TAMPA, Fla. — Representatives of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of the Mid-Atlantic concurred June 23 that the movement’s future in the multi-state region lies not what in the Fellowship can do for them, but what they can do together to advance their shared mission.
“One of the things we heard clearly last year is we are not going to have any concern about what we want people to do. We are going to discuss things that people can do,” said Kasey Jones, head of the regional affiliation, which includes churches in the District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. The meeting was one of a series of state and regional gatherings at the CBF national annual General Assembly June 21-25 in Tampa, Fla.
Jones, pastor of National Baptist Memorial Church in Washington, told a small group making the trek this year to Florida that churches in the affiliate’s region have already begun working with programs like the Fellowship’s Student.Go for young people interested in missions and CBF-partner Passport’s student ministry.
She said both have helped build awareness of the small number of centrist and progressive Baptist congregations scattered through the region and allowed smaller congregations to enlist short-term ministry help they might not otherwise be able to afford.
In the future, she suggested that CBF churches in the region start thinking in terms of “collaborative mission” to help congregations achieve together what they might or might not be able to do by themselves.
“This is what we are trying to move to,” said Jones, a member of the national CBF Coordinating Council. “The local churches are doing mission. We may be able to do them by ourselves, but smaller churches or maybe just a couple of individuals will want to go.”
Jones said the idea brings payoff to recipients of ministry by individuals who otherwise might not have been able to participate in hands-on missions and in what those individuals do in the future to build on the experience.
Opportunities already in planning stages for 2012 include a medical mission to Jamaica and a summer mission trip to build homes in Nicaragua being organized by CBF congregations in the area and ongoing rebuilding from Haiti’s earthquake coordinated nationally.
“As we move forward, it would be great for Mid-Atlantic CBF to say one of our distinctives is collaboration is missions, whether it is local or global,” Jones said.
She also said the Mid-Atlantic CBF can build on earlier efforts to engage college-age youth through scholarship opportunities through CBF and seminary students by hosting receptions from D.C.-area theology schools like Howard University Divinity School, the John Leland Center for Theological Studies and Wesley Theological Seminary for those interested in part-time ministry opportunities and internships.
Bruce Salmon, pastor of Village Baptist Church in Bowie, Md., said the idea could “almost become a job fair kind of thing,” where churches that cannot afford a full-time staff minister might be able to employ a student at a lower cost.
“Almost all the churches in our area are not in a position to hire full time,” Salmon said. “We need part-time people, but we need a good resource for finding them.”
Salmon said CBF churches “would feel better” about individuals coming through their own network compared to someone else who responds to a help-wanted advertisement.
Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.