One way Kentucky Baptists are reaching out to the world right here in Kentucky is through the Engage conference which will be held this weekend in Cave City. Put together by the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s Baptist Campus Ministries and Kentucky Woman’s Missionary Union, Engage reaches out to students from around the world who are studying here at Kentucky colleges and universities.

Funded by the Cooperative Program and the Eliza Broadus Offering for State Missions, Engage is another great example of how Kentucky Baptists are seeking to fulfill the Great Commission.

Here’s the KBC news release about this weekend’s event:

International Students ‘Engage’ in Spiritual, Cultural Event

CAVE CITY – Hundreds of college students will converge on cave country this weekend for a time of sharing and encouragement that also will provide many international students an opportunity to hear about the love of Christ, perhaps for the first time.

Last year more than 300 students representing 43 countries attended the Engage conference, hosted by Kentucky Baptist Convention Collegiate Ministry and Kentucky Woman’s Missionary Union.

Cindy Pelphrey, campus minister for several Owensboro-area colleges, is coordinating this year’s event. The theme is “Very Important Piece…Place…Person!”

A highlight of the event is Saturday evening’s banquet which includes a “parade of nations” and a cultural fashion show. Pelphrey said the activities allow students to educate their peers about different cultures and to demonstrate pride in their homelands.

“On Sunday morning, students will be invited to attend a Christian worship service where some will share Scripture in their language and others will give testimonies,” Pelphrey said. “An international choir will sing and the message will focus on the ‘Very Important Person,’ Jesus Christ.”

Sports, games and a talent show are among other activities. Tamara Koch, a counselor from Rockford, Ill., is the guest speaker. A former resident of Germany and graduate of European Nazarene College and Wheaton College, Koch helps missionaries and health-care professionals stay mentally and emotionally healthy so they can minister to others.

Pelphrey noted that today’s colleges and universities are more culturally diverse than ever, and that Baptist Collegiate Ministry is a way for Kentucky Baptists to engage in international missions without leaving home.

“It is a joy to discover the world in Kentucky during this special weekend where smiles, laughter and pride in family and culture meet,” she said. “The greatest joy is sharing the love of Christ and His desire to call each of us His child.”

The KBC Great Commission Task Force at work at the Kentucky Baptist Building.

Kentucky Baptists will move to an even distribution of Cooperative Program receipts with the Southern Baptist Convention and set an ambitious goal of increasing missions giving under a plan being proposed by the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s Great Commission Task Force.

The Task Force’s recommendations will be presented to messengers for approval at the Kentucky Baptist Convention annual meeting at Immanuel Baptist Church in Lexington on Nov. 16.

The report was released today to give Kentucky Baptists adequate time to understand and react to four recommendations, said Task Force Chairman Hershael York, pastor of Buck Run Baptist Church in Frankfort and a former KBC president.

Here’s the text of the report:

Last year Kentucky Baptist Convention President John Mark Toby appointed a Great Commission Task Force. The 17 Task Force members appointed were:

• Hershael York, pastor of Buck Run Baptist Church in Frankfort, Chair.

• Paul Badgett, pastor, First Baptist Church, Pikeville

• Charles Barnes, member of Hurstbourne Baptist Church in Louisville

• Joy Bolton, executive director-treasurer of Kentucky Woman’s Missionary Union

• Jeff Crabtree, director of mission, Warren Baptist Association

• Rusty Ellison, pastor, Walnut Street Baptist Church in Louisville

• Chad Fugitt, pastor of First Baptist Church in Monticello

• Greg Faulls, pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church in Owensboro

• John Hale, deacon at First Baptist Church in Mount Vernon

• Bill Henard, pastor of Porter Memorial Baptist Church in Lexington

• James Jones, pastor of Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Campbellsville

• Bill Mackey, executive director, Kentucky Baptist Convention

• Don Mathis, president, Kentucky Baptist Convention

• Jessica Milburn, member of Union Baptist Church in Union

• Sam Rainer, pastor of First Baptist Church in Murray

• Kevin Smith, pastor of Watson Memorial Baptist Church in Louisville

• Dan Summerlin, pastor of Lone Oak First Baptist Church in Paducah

Over the course of the past 8 months, the Task Force has met in prayer, deliberation, and commitment. Every member of the Great Commission Task Force agrees that this has been a significant spiritual milestone in our lives as we have seen God work among us and bring us to a unanimous consensus about our recommendations.

In order to reach our conclusions and recommendations, we first reached a consensus about our foundational guiding principles. The include the following:

Principles we believe

We believe that Jesus Christ is worthy of all our praise, honor, worship, and resources.

We believe that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation, and that explicit faith in Christ as Lord and Savior is necessary for all morally accountable persons to have eternal life.

We believe that faith in Christ comes only through the proclamation of the gospel applied by the Holy Spirit.

We believe that Jesus has commanded us to preach the gospel to every person on earth.

We believe that churches should evangelize the lost, baptize and disciple the saved, plant churches, and reach our nation and the world through commissioning missionaries, participating in missions personally, and giving a significant portion of income and resources to missions, especially through the vehicle of the Cooperative Program.

