1. Big Ten, Pac 12 football. Does anyone require an explanation?
2. Alliterative sermon outlines. Forgive my fervent yet forlorn and perhaps foolish foray into the subject. Adrian could make it work but no one since.
3. The silly idea that only megapastors can be SBC presidents. God, give us a faithful pastor of a sub-megachurch as president…before I die.
4. Any pastor who asks, “Are you tracking with me?” I’m tracking the talking, preaching cliche of a pastor who uses the phrase.
5. The evaluation of everything in the SBC on the basis of Calvinism. Why would any noncal describe his theology as 3.5 point, or whatever point Calvinist?
6. Any state convention entity that is generations old but still consumes cooperative program dollars. If they aren’t compelling enough to make it on their own, are we subsidizing mediocrity, or worse?
7. The artificial scarcity of white fudge Oreo cookies. If they fly off the shelves make more. I can’t find a single box now that I ate the box Santa brought me.
______
There are more. Happy New Year.
Would you mind saying more about number 6? Or pointing me somewhere to read further? I want to make sure I’m tracking with you… 🙂
Ronnie Floyd made a similar statement in his blogging while SBC president. You could look at many state sponsored educational institutions along these lines as well as other traditional state sponsored ministries. It’s a broad subject that varies by state. Some of the entities have powerful constituencies making changes and cuts difficult.
Of course, churches can and have adjusted their giving patterns rather than fight the entrenched system.
I am so… tracking with you. Especially point #7. And while they’re at it, put more in the box!!!
Please, oh please can we leave behind That Ohio State University?
Clemson certainly left them behind!
Lets be fair to Washington. They got beat by the best D’s in the NCAA and one of the brightest up-and-coming RB’s in the NCAA. And they did at least win their conference championship. So despite being outmatched, they did at least deserve the chance….Ohio State on the other hand….Yea…The Big 10 should rename themselves by dropping the 1.
As to:
1. Agree. But we in the South do need to be gracious in our prophetic announcements – as much as we can.
2. Gave them up years ago. I preach about twice a year. If I ever find myself constructing an outline that naturally goes in that direction, I find another word just to break it up.
There are a lot of things Adrian could do that we should not try to copy.
3. Agree. Will somebody run? But note, to win they must have some ability to appeal to the younger generation, and they cannot present themselves as if they are auditioning for Duck Dynasty or some other rural reality show on TLC.
4. “Let’s unpack this” “In my mind’s eye” and the overuse of the word “Gospel” as an adjective.
5. If the Trads hired me to advise them, this is the first thing I would advise. But it won’t happen. They are having too good a time with their current strategy.
6. Agreed. Please don’t be offended if I ask, but William, are you going through a metamorphosis on this issue. Didn’t you recently used to be a big CP state ministry guy, or am I mistaking you for someone else?
7. I am agnostic on this issue.
Here are some of my own suggestions that we should leave behind in 2016.
1. Colin Kapernick. I really don’t care. If he stops getting press on this, it will die a quick death from a lack of Oxygen. Even a discussion of “the issue” gives the thing more life.
2. More weird prescriptions for church life. The obsession with church discipline and church authority in some quarters. I was asked to review a church constitution and bylaws recently, and they had all of this stuff about discipline and the authority of the elders etc. The young people engaged in this enterprise had clearly gotten this off the shelf from some ministry and they thought it sounded good. I questioned why they had so much stuff on this topic. I told them that it looked like they were expecting a lot of trouble. So much so that I wondered why anyone would join such a church.
We are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Reformation this year.
Let’s not do that by continuing to make statements and adopt practices that are reminiscent of the Catholic Church circa 1517.
You know we are in trouble when the average person on the street thinks the local hierarchically organized church is more freedom loving than the average Congregational church.
3. The seeker sensitive movement. This movement, in the beginning, asked some really good questions. But it’s also produced its share of weirdness. Some of the guys leading churches like this now sound schmaltzy and kind of 1980s.
4. The desire to chase political fads. It’s so tempting to make a list here, but I will refrain. There are some issues where the church just seems to drink the current Kool Aid to get or stay in the press.
