I recently sent an attachment about the relationships between SBC entities and the local churches. The article was by Larry Richmond, DOM in Illinois. From that article the following pastors have responded. Please respond and let's have a chat about this important issue. Because the article is so long, I have resent the article over email to you.
David
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4 comments:
I read the attachment and what struck me first is that the whole premise of the paper is incorrect. The Southern Baptist Convention is not a top down organization. Yes, it is heavier at the top then I would like but each June the churches gather to guide the convention and elect leadership. Money does not flow down but upward - Church member gives to church which keeps all or most of the money and passes on to the state conventions which keep most of the money and pass on 10 to 50 percent to the national convention. That is the very definition of bottom up not top down. Churches have, if they want it, the power to make changes as seen in the conservative movement in the late 80's and 90's.
The second area that caused me to question the paper is the idea that the Southern Baptist Convention, state conventions, associations and churches are part of the same organization - they are not. Each is autonomous and freely cooperates with each other. There is simply no way to force a change from the national level on to the other levels of autonomous entities. With that said, the rest of the paper, no matter how much truth it contains, seems irrelevant to the practical nature of the individual structures that work together in the Cooperative Program.
The last thought is that it is always a mistake for a convention or association to try to do what only a church should do. They are helpers but not churches and that should be their role. No one but a church should plant a church, with help and organization that comes from the convention and associations. These organizations should draw churches together to do evangelism, discipleship, and the like but not do them for the churches or without the churches. Each entity must focus on building the local church and not little empires with godly sounding purposes that are not what God has intended. The Kingdom of God does not need another or bigger associations, conventions or anything else, it needs more Christians being Christians which means the local church must quit relying on other things other than God Himself.
It seems to me that God gave us the answer to the lifeless, flat churches and the organizations that serve them when He wrote, "if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place. I have chosen and consecrated this temple so that my Name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there."
Until He Comes,
Craig
Hi David,
I don't know who Craig Furlough is but I think he is fundamentally correct. What troubled me most about Mr. Richmond's comments was his general indictment of pastors and churches. The impression I had was that he felt the trouble was a lack of spiritual depth and commitment in SBC leaders. That might be true in some cases, but I truly doubt that this is the problem overall. Rather, I suspect it's our refusal to adapt our methods to the rapidly changing culture. Rarely do churches move as fast as current culture does. Partly because we don't know which way to move, not knowing what is really going to last in trends and fads.
I notice that he also thinks you DOM's need more education. Again, I doubt it.
Brian
Okay David, you asked for some comments; so I took the time to read the entire article, and found some interesting theories and fascinations.
We should remember that churches are the key to Baptist life; and should always be at the top of any list. If one talks about top down formula, it means the church is at the top, followed by the association, the state convention and the SBC on bottom.
Let's start with this statement: "It is time to move off our own agenda and onto God’s. Somewhere, somehow, we need to focus on being transformed into Kingdom People."
I suppose it is easy for some people to determine what's "agenda" someone else is using. Perhaps it is very easy for others to determine that I am leading the church where I serve as pastor to say "we are on our own agenda, and not God's."
What I would like to know is how many people do you know, whether in churches, associations, state conventions or SBC, that will say to you, "I am on my own agenda, and not God's."
Is it possible, especially if a church has prayed and sought God's will, to be able to merge God's agenda and your own agenda into one?
I would really like for someone to explain to me who "kingdom people" are, and what does a "kingdom church" look like? Does this mean that the IMB should take CP monies and give it to another evangelical group to do missions, plant churches, establish Bible school and seminaries?
Perhaps someone reading this can give me a simple answer. If the church where I am serving as pastor is winning souls, seeing growth in every aspect of church life, supporting denominational life, are we kingdom people.
If I support Baptist life, am I limiting kingdom people? If I believe in the historical beliefs of Baptists, am I a kingdom person? Someone share with me where does being a Baptist cause "kingdom people" to cease to exist.
