Why church Cooperative Program percentages will never go up

I rather tend to stay away from categorical statements but saying that the percentage of undesignated offering plate dollars given in churches to the Cooperative Program will never go up is, well, categorical. I would qualify that to say never go up by at least one percentage point.

This important metric has increased the past two years, as shown below:

Percentage of undesignated offerings given to Cooperative Program

2011                     5.407
2012                     5.414
2013                     5.500

These are encouraging figures, especially in the context of the decades long slide of percentages. When I entered the pastoral ministry in 1982 the average percentage for a church was over ten percent.

So, if the percentages are up, even slightly, why the prediction that they will never go up to six, seven, eight percent or greater? Here are several reasons why.

1. The Cooperative Program is static, fixed and no substantial changes will make it more attractive.

States now keep about 60% of the CP dollar. There is a movement towards a "50/50" split of funds between state conventions and the Executive Committee. This movement has shown some success. Baptist Press reported that 23 states strengthened global missions last year and were "moving toward a goal of a "50/50 allocation between in-state causes and SBC causes."

The state conventions depend almost exclusively on CP dollars to fund their staff, buildings, and ministries. As a result, their main incentive is to preserve their funds, jobs, ministries, and entities. In doing this they are accustomed to carving out ten percent of the CP dollar off the top and applying a label of "shared" ministries or other label. This accounting technique (standard for decades and not nefarious, just not well known) allows them to keep the first ten percent and then move towards a 50/50 split of the remaining 90%. Not all states do this but most of the CP dollars go through this fuzzy process making 50/50 almost a meaningless figure. The upshot of it all is that the states are making incremental changes that are unlikely to alter the behavior of individual churches, in my view.

Additionally, the SBC allocation formula is pretty well set in concrete. No one expects the seminaries to ever say they need less than 21.92%. No one I know believes that the IMB should be cut from their 50.41%. NAMB has some critics but they are not calling for a reduction of its 22.79%. The Executive Committee cut their percentage to 2.99% a few years ago. The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission is generously funded at 1.65% and better watch out because their $3.1 million looks awfully generous for what we receive in return, but there's no big money there, just tiny percentages.

No one. No one, is making any grand vision statements about the CP that will motivate churches to change their behavior and give considerably more and I see no signs that selling the program we have will suddenly have greater success.

2. Large and megachurches will never give at average and above average percentages. 

Our 175 or so megachurches fuel the trends in SBC life to a certain extent. They supply our most visible leaders. Smaller churches seek to emulate their success.

Ronnie Floyd, megachurch pastor and our current president, is a vocal CP supporter and his church is a heavy CP giver, but I haven't seen anyone claim that his church is at or above the SBC average of 5.5%. That's not a problem for me (I'll take the dollars that always pay bills rather than the percentages that never pay bills) but the string of megapastors we elect are influential and they are not going to motivate many churches to give above average CP percentages. They don't practice this in their own churches.

3. Very high CP percentage giving churches have correspondingly higher pressure to reduce that percentage. 

I was pleased to see BP's article about our SBCV colleague whose church is a 30% CP giver. That's almost six times the average, very impressive and altogether commendable. Awesome, really. I commend him and them for it. I'm a long way from the flatlands of Arkansas but I would guess that when discussions occur in his church, or in any other church giving 15%, 20% and more, they center on CP reduction, not increase. Sooner or later someone in these churches will make a proposal to cut the CP percentage by five or ten points and the church will think it to be a good idea. This is a battle that only has to be won once by those who would redirect some of that CP money, whereas CP supporters have to win year-after-year-after year.

Consequently, it is likely that a very high percentage church will eventually be reeled back towards the pack because there are considerable pressures in every local church for local ministry, staff needs, programmatic initiatives, and building plans. A high CP percentage is a big, big target for all of these. It always gets shot at and sometimes hit.

