talkCP

When I talk to people in Salt Lake City, Utah about serving in full-time ministry, they are often perplexed and want to know more because most religious clergy in Utah serve as volunteers.

They are equally as bewildered when I tell them I serve full-time with the Southern Baptist Convention because many don’t even know what the Southern Baptist Convention is. Needless to say, the people around whom I live have no idea what the Cooperative Program (CP) is, what it does, who is cooperating, or why it is relevant. Sometimes I wonder the same about our own Southern Baptist brothers and sisters and our understanding of the CP.

Put simply, the Cooperative Program consists of thousands of autonomous, like-minded congregations around the world cooperating together for the sake of missions and ministry. It has often been referred to as the greatest cooperating effort of autonomous congregations in the history of Christianity. I couldn’t agree with that sentiment more. However, since the CP was founded in 1925, many may wonder if it is still relevant to us today. Maybe a better way to fund missions and ministry is out there waiting to be discovered. Or, maybe, just maybe, even though it is nearly 100 years old, the CP is still relevant for today and is the best way to fund our joint efforts of missions and ministry. I stand, unashamedly, and say the CP is absolutely relevant and is, without a doubt, bringing together autonomous congregations who may not be working together otherwise. Is, however, the CP still relevant?

First, without the Cooperative Program and the gifts sent to our area in Salt Lake City, we would not be able to fund the overwhelming need we have for missions and missionaries. Here in Utah, our population of 3+ million people is 98% non-Christian, meaning there are fewer than 65,000 Christians in the entire state. When taking into account the percentage of those who are Southern Baptist, the number drops dramatically.

As of 2010, there are approximately 13,000 Southern Baptists in Utah, meaning we make up 0.4% of the population. There is no way 13,000 people can provide missions funds to reach their 2.9+ million neighbors. That would basically mean every individual Southern Baptist in Utah would be solely responsible for the budget of a 230 person church. Only cooperative efforts of all Southern Baptists around the world allow us in Utah to reach all of our neighbors. Without these efforts, our missions efforts in Utah would not be possible. That is directly relevant, temporally and eternally, to the persons with whom we share the gospel.

Second, as a former professor at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY, a percentage of my salary was provided by the Cooperative Program. I am thankful Southern Baptists see the need to invest in quality education and provide for biblically sound educators to train the next generation of pastors, missionaries, church staff members, and professors. Without the CP, Southern could not have afforded to provide for my entire salary and I would have needed to raise additional funds or be bi-vocational. Being full-time at Southern allowed me to stay in my office after class to focus on research, writing, and investing in students as they dropped by my office for advice, prayer, and counsel. Though the classroom was extremely important, I found that much more teaching came in my office or over coffee than in the classroom. The CP provided that opportunity for all faculty to care for students in this way. That is directly relevant to the training of the next generation of ministers.
[Read more…] about The Relevance of the Cooperative Program

In the fifth grade, my math teacher conveyed an idea that I’ve never been able to forget. Her goal was to draw a parallel between God and the concept of infinity, so she attempted to explain how deep numbers can go.

She posed this question: “Take something small, like seconds—how do we measure 60 seconds?” We all responded unanimously, “One minute!”

She smiled, then continued, almost as if jabbing at our intellect, “Good. How do we measure a billion seconds?” The room became uncomfortably silent. That wasn’t fair. We were in fifth grade! She started laughing, then continued, “Right now, it’s the year 2002. A billion seconds ago, it was 1970.”

My mind was blown. Ever since that day, I’ve never been able to look at the word “billion” the same. That word holds much greater weight than it did before.

Consider two facts…

1. There are billions of people who do not know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
2. Billions of those people live outside of our neighborhood, city, state, and country.

Please let that sink in for a moment.

These facts beg an obvious question for me. How is it possible for me, along with my brothers and sisters of the faith, to reach so many lost souls?

Prior to my junior year of high school, I did not know of a single entity capable of achieving such a daunting task. I understood the commission given to believers in Matthew 28, but I could not pragmatically comprehend an effective way to reach the billions of lost souls with the Good News. At that time, the truth of Luke 10:2 truly began to resonate—“The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.”