5. The desire to absolutely pound other Christians who don’t think as we do politically. All the dust up over the ERLC has this at its root. I suspect that if someone other than Dr. Moore were leading the ERLC, we might have had the same problems come up. I suspect it’s our broader denominational culture that encourages a uniformity on some pretty complex issues.
6. The idea that who pastors and ministry leaders vote for is desirable or important information.
7. The Walking Dead show.
I support the CP but believe that state conventions, particularly the handful of legacy ones that consume most of the CP, are almost helplessly locked into considerable spending that has limited value to their constituent churches.
I hear a lot of preachers who use the word “gospel” a lot, too much. We used to preach about Jesus; now the emphasis is on “the gospel.” I thought the focus of the gospel was Jesus Christ. Perhaps someone can explain this to me.
I think you are making a mountain out of a mole hill here. And possibly a false dichotomy.
Tyler:
That’s not a very Gospel centered answer.
Mark…maybe use the word “gospel” more, and explain it accurately. That would be preaching Jesus. 🙂
1: If all football disappeared tomorrow I don’t think I’d notice.
2: I haven’t heard one of these in years. More popular down south?
3: Heartily agree.
4: Never hear this.
5: Agreed but unhopeful. Anyone who denies being a Calvinist is, I think, suspected of being untruthful, so the interrogation will continue until it is determined just how calvinistic they are. Hopefully this is most common in blogdom. I don’t know if churches are employing the various “how to sniff out a Calvinist” methodologies. On the other hand, if you are a Calvinist, say so.
6: Don’t know anything about this.
7: I’m kind of a purist with Oreos, but I will extend my tolerance level to doublestuff. Of course eating Oreos without dunking them in milk should be a matter for church discipline.
Things I’d like to see left behind:
1: The idea that music=worship and preaching=something else.
2: The idea that crying=manliness in the same way that not-crying used to equal manliness.
3: The union of the SBC and the Republican party.
4: The gullibility of the church when it comes to fake news.
5: The idea that Christians must side with Israel no matter what they do.
6: Christians structuring their life around their eschatalogical viewpoint.
7: Peanut Butter Crunch
William, Love the post! Especially “point” number 5 (good positioning! :)) I completely agree that noncal’s should drop the comparison,..it doesn’t help their case against the Synod’s reaffirmation of 1619. It may be better to make a comparison for or against the Arminians since they were the original aggressor (like “4 point Arminian”, or something like that”). It is those 7 point Calvinist’s you have to watch! The Calvinism thing…enough already! So many more important things to discuss!
Well said! Now that you mention the Oreos….why is egg nogg only available during the Christmas season?
Because you’d die if you drank it year round.
Why is it available at all?
William, you must be a disciple of SEBTS President Danny Akin who described the state conventions as, “bloated and inefficient bureaucracies with red tape a mile long,” and his SEBTS staff member who accused the state conventions of “skimming” CP dollars that rightfully belong to the SBC. I thought that seemed strange language from a man who is president of a seminary whose bureaucracy used CP funds to gift an almost new car to a professor leaving for another seminary as CB Scott once discovered.
I think you and Danny have it backwards when you say, “they (the state conventions) aren’t compelling enough to make it on their own.” It is the SBC entities that couldn’t make it on their own without the state conventions. The state conventions promote and collect most of the CP money for the SBC. The state conventions are closest to the churches and it is the churches who tell the state conventions how much CP money to send to the SBC Executive Committee to distribute to the national entities. Without the state conventions to hold the SBC together these national entities would be on their own to gather funds using the old societal methods and would be no different than every other independent seminary and mission sending group out there.
That being said, I am all for encouraging state conventions to increase their CP percentage giving to the SBC as my state convention in Arkansas did this year. They should not be slandered and bullied into doing that by those like Danny Akin with vested interests in getting more money for their own bureaucracy.
I do agree with Akin but might be more diplomatic than using the phrase “bloated bureaucracies.” I’ve never even implied that the SCs are skimming. All entities waste money.
