PRINCIPLES FOR EFFECTIVE COOPERATION

*Editor’s note: This article was prepared by Cecil Ray, chairman of the Cooperative Missions Giving Study Committee and distributed to the committee. It provides a good historical background on cooperation among Baptists. Billy Ray Parmer, co-chair of TBC, served on the committee and gave it to us to share with Texas Baptists.

—by Cecil Ray

In light of the Convention-approved task assigned to the Cooperative Missions Giving Study Committee, I encourage your prayerful attention to what I am calling “Guiding Principles of Effective Cooperation.”

Identifying some of the basic principles of effective cooperation can serve this committee in determining those lasting values that need to be incorporated into the report and recommendations made to the Baptist General Convention of Texas in its 1994 annual meeting.

Keeping the spirit of cooperation alive depends on the alertness of Texas Baptists to the purpose of the Baptist General Convention of Texas and to the necessity of cooperation. It also depends on the people’s ability to recognize that they can cooperate even without total agreement. However, success in cooperative missions has always required and now requires at least three qualities:

— A shared purpose

— A shared method of operation

— A mutual respect for each other.

I would like to encourage the committee to consider the following principles of cooperation in preparation for fulfilling the Convention- assigned task of finding how to enhance cooperative mission giving among all Texas Baptists.

I. THE “CROUCH” PRINCIPLE

The “Crouch” Principle might be stated as, “Doing What It Takes To Make Things Work!”

Austin Crouch was the first Executive Secretary of the SBC Executive Committee following its establishment in 1914, and he was a key leader in the early shaping and initiating of the Cooperative Program. He wrote its first definition, which is recorded in the Southern Baptist Convention Encyclopedia, Volume I, page 323.

It is proper to note that he wrote this in the 1950s in preparation for the publication of this encyclopedia, which suggests that Crouch’s definition prevailed at that time as the generally accepted definition of the Cooperative Program. He wrote: “The Cooperative Program includes all distributable funds, all designated funds, and all special offerings, such as the Woman’s Missionary Union Lottie Moon offering for foreign missions, the Annie Armstrong offering for home missions, offerings for state missions, etc. In reality, all funds received for any cause included in the Cooperative Program, whether they be distributable, designated, or special funds, belong to the Cooperative Program. Designated funds and special offerings for a cause cannot be directed. They must go according to the wish of the donor.

I asked Albert McClellan (who remembers Austin Crouch and has studied his writings extensively) why Dr. Crouch had given this definition to the Cooperative Program. He explained that at the beginning Crouch feared that the Cooperative Program would experience “stillbirth” and that Crouch was committed to doing whatever it took to make it work.

Obviously this was also the understanding of the Cooperative Program in the minds of the committee leaders who recommended it in 1925 and began reporting on it in 1926 and following. In a study-research paper dated Feb. 5, 1980, McClellan noted that for the “people who signed the 1926 report, the Cooperative Program, as they understood it, included both the approved designated and undesignated offerings.” He stated that this report “seems to bear out that the special offerings were indeed part of the Cooperative Program, at least in the thinking of the men who wrote it.”

Dr. J. Howard Williams, who served Texas as Executive Secretary during the years 1931- 1936 and 1946-1953, strongly believed that this was the intended purpose and definition of the Cooperative Program. It was this understanding that influenced the Texas practice of listing both designated and undesignated gifts as “Cooperative Program”. This practice prevailed until it was changed in the mid-1960s. It was then changed by the reporting system and not by a Convention decision. (Note: I served Texas at this time in Cooperative Program promotion and was the one who requested that this change be made. It was made with the approval of Dr. T.A. Patterson, R.A. Springer, and O.D. Martin, Sr.)

With a few years’ use of this changed reporting system, Texas Baptists came generally to understand the Cooperative Program as referring only to undesignated gifts.

The first and only definition of the Cooperative Program adopted by the national body, the SBC, came in 1978 We can now recognize that this definition came at the end of an era of about 20 years during which it had been accepted by general consensus. Unfortunately, it now appears to have come just as the Cooperative Program was entering a new era of change and redefinition.

That official SBC definition reads: “The Cooperative Program is a financial channel of cooperation between the State Conventions and the Southern Baptist Convention which makes it possible for all persons making undesignated gifts through their church to support the missionary, education, and benevolent work in their State Convention, and also the work of the Southern Baptist Convention.”

Actually there has never been a Cooperative Program, but a multiple number of Cooperative Programs. For example, Texas working with the S.B.C. has a different Cooperative Program than does Florida and the S.B.C. or any other of the 35 State Conventions.

Practical flexibility should be one guiding principle for our committee’s effort to enhance cooperative missions giving.

II. THE HISTORY PRINCIPLE

Any group of people who ignore their history are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Therefore it follows that Baptist bodies that make decisions for their future without full knowledge of their history threaten to hurt the Baptist family by repeating old mistakes.

For Baptists, the most important example of this principle is found in the history of the Southern Baptist Convention. In 1845 the Convention chose to be composed only of Baptists who gave financially to the support of the Convention’s missions, educational, and benevolence ministries. Being a Baptist who gave financial support was the requirement for participation in the Convention. And the number of representatives from a body who were qualified to vote was determined by the amount given.