It has been common practice for a couple decades of Baptist life that we have heard "Money follows strategy."
If that is the case, what do you think would happen if churches decided that "money follows strategy" and cease to give to the CP and associations until strategies were fully developed and implemented?
It seems to me that we want all entities under the same umbrella; and that is not going to occur as long as we are autonomous and independent (especially independent).
One of the strategies I would like to see implemented in that of strengthening existing churches. I have fought this losing battle for more than 25 years. Perhaps it is easier to start new churches, than it is to offer encouragement, time, money and resources to strengthen existing churches.
I do not have the statistics, but I am sure someone does, that more churches probably close each year than there are new church starts.
Perhaps there are churches that need to cease to exist because of several reasons, but can anyone tell me why, unless it is a population shift or a Katrina-like event, that a church should cease to exist?
If there is a building, and there is a lack of people and money, why not put two or three churches in the same building, and continue with an open door to reach the community?
Well, David, enough of this...I could continue, but I already written too much. Give me a call, or drop by for a visit if you would like more thoughts.
Jimmie
David,
I'd like to add a some comments to this discussion. I know Larry Richmond from when he was the IL. State Sunday School Director and had the pleasure of having him speak several times at my church in Mulberry Grove, IL.
I think he raises several points which we all should ponder more seriously as pastors. I think Larry is correct in his statement:
"Strategy development is from a top down strategy, with national leaders attempting to generate “programs”
that the state and associations will promote in an attempt to encourage churches to adopt."
The key words here are "Strategy Development." The flow of "strategy" in the SBC is from the top down (whether it should be or not is another question) and we can see this in many areas such as the programs the SBC and its entities promotes to the churches (FAITH/ VBS/ World Changers, etc). Now I feel that many times these strategies really miss the mark with many of our local churches, especially those outside the "Bible Belt" and that they could and should be more responsive to local needs of churches outside the "Bible Belt." But that may be another discussion altogether.
Craig's comment concerning that the SBC is driven from the "bottom up" (my words) vice "top down" is only partially correct. It is true that each local church and association is an entity in itself and we band together and elect our leadership at annual conventions. Craig is also correct when he states that the flow of money in the SBC STARTS at the church level and goes upward from the church, to the associational and state levels and then on to the SBC. The point that Craig misses is that SBC Cooperative Program (CP) money does flow back from the SBC level to the states and associations, and that is the point that I think Larry Richmond is addressing in his flow chart.
For example,here in Alaska, SBC dollars flow back to the state in terms of 88/12 money and other programs that helps pay for our state staff's salaries and other programs. (The 88/12 agreement is where NAMB pays 88% of the salary/program and the Alaska Baptist Convention has to come up with the other 12%.) I sit as a Trustee on the ABC Finance Committee and know that there is a lot of ministry that goes on in Alaska that could not be done if it were not SBC dollars coming back down to us. (I use the term SBC dollars vice CP dollars because we receive not only dollars from the Cooperative Program but also from Lifeway and the WMU (who do not receive CP dollars) but sends money to Alaska to promote their work here as well. This is an example of the "resource allocation" that Larry is speaking of when he says:
"Resource allocation takes Cooperative Program receipts and distributes them down to the states. Some
states may allocate some of those resources into associations and churches, but from my observation, it
seems that activity is extremely limited, with support for church planting being the main exception.
Almost no funds go to associations and churches for church strengthening."
It is my personal belief that we need to spend more time and dollars on strengthening churches. When I was in Illinois, I knew of a church that was struggling to meet its current needs, but was located in a very strategic location. (There were housing areas being developed within a 5 mile radius of the church that was in excess of 5000 homes.) My church gave toward helping the church keep going, but when I approached the State and SBC about help in strengthening that church I was told it was best to "Let it die." "We can start something new there later." To "let it die" meant that the property would need to be sold to pay off debts it incurred by repairing the roof and heating system. The value of the property, if sold now would be only a fraction of what it will be worth in 2-5 years as the community builds up around it. Such short sighted policy in not supporting struggling churches is wrong and I believe ultimately it is wasteful of both human and material resources.