We believe in the value of Christian education as a means of equipping Christians to serve the Lord through cultural engagement, church membership and participation, and missionary service.

We believe that a new generation of Kentucky Baptists are not willing to settle for business as usual and that the Cooperative Program will diminish and perhaps die if we do not present a bold, sweeping vision for the future and a refocus of our energies.

We believe that we must devote a significantly larger portion of our resources to reach the 1.7 billion people of the last frontier who have never heard the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We believe that to be a faithful steward of all that God has blessed us with that each Kentucky Baptist should be challenged to provide a legacy gift for the Cooperative Program and Kingdom causes. We believe that churches, assisted by the Kentucky Baptist Foundation and Mission Board, must lead in training and developing this stewardship vision for all Kentucky Baptists.

We believe that renewed vision and ministry will only result from renewed love for Christ and repentance for our selfishness as evidenced by our decline in witnessing, proclaiming the gospel, personal sacrifice, giving, and going.

We believe that our Kentucky Baptist churches must reverse the decline in cooperative program giving, even while we engage the lost, go on mission, and plant churches.

We believe that to reach our nation and the nations for Christ will require a continued paradigm shift for Kentucky Baptists. First, our churches must become more outwardly focused than inwardly. Second, the Kentucky Baptist Convention needs to shift to a paradigm based more on outreach, evangelism, and missions and less on advising particular church ministries. To do this would require the KBC over time to become more of a facilitator of shared advice, counsel, and experience among churches, pastors, and laity rather than a provider of those services. We recognize that certain ministries (disaster relief, ministry to pastors in transition, etc) are more effective when done by the state convention so we affirm the continued significance and need for the KBC. In fact, we believe that this shift will result in a greater connection between the ministry of the KBC and the churches. We furthermore believe that the local associations are going to become key partners in renewed emphasis on shared ministry, missions, and connections.

To that end and after intense study, interviews, deliberation and prayer, we propose that Kentucky Baptists:

1) Initiate a 3-year emphasis called “More for Christ,” an intentional time of repentance, renewal, and redirection for the future. Kentucky Baptists responded to the “Find It Here” campaign in record numbers and with great enthusiasm and excitement. Our prayer is that we might respond in the same way to a call to personal and corporate commitment to Christ and to the Great Commission.

More for Christ means:

More of myself

• personal surrender
• personal witness
• personal sacrifice

More of my family

More for the lost

More for the needs

More for the nations

We propose that messengers request the KBC mission board, staff, agencies and institutions to seek ways that we can implement this theme in every part of Kentucky Baptist life and that it become a clarion call to our churches and individuals.

Explanation: We recognize that we desperately need a recommitment of our lives, our churches, our families, and our resources. Our prayer is that these recommendations will result in a great movement of the Holy Spirit among Kentucky Baptists. We pray that “More for Christ” will be the theme of what Kentucky Baptists do and give for the future. We pray that such an emphasis will be used of God to remind us and motivate us to strategize, mobilize, and give toward that end.

2) Instruct our Mission Board to move to a reallocation of Cooperative Program funds that results in 50% of our annual Cooperative Program receipts (after shared administrative expenses) being given to the Southern Baptist Convention and 50% to KBC within the next 7 years. Beginning with the 2011-12 fiscal year, the Mission Board shall implement the attached GCTF-Ky CP Percentage Distribution Plan to achieve this goal.

Explanation: To illustrate the differences in this change over the next 7 years and estimating approximately 4% of the KBC budget as shared expenses and 3% growth in CP funds, the division of Cooperative Program receipts after those shared expenses would be:

1st year 2011-12: KBC 53.28% SBC 46.72%

7th year 2017-18: KBC 50%, SBC 50%

The basis for this change in the first year would include a 6% across the board reduction in the KBC budget; eliminating the KBC’s contribution to annuitants by $400,000; reducing contribution to the colleges an additional 7% (which means that the colleges still receive slightly more than they did prior to Georgetown’s departure from the KBC budget); a Mission Board staff reduction of 12%; a total Mission Board budget reduction of 9.85%; an additional WMU reduction of 3.85% ; meaning a total of 9.85%.

In years 2-7 the Mission Board would make further adjustments of $600,000 to achieve incrementally the goal of a 50%-50% allocation between SBC and KBC causes after shared expenses.

3) Set a goal to increase overall CP receipts from Kentucky Baptist churches and individuals at least 3% per year for the next seven years. This growth would be equivalent to each church increasing CP giving by at least 0.25% of undesignated receipts each year for 7 years.

Explanation: It would be wrong simply to reallocate cooperative program receipts and ask KBC ministries to sacrifice and cut back without also asking more from ourselves. As a tenet of faith, we believe that God has already given His people all the resources we need to do what He has commanded. We cannot deny that in the past 15 years Cooperative Program giving from Kentucky Baptist churches has declined from approximately 10% of undesignated receipts to less than 7%. We simply must reverse that trend and ask our churches and individuals to respond graciously, generously, and sacrificially.