Realistically, there is just no way my local church can accomplish this missional command alone. Furthermore, even the largest local church in America cannot accomplish this missional command alone. So how do we, as a church, accomplish the task of reaching so many people? Historically, as I learned through my local church, our answer to this has been the Cooperative Program, which comprises autonomous churches cooperating together to advance the Gospel.

With this in mind, I must ask, is the Cooperative Program the best answer to this problem? Is it still relevant today? Is it still worth sending money to an entity that may not even be needed anymore?

As long as there are lost souls in remote parts of the earth, new believers who need to be discipled, and brothers and sisters within our churches who have been called to ministry, there is a need for the Cooperative Program. In the words of notable Southwestern Seminary alumnus Frank Page, “I have yet to see any model that can accomplish what Southern Baptists have done through the Cooperative Program.” So unless someone has another model or method that far exceeds what we have been able to do collectively through the Cooperative Program, I will continue being a loud advocate.

Ministry, at its very core, is man taking on a small role in the grand play orchestrated by God. Likewise, the Cooperative Program allows Southern Baptists an opportunity to play that small role. As Southern Baptists, we are made distinct by the way we go about fulfilling the Great Commission and Jesus’ command in Acts 1:8. If we are not building toward making disciples and advancing the Gospel, then we are desperately missing the mark. Therefore, everything we do as believers must point at actively building toward these two commands. The Cooperative Program effectively helps us do just that—which points even further to its relevance. [Read more…] about Is the Cooperative Program Needed Anymore?

I believe the Cooperative Program is still relevant for the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention. Each church must determine how they will fund gospel work across America and throughout the world. Personally, I have determined the Cooperative Program is the best way to accomplish this grand task.  Why do I believe the Cooperative Program is still relevant?

It is still relevant because it is:  BIBLICAL

Each local church must wrestle with how they will fulfill Acts 1:8 through their church. Acts 1:8 says, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

 I believe the Cooperative Program is built upon a biblical conviction. This conviction each church should have is that God desires us to present the gospel of Jesus Christ to every person in the world and to make disciples of all the nations.

When my church gives through the Cooperative Program, we are doing so because of our deep biblical conviction that we must fulfill Acts 1:8 in as many ways as possible.

It is still relevant because it is:  MISSIONAL

 This biblical conviction drives our passion to be missional as a church. I believe the Cooperative Program is relevant because it is missional. It is missional in that it permits our church to fulfill a compelling vision.

The compelling missional vision of Jesus Christ is for us to be His witnesses regionally, statewide, nationally, and internationally. The Cooperative Program has been built upon, is built upon, and must be built upon in the future with this compelling missional vision driving all we do as a convention of churches.

It is relevant because it is:  COOPERATION

The Cooperative Program exists to serve the churches in helping them accomplish their God-given responsibility to fulfill the Great Commission; it does not exist for the churches to serve it. Due to this, the spirit of cooperation is so important in funding our work together.

It is cooperation that elevates your church and its work around the world. Competition may be cool in the world, but not among churches. It is cooperation that repudiates competition. For example, a societal method of financial support for our gospel work together would fuel competition between our state, national, and international work.

The Cooperative Program eliminates competition between our entities as it provides a balanced approach for support. [Read more…] about THE RELEVANCE OF THE COOPERATIVE PROGRAM

Several years ago while working with a group of SBC affiliated churches outside the continental United States, I learned a very important lesson.  This association of churches had recently admitted a new congregation into their association and on the Sunday following a week long conference I was invited to preach to this new congregation.  My wife and I arrived early and discovered that this very small congregation was particularly excited that morning.  I joined in some of the preservice conversations and discovered the source of their excitement.  The members had learned about a fantastic new idea that was a revolutionary concept to them.  There was something called “The Cooperative Program” and they were going to be able to help send missionaries all around the world.

Having grown up in Baptist life, I did not remember a time when there was not a Cooperative Program.  I took it for granted.  To me it was not a revolutionary idea but rather something that was always there, quietly doing its work without requiring a lot of attention.  On that Sunday morning I was reminded that the Cooperative Program absolutely was something I should always be excited about.  No matter how small or large.  Every congregation could be a part of work all around the world.

