Trustees of the International Mission Board (IMB) unanimously elected executive assistant to the IMB president Ken Winter as vice president for mobilization during their meeting July 16–19 at the Missionary Learning Center in Rockville, Va.
In his new role, Winter will provide vision and leadership to the IMB in communicating with and mobilizing Southern Baptists and partners to be strategically involved in overseas missions. Wendy Norvelle, mobilization’s associate vice president, served as interim vice president during the 18-month period since Larry Cox resigned in January 2005 to become director of WinShape International in Rome, Ga.
A 38-year resident of West Palm Beach, Fla., Winter had an extensive business background, serving as a chief financial and management officer, before God called him into the ministry.
After serving at First Baptist Church, West Palm Beach, Fla., he joined the IMB in 2004 to work with churches to help them find their role in overseas missions. In November 2005, he was tapped to work with IMB President Jerry Rankin as his executive assistant.
In other business:
• The Southern Baptist international director of world hunger and relief ministries told trustees that of the $16.8 million Southern Baptists have given to relief efforts in southern Asia following the December 2004 tsunami, more than $12 million has been used in relief projects in that region. He said the remainder of those funds would be expended over the next 12 months.
• Board Chairman John Floyd announced he would “take no part in discussions, express no opinions, make no requests and relinquish the chair” during board action on policies that may impact financial benefits he and his wife may receive from the IMB. The Floyds served as missionaries in the Philippines, and later he directed the board’s work in Europe.
Floyd said the benefits he and his wife currently receive from the IMB in their “emeritus” missionary status include a $10,000 life-insurance policy and a $127 monthly cash allowance each to help cover health insurance costs not covered by Medicare.
He said the IMB’s legal counsel confirmed that receipt of those benefits does not disqualify a former missionary, who receives benefits on the basis of prior service, from serving as a trustee under SBC Bylaw 15(f).
Some press reports raised that conflict-of-interest issue after Floyd was elected chairman during the May meeting in Albuquerque, N.M.
• The mission personnel committee Chairman Paul Chitwood reported an ad hoc committee charged with revisiting the new policy on private prayer language and baptism guidelines had been divided into two subcommittees to deal with each of the measures approved by trustees last November. (BP)
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