If Kentucky Baptists respond and if we could reverse that trend by growing our receipts by 3% per year for the next 7 years, the results for missions would be staggering. Using the new seven-year reallocation with a 3% growth, the increase for SBC causes would be $23,786,274 meaning that over $11.8 million more would go to the IMB and put missionaries on the field.

This is attainable in several ways. If every church in the KBC increased their CP giving by just ¼% of their undesignated receipts every year for the next seven years, we could do it. If small churches that usually give a fixed amount rather than a percentage would up that amount, we could do it. If large churches that have tended to decrease CP giving in order to support their own programs, buildings, and missions would understand the global importance of the CP and reverse that trend, we could do it.

While designating missions dollars to the IMB or some other agency or effort may seem attractive, only the CP supports missions in North America and around the world, helps train pastors and missionaries through our seminaries, and speaks on moral and social issues through the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. While we encourage multiple mission efforts, we believe in the wisdom and strategic genius of the Cooperative Program which, after all, was born here in Kentucky.

4) Authorize the Great Commission Task Force to remain constituted for the next seven years, monitoring progress and implementation and reporting to the Convention and/or Mission Board each year, making any further recommendations as necessary. Each year the KBC president may appoint members to maintain between 10 and 15 on the committee.

Explanation: This work is significant enough that a single entity needs to work closely with the Executive Director and relate to all parts of the KBC to see how we are doing and make reports on our progress. We also believe that continuity is essential, especially after as extensive a study of all KBC entities as this task force has conducted. For that reason we ask that the current members remain on the committee and new ones be added only as natural attrition occurs.

Addendum

GCTF – KY  CP Percentage Distribution Plan

Fiscal Year (2010-11):

KBC:  62%, SBC:  38%

First Year (2011-12):

CP Percentages — KBC: 51.15%; SBC: 44.85%; Shared:  4%

Percentage of CP after Shared Expenses — KBC: 53.28%; SBC: 46.72%

Basis for Change: 2010-11 Budget = Base Year.  Shared Expenses 4% or $940.000; Reduction in KBC Budget 6%; Annuity Reduction $400,000; College Reduction 7% in addition to 6% KBC Budget, Total = 12.58%; Mission Board Staff Reduction 12%; Mission Board Total Budget Reduction of 9.85%, totaling $750,671; including $237,000 of the Cooperative Agreements absorbed by the Mission Board; WMU Reduction 3.85% in addition to 6% of KBC Budget; Total = 9.85%; and 3% Growth in CP divided KBC 33.1%/SBC 66.9% in years 1 through 7.

Seventh Year (2017-18):

CP Percentages — KBC: 48%; SBC: 48%; Shared: 4%

Percentage of CP after Shared Expenses — KBC: 50%; SBC: 50%

Basis for Change in Years 2 through 7: Mission Board absorbs in years 2 through 7 Cooperative Agreements Totaling $600,000 by Mission Board Additional Staff Reductions Totaling $600,000; $180,000 in NAMB Cooperative Agreements to be terminated; Total Mission Board Funding would be Reduced $1,350,691 or 17.72% the 7th year.

For more on the report and comments from Task Force Chairman Hershael York, click here to read the KBC news release on the report.

Click here to download a copy of the Kentucky Great Commission Task Force report.

–Robert Reeves

Richard Harris, Bill Mackey and Jerry Rankin

Just ahead of  the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Orlando last week, Bill Mackey, the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s executive director, participated in a panel discussion on Great Commission priorities with Jerry Rankin, the outgoing president of the International Mission Board, and Richard Harris, the interim president of the North American Mission Board.

Click on the arrow below to hear the audio of their 15-minute discussion:

If the embedded player is not showing on the device on which you are reading this post, you can also access the audio by clicking the link below. This link will also allow you to download the audio file.

GCR Roundtable Discussion with Bill Mackey, Jerry Rankin and Richard Harris

Here’s a summary of discussion highlights from the North American Mission Board:

ORLANDO, Fla. – International Mission Board president Jerry Rankin, Kentucky Baptist Convention executive director Bill Mackey and interim North American Mission Board president Richard Harris took part in a brief roundtable discussion on future trends in missions during the SBC annual meeting in Orlando.

The roundtable was one of four hosted by NAMB during the SBC meeting in Orlando. Other discussions included “Reaching Cities in North America,” “Church Planting in the 21st Century” and “Reaching People Groups in North America.” Audio of each roundtable discussion is posted at www.namb.net/orlando2010.

Mackey said reaching the increasing numbers of internationals settling in Kentucky is an issue challenging him. “We are seeing a great influx of Hispanics, a tripling to 300,000 since 2000. We’re trying to respond by urging the churches to consider the opportunities in their neighborhoods.

“We’re working with journeymen who are coming out of seminary who are experienced with working with people groups throughout the world. We need them to address the people groups moving into Kentucky. For example, we have seven dialects spoken by Indians in Louisville.”

Rankin agreed that “the world is coming to us. You no longer have to go overseas to do foreign missions and reach unreached people groups. All of us recognize that it won’t be the state convention, IMB or NAMB that reaches these people groups. It will have to be a grassroots movement of Christians witnessing anywhere, everywhere to anyone. IMB’s role would be to mobilize, train and equip these grassroots Christians, churches and associations to reach the peoples coming to their communities.”