Before the end of two decades the young convention became embroiled in its longest running controversy which centered in the debate, “Should the Convention be “ecclesiastical” in nature or “missions-supporting” in nature?” For over 80 years the Convention repeatedly voted to stay with its decision “that those who gave the money would decide on how it was to be used. However, by 1931 the passing of the years caused many to forget the “why” of that decision. And suddenly, after 80-plus years, the Convention reversed itself and changed its nature from being a body of representatives of missions supporters to representatives of local churches.

Then in 1946 the SBC made it possible for churches to be represented without any required dollar commitment to the support of Convention causes. By 1946, Baptists had forgotten their history and were not even aware of what they had lost in the changes made. From then, for the first time, churches could have messenger-representation (and votes) based on membership without any support commitment to the missions-ministry causes of the Convention.

Making decisions intended to enhance the Convention’s ability to fulfill its historic purpose through cooperative missions giving requires both the wisdom and the willingness to learn from the lessons of the past. If today’s decisions are guided by a full understanding of the history that gave today’s Baptists the benefits of cooperative giving systems, these decisions can indeed enhance Baptist mission life for this era.

III. THE TRUST LEVEL PRINCIPLE

An old Oriental saying suggests that when the trust level is high the corresponding level of cooperation will be high, and when the trust level is low the corresponding level of cooperation will be low.

This principle simply but wisely suggests that the Baptist shapers of cooperation systems need to be aware of this reality in making adjustments essential to enhancing cooperation. When Baptists’ trust is high, the systems of cooperation can be honed to their most efficient form. But when Baptists’ trust level is low, the systems that enlist support for their ministries must be given “breathing room” for the differences that exist. Otherwise, cooperative missions support will suffer.

IV. THE FAIRNESS PRINCIPLE

The level of support response from the people who make up an organization will not long exceed the fairness of the methods chosen to enlist that support and implement the organization’s activities. A voluntary organization like the Baptist General Convention of Texas depends totally on the voluntary giving of self and money by its constituents. Leaders trusted with the shaping of programs/projects and with the handling of funds given will receive long-range support from members only to the extent that these members sense “fairness” in the recognition, acceptance, and opportunities for participation granted to them.

V. THE VISION PRINCIPLE

Where there is no vision, the people perish.” These are the words of wisdom from Proverbs 29:8. The vision level of the people translates into a corresponding level of support and commitment. A shared vision is an essential for any group effectiveness. Shared visions unite, while conflicting goals divide people and their support. The effectiveness of leaders’ calls for response will depend on the compatibility of the causes they champion with the purpose for which the group was established and its members enlisted.

VI. THE PRINCIPLES OF AUTHORITY AND COOPERATION

The way Baptists understand the flow of authority in Baptist life affects their understanding of the meaning and methods of cooperation. Cooperation can be nurtured. It can be destroyed. It can be manipulated for a little while. But it cannot be dictated, for it is always voluntary or it is not real cooperation. Once it ceases to be voluntary, it becomes something other than cooperation. Divide the Baptist family and division of the channels through which cooperation flows will follow.

Understanding the denomination and the relationship of its various voluntary components in terms of “purpose” and “mission” produces one concept of cooperation; seeing it in terms of “authority” produces a very different concept and response.

The following four illustrations reflect some of the ways Baptists have attempted to illustrate the relationship of authority and the flow of cooperation.

The pyramid concept has been used to illustrate the relationship of Baptist bodies. While never so stated, the implication is that authority flows from the top to the bottom. Usually this has been explained to interpret a flow from the churches to the world. At best it has been a flawed picturing of how Baptists generally understand the denomination’s relationships.	Dr. James Sullivan noted that the pyramid illustration of Baptist polity and authority is wrong. He insisted it must be inverted, with the churches at the top. The value here is the focus on the churches and the members. While more acceptable, it is still flawed in concept because it suggests authority flows through the associations and the state conventions to the national body.
A new variation of the pyramid concept of polity-authority seems to be emerging and can be illustrated by another variation of the pyramid illustration. It tends to make all Southern Baptist denominational parts into a “Denomination” with a sort of wraparound authority for the Southern Baptist Convention over the other parts. This concept tends to portray the national body as the parent body of the whole Southern Baptist family. The little “d” of denomination becomes a capital D dominated by the authority of the national body.	The Rocket Concept provides a new way of picturing the changing Baptist ways of relating and cooperating. The rocket, while not a perfect illustration, seems to more accurately picture Baptists’ intended relationships and the actual flow of cooperation from the churches. From the beginning, the relationships between Baptist bodies have been those of cooperative function rather than authority level. This illustration provides a clearer picture of how Baptists can and do cooperate in freedom. It is now a reality that within the family or denomination there are churches, associations, state conventions, the Southern Baptist Convention, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, and multiple mission causes to which Baptist churches and individuals designate mission money. The Cooperative Program has been a changing vehicle, always being reshaped to serve Baptists. While this is true and important, the greater issue of importance is and always has been keeping Baptist cooperation alive and well.

September 1994