

The Result of Everyone Wanting to Do Everything
When we have so many organizations around the country with this same kind of attitude, that means there are a lot of people doing exactly the same job just for a different geographical region or different constituency. Instead of having 2 or 3 things we do really well, we all have the same 10 things that we’re working on and our attention and resources are divided.

Add to this the fact that it’s not just 41 state conventions we’re talking about, there’s also NAMB, local associations, churches, parachurch organizations… That means that in addition to ministry staff for each of these different ministries in each organization there are also administrative and organizational costs. Overhead increases exponentially. There ends up being a lot of wheel reinventing going on.

Can’t We Delegate?
As an example, here are five items that are often available at the state convention level and also in some area of Southern Baptists’ national organization:

1. Church planting
2. Mission trips
3. Church consulting
4. Stewardship education
5. CP promotion

So the question is, instead of everyone doing all five, why don’t we designate one level to be responsible for some of these things? Maybe divide them up 3/2 so that each level can focus more clearly on the tasks it’s responsible for. Say church planting and mission trips become the responsibility of NAMB and let state conventions take care of church consulting, stewardship education, and CP promotion.

Makes sense and sounds easy, right? Well, I’ll be the first to admit that theory is easier than reality here. It’s not realistic to make such clean-cut distinctions and divvy out jobs like we’re task manager on Celebrity Apprentice.

But at some level this is what Component #4 is about and attempts to do. Here’s the text of Component #4:

We believe in order for us to work together more faithfully and effectively towards the fulfillment of the Great Commission, we will ask Southern Baptists to move the ministry assignments of Cooperative Program promotion and stewardship education from the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention and return them to being the work of each state convention since they are located closer to our churches. Our call is for the state conventions to reassume their primary role in the promotion of the Cooperative Program and stewardship education, while asking the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention to support these efforts with enthusiasm and a convention-wide perspective.

So what we’re talking about is making clear that the Executive Committee will no longer play a role on stewardship education and Cooperative Program promotion. That job will be left to the state conventions, who are already involved in this area as it is.

In my view, this is a fairly modest proposal considering the amount of duplication that exists. The task force could have called for more here and I would have been happy. But as a jump out of the starting block, I’m happy with this proposal.

Morris Chapman and Failure
One final note on this item. I came across an interview with Morris Chapman (HT: Les Puryear), head of the SBC Executive Committee yesterday. He said if this proposal is adopted, it “will be the first time since 1927 the convention will fail to use its own money to promote its own ministries.” This is nonsense. To decide not to do something, and then to follow through and not do it does not equal failure. It really is beyond me why some people can’t see past the way we’ve always done it. There are other options. The only failure here would be to allow duplication in this area to continue.

Did you know the IMB is literally prohibited from operating in North America? It seems to make sense at first, though, doesn’t it? The North American Mission Board is responsible for North America and the International Mission Board is responsible for other continents. Seems like it should work out just fine. And, after all, isn’t part of this whole Great Commission Resurgence movement about avoiding and reducing duplication of ministry?

Well, as with most things pertaining to Southern Baptist organization, it’s a lot more complicated than that. First, it’s a little misleading to think NAMB is responsible for North America since it’s really only the U.S. and Canada (and their territories) that NAMB is charged with serving. But on top of the fact that Mexico isn’t included in the SBC’s map of North America (smile, I’m joking) there are people groups here in North America that NAMB is by no means prepared to reach. Language and cultural barriers are too great with many immigrant populations – and there are too many of these for NAMB to try and accommodate.

Then you have a thought… “Wait! I know! The IMB already ministers in many of these international contexts so they might be able to show us how to reach these groups.”

And then someone tells you, “No, the IMB isn’t allowed to do that.”

It isn’t that the IMB doesn’t want to help, or that they can’t afford the personnel. (Though either of those may be true at different times.) The real reason they can’t is because it’s on page 325 of the Official Rulebook of the SBC. Ok, not really, but it is a real rule the IMB has to abide by.

The Text of Component #3:

We believe in order for us to work together more faithfully and effectively towards the fulfillment of the Great Commission, we will ask Southern Baptists to entrust to the International Mission Board the ministry to reach the unreached and under-served people groups without regard to any geographic limitations.

The IMB has already indicated that even if this recommendation is accepted, they have no intentions of appointing missionaries stateside. The thrust of this recommendation is to remove the artificial barrier preventing IMB personnel and resources from being used to help equip others to minister to these groups.

Here’s more from the report:

Most of the 586 people groups that do not speak English in the United States have strategy coordinators working overseas with the same groups. With geographical limitations removed, a new synergy can be created in international missions.

So the expertise of our missionaries overseas can be channeled to help us (local churches primarily, I hope, along with state conventions and NAMB) reach these groups with the gospel. Let’s use the resources we have available to us and stop limiting based on barriers that are no longer as significant as they were 50 years ago.