NAMB’s Harris said, “You have to identify these folks and find them: where are they and what are their interests? What is their heart language? What are their needs?

“One area we need to do more in is on university campuses,” said Harris. “We have to get more career, MSC and summer semester missionaries on campus – to get in there and engage students with campus ministries and try to reach them. They’re the ones going into leadership positions.The college campus is a great opportunity.”

The three men also discussed the advent of “participatory missions” – whereby more of today’s Baptists want to take a hands-on approach to missions, rather than leaving it just to missionaries.

“There’s a massive challenge of reaching billions of people overseas,” said Rankin. “We’ll never have enough missionaries to reach them all. But if we could mobilize the 16 million Southern Baptists and 45,000 churches to be strategically involved, God has raised up the necessary resources to fulfill the Great Commission.”

story by Mickey Noah, North American Mission Board

–Robert Reeves

Although I don’t play very often, I enjoy the board game, Risk. The object is for players to win the world. They start at rough parity in terms of the geography over which they have influence and in the course of the game either grow stronger or decline until they are eliminated.

Risk is primarily a game of strategy but gets its name because there are key times when players have to make decisions about how bold they should be in pressing forward. The player that makes the best decisions in positioning his resources and pacing his advance is the one who ultimately wins the game.

There are two very common strategic blunders that are made in this game. One, often made by new players, is to try to do too much when there aren’t enough resources available to be successful. These players try to put their pieces into as many countries as possible as soon as possible. For a short time they look like they control a substantial portion of the world map. But because they don’t have the necessary strength to hold these territories and have no significant home territory from which to draw greater strength, they quickly succumb to the pressures of the game.

The other common blunder, which may very well be made even by experienced players who have been successful in previous games, is to try to play the game too safe. These players recognize the importance of having a strong home base. They work to control a continent that is easily defended against the other players. They slowly build strength in numbers in their base territory and only advance when it feels safe.

These players tend to stay in the game longer than those who spread themselves too thin. But ultimately they also go down to defeat because there comes a point when a competitor has to be willing to push forward and take some real chances. Players can’t wait until everything is perfect because the other players are also seeking to make their moves. If a player delays too long, he ends up on the defensive and battling against diminishing returns.

I can’t help but see comparisons with the game of Risk and the current Great Commission Resurgence discussion. It’s way too simplistic to say that there are only two positions on the GCR but I think the game’s common blunders do illustrate the dangers in the two most extreme positions in the conversation.

On one extreme is the thinking that Southern Baptists should throw all of our resources into the world as forcefully and quickly as possible. The argument goes that in a world of 6.7 billion people, most are lost and have never had the opportunity to hear the Gospel. We should therefore stop spending cooperative missions dollars in the Southern United States and put all of our denominational resources into reaching the world. The job of reaching our home areas can be left solely to the local churches.

On the other extreme is the belief that no change is needed. The thought is that we are nowhere close to winning our home territories for Christ, have many established ministries in these areas that need continued support, and that there must be spiritual revival among Southern Baptists before we can hope to be successful in winning the world. Expanding the missionary force is important but we should recognize that even if we spent every penny that Southern Baptists give on international missions, it would still only amount to a few cents per person when divided among the world’s population.

The first strategy loses because it assumes that there’s no need for cooperative ministry at home. It also undervalues the need for developing those churches that will provide the funds and manpower for future missions endeavors. The Southern Baptist Convention is a convention of small churches. While there may be some large churches that can easily access all they need for growing their congregations and reaching their communities, most small churches depend on the leverage that cooperation provides. Working together through their associations and state conventions enables them be healthy and active Acts 1:8 participants in sharing the gospel. At the same time, these small churches in the traditional Southern Baptist strongholds provide the majority of missionaries and vocational Christian workers for service around the world. As in Risk, a strategy that neglects the home base is likely to lead to rapid burnout.

However, the other extreme position is just as dangerous. The impact will just be felt more slowly. With this strategy, Southern Baptists will wither because the denomination never really take any risks. Churches, conventions and denominational entities can continue to do good things in the same ways they have always done them. But we will continue to lose ground because some of the old tactics don’t work so well in a post-Christian culture. Our dwindling numbers may lead us to begin to isolate ourselves from the world like the Amish and to die out like the Shakers. Meanwhile, the Convention’s risk-takers — often found among the much-needed younger generations — will grow impatient with the denominational lethargy and bolt to pursue other strategies.

It is so easy for us to keep doing what we are doing and not move forward. It is also easy to take the position that nothing that worked in the past is of value now and set about the process of reinventing the wheel. In truth, there is merit in what both extremes in this discussion are saying. Wise Baptists will not take sides but will listen and learn from what those on both ends of the spectrum are saying in arriving at a course of action somewhere in the middle.