4. Churches will inch the CP percentage upward in fractions but move downward in large numbers.

I am familiar with a church that cut their CP percentage from over 15% to 10% to free up funds for local ministry. A 5% cut. Show me churches that increase their CP percentage by 5% from 5 to 10% or 7 to 12%. Seldom happens. This is why Frank Page's Great Commission Challenge which asked for one percentage point increase by churches, can be widely successful with thousands of churches accepting it but the CP can still decline. A church that goes up by 0.5% or by 1% is more than offset by churches that drop by 1%, 3%, or 5%.

The CP was undoubtedly helped by Page's initiative but the math is such that it isn't showing in any considerable increase in revenues or lifting of percentages.

5. It's official, we are mostly a societal giving convention anyway.

OK, my erudite SBC colleagues. What is trending upwards in SBC life? Lottie Moon is, record offering in 2013. Annie Armstrong is, SEND North America is thriving, offerings are up. Churches doing direct missions both here and overseas are up. Churches partnering directly with IMB (and thereby bypassing both their state convention and the Executive Committee) are up. None of these are CP driven. All of them are CP unfriendly.

And it's old news now but for two years straight the Executive Committee has received more in designated dollars than in undesignated, Cooperative Program dollars. At the SBC level we are mostly societal, brethren.

6. The Cooperative Program is a dying brand. 

I asked a thirtysomething, solidly Southern Baptist pastor what he thought of the Cooperative Program. He looked at me and replied, "Oh, that's a state convention thing." Not said was, "That's a state convention thing and we aren't all that interested in funding central staff and expensive buildings. We are much more attuned to local ministry and supporting North American and international missions. The CP is a tough sell. In fact, the CP does much better the less pastors and laypeople know about it, since the less people know them more they believe that the CP is mostly IMB and NAMB. The brand is not dead but it is slowly dying.

But let's be positive here. The CP still puts hundreds of millions of dollars into ministry all over the US and the world. It is a huge funding engine. We should thank God for it and support it. But it will never recover from where it was.

I have several hats and will be glad to eat any one of them if the CP goes northward of 6%.

Top SBC Good News Stories of 2014

Bah humbug! Bad news all around...but...here's my list of the top good news stories for SBCers in 2014:

1. Lottie Moon hits record total, $154.1 million.

Southern Baptists may be giving less to the Cooperative Program and less of their disposable income to churches and mission causes, SBC entities may be mired in retrenchment mode because of flat or declining giving, but the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions is at its highest level ever (but I am not allowing anyone to recalculate this in real dollars, adjusted for inflation, so as not to rain on good news).

2. Messengers elect a president who has greatly increased his church's Cooperative Program giving.

OK, so Ronnie Floyd's church is still below the average percentage and Baptist Press didn't report what that percentage was but he did lead his church to give substantially more to the CP than in earlier years. The CP has no chance of any increases if messengers elect leaders who show no interest in supporting it and most megachurches are not heavy CP supporters. This year, the election of a megachurch pastor was a positive move relative to the Cooperative Program.

3. Our housing allowance is safe from federal constitutional challenges.

At least it is safe for now, the previous federal district court's ruling that it was unconstitutional having been overturned on appeal.

4. IMB trustees show a willingness to embrace the 21st century.

With the election of thirty-six year old David Platt as the new IMB leader, replacing his seventy-year-old predecessor, trustees demonstrate that they recognize that some new thinking is in order for our flagship institution. Younger Southern Baptists are encouraged thereby.

5. Southern Baptist leaders and entities recognize mental illness as a grave problem.

The SBC, it's leaders and entities, have been AWOL on the serious business of mental illness among us. While leadership cannot force change at the local church level, at least there has been a steady stream of sensible initiatives from our folks. Regretfully, this has come as a result of the suicides of two children of high profile SBC leaders.

6. At various levels, the SBC is showing engagement on racial issues.

The response to racial turmoil of Ferguson, Missouri and of the death of Michael Brown in New York has generated sensible commentary from our leaders and mostly civil and profitable discussion among us. This is a change and is good news.

