ATLANTA – On the first day of its October meeting, the CBF Coordinating Council focused its work on implementation of the organization’s promising future as presented by the 2012 Task Force Report, which was approved by the 2012 General Assembly in June.
 
“We came out of the summer knowing we had to put wheels on the plan from the Task Force,” said CBF moderator Keith Herron, who serves as pastor of Holmeswood Baptist Church in Kansas City, Mo. “This is a historic time, a wrinkle in time, in which the past structure is about to give way to a new structure. For the near future, this is where we are headed. It’s decisive. It’s bold. We’re creating a map that that will take us on a journey. The Implementation Team is figuring out how we will take the next steps.”
 
The Council heard a report from the 2012 Task Force Implementation Team, which met earlier in the week. Herron, on behalf of the team, presented the Council with a transition timeline. Breaking into small groups, Council members discussed the transition timeline and focused their conversations on the following questions: What do you appreciate about this? What concerns you about this? Where do you want this to go?
 
After discussion and feedback, the Council approved the following amended motion from the Advisory Council:
 
“In order to begin implementation of the 2012 Task Force Report, we recommend the following transitional process to form the Nominating Committee. The officers will receive names from states and regions and the Fellowship at large. The officers will submit a slate of names on January 17th to the Coordinating Council that is authorized to elect the committee.
 
The Nominating Committee will elect its own chair and will present to the June 2013 General Assembly nominees for the Moderator-elect, the Governing Board and transitional leadership for the formation of the Ministries and Missions Councils.”
 
“We feel we need to kick start this transition of our organization,” said Pat Anderson, CBF’s interim executive coordinator. “We don’t need to take years to facilitate this. With guidance from Dave Odom, executive director for Leadership Education at Duke University, we have worked out a way to carry out the transition up to the 2013 General Assembly. Nothing happens in this new plan until we have a Nominating Committee. It all starts there.”
 
Also Thursday, Herron provided a report from the Executive Coordinator Search Committee. He said the committee is preparing to bring a candidate to the Coordinating Council at its February meeting. The candidate will be presented to the Advisory Council and announced to the public in mid-January.
 
“The search committee has been doing the kind of work that might be done with any ministerial search process,” Herron. “They’ve created a description of the kind of person we are looking for, and they have an impressive list of candidates. I was amazed at the quality of candidates and it makes me feel good as a CBFer to know that we will be in good hands.”
 
The Implementation Team’s transition timeline can be viewed online at www.thefellowship.info/2012taskforce.
 
The CBF Coordinating Council meeting continues Friday at First Baptist Church in Decatur, Ga.
 
CBF is a fellowship of Baptist Christians and churches who share a passion for the Great Commission and a commitment to Baptist principles of faith and practice. The Fellowship’s mission is to serve Christians and churches as they discover and fulfill their God-given mission.