So what’s the takeaway from this? Let me suggest three things we can learn from this comparison with a board game:

First, we must be wise in allocating resources. It is important to keep enough resources at home to help strengthen churches and reach out to the lost in our home states but we need to stay as lean as possible. We, as Southern Baptists have a tendency toward overeating at the dinner table, and we probably do the same at times with our ministry dollars. Each national Southern Baptist body (including the two mission boards, each seminary and the Executive Committee), state convention, state convention ministry, association, and church, must redouble efforts to cut any fat so that we can be the muscle behind the punch that we send into the world.

Second, we need to recognize the importance of being willing and able to move quickly. The successful Risk player is the one who is both careful in managing resources from a stronghold but is also nimble enough to take and press the advantage when the opportunity arises. Our cooperative system is a good one but can also be cumbersome at times. This is where good leadership plays such a vital role. Having leaders at the heads of our various Baptist organizations who truly believe in cooperation and are willing to engage each other in a spirit of partnership rather than competition can do so much to move Southern Baptists forward quickly in a unified way.

Finally, we need to trust the Lord to guide us into His will as Southern Baptists. In the game of Risk, there’s an element of chance involved because even with wise planning and the proper mixture of daring, there are aspects of the game that are outside of the player’s control. We can be grateful that we don’t have to deal with that in terms of the Great Commission. We’ve already read the end of the Book and know that the Lord wins. We don’t have to have all of the answers right now. We just have to be willing to let God lead us. If we do, he will allow us as Southern Baptists to be a part of what He will do for His Glory in ensuring His gospel is preached in every nation and every tongue.

–Robert Reeves

The Southern Baptist Convention’s Great Commission Task Force met earlier this week and has announced that it came to a unanimous consensus on the content of its final report to SBC messengers to be presented in Orlando in June. Dr. Ronnie Floyd, chairman of the task force, said the report will be released at 9:30 a.m. Eastern time, Monday, May 3, on the task force’s website at www.pray4gcr.com.

We’ll have to wait until Monday to know what changes may have been made to the committee’s original progress report and whether any adjustments represent changes in substance or only in wording. Dr. Bill Mackey, executive director for the Kentucky Baptist Convention, recently wrote about his hopes and prayers for the revised report in his column in the Western Recorder and on his Partners in the Mission blog. Here’s that column:

Great Commission Hope

Dr. Bill Mackey

By Bill Mackey

I have been asked on numerous occasions about the progress report issued in February by the Southern Baptist Convention’s Great Commission Resurgence Task Force. I have certainly had some concerns but I am encouraged by the response of the task force to feedback and look forward to the release of the final version on May 3. I am prayerful that new language in the report will relieve concerns and permit a little more flexibility in its implementation.

Southern Baptists certainly support the call to renewed commitment to God’s mission through the Great Commission. I am grateful that the task force has placed such a strong emphasis on prayer and spiritual vitality.

I am also appreciative that the committee has invited feedback from Southern Baptists. The task force graciously invited various leaders, including state executive directors, to present in person and have conducted conference calls with large groups.

One of the report’s recommendations deals with phasing out cooperative agreements between the North American Mission Board and state conventions. These agreements guide the way state conventions and NAMB share expenses in the common work of spreading the Gospel. NAMB would use the savings to help fund an aggressive church planting process in the unreached and underserved areas of North America, especially the largest cities.

Some executives in the “old line” state conventions (the larger Southern state conventions that originally formed the SBC) have expressed to me their willingness to absorb the cost of ending the cooperative agreements for their states provided that NAMB continues to have a strong supportive role with new work state conventions. I am hopeful that the final report will lengthen the phase out time of the cooperative agreements to seven to eight years rather than four in the old line state conventions.

I believe the final report should also place a stronger emphasis on the Cooperative Program as the preferred and primary way of funding Southern Baptist missions and ministries. Hopefully, the updated report will remove concerns that a new reporting category called Great Commission Giving will hurt CP giving. The SBC’s Executive Committee also needs to have a strong coordinating role, along with state conventions, in promoting CP.

I would also like to see the final report reflect NAMB as the primary coordinator of strategy to reach North America. This strategy can be supported by International Mission Board personnel as requested to reach international people groups.

The final report would also be strengthened by including a strong spiritual emphasis on Biblical stewardship. A national emphasis on increased Cooperative Program support through local churches will result in more support for all mission causes — especially world missions.

If all mission partners, churches, associations, state conventions and the SBC will seek the Lord as never before, I believe Southern Baptists can experience a Great Commission Resurgence under the Lordship of Jesus Christ!

–Robert Reeves

For nearly 85 years now, the Cooperative Program has helped Southern Baptists send missionaries all over the world to share the Gospel in fulfillment of the Great Commission. Such international missions support is certainly not the only purpose of the Cooperative Program (which was established to also support a wide variety of Baptist causes on the state and national levels) but it is definitely one of its top priorities

Even in a year when the Kentucky Baptist Convention is managing a recession-limited budget, Kentucky churches are expected to send more than $4.37 million to the International Mission Board through the Cooperative Program. We can add to that figure record-setting giving by Kentucky churches to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering. I just saw a report today that showed that Kentucky churches have already given more than $4.9 million through Lottie Moon and that we anticipate hitting the $5 million mark sometime in May. (Last year, the total for the year was  $4.4 million.)

