Spontaneous Missions Efforts–Apostolic Partnerships

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Long before Baptists or any other group of churches or Christians formed conventions or mission boards, Christians naturally sought ways to work together through partnerships.   This is true of the earthly ministry of Christ himself and of the Apostles.   Acts 13:1-3 reports how the Holy Spirit spoke to five leaders of the Church in Antioch telling them to “set apart” two of their members for mission work to which the Spirit called them.  “So, after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them on.”   Acts 13:3   No mention is made of finances or even of a public commissioning service by the church itself.   (Read more)  There may well have been other details about this sending that are not described here, but if there were, they were regarded by Luke, the writer, as incidental and not crucial.  Later, we see Barnabas and Mark pairing up for a mission journey while Paul and Silas do the same.    In reading Paul’s story, we see him being accompanied by others, sometimes by small groups.   These arrangements were surprisingly informal, spontaneous and personal.   The means of financing varied.   Church gifts were sent.  We also know that Paul not only supported himself on the road by means of his tent-making business, but that he used that to pay the expenses of team-mates as well.   Missionaries also received support by the people to whom they had come to minister.   We are to fulfill the Great Commission.   How this is financed is secondary.

The Holy Spirit has not limited itself to work only through established conventions and boards.  This is true of God’s work among Baptists as well as among others.  Many Christian institutions, such as seminaries, colleges, orphanages and hospitals were born to groups of men and women who, sensing the need, banded together, organized and formed a board to bring about the realization of their dream.   This has happened even more frequently for the cause of missions.   On a small scale, a family may feel called to a missions task and their church agrees to support them.   Often, missionaries see special needs or opportunities on the mission fields and return to their home base to organize support and enlist workers for the task.    Missionary organizations have been formed because a great need was found for which no existing organization was available to accept the challenge.   As with any human effort, abuses can occur.   But more often, these efforts represent great sacrifices on the part of the founders.   Any Christian organization, seeking support gifts, should be very transparent in all its finances and dealings and potential supporters should be able to feel full confidence in their giving.   These efforts are especially worthy if they make ample opportunity for their supporters to personally participate on the fields for which they are supplying resources.

A Cooperative People (Denominational)

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Southern Baptists fiercely hold to the autonomy of every one of their churches.  Historically, the denomination was created by the churches and not the churches by the denomination.  Ecclesiastically, therefore, the churches, collectively, are superior to the boards and institutions they created.  It might be thought that a denominational program created by the vote and support of independent churches would be weak, but that has not been true of Southern Baptists.   The churches have wanted their denomination to (Read more)  give strong leadership in fields of ministry that go beyond the capacity of individual churches.    Churches are free to give whatever financial support they choose to the denomination and that fact has encouraged the denominational agencies and personnel to serve in ways that the supporting churches would most favor.   That factor has unquestionably worked to keep both the convention agencies and the churches on parallel tracts following shared values.     The funds given and spent are called “Cooperative Program funds” and this term is a good reflection of the spirit in which the funds are both given and received.

The Southern Baptist Convention unites Southern Baptists on a national scale.  Likewise, states or neighboring states form their own convention programs, bringing together Baptist resources for united efforts on that level.   Most of the ministries of state conventions are done within the boundaries of the same state although it is common for state conventions to form temporary partnerships with others, including Baptist conventions or associations in other nations.  The ministry of state conventions has a greater involvement of member churches than does the national convention, due to the closer proximity and acquaintance of the churches and the conventions.    Normally, Cooperative fund giving of the churches goes to the state conventions and those conventions, by vote of their members, determine what percentage of the gifts are to be passed on to the national convention.

The most basic unit of Baptist denominational life is the Baptist association.   Most frequently, the associations develop their activities within just one county.   This permits a high degree of fellowship and direct participation by the member churches.   Like Baptists anywhere, they are free to determine the scope and size of the organization.   Many associations support only one person for ministry, called the “associational missionary” or the “director of missions.”  The work of that leader is realized in large part by volunteers provided by the member churches.   Increasingly, Baptist associations call themselves “networks,” indicating the spontaneity with which the local participants labor together for their common causes.     Associations in large metropolitan areas often function in ways similar to small state conventions.