Please note that I did not say that SCs aren’t compelling enough to make it on their own. My point was that some SC supported entities have been around for generations and ought to have enough support to not line up for CP dollars forever.
I will say that the legacy state conventions that consume hundreds of millions in CP dollars have a very difficult time making a compelling case for the amount of money they spend considering the results we see.
I’m sure we will have many fruitful discussions this year…and a few unfruitful ones.
Hope you have a great year.
Except that, tied to those CP dollars for generations there is a string: no fundraising or direct appeals without approval from the State Convention. At least, that’s the rule in Arkansas.
OBU and Williams, for example, have to have all direct appeals to churches approved by the ABSC. Likewise if Siloam Springs (Camp) wants to.
As a result, they have existed for years on the CP payout. To cut these off at the knees because “they aren’t compelling enough to stand on their own” ignores the basic fact that they haven’t built a plan to ask for funds in competition with their states.
And we all know that it would be in competition. The appeal would be “give 1% of your church budget to the local BCM or state Baptist college instead of through the CP.” Not “keep giving 3% (if you’re Ronnie Floyd) through the CP and give to us as well.
The model is broken–that much is true. But I would suggest adjusting it may be like fixing the problems in Social Security: you have to account for the promises made and the folks who trusted the system would stand. We ought not tell 55 year olds that they should have saved instead of trusting the SSI they’ve paid for….most of these entities have helped “pay for” CP by encouraging giving through the CP instead of consistently soliciting funds from church on their own.
So, it needs to go away. But ending it 2017 would be too quick–yes, you and a few other great minds in the blogworld have said it for years. But the people who sign the checks and vote on the state convention budgets haven’t said it for very long. It will take some time to make those adjustments.
Just speaking for myself, I use the word gospel and Christ interchangeably. Sometimes I catch myself and explain that I mean the same thing. Maybe I’m wrong. Who knows.
I’m sure we will William, I will aim for fruitful.
William,
Your post is:
Big Ten, Pac 12 football. Does anyone require an explanation?
2. Alliterative sermon outlines. Forgive my fervent yet forlorn and perhaps foolish foray into the subject. Adrian could make it work but no one since.
3. The silly idea that only megapastors can be SBC presidents. God, give us a faithful pastor of a sub-megachurch as president…before I die.
4. Any pastor who asks, “Are you tracking with me?” I’m tracking the talking, preaching cliche of a pastor who uses the phrase.
5. The evaluation of everything in the SBC on the basis of Calvinism. Why would any noncal describe his theology as 3.5 point, or whatever point Calvinist?
6. Any state convention entity that is generations old but still consumes cooperative program dollars. If they aren’t compelling enough to make it on their own, are we subsidizing mediocrity, or worse?
7. The artificial scarcity of white fudge Oreo cookies. If they fly off the shelves make more. I can’t find a single box now that I ate the box Santa brought me.
William, your post is:
1. Superb
2. Succinct
3. Sublime
4. Sane
5. Sincere but not Forseeable
6. Solid
7. Satisfying
🙂
6. Any state convention entity that is generations old but still consumes cooperative program dollars. If they aren’t compelling enough to make it on their own, are we subsidizing mediocrity, or worse?
I used to be fairly negative toward state conventions and wanted all of the money to go to the mission field. But, over the past few years, I’ve recognized that the problem often is not “how much” money is spent in states, but “how” the money is spent. For example, you see Southern states that are reducing their share of CP monies that they receive and are then sending it on to NAMB, IMB, etc. Then, NAMB turns around and supports church planting in those states. That is not about “where” money is spent, but “how” money is spent. I mean, I get it, but I think that the more money that goes to national entities, the more that they will spend on things that do not necessarily advance the mission. That is the nature of things.
The problem that many of these state convention entities have is that for years and years we have been against any offerings other than CP, Lottie, and Annie, and we told these entities to just be part of the system. So, they depended on CP dollars because we told them to. Now, we want to cut them loose and they were never allowed to go straight to churches for giving because we told them they couldn’t. It is a bit of a problem to now tell them that they should have been able to stand on their own long ago when they weren’t allowed to. And, when national SBC entities that rely on CP dollars say that, it also seems to miss the mark.
