Telling the Story of Tennessee Baptists Since 1835
Baptist and Reflector
BRENTWOOD — Tennessee Baptist Convention churches contributed $2,278,724 in November, the first month of the 2015-16 budget year.
The amount is $14,693 or 0.6 percent more than was given in the first month of the last fiscal year.
The total, however, is $575,443 or 20.16 percent below budget needs. [Read more…]
Baptist Press
The annual wild game supper at Bethel Baptist Church in Greenfield, Tenn., draws about 200 diners, many of whom are not church members.
GREENFIELD, Tenn. (BP) — The men at Bethel Baptist Church reach out to the unchurched men in their community each autumn by showing off their culinary skills at a wild game supper, preparing turkey, deer, raccoon, crappie, catfish, rabbit, duck and other critters.
Meanwhile, the congregation’s Women on Mission excel each year at promoting missions, noted David Worley, pastor of Bethel Baptist in Greenfield, Tenn. In 2014, for example, with a goal of $19,630 for the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions, the church gave $26,896.
The church “believes strongly in missions,” Worley said. Bethel Baptist has given 20 percent to missions through the Cooperative Program for years, preceding and throughout Worley’s pastorate that began nine years ago. [Read more…]
By Randy C. Davis
TBC Executive Director
Randy C. Davis
The world is in chaos. Wars rage. Terror perpetrated by evil people has nations on edge. Millions are displaced, and the debate over refugee resettlement is burning white hot. The world’s spiritual soil is as fertile as it ever has been and cries out for a broad spreading of gospel seeds. This world desperately needs Jesus.
Southern Baptists have historically rallied to the moment and responded to the call of Christ to go into the world and make disciples of all nations. However, I believe we as Southern Baptists stand at a crossroads. Either our action will be the substance that validates our calling, or it will be hollow “Great Commission” rhetoric with no action and it will expose the superficiality of our Christianity.
In other words, it is time to put our money where our mouth is. [Read more…]
Baptist Press
NASHVILLE (BP) — Contributions to Southern Baptist national and international missions and ministries received by the SBC Executive Committee in October were 0.18 percent above last year’s opening month of the convention’s fiscal year and 3.26 percent above the projected budget for the first month, according to a news release from SBC Executive Committee President and Chief Executive Officer Frank Page.
As of Oct. 31, gifts received by the Executive Committee for distribution through the Cooperative Program Allocation Budget totaled $16,048,439.92, or $29,259.07 above the $16,019,180.85 received in October 2014.
“We are tremendously grateful that for the second year in a row Cooperative Program receipts received by the Executive Committee exceeded the previous October’s gifts and surpassed our projected budget goal for the first month of the fiscal year,” Page said. [Read more…]
Gives large gifts to Southern Baptist missions/ministries while building new facility
By Connie Davis Bushey
News Editor, Baptist and Reflector
David Worley, right, pastor, Bethel Baptist Church, Greenfield, thanks Jeff Perkins, worship leader of the church and chair of the building committee, on Oct. 18. From left are other members of the building committee, Larry Pentecost, Judy Huffstetler, and Martha Allen. Not pictured is Jeff Rush.
GREENFIELD — Bethel Baptist Church here celebrated a momentus day on Oct. 18. The congregation began meeting in its new facility.
Church members did this with a clear conscience — they had continued their tradition of strong support for Southern Baptist missions and ministries while building the facility.
The new $3.5 million facility was built over the past couple of years, said David Worley, pastor.
During that period the only basic change in the financial situation and plan of the church was the increased total giving which was up from 2014 by 41 percent. Members were asked to help pay off the building debt so they gave designated gifts to the building fund which may have led to that increase, explained Worley. [Read more…]
By Ronnie Floyd
President, SBC
Ronnie Floyd
The Southern Baptist Convention is a convention of churches that partner together to reach the world for Christ. As we aspire to this biblical vision of presenting the gospel to every person in the world and to make disciples of all the nations, we must find a way to increase financial resources to this serious and grand vision.