A Church People

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Southern Baptists have always been “church people.”   The local church, for them, has been the central focus of their ministries.   The local Southern Baptist church is an autonomous democratic body of believers professing to be under Christ’s direct rule and authority.   Most of the churches honor and respect their pastors as the spiritual leader of the church while retaining the ultimate responsibility for the congregation in its practice as a spiritual democracy.  This has important implications for missions.   One is that the Great Commission mandate of the church will be most effective when the pastor is guided to use the pulpit to speak for Christ in its behalf.  Another is that the church is most likely to practice the Great Commission when its pastor leads it in that direction.   This means that the pastor of a Southern Baptist church is the most influential factor in that church’s effort to live out the Great Commission.   It is important, therefore, for a pastor to understand what the Great Commission means and how the church is to practice it.  This is sometimes not even understood by those who train pastors and it is probably one reason why many churches fail to grow and to reach their community.   The Great Commission is too often seen only as an idea for international missions, not realizing that it is the key to success in the local church as well.

The importance of the local church among Southern Baptists should have still another effect in the mission efforts of the church and of its denomination.   It is that the Great Commission is most faithfully executed when it intentionally promotes the starting and growth of churches on the mission field.   Much modern mission effort has little to do with churches, but that should not be true of Southern Baptists.    As Southern Baptist mission efforts promote the multiplication of churches on the mission field, it creates a strong, permanent national base on that field for disciple-making and ministry.   American mission efforts will ebb and flow, but the national churches, if well orientated, will continue to grow and reach their nation.    Historic Southern Baptist efforts on the mission fields of the world were largely successful because they realized their primary task was to help raise national churches that would take permanent responsibility for winning their nations to Christ.   That is always true.

A Culture-Challenged People

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The last forty years, especially, have been years of enormous change in the American culture as well as the cultures of many other countries.   The changes have not been favorable to Christianity and anti-Christian values have increasingly dominated society.   These changes make more difficult the advance of Christianity and challenge the values of the churches and their members.   This has affected the support of missions in ways that might never have been anticipated.     As an example, these changes have lessened the strength of the women’s missionary movement in the lives of many of the churches.   Other long-standing church-based organizations, such as the Brotherhood, Training Union and even the Sunday school have suffered in the wake of massive cultural change in the nation.    Substitute efforts come about, but often fall short of what the churches most need.

The missions’ cause has continued to flourish, but in other ways.  Greatest among these has been the growing practice of churches to send their members on mission teams to other nations and to other communities in the USA.  Churches are learning about missions on the mission field itself—made possible by  low-cost air travel and American prosperity.   This has given rise of many small missions organizations headed by the churches or by some of their members.  Much good has come from this, but we must also acknowledge that many such efforts are on the level of projects and are weak in any strategy to win nations to Christ.   SBC’s International Mission Board” has largely withdrawn its resources from many of the nations where it planted Baptist work in order to dedicate its primary efforts to harder-to-reach people groups.   These are groups that would probably never hear the gospel or be touched by most grass-roots missionary efforts originating in the churches.

Southern Baptists have an enormous influence on the cause of world missions.  In addition to their own efforts, they have inspired and contributed heavily to many non-denominational efforts.   Many of these are strong promoters of the gospel while others gradually drift into social welfare programs that are only marginally Christian in name and emphases.  Southern Baptist churches also have often sent their missions teams to groups of other denominations, including those that have little in common with Southern Baptists in terms of faith and practice.

We conclude that there remain powerful reasons to vigorously support the International Mission Board and its domestic equivalent, the North American Mission Board in their strategic world and national missions efforts.  State conventions and associations also are helpfully entering mission fields of the world with special projects. Many churches also seek to engage in mission efforts on promising mission fields where denominational help is no longer available.   Direct church involvement on mission fields can do much to vitalize the church at home.  This should be done responsibly, not simply for the spiritual satisfaction of their volunteers but even more for the spiritual transformation of the communities and nations to which they send them.