The biggest problem with the CP and Southern Baptist funding is that we have a bunch of local, state, and national entities competing with an ever shrinking pie, proportionally. So, there is competition that emerges. The “Cooperative” Program becomes more like the “Competitive” Program as ministry institutions established in previous generations and under totally different circumstances compete for money that is headed in different directions.
I always appreciate the thoughtful comments you make, Allen. There’s far too much to address here. Perhaps a separate article on SCs would be helpful. But I’ll say that in regard to SC supported entities some have developed sufficient support. Some have been propped up when the better course might be death or merger.
One thing I’ve never seen is any measure by which churches can evaluate success on the state level. We have numbers: student count, conference attendees, etc.
My view has been that SCs, at about 61 or so percent of the CP dollar are overfunded and underperform. Doubt I’ll be elected to anything, ever.
I would take a “You tracking with me?” over a “Can I get an amen?” any day. 😉
Me too!
But they’re both annoying.
How about those annoying ones:
“y’all just missed a good place for an amen”
Or
“That ought to make a Presbyterian shout!”
Willliam you say, “legacy state conventions that consume hundreds of millions in CP dollars have a very difficult time making a compelling case for the amount of money they spend considering the results we see.” I don’t know your situation in Georgia but in Arkansas our convention has made a very compelling case for the amount of money we spend and our churches reward that with trust and voting to approve the budget that is presented to us for our approval. They present their results every year at our state convention. State convention expenses are just as much cooperative program as are national.
The national entities also spend millions of dollars. At the national convention, every year we get a brief report from the seminaries with very little explanation of how money is spent. Nothing about the cost of the automobile given to the professor at SEBTS. Nothing about the cost of maintaining Pecan Manor or the President’s office at SWBTS with its stuffed animals. They may be valid but you are right when you say all entities waste money. I am just saying that there is not necessarily more waste at the state conventions than the national entities.
Ron, what’s the trend for CP percentages in your state?
When a state convention is spending more that 10% of a 30+ million dollar budget on the state printed newspaper but can’t muster more than 40% to the SBC – then i think it’s fair to say the budget is askew.
I would like to know what state convention is spending 10% of its budget on the state printed paper.
Tarheel, I’m guessing your figures are off, I can’t imagine any state paper receiving 10% of a SC budget.
I’m normally pretty strong on cutting state expenses to get more to the IMB, but there are legitimate and important SC ministries that need to be funded. State papers may be a good illustrative point. There was a time when (almost?) all state conventions published their own newspaper. Those days are gone, and rightly so. We don’t need 20+ state newspapers – that’s the kind of duplication we often complain about. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room now for a few state papers who do a good job at actually reporting. I’m in VA where there is no state paper, but I still get email updates and visit the Biblical Recorder website (NC state paper). And I actually think its an important enough enterprise that I’m ok with a few states subsidizing the cost of keeping a state Baptist newspaper up and running. I think the SBC is healthier and better off if we have several state news organizations, independent of one another, to report on news & opinions around the convention.
William, this year we send 43.77% to the SBC Executive Committee. We voted to increase almost 1/2 % a year for the next 5 years which will put us close to 46%. Each state entity agreed to reduce their state convention budget receipts in order to do this.
Tarheel, our state paper only receives 1.3% of our state budget. Are you saying in NC your state paper gets 3 million dollars or 10% of your state budget??? Do you have a daily paper?
It’s not daily but it comes a lot.
I’ve got the book of reports in my office – I’ll share specifics tommorow.
Perhaps some truth should be injected into this conversation. North Carolina Baptists’ newspaper, the Biblical Recorder, is published every two weeks and new material is posted online throughout the week and some on weekends. The state convention allots 1.36% of its 2017 budget to the Recorder with additional funds to provide annual subscriptions to “new Baptists” — that is, those who join any Baptist Church in the state are given a one year subscription by the state convention.
