Afterthoughts Regarding the SBC

I had the privilege of attending the Southern Baptist Convention in Orlando this past week. This was my first SBC...though I've been a member of SBC churches since the early 90's.

I went into the experience with good anticipation regarding the Great Commission Task Force report. I thought I'd vote for it. Alas, I did not.

What struck me was that the report, while offering many things I can celebrate...didn't start at the place of transparency it should have.

I think second to the fact that we need revival and the empowering of the Holy Spirit resulting in obedience to the Great Commission and Great Commandment is the need to address WHERE cooperative dollars are distributed.

It's at the point of distribution where I find my biggest challenge.We heard a lot of talk about how we were going to scale back the number of IMB missionaries...yet, we spent millions on getting together to talk about convention stuff (read: the cost of having a convention as we do it would fund a lot of missionaries!!!). Currently, cooperative dollars by the hundreds of thousands are spent five times a year on IMB trustee board meetings alone!

My question: Can we not streamline and do things a different way that will still keep the convention strong yet free up funds to be reallocated for things more noble than the two illustrations of superfluous spending mentioned above?