A Great Commission People

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Southern Baptists were moved to organize as a convention when they realized that the challenge of world wide missions required resources that most churches alone would never have.   When they organized the Convention in 1845, in Augusta, Georgia, they created the “Foreign Mission Board” and appointed their first foreign missionaries.  Soon after, they formed the “Home Mission Board,” primarily charged to use cooperative resources to take the gospel into western lands being settled on the American continent.  Seminary training, literature production and distribution, and other important ministries likewise were developed by the young convention, but missions was the driving purpose of the Convention.   The promotion of these mission causes, largely sponsored by women who formed the “Woman’s Missionary Union,” kept the cause of world missions and national missions in the sight of the churches, including the smallest rural church.   It emphasized the missionary education of children and youth, and this contributed greatly to the large number of missionary volunteers ready to meet the personnel needs of an ever-expanding denominational missions cause.

A Biblical People

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Most Southern Baptists, at the beginning, were members of small rural churches spread across the Southeastern part of the USA.   Many, if not most pastors had to supplement their income by farming or other work.   Educational standards were low and seminary training was almost unheard of.   Even so, Baptists were surprisingly united in doctrine, believing that the Bible should be their only authority for doctrine and practice.   The Bible was the primary text book of the pastors, churches and members before other Christian literature became commonly available.  (Read more)    As Baptist colleges and seminaries sprung up, the final authority of the Bible in matters of doctrine and faith was almost universally held to and insisted upon by the supporting churches.    This gave Southern Baptists a foundation that has kept the denomination Biblically conservative.    That conservatism has done much to spare Southern Baptists from the constant convulsions of doctrinal changes and insipid Christianity that has clearly weakened many other denominational groups.   Some denominations, with their new doctrinal thinking, no longer see missions as being central and withdraw from the effort.   Southern Baptists are among others who, in obedience to Christ, hold the Great Commission as inviolable.   Evangelism, as a central feature of the Great Commission, remains very important to Southern Baptists.

Christ’s People

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Many millions of people who identify themselves as “Southern Baptists” In the United States and out across the world.    That is a secondary description, because if they are truly Southern Baptists in the sense of ultimate values, they would first say, “We belong to Christ.   We are his people.”  They do not say this exclusively.  They freely recognize that Christ has many loyal peoples and most of them are not Southern Baptists.   However, every religious group must clearly identify itself in its relationship or lack of relationship with Christ, and Southern Baptists profess for themselves, “Jesus Christ is Lord.”  He, by their choice and decision, is their Lord.   The constant challenge is to acknowledge and obey Him in all things.

Southern Baptists began as a group of Baptist churches in the Southeastern part of the United States who in 1845 organized the Southern Baptist Convention as their cooperative instrument for missions, starting with international missions.   It sent missionaries out into a few countries, at first.  (Read more)    Decade after decade, it expanded the number of nations to which it sent its laborers and it became, for many decades, the largest Evangelical missions agency in the world, starting or assisting Baptist churches in most nations of the world.   These missionaries encouraged the new Baptist groups they helped form to organize themselves into national conventions or unions, similar to the SBC pattern.   Southern Baptist missionaries helped start churches and helped train their pastors and had a great influence on what Baptists are like in many countries of the world.  Meanwhile, in the United States, Baptists from the south moved westward and northward, until “Southern” Baptists are now seen in every state of the Union, including Alaska!

Most people called “Southern Baptists” are members of churches that are members of the Southern Baptist Convention.   However, many others also consider themselves as “Southern Baptists” because their core doctrines and practices came to them either by missionary emissaries or because their personal faith in Christ first happened among Southern Baptists.   Baptists in many parts of the world proudly identify themselves as Baptists of that nation and of its national Baptist organizations.   And many of these will also say, when comparing themselves with other Baptists and other Christians, “I am Southern Baptist.”   The label identifies them with values and practices that are common to Southern Baptists anywhere in the world.

This web page, as a result, is not an official webpage of the Southern Baptist Convention but is at the voluntary initiative of men and women who cherish Southern Baptist beliefs, purposes and values and are eager for them to be reproduced throughout the world.