International Mission Board (IMB) trustees have approved an immediate $23 million expansion of its crowded Missionary Learning Center (MLC) in Rockville, Va., to handle the rapidly escalating numbers of Southern Baptists coming forward for overseas missions service.
Approval for the expansion came during the trustees meeting Jan. 10–11 at Auburn University Hotel and Conference Center in Auburn. It followed a seventh straight year of record missionary appointments.
Gene Dykes, trustee from First Baptist Church, Center Point, said, “This is the largest expenditure we’ve ever had.”
Dykes, who headed up the MLC expansion effort, noted the congeniality of the trustees as they deliberated over the issue.
“MLC is where it all begins,” Dykes said. “Things will happen at MLC that will impact a world overseas. With the phenomenal growth that the Lord has given us, we’ve got to take care of it,” he said.
Bill Hudgins, trustee and pastor of First Baptist Church, Hokes Bluff, said the expansion was thoroughly examined.
Hudgins said he was negative about the expansion at first but now agrees with the effort. “I could see other possibilities such as using other facilities for ISCers, journeymen and masters, but someone made a statement that one of the great things that is happening by pulling everyone to the MLC is that they are giving the same orientation to everyone,” he said. “That sold me.”
David Taunton, trustee from First Baptist, Birmingham, said the expansion is an important decision, because ‘we can’t handle the number of missionaries being appointed.”
Board officials said the need to quickly expand the overwhelmed training facility is so great they would immediately take the funds from the agency’s capital reserves.
In addition to the $23 million for the MLC, trustees also voted to take another $5 million over the next three years from that “God-provided stock market dividend” and spend it on strategic field projects overseas.
In other actions announced during the board meeting:
-David Button, vice president for public relations and development, resigned to pursue business opportunities in Texas.
-Wendy Norvelle, associate vice president for public relations, was named acting vice president for the office of public relations and development. The trustees’ OPRD committee will serve as the search committee to work with Rankin to select a new vice president.
-Louis Moore, associate vice president for communications, has been designated assistant to the president.
-Trustees authorized a pilot project to create Great Commission Resource Centers in selected churches around the country to provide initial contacts and applications for people interested in missionary service, interview and nurture candidates, enlist and train volunteers, promote prayer strategies, distribute and promote IMB materials and resources and match congregations with unreached people groups. (BP, Jennifer Rash contributed)
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