7. NAMB's church planting initiative, Send North America, is continuing to thrive.

While some critics snipe about it, SNA is engaging large numbers of younger Southern Baptists who are interested in church planting and large numbers of SBC churches who wish to partner in planting churches in North America. One is hard-pressed to name any other national SBC initiative that shows success.

8. Great Commission Giving is up.

Southern Baptist churches gave $777 million in Great Commission Giving for 2012-2013, an increase of $23 millions from the previous reporting period. GCG is the aggregate of giving to all SBC causes. Although these figures are somewhat soft in that churches self-report as they choose, any increase is good news. Critics of GCG will have to explain why it is not good to give to SBC causes and why such should not be celebrated.

9. The key Cooperative Program percentage increased.

That would be the percentage of undesignated church offering plate dollars given to the CP. We moved up ever so slightly from 5.414% to 5.5%. This makes two years straight there was a tiny, tiny increase. Frank Page concludes that the CP has reached its "nadir". An increase of 0.086% isn't much...but it's something.

10. Average SBC clergy salaries are up.

The 2014 LifeWay Compensation Study revealed that total "package" compensation for senior pastors was up 1.8% from 2012. Not much but up is up and not down...has to be good news. Senior pastors are advised to thank God for this and not to complain that the average pay for non-senior pastor staff positions were up by a good bit more than for senior pastors.

Top SBC news of 2014, Part One

Here is my list of top news stories of interest to Southern Baptists for this year, with insightful and witty commentary. I am presuming that all SBCers will be focused on football the next few days and will not be making any significant news between now and the end of 2014.

My ranking is completely subjective.

1. David Platt elected president of the International Mission Board

At the tender age of 36 David Platt was picked to succeed 70 year old Tom Elliff as head of our flagship entity, the IMB. The Board has the largest budget, the most employees, and arguably does the most important work. Platt was quickly criticized for his weak Cooperative Program giving and, by those who keep score for such things, his supposed Calvinistic beliefs. His young age, his lack of international mission experience (he is an outsider in that he has never served overseas as did his predecessors) raised Southern Baptist eyebrows. The change at the IMB was generational and has the potential to bring the IMB into the 21st Century in many ways.

It is the nature of these high profile hires that trustees who do the hiring appear to come down off the mountain after meeting with God and being handed a name on a stone tablet; that is, trustees are secretive, non-transparent, and feel not the least compunction to explain their process or thinking and always, always exclaim that they have "God's man".  I think so. I hope so. He has my support.

Platt has been a visionary pastor with a record of accomplishment and is held in high regard among younger Southern Baptists. The IMB is a venerable institution in need of fresh organizational thinking and acting. I like David Platt. If he fails or if his leadership is stifled by the unwieldy trustee board of older Southern Baptists, nearly one hundred of them, there could be consequences for years. Thus far, the IMB has managed well in a time of retrenching. Lottie Moon is at a record level. Platt has my prayers for the challenges ahead.

2. The Housing Allowance is upheld by a federal appeals court.

A federal district judge struck down the cash Housing Allowance (but not the HA that pertains to parsonages) in 2013. The federal appeals court overturned the decision on a technical matter. I rank this second in importance because SBC clergy pay attention to their paychecks and the Housing Allowance income exclusion permits us to avoid paying thousands in income taxes. Don't get too excited because this will be challenged again...and again...and again.

3. Ronnie Floyd elected SBC president.

Ah, another megachurch pastor, the latest in a long string of such, elected president of the Southern Baptist Convention. There is nothing new about this except that in Floyd's case he was easily defeated back in 2006 primarily on the basis of his extremely low (less than 1%) Cooperative Program giving. In the intervening years he led his church to raise the percentage considerably, though his church is still below the SBC average.

