The Khagrachari Hills region of Bangladesh is an area few Americans will ever visit. It is rugged and remote. The people live in deplorable poverty where basic survival is a day-to-day struggle.
Yet God is moving among the Chakmas and the Tripura people who live in this area. The Chakmas come from a Buddhist heritage. Abandoning that faith brings daily persecution, but that is a price a growing number of Chakmas determine to pay. In the last 10 years the number of Chakma Baptist churches has grown almost tenfold, from almost nonexistent to more than 100. Among the Tripuras, a similar miracle is taking place as they, too, have about 100 churches.
Bonnie Resu, general secretary of the Asian Baptist Federation, shared about the work in the Khagrachari Hills during his report at the recent meeting of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) Executive Committee in Falls Church, Va. Resu is a regional secretary for Asia for the BWA.
Resu pointed to Nepal where the number of Baptist churches now stands at 85. In 1994 there were 10. Here the Asian Baptist Federation serves as a link for what Resu called “holistic” missions. The ABF has helped to link Baptist World Aid Australia with Baptist bodies from Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, Okinawa, New Zealand and the British Baptist Missionary Society to do community health and development work for the past six years.
In some parts of Eastern Europe and the Middle East, Baptists struggle against great odds. All Baptist churches are closed in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, reported Theo Angelov, general secretary of the European Baptist Federation and a BWA regional secretary. Angelov, a former Bulgarian Baptist pastor, showed a news clip from Georgia where a mob broke into a warehouse and burned more than $100,000 worth of Bibles purchased by Baptists. Later, Central Baptist Church in Tbilisi was attacked with doors and windows broken out and several church members beaten.
Mob members carried signs declaring “Orthodoxy or Death.” The attackers were not Muslims or communists. They were Christians, members of the Georgian Orthodox Church. Angelov told BWA executive committee members that “intolerance between Christian denominations can be as aggressive as that between representatives from various religions.”
Others reported on BWA-led efforts at peacemaking among Baptists. In Cuba, divisions between the “Fraternity of Baptist Churches” and the West Cuba Baptist Convention resulted in confrontations over property and buildings. It was a bitter relationship. A peacemaking team of BWA officials mediated the disagreements during an October visit to Cuba, and the result was a restoration of fellowship between the two groups.
In South India, another peacemaking team met with leaders of rival Baptist bodies where the tensions had become so high that one group hired professional assassins to murder the leaders of the other group. The executive committee received a recommendation that if one group did not comply with the requirement of the Interim Reconciliation Committee that steps be taken to expel that convention from the BWA. Thankfully, the executive committee also heard that the stymied reconciliation movement had made progress in recent weeks.
There was much more demonstrating the value of the worldwide fellowship of Baptists through the Baptist World Alliance. Angelov and others stressed that one cannot overestimate the value and importance for Baptists living in minority settings to know they belong to a worldwide family of Baptists and that the Baptist family cares for them.
The meeting demonstrated again that no other organization of Baptists provides the benefits available through the Baptist World Alliance.
The meeting also demonstrated challenges faced by the worldwide body of Baptists. As the organization approaches its centennial anniversary in 2005, members are asking again, “What is the major purpose of the organization?” Some emphasize fellowship; others evangelism. Some point to the historic role of BWA in defending religious liberty for Baptists around the world. No organization has done more in this area. Still others seem to want Baptist bodies of the world to coordinate their work through the BWA as some sort of clearing house.
A Twenty-first Century Committee is attempting to recast the vision for BWA, and the organization desperately needs to clarify its purposes.
Support for BWA is evidenced by the participation of Baptist executives from around the world. Yet participation is not backed by financial support in all cases.
For example, the Baptist bodies in North America contributed $512,921 toward the operating budget of BWA last year. Of that amount, Southern Baptists gave $425,000. Baptist bodies around the world contributed a total of $627,897. That amounted to about 40 percent of the BWA budget.
Southern Baptists have long been the major contributor in total dollars. Baptists from several other countries are ahead of the SBC in terms of per capita giving. Unfortunately, many member bodies provide no financial support. In countries with currency restrictions, financial support is impossible, and in some places poverty is so deep that financial support of the BWA is out of the question.
But most member bodies could give and many of those do not. That must change.
Executive committee members learned that consideration is being given to establishing a minimum level of support from each member body based on the ability to pay. That would be a positive step.
At the March 3–5 meeting, members learned of a $390,000 operating loss last year not counting unrealized losses in investments. The annual budget was cut 20 percent. The financial concerns for the BWA are real, and that is before the impact of the SBC decision to reduce its funding by $125,000 beginning this October.
Personally, this writer regrets the SBC decision. Yes, the BWA needs to recast its vision for the future, but its value is indisputable. The best way for the Baptists of the world to know Southern Baptists is for them to experience us serving shoulder to shoulder with them where appropriate and walking side by side with them in fellowship and witness.
The BWA has nearly 100 years of positive history. Despite problems, it continues to do good work today. The Baptist World Alliance is worthy of our prayer support, our participation and our backing through the pocketbook.
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