Several years later I find myself with the privilege of serving as a Global Missions Pastor with responsibilities for missions across our country and the world.  My perspective has matured from just knowing I should be excited about how the Cooperative Program helps every church send missionaries around the world to a place where I depend upon the resources the Cooperative Program provides to facilitate my work.

As we participate in planting churches here in the United States, I do not have to vet potential church planters.  When a potential church planter sits down at my desk, I have the resources of the North American Mission Board at my disposal.  NAMB assists with vetting, training, counseling and placing these church planters while allowing me to focus on helping these new church plants with finances and personnel.  Imagine the resources I would have to expend to do the work NAMB does for me.  The Cooperative Program helps fund NAMB.  NAMB does for me the tasks they can do better than me.  I can focus on applying the talents and gifts of my congregation to the work of planting churches.  Ultimately, the Cooperative Program provides efficiency and excellence that would be difficult to obtain otherwise.

Internationally, the Cooperative Program helps fund our International Mission Board which partners with my local church in our efforts to serve around the world.  Today’s ever changing geo political situations necessitate the making of wise decisions about how to apply our physical and personal resources.  Our excellent IMB personnel are a critical resource in making those sort of decisions.

[Read more…] about The Cooperative Program – Something I Should Always be Excited About

The traditional role of CP funding to facilitate missionaries on the field is critical to Englewood Baptist Church’s strategy.  From our perspective, being able to connect our mission efforts through our SBC personnel both in the United States and around the world allows us to skip over the vetting process that would be necessary without our mission agencies.  We trust that if the SBC sending agencies have approved these persons we can work with them with confidence. 

We also have the knowledge that our work is not something that is “one and done.”  We are part of an overall strategy for a particular place or people group that will have ongoing work taking place even when we are not present.

Having CP funded personnel on the field makes our work more effective.  We work in many locations and it would be difficult for us to master all the cultural norms that would make us most effective without the training and guidance provided by our field personnel.

BAPTIST PRESS – October 5, 2016

NASHVILLE (BP) — The Southern Baptist Convention ended its fiscal year $9.23 million over its 2015–2016 budgeted goal and $6.57 million over the previous year’s CP Allocation Budget gifts, according to Frank S. Page, president and CEO of the SBC Executive Committee.

The SBC received $195,730,508.04 in Cooperative Program Allocation gifts for the year. This amount is $6,570,276.63, or 3.47 percent, more than it received during the last fiscal year, and is $9,230,508.04, or 4.95 percent, more than its budgeted goal of $186.5 million.

“Our Southern Baptist churches have responded powerfully to the call for missions support and ministry support through the Cooperative Program,” Page said.

“I would say two factors are present here — sacrifice and strategic decisions,” he noted. “We thank God for the sacrifice of thousands of churches who truly believe we can collaborate together and do more for the Gospel than we can do alone. This sacrificial giving will minister on the mission field, in theological education and other areas stronger than ever before.

“We are also thankful for the strategic decisions of many of our state conventions who are forwarding more and more to the national level,” Page said in written comments to Baptist Press. “We have just finished five years of increase [from the states], only the third period of time in our history when national CP forwarded from the states has reached or exceeded 38.75 percent. We are thankful for our state partners and thankful for the strategic decisions that many have made.”

In designated giving, the fiscal year’s total of $204,671,725.92 is 4.95 percent above the previous year’s $195,013,412.58. Of this designated amount, $204,135,367.21 was disbursed to IMB and NAMB through the seasonal missions offerings and Global Hunger Relief. The balance was designated for other SBC entities or the SBC Operating Budget. Combined designated gifts to SBC causes and CP Allocation Budget gifts showed a 4.22 percent increase over the same time last year.

The convention-adopted budgeted amount was distributed as follows: 50.41 percent to international missions through the International Mission Board, 22.79 percent to North American missions through the North American Mission Board, 22.16 percent to theological education, 2.99 percent to the SBC operating budget and 1.65 percent to the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Of the amount received that was over the budgeted goal, IMB received a full 51 percent of the $9.23 million overage, while the SBC operating budget received only 2.4 percent of the overage. Other SBC entities received the same percentage of the overage as the allocation formula in the 2015–2016 adopted CP Allocation Budget.

