March 1, 2000

Executive Board approves focus on
church health, plans for restructuring
___By Mark Wingfield
___Managing Editor
___DALLAS--Improving church health will become a major focus of the Baptist General Convention of Texas in the years ahead, based on a directive given by the BGCT Executive Board Feb. 22.
___The 200-member Executive Board adopted the report of a Church Health Task Force that spent the last year studying needs of Baptist churches across the state. The report of that task force was detailed in the Baptist Standard's Feb. 16 edition.
___Three recommendations adopted by the Executive Board call for:
___ Making church health a priority concern for Baptist Building staff "by assisting congregations in achieving and maintaining spiritual vitality and wholeness."
___ Using the description of church health produced by the task force as a framework for responding to church needs. That description says, "A healthy church could be characterized by a progressive intimacy with God, genuine relationships among its members and compassionate mission/ministry to its community and world."
___ Executive Director Charles Wade to appoint a five- to seven-member team to design a comprehensive strategy for Executive Board staff to advance church health. This report is to be given to the Executive Board in September.
___In a related matter, Executive Board members authorized Wade to name another seven-member committee to assist him in recommending a restructuring of Executive Board staff. This committee is to be comprised of two members of the BGCT Administrative Committee, two members of the Executive Board and three members at large.
___In recommending appointment of this restructuring committee, the Administrative Committee noted the basic structure of the Baptist Building staff has not changed since 1959. When Bill Pinson announced his retirement as executive director last year, he suggested the time was right for restructuring and that his successor should be the one to lead the way.
___"There is general agreement among the staff that restructuring will result in improved services to the churches, associations and institutions affiliated with the convention," the Administrative Committee recommendation also noted.
___In his first report to the Executive Board as executive director, Wade applauded the increasing ethnic diversity of the board. The board is increasingly "reflecting the complexion of Texas," he said.
___Wade compared the role of the Executive Board to the role played by deacons in "a good Baptist church." He said he will seek two things from board members--wise counsel and telling the story of the BGCT across the state.
___"We can sit here and vote whatever we want to vote, but if we can't go back to our constituency and explain it," then the actions are futile, Wade said
___He admonished board members to "tell the story of the convention" and noted that "there are people out there telling other stories."
___That was one of several references throughout the meeting to accusations made by critics of the BGCT, including some by individuals affiliated with the new Southern Baptists of Texas Convention.
___Phil Strickland, director of the BGCT's Christian Life Commission, referenced these attacks in his report. He has been criticized for his relationship to the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, a Washington-based religious liberty organization the BGCT also supports.
___More than defending himself, Strickland said, he wants to defend the BJC against false characterization. His comments received hearty applause from board members.
___"The Baptist Joint Committee is the most vital Baptist voice in the world on behalf of religious liberty and church-state separation," Strickland said. "We live in a time when that is being challenged."
___Challenges are coming from the secular side to the free exercise clause of the First Amendment and from the religious side to the establishment clause of the First Amendment, he said.
___"It is a virus in the lives of our churches when we begin to feel like we can do the gospel of Jesus Christ with tax dollars," he said in reference to those who advocate a lower level of separation between church and state.
___BGCT President Clyde Glazener, pastor of Gambrell Street Baptist Church in Fort Worth, also briefly referenced criticisms of the BGCT in his report to the board.
___Glazener affirmed Wade's comparison of Executive Board members to deacons in a local church, noting that one of the primary reasons deacons were first appointed in the first century church was "putting down murmurings."
___"That's a big part of your task too," he said.
___"We cannot go on not challenging the untruths that are told about our leaders," he said. But he added that must not be the main thing the BGCT focuses on.
___The work of statewide and worldwide missions and evangelism must remain the priority, Glazener said.
___And that's why the BGCT remains the best means of cooperation among Texas churches for world evangelism, he said. "There's not anything you can do in any other convention that you can't do in the Baptist General Convention of Texas except control people."
___Board members also heard an appeal for personal reconciliation from Pete Freeman, pastor of First Baptist Church of The Woodlands. Freeman is a member of the Reconciliation Forum, an informal network of Texas Baptist pastors that has been meeting for several years.
___He encouraged board members to sign a "reconciliation covenant" drafted by the Reconciliation Forum. The covenant pledges an individual's support for the concept of reconciliation and work to bring about reconciliation on a person-to-person level.
___"This is our last action as a forum," he reported.
___In other business, the Executive Board:
___ Elected Jan Daehnert coordinator of minister/church relations for the BGCT. Daehnert, who had been associate coordinator in that office, succeeds Dick Maples, who recently became associate executive director.
___ Approved distribution of nearly $500,000 in unspent budget income and undesignated interest income as well as another $1.16 million in excess challenge funds. The money will support a wide variety of projects such as emergency grants for terminated ministers, church starting, evangelism and ethnic ministry.
___ Approved a new international partnership between the BGCT and Baptists in Spain. The three-year partnership will begin in January. A partnership with Australia will end in December.
___ Affirmed a shift in legal ownership of Baptist Healthcare System in Beaumont and Orange. The new structure modifies an earlier agreement with Memorial Hermann Health System to involve Southwest Community Health System. The new agreement was said to be necessary to preclude serious financial problems.
___ Declined to act on a motion made at last November's BGCT annual session in El Paso that called for setting up satellite meeting places for future annual sessions.
___The Executive Board's next meeting is scheduled for May 23, when an installation service is planned for Wade.

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