The Georgia Baptist Convention’s executive committee has endorsed the Cooperative Program as “the historical and proven method of missions support” for the Southern Baptist Convention and asked the Southern Baptist Convention’s Great Commission Resurgence Task Force to reconsider proposed new terminology for missions giving.
In a March 16 meeting in Duluth, Ga., the committee urged the GCRTF to reconsider proposed new terminology for missions giving and “bring clarity to the GCRTF’s desire to keep the Cooperative Program as the central means of support for Great Commission ministries.”
The task force’s Feb. 22 interim report suggested “Cooperative Program giving and designated gifts given to the Southern Baptist Convention, a state convention or a local association” should be called “Great Commission Giving” and celebrated by all Baptists.
“The wide application of the phrase ‘Great Commission Giving’ for monies given through the Cooperative Program as well as to designated causes may cause some Baptists to surmise wrongly that the Cooperative Program is merely a subset of giving, instead of the primary means of missions giving for Southern Baptists,” a statement adopted by the GBC executive committee said. The committee wants the task force to formally state that designated or special gifts are best provided as a supplement and not a substitute for the Cooperative Program.
The committee asked GBC executive director J. Robert White, who is a member of the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force, to present their concerns at an April 26 task force meeting in Nashville.
White told the committee he believes Southern Baptists must affirm the value of all mission gifts, whether directed through the Cooperative Program or not.
“The thing I would ask you to do is help me make the right recommendation; and here is the assignment: ‘not to do any damage to the Cooperative Program at all; leave it like it is,’?” White said. “Now, on this one, some of you are going to have to swallow real hard, but I think it is a godly thing to do. Acknowledge that churches are autonomous and they have a right to decide where their money is going to go. You don’t have to agree with them.
“I don’t agree with what a lot of churches are doing with their money, but as long as they are giving it to a Southern Baptist, or a state convention or associational cause, let’s tell them that we appreciate that gift and not call it ‘other,’?” White added. “Give me a term that will acknowledge a gift that is given to Southern Baptist causes in such a way that they will feel that what they have voted to do as a church is appreciated. We want them to be in the family.”
The GBC executive committee action said the way to “take the gospel of Jesus Christ to the nations in a cooperative, biblical, and missional way” is not through a redefinition of terms, but by challenging the local churches to increase their support and sacrificial giving through the Cooperative Program.
In introducing the recommendation, John Waters, chairman of the group’s administration committee, said: “The ability for us to take the gospel to the nations is inherently and intrinsically tied to the way we utilize and support the Cooperative Program. Therefore, we’ve got to let the task force understand that how we accomplish the Great Commission Resurgence will either unite us as Baptists or divide us as Baptists.
“We want to say that we care about the Great Commission, about the Cooperative Program, and about taking the gospel to the nations,” Waters added. “The members of the administration committee don’t want to be a part of the generation to whom the baton has been passed, and who dismantle it and dismiss one of the greatest mechanisms for taking the gospel to those who are lost.”
Executive committee chairman Fred Evers called for a standing vote on the recommendation, which passed unanimously.
– Harris is editor of The Christian Index, newsjournal of the Georgia Baptist Convention.