IMB Search Committee: Take your time but get it right.

What’s up with the International Mission Board trustees and their search committee for the new leader?

Not much that I can see. Periodically, the committee tells we SBC commoners that they’re still looking but when they get the job done they will “have full confidence that we’re presenting God’s man.” The search committee chairman said that back in September.

I grant that the committee is genuinely interested in finding and doing the will of God in this matter; however, the ‘God’s Man’ talk is sorely overused and virtually meaningless. Would any search committee present a candidate for any position and say that he is not ‘God’s man’? Uh, no.

Nonetheless, this is one job, one position that we need to get right. God forbid that we have to go through a couple of ‘God’s men’ like the last two NAMB CEOs.

Plodder eschews inside information and cannot add any insight to what is going on. Actually, I am so much an outsider that I haven’t the foggiest idea what the problem is but most of us could guess. Perhaps the committee is divided. Perhaps they are courting a consensus candidate who can’t make up his mind. I don’t know.

I will say that the IMB absolutely must not end up with a leader who is lacking in a couple of key areas:

• He must have a record of stellar support of the work of the IMB, the Cooperative Program, and the Lottie Moon offering. Whatever NAMb has done, is doing here, I don’t think you can make even a weak case for an IMB leader who has not been a strong believer in the work of the IMB. But should the search committee be mezmerized, and no group is more susceptible to such than a Southern Baptist search committee, by one who has no record of support but whom they think is irresistible because of perceived gifts and abilities, we will be in for some acrimony.

• He much have solid missiological knowledge and overseas experience. I cannot imagine the leader of over 5,000 missions personnel not having some life experience overseas with another language and culture.

There are plenty of people who meet these two requirements.

Gerald Harris, editor of our pretty good state paper, The Christian Index, editorializes about the search and makes some good points. Harris points out that since Jerry Rankin announced his retirement the trustees have had a solid SIXTEEN months on this task.

This search committee has been working longer than any I can recall in national Southern Baptist life. I hope the length of time is rewarded by the right person being chosen. We absolutely cannot afford to go through turmoil on this one.

Would declining IMB baptisms be a good sign?

If Southern Baptists are obedient to the Great Commission, if our leaders are genuinely concerned about lost souls, if our priorities are such that we feel compelled to put resources in places where Christian witness is unknown or seldom heard, are we prepared to endure some years of decreasing baptisms and church plants reported by our International Mission Board?

I’m not sure we are. I’m not sure that IMB trustees are. I’m not sure that IMB administrators are. But it seems to me that we should be so prepared. Our beloved flagship entity has been criticized in the past for fuzzy (dare I say ‘inflated’) statistics on baptisms and church plants. The official word is that the half-million 2009 baptisms and 200,000 overseas churches is inclusive of those groups with whom we work. Reporting such stats is problematic, IMO, since we don’t have SBC churches overseas nor does it seem proper to merely report those whom our personnel directly baptize. I leave it to the IMB folks to decide how to report to us but wish they would be consistent about it.

By whatever method and policies that the baptism and church figures are derived and compiled it seems to me that if one looks at the unreached, unengaged people groups (check the IMB’s Global Research page), the people and places that have the highest priority for our resources and workers, I think you can conclude that these are difficult places to serve. Many are places where laws prevent Christian churches from meeting openly, where conversions are illegal, and where baptisms are, at least for now, few. I admit to being a neophyte in missiology. If I am wrong, some expert may correct me.

I heard a prediction recently that whomever our new IMB leader is, he will have two eyes, two ears, and a brain (a fairly safe assumption, though there are SBC leaders who have demonstrated a lack of the latter) and will surely lead so as to put personnel where they are most critical, ie, where the “UU” groups are.

Sounds like the proper policy to me. On a recent summer mission trip to Central America I gave a prediction to a layman that we would run into other church mission groups at the airport. Sure enough, we were just one of several arriving in the country to do mission work. It makes little sense to me to pour resources in countries with abundant Christian witness.

So, if our IMB has prioritized their work so that we put less people in such countries and more people in “UU” countries, are we prepared to offer resolute and growing support even if the statistics that we all love trend downward?

I hope so but we Southern Baptists are nothing if not numbers driven. On this matter I hope that we can look past the statistics and recognize reality.