Let me be clear here - I am a firm believer in planting new churches. We should be always looking to start new churches, but I am of the opinion that the "start something new" is sometimes used by people like "notches on a gun." We have people who are graded and paid by how many new church plants they begin and we keep those statistics. But who notices or keeps statistics on how many struggling churches were saved by someone coming along side of them and strengthening them so that that could minister and grow where they were already planted. I do not know of any statistic like that, so few if any care about making that their mission in life.
I can give another personal example of what I think Larry is referring to when he said:
"In this model, strategy development starts with the needs of churches and a church strategy to meet
those needs. The association takes the collective needs and strategy of its churches and develops a
strategy to partner with the churches by bringing value to the churches in the form of needed resources
tailor-made to facilitate the local church strategy"
When I was the Moderator of the Kaskaskia Association in Illinois, several of the churches in our association banded together to start a new church in an area where there was no evangelical work at all. We hired a church planter to come and work there. The State convention and the SBC agreed to help with his salary with a standard 3 year pay-down - with the expectation that his church would grow enough to compensate for the 1/3 loss of funds each year. At the end of the 3 year period, the church was indeed started and growing, but still not quite large enough to fully support the pastor and pay for needed materials and such. As the moderator of the Association I approached the state to see if they could come along side us for one more year to continue to help the church get itself firmly planted. I was told that they could not help and that if if could not survive on its own then it should die and we could then in a year or two "Start Something New!" If really was not a matter of the church dying but one of either struggling along with minimal resources or moving aggressively forward with funded programs into a community full of lost people. After much discussion with the state about their lack of resources to help churches, I told them that if they could not find the money to help the new church that my church would find the money - and that it would come out of the money we sent to the state every month. At that point the state worker told me "You can't do that!" to which I replied, "As a pastor I feel I can speak for my church and we believe that our church can do what it wants to with its money - and our goal is to start and maintain churches that are winning people to Christ and not just pay for programs and salaries of people who tell us what can't be done." To make a long story short - the state found the money for one more years of support and the new church continued to grow and still is to my knowledge.
This is why I believe that we need to focus (at least more than what we currently do) on strengthening struggling churches. I will readily concede that not every struggling church should survive. Sometimes the factors that keep a church from relating to its surrounding community in such a way that it cannot reach them is so ingrained in that church that it should be allowed to die. But that is not always the case. Although I may not totally agree on everyone of Larry's points in his model, I basically agree with his idea that:
"...if church strengthening and church planting can be developed... the local church will be strengthened
and be in a much stronger position to bring about the Kingdom impact within communities."
There are many ways that we can work to strengthen churches. Financial help is needed sometimes but simply to throw money at the problem is not always the best answer. Some ways I believe that churches can be strengthened is by other churches from its own association coming alongside and helping to support it through joint events. For example, people from one church going over and helping host outreach events like block parties or other events that will attract people from the community. Churches can help strengthen one another by helping out in building projects by supplying workers and materials. A lot of our churches here in Alaska often have mission teams from the lower 48 come up and help, but I believe there is a lot of stuff we could do for one another if we decided to be less parochial and more cooperative.
We pastors and workers do need more training and the feedback that comes from talking with and learning from one another. I disagree with Larry that the emphasis ought to be on the pastors who are "45 years old and younger."
I think we need to educate all our pastors and staffs and volunteers in areas such as being able to understand and distinguish the Biblical worldview from the cultural worldview and how we can bridge that gap so that our leaders and people can reach a "feelings trumps facts" culture with the truth of the gospel.
I have other thoughts on Larry's paper but will keep them for another day. Thanks for giving us the chance to give thought and feedback.
Keep up the good work.
God Bless-
Garry Loeffler
Pastor, Hillside Baptist.
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