Thus far, Floyd is exhibiting the typical megachurch pastor style as SBC president in that he is serving as an inspirational leader. While this is what megapastors do best in their megachurches, such have never shown any effectiveness in the Convention at large. We appreciate calls for prayer and revival from our leaders and these are to be expected but the tens of thousands of SBC churches and millions of members have never responded in any measurable way to this.

4. The Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions reached a record level.

The offering for 2013 (reported in June, 2014)  was over $154 million, almost $4 million above the previous record total. Giving to the LMCO is the brightest financial news for Southern Baptists in a time when most of the financial indexes for us are flat or declining. Even then, the increase is just over 3%, welcome but not really enough to do much more in overseas missions other than tread water.

5. The SBC Executive Committee proposes a constitutional change.

Only those who eat and breathe SBC stuff will not glaze over here, but the changes proposed to the SBC Constitution by our Executive Committee were quite significant. The change in messenger qualifications is just an update and no big deal. The linking of the Baptist Faith and Message to what is considered to be a church in "friendly cooperation" with the Convention is a potential trap. My read on it may be seen here. If the change is confirmed this June it will best be left to die of disuse.

6. Golden Gate Seminary closes big real estate deal.

Money talks in SBC life and GGBTS has something to talk about. They closed the sale of their prime property in Mill Valley, CA for a tidy $85 million, plus some incentives. The sale provided an instant endowment increase of $50 (more than doubling the present $21 million endowment total), a smooth relocation, and assures the seminary's continuance in a time when the old seminary model is failing and other institutions are dealing with significant challenges. We will see if having a substantial endowment on which to draw operating funds makes GGBTS less nimble and more stultified. Let's hope not.

Dennis Kim would be a good choice for SBC President

I think that Korean pastor Dennis Manpoong Kim would be a good choice for SBC president this year. He would have my vote were I present. Kim's Silver Spring, Maryland church, Global Mission Church, has a predominantly Korean membership, according to a Baptist Press report.

It may surprise many that the Southern Baptist Convention is made up of a considerable number of non-Anglo congregations. A few years ago our North American Mission Board stated that fully 20% are non-Anglo, or as conversely put, ethnic congregations, and that the percentage of such congregations has grown considerably in recent years.

Source: SBC Ethnic Congregations up 66% since 1998

There are three announced SBC presidential candidates. Jared Moore is a young, small church pastor and seminary student known mainly for his blogging. He is the current SBC 2nd Vice President, having been voted to such office with 451 votes in a quorum-lacking session last year. Great guy. Good pastor. Lacks seasoning, a broad knowledge of the SBC and its history and work. Has some positions that he has not thought very deeply about.

Ronnie Floyd is one of the SBC's most prominent megachurch pastors. He lost to Frank Page in 2006 primarily, in my view, because of his almost non-existent Cooperative Program support. His church has since moved to an acceptable, though below average percentage. He is to be nominated by Al Mohler perhaps because (a) Mohler is the SBC's most prominent leader, and (b) Mohler is the SBC's most prominent Calvinist and Floyd is no Calvinist, thereby making a meld of the SBC's two primary theological tribes.   Although he is a stellar, high-powered, and successful pastor, I'm ready to move away from the megachurch/megapastor model for SBC leadership. Floyd would have to be the heavy favorite. If elected, he will do a good job and will have my support.

In some ways one might identify the future growth of the SBC with the growth of non-Anglo congregations such as that of Dennis Kim. I think it would be a very forward looking move for the SBC to elect the pastor of one such congregation as president. Frankly, I cannot think of a better, more visible and positive manner by which we could signal our view of the future of the SBC.

Ronnie Floyd and the SBC Presidency

Baptist Press reports Ronnie Floyd to be SBC president nominee.

No less than Al Mohler has an endorsement in the article and will nominate him at the annual meeting in Baltimore in June.

Here are some things that can be said about this:

He is a leading pastor, megachurch pastor, highly successful pastor as we see such things. To be candid, I've got a heavy case of megachurch/megapastor fatigue syndrome. I'd really like to see the SBC get off of the celebrity pastor bandwagon. It probably will not happen.