“We believe the Acts 1:8 strategy includes local, state, as well as national and international ministries, and we are thankful for our state partners!” Page added.

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow. While we give thanks for the strategic decisions and the sacrifice of God’s people, the heart of the issue is always stewardship,” he said. “We need to continue to call upon our people to be diligent in fulfilling the biblical tithe and going beyond so that we can truly see our world touched for the Gospel.”

September gifts through CP totaled $16,569,490.69, while designated gifts were $4,681,908.00. Monies include receipts from individuals, churches, state conventions and fellowships for distribution according to the 2015–2016 Cooperative Program Allocation Budget and to SBC causes as stipulated in designated gifts.

The CP is Southern Baptists channel of giving, begun in 1925, through which a local church can contribute to the ministries of its state/regional convention and the missions and ministries of the SBC with a single monthly or weekly contribution.

Month-to-month swings in the amount received through the Executive Committee reflect a number of factors, including the timing of when the state conventions forward the national portion of Cooperative Program contributions to the Executive Committee, the day of the month churches forward their CP contributions to their state conventions, the number of Sundays in a given month, and the percentage of CP contributions forwarded to the SBC by the state conventions after shared ministry expenses are deducted.

CP allocation budget receipts received by the Executive Committee are reported monthly to the executives of the entities of the convention, to the state convention offices, to the state Baptist papers and are posted online at www.cpmissions.net/CPReports.

Is the Cooperative Program relevant? My answer has always been YES because of the way I view two words: Cooperation and Capacity.

I said YES as a church planter – when I realized the missiological efforts of our core group were being fueled by funds from the Tennessee Baptist Convention and the North American Mission Board. I clearly understood that we could plant a church near a public-housing development with many low-income (or no income) residents because Southern Baptists across this nation were partnering with us. That same understanding led our church plant to continue supporting the Cooperative Program, even after we were no longer receiving NAMB and state convention funding.

I said YES as a pastor when I led a fifty year-old congregation into Southern Baptist (and Kentucky Baptist) life. The Cooperative Program and the “Southern Baptist” way of doing missions were new to these Christians. During this transition, I explained many things to our congregation, but the training and ministry-preparation events provided by our state convention and LifeWay sold that congregation on the benefit of cooperative missions giving.

Also, during this time, I benefitted from theological education at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, which was a fraction of the costs charged by other Bible-believing seminaries  (By the way, it feels quirky justifying the CP to a pastor that has been educated in a CP-supported institution).

As an African-American congregation new to Southern Baptist life, that church became one of the leading CP churches in our state.

I said YES when pastoring a large SBC church. I pushed for increased CP giving even in challenging economic times. In a larger church, with the capacity to do many ministries and support individual missionaries, I was reminded of Pastor Johnny Hunt’s words regarding a church’s “stewardship of influence.” First, no church, regardless of its size, can do as much as they might do when locked up with other churches for missiological impact. Second, in light of the interaction between churches in the New Testament, I would encourage churches to view a “lone ranger” approach to missions as inconsistent with New Testament models.

Besides my experiences, let’s think about the two words: cooperation and capacity.

First, cooperation. Southern Baptists have said, “At the center of our funding stands the Cooperative Program, which since 1925 has served to mobilize the stewardship of Southern Baptists for worldwide missions and ministry” (GCRTF Report). That is not simply a “We’ve always done it like that” statement. Instead, it reflects an appreciation for the consistent funding stream that has allowed Southern Baptists to attempt many (not a few) great things in the area of missions. [Read more…] about Cooperation and Capacity

The overflow crowd crammed into the small room and spilled out into the street. You needed to be early or fast to get a good seat. Neither of those are an option when you can’t walk. Late arrivals are relegated to the farthest reaches of the human sea …and a long way from hope.