We are grateful to every Kentucky church for its faithfulness to support international missions through both the Cooperative Program and the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering. With CP providing foundational support and the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering adding strategic focus, Southern Baptists have a system in place that enables Baptists to be true Acts 1:8 Christians who reach out simultaneously both at home and abroad.

Nothing bears this out more than the stories of the impact of giving from the missions field itself. Below is a story the KBC released last month focusing on a Kentucky missionary on the international field:

IMB Missionary: CP is ‘Reason I’m on the Field’

By Kristie Randolph, Kentucky Baptist Convention

LOUISVILLE - Elizabeth Warren* has literally gone around the world and back, thanks to many people she will never get the chance to meet.

Warren has been serving as a missionary to Asia for the past seven years through the Southern Baptist Convention’s International Mission Board. As Southern Baptists prepare to celebrate Cooperative Program Sunday on April 11, Warren is spending her stateside time traveling to Southern Baptist churches in order to thank them for their gifts.

A lifelong Southern Baptist, Elizabeth Warren was discipled, educated and called to missions through ministries of the Cooperative Program. She is now an advocate for CP, seeking to help people understand how the program enables thousands of missionaries like her stay on the field.

“The reason I’m on the field is so people who have never heard of Jesus have the chance to hear,” she said. “When people give through CP and Lottie Moon, they aid what I do. Without their giving, it would be difficult to be there.”

Warren’s deep ties to Cooperative Program ministries and missions began during her fifth grade year at a Girls in Action camp, sponsored by the Woman’s Missionary Union in Texas and supported through CP. It was there that Warren first felt God calling her to be a missionary.

“God was doing something in my heart there, showing me he wanted me to be a missionary,” she said.

When Warren moved to Kentucky, her involvement in the youth group at Severns Valley Baptist Church in Elizabethtown fueled her excitement for missions as she sat under missions training and teaching, and was exposed to hands-on missions work.

While she knew the basics about how CP worked, it wasn’t until Warren got involved in the Baptist Campus Ministry at Eastern Kentucky University that she began to experience its benefits firsthand.

“During my college years, I had many opportunities to be exposed to missions and be a part of missions,” Warren said of the BCM, a ministry supported through CP.

It wasn’t long before she learned through the BCM of extended missions opportunities available to college students through the IMB and North American Mission Board. After her freshman year, Warren was commissioned by NAMB for missions work in Wyoming for a summer. Several years later, she went on to serve for a summer in Asia through the IMB.

Warren would again benefit from the Cooperative Program as she set her sights on attending seminary in order to prepare more fully for her calling. She would go on to complete a Master of Arts in missions at Southwestern Seminary in Forth Worth, Texas.

“I knew I wanted to go to seminary, and I knew I wanted to end up on the field, so I wanted to go to an SBC school,” she said. “Part of CP funds are given to the seminary, so that was obviously supporting my education. When I was in seminary, I had a defining moment when God showed me exactly where he wanted me to go.”

With her seminary degree completed, Warren headed overseas to serve as a journeyman in Asia through the IMB. While there, Warren’s call to lifelong missions was affirmed once again, and she applied through the IMB to be a career missionary.

Warren was appointed as a career missionary by the IMB and then returned to Asia in 2006 to continue serving, this time with a specific people group in view. Now several years into her assignment, Warren has seen God working amongst the people she serves and is hopeful that she will be able to continue serving there for years to come.

“I’d like to be there for life, but there are no guarantees,” she said, referring to strict government policy in Asia that has often resulted in missionaries returning home. “I could end up anywhere, but that’s okay as long as I am serving somewhere.”

Warren now lives in a town in her assigned country and frequently travels to the countryside where her target people live and work. Her goal is to form friendships amongst the people and build a relationship of trust that will ultimately allow her to share the gospel.

The work is difficult, but Warren feels certain she is exactly where God has led her. She enjoys her time on stateside assignment in the U.S., but always looks forward to returning to the field.

“I’m thankful that I don’t have to stress about raising money when I’m home,” she said. “The main thing I want to do when I’m at home is thank churches for giving through CP and the Lottie Moon Offering.”

The Kentucky Baptist Convention is a cooperative missions and ministry organization made up of nearly 2,400 autonomous Baptist churches in Kentucky. A variety of state and worldwide ministries are coordinated through its administrative offices in Louisville, Ky. including: missions work, disaster relief, ministry training and support, church development, evangelism and more.  For more information, visit www.kybaptist.org.

*Note: The name of the missionary featured in this story has been changed to protect her identity for security reasons.

– Robert Reeves

Keith Inman

As I have shared here before, one of the powerful ways that Kentucky Baptists are reaching the world for Christ is through the international missions work of Baptist Campus Ministry. Each year, thousands of students from countries around the world come to U.S. colleges to receive the benefits of American higher education. Many will be returning home to take on leadership positions in business and government. Their presence on our campuses gives us a wonderful opportunity to minister and share the Gospel at a time in their lives when they are open to listening to and considering new ideas.

