Big Tuesday night as I'm going through the comprehensive rewrite of the Business and financial plan.

Overall a very streamlined version.

The current plan has 21 sections, compared to the 9 major sections in the 2025 proposal making it more structured and easier to follow.

https://twitter.com/lukeholmes/status/1892004825342046328

The new version starts off strong with an emphasis on the CP, calling for all entities to call for churches to "prioritize giving through the CP." (1,C)

The old version calls for disbursements to be made weekly (IV), while the new version calls for twice a month. (1,C).

My dad was a principal at a Christian school of about 800 students. He recently retired after 45 years there.

About 15 years ago he stopped in my office one day and told me he had a confession: he worked too much when I was a kid. 🧵 I told him that I already knew that, but wondered why he was bringing it up. It had been on his mind he said, probably in no small part because my youngest sibling was finally leaving the house.

He said from the time I was in second grade he was working 80 to 90 hours a week.

James Sullivan was the longtime leader of the Sunday School Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, from 1953-1975. He was considered an expert on Baptist polity and wrote on it extensively. His book “Baptist Polity As I See It." He asks what is the ideal position for the SBC in regards to conservatives and liberals. He seemed to accept that there would always be some Baptists who were more liberal than others, and that historically the SBC has been made up of centrists.

Baptist Faith and Message 2K, Article XVII

God alone is Lord of the conscience, and He has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are contrary to His Word or not contained in it. Church and state should be separate. 1/5 The state owes to every church protection and full freedom in the pursuit of its spiritual ends. In providing for such freedom no ecclesiastical group or denomination should be favored by the state more than others.

2/5

Since the @SBCExecComm is now taking nominations for a new Executive Director Treasurer, here is a bit of info about the position and the role they play in the EC.

sbc.net/ecsearch/ The SBC Constitution says that “the treasurer of the EC shall be the treasurer of the Convention” & "Each entity shall elect a president, a recording secretary, a treasurer, and such other officers as may be required." That's basically all it says about that office.

A brief history of the @ERLC

When the SBC was formed in 1845, it started with 2 entities, the Board of Domestic Missions and the Foreign Mission Board, later to become NAMB and the IMB.  Over time the entity list has grown to include 6 seminaries, Guidestone, Lifeway, and @ERLC Most of these institutions have easily understood purposes, such as the seminaries to train pastors.  Recent events in the SBC show that many misunderstand the reasons behind the formation of the @ERLC and what role it plays in the SBC today.

It’s impossible to study about Baptists without talking about division. As long as there have been baptists there have been splinter groups of Baptists, but some take on different forms than others. Baptists have split over almost every issue you can think of. Atonement, slavery, race, baptism, Landmarkism, missions, and more. There is almost nothing that Baptists won't fight over.

As some one who has stuttered since kindergarten due to falling, I hate seeing people mock Joe Biden in the #SOTU It’s never easy even for a career politician to give a speech like this, but having a speech impediment makes it even harder. It’s hard to describe what it’s like having a stutter. You desperately want to say something, and even know the word you want to say, but it just physically won’t come out of your mouth. It’s nothing like searching for the right word when you can’t think of it.

OTD in the morning, Dec 19 1950, Bill Wallace was arrested by the communists on trumped up charges of being a spy for the US. A doctor in the Wuchow mission hospital, Wallace was loved by almost all. When he was carried off, the other missionaries could do little but watch. The first night in prison was difficult, but Wallace kept his head high. It's said that Wallace told his jailer of Jesus Christ and preached from the cell window to peasants who would gather. Other missionaries were unable to get word to @IMB_SBC or other authorities.

On Dec 8 1941 after Pearl Harbor SBC missionaries in Hwanghsien, China were placed under house arrest at their mission compound by Japanese soldiers. Wiley &Jessie Glass, Dr. Bryan, Florence Lide, Martha Franks, and C.L. Culpepper were confined to the attic through the new year. The seminary that they oversaw sent carolers to them on Christmas Eve and tied notes on the tails of sparrows to get notes to the captives to encourage them. Glass noted they had a hard time catching the birds and getting them out of the house, but were glad to have the messages.

“The EC only has authority to disburse the funds as the convention allocated them. The @SBCExecComm must recognize the sovereignty of the SBC.”

What prompted this statement from former SBC Attorney James Guenther? A short thread In 1988 a long simmering feud over the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs came to head during a meeting of the @SBCExecComm
The BJCPA was a coalition of Baptist bodies that spoke to First amendment issues and religious liberty.

In 1986 James Guenther, attorney for the SBC EC, spoke at a conference of administrators and trustees of institutions affiliated with Missouri Baptists. He spoke on the relationship between trustees, Executive Directors, and entities. @BaptistPress reported on his address “The laid-back good old boy trustee was never helpful and today he is absolutely unacceptable," "Executive directors and presidents...are hired hands. Trustees hold the real power. In the eyes of the law and in the minds of Baptists, trustees are in control of the institutions."

From the former SBC EC Pres Morris Chapman @morriscode21 Report of the EC to the Conv. in 2006

"If we genuinely want the power of God upon this Convention, we must determine to walk away from political posturing and polarization of our people and our churches. 1/10 We have a bigger task; the cause around which we have coalesced historically, the cause of world missions 2/10

A short history about attempting to remove trustees of the SBC.

At the 1985 Meeting in Dallas, James Slaton made a motion to amend the Comm on Comms report by substituting the present state conv presidents and and state WMU presidents in order that as “more inclusive and representative group to serve Southern Baptists as the Committee on Boards.”

Porter Routh was the Executive Secretary of the SBC Executive Committee from 1951-1979. His longtime friend and colleague at the EC Albert McClellan listed 9 personal principles for administration that Routh used to guide himself as he led the EC for almost 30 years. "I will encourage business practices that will build the confidence of the people who give the funds in the way the Convention uses the funds."