That is unless you have friends committed to doing whatever it takes to get you to the Savior’s feet. Jesus sees your faith. He speaks to you. Seconds later, you get up and walk – possibly for the first time ever – through the astonished and parted sea.

But that never happens if not for a shared vision brought to fruition by the tangible commitment of four people each grabbing a handle of your stretcher, cooperating for your spiritual benefit.

Of course the story is from Mark 2 where the paralytic man’s friends dig a hole in a roof to lower him to Jesus’ feet. I believe there are billions of people today across Tennessee, North America and around the world just like the paralytic man. They are in need of spiritual healing and are in desperate need of friends who will do whatever it takes to get them to the feet of Jesus.

Southern Baptists must be those types of friends if we are to share our life-altering message of hope. Fortunately, our Baptist forefathers created the Cooperative Program to ensure Southern Baptists could lay hand to the pallet and usher the lost to our Savior. That legacy of cooperation rooted in the doctrine of missions is 90 years old and is still the tie that effectively binds us in our Great Commission cause.

There is, however, a tug across our denomination away from cooperation. I believe the tug is born out of a genuine commitment to spiritual urgency. However, I also believe our well-meaning efforts to focus only on our individual part of the missions effort positions us to eventually pull against each other. The result would be detrimental to our local churches, our denomination and most importantly to the world’s spiritually lost. The proverbial “roof top” will be full of millions who will never make it to Jesus’ feet.

Here’s our reality: By any measure our churches have generally plateaued in growth or are declining. Nothing new there; people have said that for years. We’ve spent a significant amount of time camping in that macro-level conversation. Unfortunately, less time is spent at the micro-level, the church health level, identifying the root of the decline. I believe there are many contributing factors but one that rises to the surface is a failure to teach and embrace our historical Baptist distinctive of missional cooperation exorcised through the Cooperative Program. [Read more…] about Are You Grabbing a Handle of Cooperation?

At our dinner table last night, our 13-year-old guest turned to me and asked abruptly, “Do you know why I’m glad my sister is here?” Our guest comes to visit once a week. She is working her way through a residential treatment program, trying to recover from years of abuse and neglect. The question caught me off guard and, knowing at least some of what she and her little sister have endured, I wasn’t sure what she would say next, but I wanted her to understand she was free to say whatever was on her mind.

I simply replied, “No. Why are you glad?”

Her sister was three when she came into the care of Sunrise Children’s Services, the James 1:27 ministry of Kentucky Baptists. Fueled by the Cooperative Program, Sunrise ministers to more than 1,000 hurting kids in Kentucky.  Fueled by the Cooperative Program, Sunrise ministers to more than 1,000 hurting kids in Kentucky. With more than 8,000 kids in our state’s care, Kentucky Baptists feel we are only scratching the surface even though we are the largest private provider.

When Sunrise contacted us about a three-year-old, my wife Michelle and I were a little hesitant. We had been foster parents for a teenage boy for a year, and, although he had recently been placed with another family, three-year-olds had never been on our radar. With two kids in college and one heading into middle school, a three-year-old didn’t seem like a “good fit.” But the scriptural mandate to care for orphans doesn’t say much about which kids fit our life-stage or lifestyle, so we took the plunge.

Now, at our dinner table, her 13-year-old sister is about to break my heart even though I don’t know it yet.

“I’m glad she’s here because I’m glad she has a father.”

I knew our foster daughter had no memory of a father, so I wasn’t at all that surprised when, in a matter of hours, she was calling me daddy. But what broke my heart was the 13-year-old celebrating that her little sister now has a father even though she doesn’t.

These two precious girls are among the 400,000 kids in foster care in the US. Thanks to CP ministries like Sunrise, many of those kids are finding foster homes and some are finding forever families. I’d call that relevant.

How relevant is the CP funding model in fueling Southern Baptist missions and ministries? I believe it is not only relevant; I believe CP is essential and irreplaceable.

If CP disappeared today, so would a significant portion of the ministries and mission work of Southern Baptists. Even the ministries and mission work that somehow managed to continue to exist would be significantly crippled. Let me explain why.

[Read more…] about The Role and Relevance of Cooperative Missions and Cooperative Funding Across the SBC