International Mission Board (IMB) President Jerry Rankin has given missionaries who have not yet affirmed the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message (BF&M) a deadline of May 5 to make their decisions.
Three other couples were notified that they must resign by May 5 or be terminated.
Rankin is appealing to 25 workers to either promise to work in harmony with the faith statement or tender their resignations by that date. Otherwise they also will be terminated.
The letter mailed April 11 represents a reversal of position for the IMB. Earlier Rankin told a group of retired missionaries that no one would be fired for failing to affirm.
Now Rankin says he will ask IMB trustees to terminate the services of those missionaries who are reported to be “refusing accountability to the beliefs of Southern Baptist churches.”
Facing termination
In letters sent to 18 missionary units (31 people), including some Alabama Baptists, Rankin noted that he asked Southern Baptist field personnel to affirm the revised faith statement more than a year ago.
Since then, 98.7 percent of the board’s 5,500 overseas workers have affirmed the document and 32 missionaries have resigned.
When the IMB trustees meet May 6–8 in Boston, they will vote on the resignations of eight more. And one couple will resign in August.
Rankin wrote to one missionary: “I am grateful for your years of service and would be delighted if you should decide to affirm the current Baptist Faith and Message and continue your effective ministry with the IMB.
“Apart from that, I would like to ask that you consider resigning rather than maintaining a position that would undermine the integrity and credibility of the IMB,” Rankin continued. “If I do not hear from you regarding one of these options by May 5, 2003, I will be recommending that the board take action to terminate your service in their May meeting.”
Rankin said he believes several of the missionaries will yet choose to affirm the faith statement and some may choose to leave the IMB rather than force a termination action.
Letters to three of the missionary
units, however, do not give them the option of affirming the 2000 BF&M but ask them to resign.
Those six workers “have clearly and publicly stated positions contrary to the BF&M that are beyond acceptable parameters. They have adamantly refused to be accountable to the IMB and Southern Baptist churches as requested,” Rankin said.
Names of the missionaries receiving the letters are not being released by the board.
But The Alabama Baptist learned that two of the couples — Rick and Nancy Dill (Germany) and Ron and Lydia Hankins (Japan) — are from Alabama. The third couple is Leon and Kathy Johnson, who are from Arkansas and serve in Mozambique.
Southern Baptists have always expected missionary beliefs to reflect the beliefs of the churches that send and support them, Rankin noted. All missionaries on the field made a similiar affirmation of earlier versions of the Baptist Faith and Message when they were appointed, according to IMB officials.
Handling disagreements
IMB leaders say the current affirmation process also allows a worker to continue serving even though they indicate minor disagreements when they sign an affirmation of the faith statement.
“We wanted this to be a decision the missionaries make for themselves,” Rankin said. “We wanted to give every missionary ample time to consider his or her response. If a missionary decides he or she cannot affirm it and therefore cannot continue serving through the IMB, we regret that but appreciate the integrity of conscience it demonstrates.”
Four of the missionary units receiving letters are currently on stateside assignment and nine units are overseas. Five units who qualify are being offered the option of retiring with full benefits.
“We have total confidence in our missionaries, and my initial letter was a collective appeal to assure Southern Baptists of the doctrinal integrity of the missionaries they send and support,” Rankin said. “However, the failure of some to affirm their accountability undercuts the credibility and support of all missionaries serving with the IMB in a time of remarkable evangelistic harvest and unprecedented opportunities.
“Most of our missionaries responded immediately to the request to affirm the BF&M, with many expressing appreciation for the opportunity to testify to what they believe,” Rankin added. “No one was coerced.
“For most of a year, regional leaders around the world sought to answer questions and provide clarification and encouragement to those who had reservations about their response,” Rankin said. “Over the last few months, Avery Willis, senior vice president of overseas operations, has talked personally with each missionary who had not affirmed, helping him or her to understand the importance of affirming doctrinal accountability and the consequences to the missionary, the IMB and their colleagues.”
The Dills described Willis’ conversation as strategy. In October when he contacted them, Willis was calling missionaries he believed were just two weeks away from returning to the field after stateside assignment, Rick Dill said.
At that point missionaries had already shipped their belongings and they were emotionally set to go back, Rick Dill said.
And while mission leadership at the regional level has also worked with the missionaries who refused to affirm the BF&M, the missionaries are now out of time.
Rankin said, “This final letter (to 25 of the missionaries) is to once again appeal to [them] to affirm they will work in accord with the Baptist Faith and Message.”
(Compiled from wire services, TAB contributed)
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