Thanks for weighing in, Allan. I was thinking that it probably came weekly, as it does in Alabama. Baptist papers are important and the Biblical Recorder is one of the best papers that Southern Baptists have. Thankful for the ministry and journalism of the BR.
Allan Blume, Brent Hobbs, and others;
Just got to the office today – meetings and funerals kept me out till now. I said I would look back and get the specifics to you so here it goes.
First off, Allan Blume who is the editor of the NC Baptist State paper (Biblical Recorder) has weighed in and is correct in his statement above that the BR is around 1.5 or so of the overall state CP budget. (As he indicated the allotment is 1.36% and then there is a “special project” line item that is added to that) Perhaps this is the free copies to new members of the SBC churches that Allan mentioned in his comment???
Sorry for the confusion. I was badly wrong. The Baptist Paper in NC is not allocated anywhere near the 10% I mentioned earlier.
Let me explain how this mix-up happened…when I made the post on Monday I was not looking at the book of reports but my personal notes jotted while at the convention – this was in my handwriting and I had written down: “10%+ of budget goes to agencies (Biblical Recorder)” – I should have looked back at the actual budget before using that shorthand note as a basis to comment here on voices that the newspaper *itself*is allocated 10%+ of the budget.
Factually, The slice of the pie that includes the the BR allotment is well over 10% of the budget it is actually 15.3%. To be clear though, this “slice” includes other state agencies and Institutions as well (children’s homes, etc…).
I apologize for my sloppiness in my earlier posting – and I beg the forgiveness of Mr. Blume and others impacted by my unintentionally false statement.
Sorry, I meant average church CP giving.
I want to hear these preaching phrases go away:
1) “Bless the gift and the giver”
2) “And God’s people said” which is supposed to be followed by a group “amen”
3) “If that special didn’t light your fire, your woods wet”
4) Purposely mispronouncing a celebrity name or movie title to make it look like your only vaguely acquainted with it.
5) Go-o-od .
Lol!
Hey Scott – Basically let’s ban (as if we had the power) all cheerleader phrases used in preaching!
It’s rude IMO to basically tell (shame) people into cheering for you –
Besides, we ain’t cheerleaders!!
Sadly, I’ve seen more than one preacher actually leave the platform area – go sit down on the front row point at the podium and say “amen preacher”…. and then follow that up with something like “if you won’t do it I will do it myself”.
Ridiculous.
I’m seeing more of a certain response in worship where periodic clapping, whistling, and exclamations (wow!, etc.) are sought by the preacher who includes a string of applause lines.
Seems artificial. Frankly, I hate it.
Alan is exactly right–there is terrific competition for Cooperative Program dollars. Sixty years ago the average church gave 12% to the Cooperative Program. The most recent figure I saw was 5.6%, or less than half. Perhaps we should discuss the reasons for the decline; however, for sure there is great competition for the CP dollars. In the past the SBC and the state conventions had enough money for everything, but that is no longer the case. This dilemma forces us to make difficult, painful decisions–on every level of Baptist life. If you have fewer dollars, then determining priorities becomes more important.
Ron West is correct. The Arkansas Baptist Convention operates in an excellent way. It focuses on evangelism and church planting. Its executive director, Sonny Tucker, is great. He has a passion to win the people of Arkansas to Christ.
Yes on #2. I used to do the alliteration thing thinking it was clever and somehow proved I was the only one who could do it. Then I discovered practically everyone around me was doing it. Now it just seems forced and tired. Plus, it took forever to get that 3rd or 4th point to jive and I wasted a great deal of time.
William, my unofficial numbers from looking at the annual reports show Arkansas churches were still averaging about 9% of undesignated receipts to the CP 15 or 20 years ago. The last couple of years it is around 7%. As Mark Terry said, back when he and I were appointed to the FMB/IMB the average was above 10%.
Mark is also right about our state executive director. Sonny Tucker is a good guy and a friend. I have discussed many of these issues with him and he is a strong supporter of SBC missions as well as our state missions and evangelism.