I am often asked, “Where is the money to accomplish this vision?” In this month of emphasis on the Cooperative Program, I think we must answer this question openly and honestly. As one Southern Baptist, I want to attempt to answer the question, “Where is the money?”
The money is in the pockets of God’s people. The most recent research by empty tomb, inc., reveals the following:
The money to reach our towns, cities, regions, states, nation, and the world is in the pockets of God’s people. We need to repent now and call people back to God with boldness and compassion.
Pastors, Christian leaders, and church leaders must lead the way in giving at least 10 percent of their income through their local churches. The professing Christians and members of our churches must also do the same.
Money is in the pockets of our churches. Each of our churches must evaluate continually what we are doing to partner with our Southern Baptist Convention in reaching the world for Christ. We do this through our gifts through the Cooperative Program. How much a church gives through the Cooperative Program is a church’s decision. Each church is autonomous and we honor their decision. [Read more…]
By SBC staff
The “1% Challenge” is simply a request to every Southern Baptist pastor and every Southern Baptist church to increase their Cooperative Program gifts by one percent of their church’s undesignated contributions.
Frank S. Page, president of the Executive Committee, issued this challenge during the Executive Committee report at the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Phoenix, Arizona. He said, “To do better what we’re doing together, we’re asking you… we challenge you, we encourage you to raise your Cooperative Program support. Would you do that? One percent? Next year?”
During his report, he noted that though the dollar amount contributed through the Cooperative Program has increased fourteen of the past twenty years, a twenty-year decline in percentage of funds forwarded by local churches through the Cooperative Program was a reflection of a much larger cause for concern. He said, “We’ve been headed in the wrong direction in several ways. In 1989 our gifts to total missions expenditures were 16.5 percent of our total receipts [average per church]. Twenty years later, in 2009, our gifts to total missions expenditures had declined to 12.3 percent. That’s a 4.25 percent drop in missions giving. Did you hear me? I’m not even talking about the Cooperative Program, I’m talking about missions expenditures… that is not right! [Read more…]
Roc Collins
By Roc Collins
Pastor in Kingsport
As followers of Christ we have been called to “Go and Make Disciples.” What a great task is ours!
There is no one person who can fulfill that mission alone. God, in His infinite wisdom, has granted us the opportunity to fulfill the Great Commission by working together. Certainly we can get together to participate in ministry but there is another way.
We can give through the Cooperative Program (CP). As we give through the CP we are giving fuel to fulfill the Great Commission. The whole purpose of our giving is to point people to Jesus Christ. [Read more…]
Baptist and Reflector
BRENTWOOD — In January, Cooperative Program giving from Tennessee Baptist Convention churches was nearly 16 percent below what was given in 2013 at the same time.
After September receipts were counted, however, giving has rebounded.
Tennessee churches gave $2,934,212 through the Cooperative Program in September. [Read more…]
Editor’s Note: October is recognized as Cooperative Program month on the calendar of the Southern Baptist Convention. Selected articles from this issue demonstrate how the Cooperative Program is at work in Tennessee.
By Chris Turner
Director of Communications, TBC
Students at the University of Memphis learn about the Baptist Collegiate Ministry as they stop by its exhibit recently and visit with Jeff Jones, center, BCM director. — Photo by Royce DeGrie
MEMPHIS — The countenance on Abrahim’s* face betrayed the secret he was hiding inside, and he didn’t even know it. How could he? Only days before he’d accepted Christ into his heart and now he was home in a staunchly fundamentalist Islamic country.
But being alive in Christ changes everything, and Abrahim’s parents immediately noticed.
“I was only home three days and my father came to me and said I’d changed,” Abrahim said. “ ‘What is different about you?’ he kept asking. I only told him at that time that God changed my heart.”
God had changed his heart, and He used the faithful witness of fellow college students involved in the University of Memphis’ Baptist Collegiate Ministries (BCM) to do it. [Read more…]
