Telling the Story of Tennessee Baptists Since 1835
Baptist and Reflector
FRANKLIN — Tennessee Baptist Convention churches gave $2,766,596 through the Cooperative Program in July.
For the year-to-date, Tennessee Baptists have given $26,029,445. The amount is $504,905 or 2 percent over the amount given at the same time last year. After nine months of the current fiscal year, the gifts are $154,445 or 0.60 percent above budget needs. [Read more…]
By Randy C. Davis
TBMB President & Executive Director
Aparna had no idea what to expect when she arrived in America and on the campus of East Tennessee State University. Johnson City couldn’t be more culturally different from her home in Northern India.
She didn’t know anybody when school started. One day she saw a group of people standing around and wandered over to see what was going on. It was the Pop-Tart Cart, a ministry of the ETSU Baptist Collegiate Ministry. Sure, it is a place to grab a pack of Pop-Tarts and a cup of coffee, but it is really a connecting point for BCMers to share the love of Jesus and the gospel with fellow students. One of them struck up a conversation with Aparna and invited her to the BCM. That invitation changed her life.
She made lots of new friends in the following weeks and frequently heard the gospel. It wasn’t long before she realized her need for a Savior and gave her life to Jesus. Awesome!
But the story gets better. [Read more…]
By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector
lwilkey@tnbaptist.org
Cooperation. Churches talk about it all the time. Churches actually practice cooperation when they participate through the Cooperative Program. But how often do churches truly practice cooperation by “cooperating” with each other? My guess is — not often enough.
The standard definition of cooperation is “the process of working together to the same end.”
In this week’s issue (see photos and story here) is an example of area churches working together to show the love of Jesus in their community. [Read more…]
Baptist and Reflector
FRANKLIN — Tennessee Baptist Convention churches gave $2,801,903 through the Cooperative Program in April.
Year-to-date gifts total $17,476,193. After six months of the 2017-18 budget year, CP giving is up $330,759 or 1.9 percent over the same time frame last year.Cooperative Program gifts also are $226,193 or 1.31 percent over budget needs after six months. [Read more…]
By Todd Brady
Vice President for University Ministries, Union University
Money is not evil. But loving it is.
The Apostle Paul said “The love of money is a root of all kinds of evils” (I Timothy 6:10). The difference is a matter of the heart, not the wallet. It’s not about how much money I have. It’s about how much does money have me. The issue is not the size of my bank account, but the proclivity of my heart.
Believers are not to love money. However, believers can and should leverage money for God’s purposes. When I think about God’s work through Tennessee Baptists, it seems obvious to me that major leveraging has been happening. [Read more…]
Editor’s Note: View the Cooperative Program video featuring Todd Stinnett at tnbaptist.org/CP or see below.
By David Dawson
Baptist and Reflector
ddawson@tnbaptist.org
KNOXVILLE — Todd Stinnett is a strong believer in synergy, especially when it comes to churches working together to reach the world for Christ.
Indeed, Stinnett, the pastor of Black Oak Heights Baptist Church in Knoxville, said churches need to understand the importance of the concept of “the whole being greater than the sum of its parts” in regard to the Cooperative Program.
“I love being a Tennessee Baptist — a Southern Baptist — because we can come together and put all of our resources together,” said Stinnett. “We can do a whole lot more together than we can separately.” [Read more…]
By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist & Reflector
Editor’s Note: View the Cooperative Program video featuring Gene Nelson at tnbaptist.org/CP.
RUSSELLVILLE — Pastor Gene Nelson is convinced that one reason Russellville Baptist Church is “healthy” today is because of the church’s strong commitment to missions — both in giving and going. [Read more…]
Editor’s Note: This column was distributed among directors of the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board during their April 24 meeting in Franklin. See related story.
By Randy C. Davis
TBMB President & Executive Director
The Cooperative Program is the fabric that weaves us together as Tennessee and Southern Baptists. From the cradle to the grave, the Cooperative Program has a profound impact on our calling as Great Commission Christians and our ability to reach a spiritually lost and dying world. It binds us together for the purpose of reaching every geographic priority Jesus identifies in Acts 1:8.
It fuels the SBC Ecosystem.
Here’s what I mean.
Take a Tennessee boy named Billy Baptist. He comes to Christ at 10 years old during a Vacation Bible School where workers were trained and equipped through a joint venture of his church’s local association and specialists from the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board (TBMB). Later, at a summer camp held at one of the TBMB’s two conference centers, Billy responds to a call to ministry. Eventually he’s off to college and gets involved in one of the TBMB’s 20-plus dynamic Baptist Collegiate Ministries. While there, Billy gets his first taste of international missions during a summer BCM project in India. [Read more…]
By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector
FRANKLIN — The board of directors of the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board unanimously approved a $2.1 million goal for the 2018-19 Golden Offering for Tennessee Missions.
The goal is an increase of $250,000 or 13.5 percent over the 2017-18 goal of $1.925 million. The projected income is $1.85 million.
The Golden Offering for Tennessee Baptist Missions is a cooperative effort of Tennessee Woman’s Missionary Union and the TBMB. The goal also was approved by the Tennessee WMU Executive Board.
The Golden Offering “is an important part of what we do,” affirmed Martha Pitts, president of Tennessee WMU. [Read more…]
By Lonnie Wilkey
Editor, Baptist and Reflector
In February, the International Mission Board learned that President David Platt was returning to the pastorate, so trustees are in the process of searching for a successor. This will be an important hire because the individual will be leading Southern Baptists’ largest missions-sending organization.
But just recently another SBC leadership position opened that is just as, if not more, important.
Frank Page resigned as president and chief executive office of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee in March after acknowledging “a morally inappropriate relationship in the recent past.”
The person who replaces Frank Page just may be the most important hire the Southern Baptist Convention will have in the next decade, even more important than the next leader of the International Mission Board.
Why? Because the president and CEO of the Executive Committee will be the face of Southern Baptists. He will be the most important cheerleader and advocate of the Cooperative Program. He will be the person who will work with state convention leadership to help promote the Cooperative Program, which funds every level of an Acts 1:8 strategy, enabling Southern Baptists to reach people for Christ across the street, in their states, and around the world.
Lonnie Wilkey
Unfortunately, I am not convinced that every SBC entity head has totally bought into the concept of cooperation and the Cooperative Program. They may give lip service, but most seem more interested in their own entity, rather than the best interests of Southern Baptists as a whole.
I hope I’m wrong, but that’s what I have observed from afar in recent years.
It is imperative that the next leader of the SBC Executive Committee be 100 percent totally supportive of the Cooperative Program. He must understand the importance of Baptist state conventions in the life of the convention and welcome them as equal partners. Without everyone on board for the Cooperative Program, we will eventually drift back to the old societal method of giving. That would be a tragedy.
Pray for the search committee for the new EC president and CEO. They have a tremendous job ahead of them. Pray that will totally seek the person God has in mind for this position. Personal agendas must be set aside. Too much is at stake for the future of the denomination.
