A billion dollars! That is fantastic! On Sept. 8, Alabama Baptists surpassed the $1 billion mark in Cooperative Program (CP) giving.
But how much is a billion? If you count one number a second without stopping until you reach a billion, then that task will take you 31 years, 259 days, 1 hour, 46 minutes and 40 seconds.
If you go back in time a billion minutes, then you would be about to the time of Jesus.
If you measure a billion inches, then you would reach a little more than halfway around the world.
If you stack tightly packed $1,000 bills on top of one another, then you would have a column reaching 63 miles into the sky by the time you reach $1 billion.
Obviously a billion dollars is a lot, but that is how much money Alabama Baptists have given to missions through the CP since the giving channel was established 83 years ago. That averages out to an annual contribution of $12,048,193 every year since 1925.
Alabama Baptists give more to missions through the CP now than in 1925 in terms of total dollars. For example, in 2007, almost $45 million was channeled through the CP.
That is a lot more dollars than Alabama Baptists contributed that first year, but the percentage of a church’s undesignated receipts given to missions through the CP is no higher now than then.
Alabama Baptists have always been a missions-minded people. More than 1,200 sons and daughters of the state have given their lives to missions through service with the International Mission Board (IMB). We have taken our responsibility seriously whether the opportunities were in Alabama, across the nation or around the world.
That concern continues today. Though the average income for Alabama is below that of most neighboring states — for example, Alabama’s average income is about 15 percent below Georgia’s — Alabama Baptists’ CP giving is near the top among state conventions.
Because state conventions budget differently, a direct comparison is difficult, but Alabama provides as large a percentage of undesignated receipts for causes beyond its borders as any traditional state convention.
Alabama Baptist churches also give a higher percentage of undesignated receipts to missions through the CP than most Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) churches.
The Alabama average is 8.15 percent. Across the SBC, the average is 6.66 percent.
When the CP was initiated, it provided a channel through which Baptists could support all their cooperative causes whether in the state, in the nation or around the world. In Alabama, it still does and that is one of the appeals of the CP.
CP giving helps support evangelistic programs in some of the state’s prisons. Funds help provide instruction about how to have a better Vacation Bible School, training for disaster relief volunteers, Bible study for students on state university campuses, a state-sponsored retreat center, guidance for missions education leaders, instruction for pastors and much, much more.
CP gifts help fund church starts across the nation, provide ministry centers in some of the nation’s largest cities, undergird church leaders in areas where Baptists are not as numerous, train chaplains for service in the military and hospital settings and provide for an array of other necessary tasks.
CP funds help take the gospel across the world as Baptist representatives join hands with national Christians to share the good news of Jesus Christ.
It is no wonder Alabama Baptists have resisted the pressure to equate missions giving with CP giving. It is good that churches send more and more missions teams around the world. But spending money on one’s own missions teams is not the same as supporting all that Baptists do together.
The CP is missions. It is also education. It is benevolence. It is church growth. The CP is the financial lifeline of all Baptists do together.
The CP is a partnership between individual Baptists, their local church, their state convention and the national body.
Members contribute tithes and offerings to their church with the expectation that the church will share a percentage of the funds for causes beyond the local setting through the CP. Each local church decides how much it will share.
While the money is forwarded to state convention offices, the expectation is that each state convention will forward an agreed-upon portion of the funds to support causes across the nation and the world. Each state convention decides what percentage will be used to support work in that state and the percentage used for work beyond its borders.
The national convention receives funds from state conventions. These are distributed to the IMB, the North American Mission Board, the six convention-related seminaries and other agreed-upon causes. The national body in annual session decides how the funds will be divided among the various ministries.
The whole process is based on trust and cooperation. Each step is characterized by agreement on percentages to be shared and on causes to be supported.
The methodology is Cooperation. The work is the Program. Each word represents an important element of this giving channel.
A handful of churches, including a few in Alabama, forward their gifts directly to the national body. These funds cannot be counted as CP funds because the CP includes state causes as well as national causes. Some other churches give only for state causes. Likewise these funds are not considered CP gifts because the giving channel includes national causes as well as state causes.
In Alabama, CP means exactly what it did at the beginning. It is a partnership between member, church, state convention and national convention.
That Alabama Baptists celebrate this wonderful accomplishment of $1 billion given to missions through the CP is appropriate at this time because October is CP Month. It is a time to remind ourselves that the CP makes it possible for us to join hands to do together what none could do alone.
Many churches begin preparing their annual budget during October. Make sure your church gives through the CP so it will be a part of reaching the next billion-dollar milestone.
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