How should the Cooperative Program contributions from the churches be divided between the ministries of the South Carolina Baptist Convention and the Southern Baptist Convention?
Messengers to the annual meeting of the state convention Nov. 13-14 at the Florence Civic Center will consider a proposal to increase the percentage given to the SBC and presumably provide an answer to that question. That answer will have far-reaching implications for both the SCBC and the SBC.
Right now, and for many years, the state convention budget allocates 60 percent of undesignated receipts from the churches to its own work while channeling 40 percent of that money to the Southern Baptist Convention.
Among the state Baptist conventions, that 40 percent going to the SBC earns the state convention fourth highest ranking in percentage giving and fifth overall in actual dollars contributed.
At the 2006 annual state Baptist convention, Hans Wunch, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, Ware Shoals, made a motion that the convention’s Executive Board designate a committee to “study and come up with a plan” to move the convention from the 60-40 split to an even distribution of CP funds to the SCBC and the SBC.
The convention did not vote on the motion, but it did assign the work of study to the budget, finance and audit committee, chaired by Dennis Wilkins, pastor of First Baptist Church, Bluffton.
At its October meeting, the Executive Board, after hearing the report and recommendations of the committee, gave unanimous approval in adopting the budget recommendations.
Proposed for vote by messengers in November is the Cooperative Program Advance Plan, which was first introduced at the 2006 Southern Baptist Convention as a way for state conventions to give more CP money to the SBC.
The CP Advance Plan allocates 50 percent of each budget increase to the SBC each year. By allocating 50 percent of all new budgeted CP funds to the SBC, the percentage to the Southern Baptist Convention would increase anytime there is an increase in the budget.
The extensive study carried out by the budget, finance and audit committee also revealed statistics that the committee considers “significant and alarming” in regard to contributions through the Cooperative Program. These findings should have a bearing on the decision reached by messengers at the November convention.
The committee determined that during the past 10 years overall giving to South Carolina Baptist churches rose by an average of 4.68 percent each year, while CP contributions from the churches increased by only 2.73 percent annually.
The analysis also indicated that the percentage of undesignated money given through the Cooperative Program dropped from 8.95 percent to 7.74 percent during that same time period.
As a result, the committee sounded a cautionary note in its report to the Executive Board: “Whatever changes we make in the percentage given to the Southern Baptist Convention, we must take care not to damage the excellent work being done in our state.”
The budget, finance and audit committee is to be commended for its thorough study. Its findings related to past performances by South Carolina Baptist churches in their contributions through the Cooperative Program provide a good, if unsettling, indicator of what might be expected in years to come.
For more than 10 years, the budget, finance and audit committee of the South Carolina Baptist Convention has followed a procedure of what can accurately be called receipt-based budgeting. In other words, budget goals are determined by receipts from the previous year.
Without question, this has been a sound, reasonable approach to preparing state convention budgets that has afforded South Carolina Baptists the confidence that meeting, and even exceeding, budget goals are within their grasp.
The key to providing more funds for the Southern Baptist Convention, while at the same time producing more money for the work of the state convention’s ministries and its institutions, is simple really: Churches must give more in dollars and percentage through the Cooperative Program. As those gifts grow, all of our ministries will flourish.
The idea of moving away from the 60-40 division of Cooperative Program funds remaining in the SCBC and sent to the SBC in favor of an even distribution of CP money to both entities is not new to South Carolina Baptists, who have been consistently reluctant to risk hurting Great Commission work in the state by altering the percentages.
If it is the intention of messengers attending the November meeting to move the South Carolina Baptist Convention toward a 50-50 split of Cooperative Program money with the SBC – and not everybody is convinced that is the best thing to do – then it appears that the slow but surer pace set by the Cooperative Program Advance Plan is the most prudent route to take.
The plan recognizes the potential of South Carolina Baptists to increase their giving to missions causes at the state, national and international levels which lie at the heart of what we believe is our sacred task as Southern Baptists. It would not, however, be wise for the convention to plot its course for the years to come based solely on the potential of churches to increase their giving. Past performance is a dependable gauge of what can be expected in the future.