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So now, let’s take time to reflect on the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship – How many of you have had some connection with this fellowship since its very beginning in 1991? And how many have formed a connection with CBF sometime in the last four to five years? For how many is this your first General Assembly? How wonderful to have you here!

 

CBF is 17 years old – and what an amazing 17 years it has been. A passion for the Great Commission and in Baptist principles of faith and practice have created bonds of fellowship and ministry around the world – that passion – and what someone once told Daniel Vestal is the greatest vision statement in all of Christendom, – “being the presence of Christ in the world.”

 

And, indeed, for 17 years CBF has been serving Christians and churches as they seek to incarnate Christ’s love.

 

Together, we support the ministries and witness of 160 global missions field personnel serving among the most neglected people in the world. Together we participate in the astounding diversity of witness from more than 500 chaplains. Together we partner with 14 theological schools, preparing more than 2,000 students for lives of ministry.

 

We do all that in partnership with 19 fully autonomous state and regional organizations across all 50 states. Our whole is definitely greater than the sum of our parts. For example, we just presented you a $16 million budget for the national Resource Center, and we will vote on it tomorrow. But that is only a piece of the picture. If we combined the financial resources of all of CBF – the states and regions through which you give – our combined budget tops more than $40 million dollars. Imagine that in 17 years!

 

The impact is greater than even that. We maximize our resources by partnering with more than 15 ministry organizations worldwide. They are an integral part of CBF and give us resources for ministry to a lost world beyond what we can quantify.

 

Clearly God has been at work and has given CBF a definite sense of who we are and what we are called to do.

 

Now, we have come to a time in the life of this movement when we are healthy and strong enough to step back and ask, “What has God prepared for us now? In what new or improved ways are we now being called to step out on faith to follow Christ and serve God better?” That is what we have been asking this past year. This process has involved the Coordinating Council, coordinators of all your states and regions, the state and regional moderators, Current, our Foundation Board, Christian educators, our field personnel and others in a process to ask: how would the Spirit have us live out our vision and mission in the years ahead?

 

We have done this through prayer to discern the will of God. It has been moving – and humbling – to watch God speak through prayer and discussion. We do not yet have answers, but we are excited about the questions we are bringing to this General Assembly for you to pray over so that together we can seek God’s answers.

 

This afternoon, the entire assembly is going to convene specifically and solely for the purpose of praying to discern the Spirit’s leadership. We are a people convinced of the power of prayer – this is going to be a unique and holy time for us and a time that will have great impact on our future as a fellowship.

 

Let me tell you a little about what will happen today and tomorrow because we want every single person here to participate. New to CBF and experienced with CBF – we need you all.

 

This afternoon in our worship service, Daniel will start us thinking about how God has been leading this movement. You will then go to a room assigned to you according to your state or region. In all your rooms, there will be a facilitator who is experienced and trained in spiritual discerning to guide you through a variety of prayer experiences and small group discussions to help you sense God’s guidance.

 

The session this afternoon will help you become familiar with a list of possible priorities, thoughts and themes developed through this past year with many of our constituent groups.

 

Tomorrow at 9 a.m. is a second prayerful discerning session when you will share your own sense of CBF’s priorities in the coming years. In addition, you will work with a small group to give additional input.

 

Here is an image of the discerning survey you will receive. Your can see that ultimately you will be rating each item listed. But for now, let’s just look at the seven major topics. Under each topic will be several specific items for you to consider. The major topics are:

 

 

What possibilities! And that’s just a sampling of the ideas for you to ponder. Each holds promise and opportunity. Where do we focus? Which ones have priority over others? What do you most need from CBF?

 

When you complete the discerning process on Friday, you will turn in both your individual responses and the responses from your small group. These will all be presented as an offering during our Friday morning General Session.

 

And your participation in this process is indeed an offering of your best thoughts, prayers and insights as we face the future unafraid to find new ways to be the presence of Christ.

 

The discerning survey will be on our Web site through next Tuesday so encourage friends who aren’t here to participate. All the information from General Assembly and the website will go to the Coordinating Council in October for its consideration and adoption. Then we will begin he process of implementation. Our plan is to be fully in process by this time next year. It’s a wonderful challenge.

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “Daring to do what is right, not what fancy may tell you,  valiantly grasping occasions, not cravenly doubting – freedom comes only through deeds, not through thoughts taking wing. Faint not nor fear, but go out to the storm and the action, trusting in God whose commandment you faithfully follow …”

 

And so it is for us as we move into the future. In this discerning process, there is indeed a sense of commitment and urgency to dare to do what is right.

 

We started the prioritizing process not knowing where we would end, but from the beginning, the discussion was rooted in an affirmation of and a call to be missional. This has been CBF’s commitment from the beginning, but I have to admit, I just didn’t know that word, missional, until recently! Is it new for any of you? Here are a couple of explanations.

 

If you were at the CBF General Assembly in Washington, last summer, you heard Rob Nash, our coordinator of global missions, explain, “Simply, the missional church movement leads congregations to ask, ‘What is God wanting us to be, become and do to continue the ministry of Christ within our present community and global context?’” Another definition I really like is: “A missional community is about becoming by grace what Christ is by nature.”

 

What Christ is – That means in our daily lives naturally and routinely embodying, demonstrating and announcing God’s love fore the world around us. Well, that’s huge. It is working for the kingdom of God right here, right now.

 

One image we found that helped us visualize this idea of being “like Christ” is a moebius strip. How many of you know what that is? Basically, it is a strip with no beginning and no end – and it has only one side. Let me show you.

 

This image works for us as we think about being like Jesus because it is all one. What is inside – for us, our faith and our desire to follow Jesus – is the same as the outside – our behavior is consistent with our faith. We are outwardly what we are inwardly.

 

I couldn’t resist showing this because just as the moebius doubled in size, God blesses our efforts to be like Christ beyond anything we might expect.

 

The role of CBF is to help you incarnate God’s love. How can it even be possible to answer this overwhelming call? Listen to the words of Henri Nouwen: “The answer is that (those we serve) all hold a blessing for (us), a blessing that (we) need to receive. Ministry is, first of all, receiving God’s blessing from those to whom we minister. What is this blessing? It is a glimpse of the face of God.”

 

May you glimpse the face of God, even here in these days.