He was nominated in 2006 and lost. At the time the only issue seemed to be his church's extremely low Cooperative Program percentage. He came to be known as "Mr. Zero Point Two Eight" which was the percentage. As I recall he said that they had a problem with the state convention. Frank Page was elected that year with a robust, double digit CP percentage.

Since 2006 Floyd's church has given heavily to the CP. The article above says that last year the church gave over $700,000. Presumably, this was routed through the state convention in the normal manner. Baptist Press is either holding something back from us or is being negligent in not reporting what percentage his church gave to the CP. Maybe later. Those who decry the low giving of megachurches to the CP should take a look at the positive change in CP giving by Floyd and his church.

His church is very heavy into church planting and planting in the SEND North America areas and NAMB's SEND North America is about the only positive thing going in the SBC these days, aside from the arduous labor overseas for the Gospel.

As best I know Ronnie Floyd is not a Calvinist, in fact, some of his stuff has been anathema to many Calvinists (Google "Ronnie Floyd" + "fire truck"). If he and his church is OK with Al Mohler, that ought to settle any problem about that.

It wasn't explicitly stated (the word "Calvinism" doesn't appear in the article or Mohler's endorsement) but this looks like a signal that we're not going to fight over the SBC president's stance on Calvinism/Traditionalism issues. This is good and comes at an opportune time.

I'm not sure that the SBC presidency means much in the big picture of things. He can mess things up with his statements but there's not a whole lot he can accomplish that I can see.

Before I decided for whom to cast my vote - if I go and if I am a messenger - I would like to see if any others will be nominated along with the CP percentage for his church.

Do SBC megachurches/pastors drive Cooperative Program trends?

Does the level of Cooperative Program giving (or lack thereof) among the few dozen of SBC megachurches (and I’d limit that to high profile megachurches…we know ‘em when we see ‘em) drive CP trends among our 42,000 or so congregations?

Can’t say that I know but some seem to think it does.

Consider the attitudes of some to (a) the SBC electing Bryant Wright who has pointedly reduced his church’s CP giving from 10% to somewhere around 4%, and (b) the plaudits being given to Ronnie Floyd for increasing his church’s CP giving from 0.29% a few years ago (sufficient to cost him the SBC presidency in 2006, IMO) to somewhere around 5% projected for 2011.

Look for the former to be criticized by many and while the latter is praised, sort of a denominational Doppler effect. It sounds different when it’s rising than when it’s falling?

When the dust clears, both of these high-profile SBC megachurch pastors will be giving roughly equivalent amounts to the Cooperative Program; however, the one on the ascent is, among some SBCers, to be praised, while the one on the descent is to be criticized. Both have stellar records of mission support, church planting, and the like.

Note the piece by Norman Jameson, here, where he ends with this paragraph.

Please forward this news [Floyd’s push to increase CP support] to new SBC president Bryant Wright, who said in a press conference following his election that it is poor stewardship to give through the Cooperative Program if reaching the nations is your goal.

Question for Norman: Bryant Wright church’s CP giving reflects the stewardship that he and his church leadership believe is good for reaching the nations. His percentages are (or will be, soon as Floyd catches up with Wright) about the same as Floyd’s. How is it that he gets a slap while Floyd gets a big kiss? Both end up at the same place.

Prediction from Plodder: Floyd’s church will not go beyond 5% in CP support. I commend him for the increase and would happily support him for SBC president should he try it again down the road. His 0.28% was too low. Four or five percent is sufficient for me.

On the original question about high profile megas driving convention-wide CP giving. I just don’t think that it will and if it does the messages from the megas have been mostly negative. All three megachurch pastors in the recent election had cut their CP giving and the one who cut the most got elected.

I'm thinking that CP giving depends more on what funding decisions are made in the next few years, now that the GCRTF made some modest recommendations that the convention adopted, than on what the megas do.