While voicing a number of concerns about missions work done by the Southern
Baptist Convention, a Texas Baptist study committee is suggesting little change
in funding of that work.
While voicing a number of concerns about missions work done by the Southern
Baptist Convention, a Texas Baptist study committee is suggesting little change
in funding of that work.
The Baptist General Convention of Texas committee is recommending no change
in state funding of the Southern Baptist International Mission Board and no
direct funding of the moderate/conservative Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.
The most significant recommendation of the group is to keep about $1.3 million
of Cooperative Program money the state sends to the Southern Baptist North American
Mission Board to be spent back in Texas.
Mississippi Baptists took similar action several years ago. The committee says
the change is not a “defunding” but simply a more efficient administration
of funds that would have returned to the state anyway.
The state convention would continue to send about $4.6 million in Cooperative
Program funds to the North American Mission Board. This would not decrease funding
of mission work outside Texas.
Still, the Texas committee did voice concerns about the missions agency.
The primary concern cited was the use of the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message.
The board requires all missionaries and chaplains to affirm the statement. The
Texas convention has not adopted the new statement and does not require allegiance
to it on the part of missions workers it funds. That is an issue when workers
are jointly funded by the state convention and the mission board.
Chaplains also are an issue, with the committee noting that “many, if
not most” of the 45 Baptist prison chaplains in the state have said they
will not endorse the 2001 Baptist Faith and Message.
If concerns about chaplaincy endorsements cannot be resolved, the committee
suggests the Baptist General Convention of Texas may want to explore becoming
an endorsing body for chaplains.
In turn, while recommending no reduction of funds for the International Mission
Board, the committee cited six concerns about the agencys work. They are:
That the current strategy of the International Mission Board has abandoned
meeting the “total needs of humanity” in order to focus almost exclusively
on church starting. “We are concerned that missionaries who trained and
have served as doctors or administrators or teachers are being required to redirect
their work into church starting at the expense of their training and calling,”
the committee report says.
A decrease in the number of people appointed as career missionaries. While
the mission board has reported an increase in total missionary numbers, “the
number of career missionaries has not grown for some years,” the committee
notes. For example, the board had 3,365 career missionaries in 1990 and 3,323
in 1999. Instead, recent increase in the missionary count has come through short-term
workers. The committee calls on the board to be clearer in its reporting of
missionary totals and to begin replenishing the ranks of career workers.
Reports by missionaries that they have experienced a “less meaningful
voice in strategy planning and determining how to do their work.” Some
missionaries report that New Directions has created a centralized decision-making
post and that they now feel more like corporate employees than God-called missionaries.
Neglect of women in board leadership, with no woman serving as part of the
senior administration or as a regional leaders.
Relation to the Southern Baptist Womans Missionary Union. The committee
urges the mission board to strengthen its relationship with the group.
Use of the 2001 Baptist Faith and Message as a primary doctrinal statement
that missionary candidates must affirm. “We call upon those who screen
missionary candidates from Texas and other states to hear carefully their biblical
convictions
and to measure them by Scripture alone.” (ABP)