In this guest post, Keith Inman, collegiate and young adult ministries director for the Kentucky Baptist Convention, shares about how this important ministry of Kentucky Baptists:

The World is Coming to Kentucky’s College Campuses

Every week it seems as if I hear of another international student coming to faith in Christ through our Baptist Campus Ministry on our university campuses. There is a reason for this news.

Ten years ago, Tommy Johnson, currently our campus minister at Western Kentucky University, shared a dream of reaping the harvest that God was bringing here to our state from countries all over the world. The Cooperative Program and Eliza Broadus Missions Offering make this possible. I am so grateful to Dr. Bill Mackey and Joy Bolton for supporting a vibrant international ministry on the campuses.

Currently, we now have committed semester missionaries on various campuses specifically for the purpose of international ministry. Under the influence of Riley Byers, a former International Mission Board Journeyman and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary graduate, the KBC Collegiate and Young Adult Ministry Department, in partnership with students from SBTS, has one of the best international ministries in SBC collegiate ministry. A committed base of lay ministers provides a support that makes our efforts so much easier and effective.

According to statistics gathered by the North American Mission Board, more than 623,000 international students are studying in the United States today. Below is a brief snapshot of who is coming to our country to study on our campuses:

International Students in the U.S.

These statistics are from The Institute of International Education which publishes Open Doors, Fast Facts.

Top 20 countries of origin for international students 2006-2007, 2007-2008.

1. India (over 94000)

2. China (81,000)

3. South Korea (69,000)

4. Japan (almost 34,000)

5. Canada (29,000)

6. Taiwan (29,000)

7. Mexico (almost 15,000)

8. Turkey (12,000)

9. Saudi Arabia (almost 10,000)

10. Nepal (9,000)

11. Thailand (9,000)

12. Germany (9,000)

13. Vietnam (9,000)

14. United Kingdom (8,000)

15. Hong Kong (8,000)

16. Indonesia (7,700)

17. Brazil (7,500)

18. France (7,000)

19. Columbia (6,600)

20. Nigeria (just over 6,000)

These countries contain some of the least reached people groups. Just the top 5 countries send 49% of all international students, with 15% from India, 13% from China, 11% from South Korea, and 5.5% from Japan.

The number of students from India increased by 13%; the number from China increased by 20%. Increases South Korea were 11%, Saudi Arabia 25%, Nepal 15%, and from Vietnam 45%.

According to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Web site, Kentucky has between 2,000 and 4,999 students currently studying on our university campuses. The Baptist Campus Ministry is the most consistent witness to Christ of any ministry in our state.

Recently, I received this e-mail from Brian Combs, our campus minister at Northern Kentucky University which is indicative of the intentional effort to reach these international students.

“We (NKUBCM) are meeting with Dr. J.D. Payne, director of the Church Planting Center at SBTS to develop a strategy of reaching international students for Christ and discipling/training them to be prepared to start a contextualized church at home when they return.  The thinking is that we have so many students coming to the US from countries of unreached people and if we can reach those students while they are here and send them back prepared to share the Gospel, we will be able to continue to make a difference for Christ around the world.  fyi…JD and I grew up together in Corbin, went to UK together…  He’s a great guy that is seeking to follow what the Lord has laid on his heart and I look forward to partnering with him and seeing what God has in store.”

The command to “go” is obviously intended to extend to the “uttermost parts of the world.” In the 21^st Century, the “uttermost” is coming to our back door! This is creating an interesting dynamic: students going overseas on mission are coming back with an awareness that these same people groups are studying with them on their campus. Furthermore, as these Christian students “recruit” others in our effort to be intentional in building relationships with our foreign friends, students find a new desire to go overseas.

International students in the university culture are very open to hearing the Gospel because our students genuinely befriend them and help make life easier as they adjust to a new country. The Gospel is presented, the message is shared, and the presence of Christ is manifested in love. New brothers and sisters are born into the family of God because of a Great Commandment and a Great Commission intersecting in friendship with peoples from around the world.

This is the fourth of several guest posts from the Kentucky Baptist Convention’s disaster relief team in Haiti. The 10-member medical team arrived in Port-au-Prince Monday and began ministering through a makeshift hospital on the edge of a tent city on Tuesday. In this post, Butch Vernon, pastor of Thoroughbred Community Church in Nicholasville and the chaplain for the group, shares about the group’s third day of work.

Kentucky doctors minister to a little girl brought to the hospital by ambulance

Another great day in sunny Haiti! Every day is different. We got to the hospital this morning and right after we got there a beautiful little baby was born. Kind of like Jesus in the manger, he ended up in a copy paper box.

Big prayer request: about 50 of the hospital staff left today to go back to their respective countries.

We probably saw about 600 patients today. We will have 10 new folks helping tomorrow. It could be a really, really busy day tomorrow.

Our team is essentially going to be heading up most of the areas in the hospital tomorrow. What’s really great is how well these guys and girls will handle it with a Christlike attitude. This is one of the finest teams of any kind that I have ever had the opportunity to serve with.

We had some U.S. Army Rangers from Fort Bragg come by today to get a doctor and some nurses for some undisclosed purpose. I got to talk to them a little bit and I don’t think the Haiti tour is their favorite posting so far, but they were pleased that they got to make a difference.

The view of the damaged Haitian presidential palace from the hospital

We had some guys from the International Missions Board communications office come today. They followed several of us around and a few of us got to do interviews. Keep an eye on the IMB Web site and some of the material may be up soon.

We also went walking around downtown Port au Prince with an armed police officer and got to see some of the damage up close and talk and pray with several people. I really wasn’t scared at all until the officer started looking around and told us we needed to go in another direction because this was a very bad part of Port au Prince. I personally had no desire to tour a very bad part of Port au Prince so we took his advice and left.

We went by the Catholic cathedral that was destroyed and the amount of devastation was amazing. Just as we were leaving, this long convoy of cars went by (I mean so close that they almost brushed us). Our guard told us it was the Haitian president.

The Florida Baptist Convention did a small food distribution outside the hospital. The people were truly appreciative but we saw first hand why there are very specific rules in place for our disaster teams. Experienced Haitian pastors were distributing the food but when it ran out the crowd could very easily have turned into a mob.

Fortunately some police pulled up and kept anything from happening, but we were all reminded why we couldn’t randomly hand stuff out. These guys new what they were doing and things still almost got out of hand.

The tent city near the hospital

The CMBH (Confraternite Missionnaire Baptiste dHaiti) house where we are staying is packed tonight. Tomorrow will be pure chaos as two teams that just arrived will be going out for the first time. Please be praying for them because the culture shock from an American hospital to a temporary Haitian hospital is immense. Be praying as they make the transition to being creative and trying to provide as sterile an atmosphere as possible in the midst of absolute filth.

The lady who is heading the hospital right now, Omayra Alvarez, loves Southern Baptist Disaster Relief. She was here several days after the earthquake trying to help a friend from the Dominican Republic find a loved one. She saw the need as the tent city began to grow up in front of the capitol building.

It was Southern Baptist Disaster Relief folks who provided her with the funds to get up and running. Everytime she sees one of our yellow shirts she smiles a mile wide smile. Pray for her as she has been on site since the beginning.

Well, it’s almost 8:30 and I got a little too much sun today so we’d better shut down. We really covet your extensive prayers tomorrow as it is a day of great transition. These are the type of days Satan loves to play havoc with, so please intensify your prayers.

The Southern Baptist disaster relief assessment team is back in Miami and meeting with the assessment team from the Florida Baptist Convention to formulate the long term Southern Baptist response to the Haiti earthquake disaster. I think we can anticipate recommendations that will keep Southern Baptists busy for the long haul but that may also be a bit different than the kind of disaster responses we’ve had in the past.

The assessment team has already signaled that it is unlikely that we will be sending down feeding units as we have in response to hurricanes and other disasters. Instead, it is more likely that we will do food distribution through Haitian Baptist churches that will allow families to pick up food staples and prepare it themselves.

Because of the difficult conditions as well as the difficulty in providing logistical support in the short term, our first teams are going to be made up of those individuals who are “tent dwellers” and can pretty well fend for themselves even as they help others. I suspect we will quickly be moving into building and repair mode once we are able to get full-fledged teams there.

Right now, it is still difficult to get people into Haiti. Commercial flights have not resumed and when they do, priority is going to be given to Haitians who were out of the country when the earthquake struck. The relief system is getting better by the day, though, and within a few weeks there will probably be a more solid aid infrastructure in place.

For the moment, the best thing that we can do as Southern Baptists is to give financially. Dr. John Sullivan of the Florida Baptist Convention, which has had an active partnership with Haiti Baptists for 15 years, says $20 will buy 100 pounds of rice to help feed the Haitian population and rice is what is needed there most right now.

There are several channels for sending funds to support Haiti relief. I definitely encourage people to give through a Southern Baptist organization, though, because 100 percent of your gift will go to Haiti relief. Unlike with other charities, administrative costs are already covered by foundational support of the Cooperative Program which allows all Haiti gifts to be used directly for relief.

There are already stories coming out about how Baptists are making a difference in Haiti, including one from Kentucky Disaster Relief Associate Coy Webb, who shared how the Southern Baptist disaster relief assessment team was able to deliver much-needed supplies of baby formula to a medical clinic caring for children across from the presidential palace in Port-au-Prince. The director there had been praying for a miracle that supplies would arrive before babies died. God is good all the time!

For those who would like to give for Haiti relief through the Kentucky Baptist Convention, you can give online through the KBC Web site or by sending a check to Kentucky Baptist Convention, P.O. Box 856300, Dept. 124, Louisville, KY 40285-9900. (Indicate “Haiti disaster relief” in the memo field.) Kentucky Baptists can also give through their churches simply by designating the gift for “Kentucky Baptist Disaster Relief – Haiti.”

In addition to giving, you can also be preparing to go when the doors open. There will be much work to do for a long time so you can think now about when you might be able to go in the future. To go with a Kentucky Baptist disaster relief team, you will need to go through training to be certified so if you are not now a trained volunteer, plan to participate in an upcoming training session.