2022 year-end report from Illinois churches
Illinois Baptist State Association
Our $20 billion vision
I
t may seem hard to believe, but Southern Baptists have given $20 billion to missions since the Cooperative Program was created almost 100 years ago. Here, after the pandemic, yearly giving has rebounded. Together our nearly 50,000 SBC churches are supporting global missions, church planting, discipleship and leader development, preparation of pastors and missionaries, and a voice for religious liberty in Washington, D.C. That we can do more together than any one church can do individually is well proven. But for this dynamic system of missions work to continue, the next generation must take up the cause. That will require intentional education about CP. Nobody gets CP through osmosis. At one time, the average CP gift from churches was 10% or more of undesignated offerings. Many churches, realizing the importance of their global missions support give above that even today. The average church’s CP offering in Illinois is 6.1% today, which is still a bit above the average across the denomination. Every church of every size contributes meaningfully at its own level, choosing to send a percentage of their undesignated offerings to IBSA.
This is my CP story
SBC Missions by the Numbers
2,218
church planters and missionaries serve with NAMB in North America
18,000 students train to be pastors and missionaries at 6 SBC seminaries
154,701 baptisms by SBC congregations in North America
My family attended First Baptist Church of Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina. As a child, I was taught by a lady named Ms. Beasley who went to Guam as a CP-funded missionary. That was my first exposure to the Cooperative Program, because our church supported CP through our budget. Later I attended a CP-assisted Baptist college and earned two seminary degrees at a fraction of the cost of non-SBC schools. I served as a CP-assisted church planter, then pastored four churches. I led them to be big supporters of CP. As a pastor, I have been part of sending out several missionaries. One of my children will soon become a career missionary with the InterHARRIS national Mission Board. I have been on numerous trips working with IMB missionaries who are grateful for their CP support. I’ve heard non-SBC missionaries lament not having CP support. Our combined CP resources have impacted lostness far beyond what any of us could do alone. Now I work every day with IBSA, funded by the Cooperative Program, helping Illinois churches “turn inside out” to reach their communities and the world. This is why I support CP.
IBSA uses 56.5% for equipping churches and planting new churches in Illinois, while sending 43.5% to the national SBC to support North American and international missions. This cooperative-missions funding was created after the “$75 Million Campaign” following World War I. The SBC was financially distressed and missionaries’ work on the field was in jeopardy. The “society method” where individual missionaries came home often to visit churches and ask for money simply wasn’t working. Through the new Cooperative Program, a steady flow of funds meant mission work would continue without threat or interruption. Missionaries could stay on their fields longer, sharing the gospel, baptizing new believers, and starting new churches. Across a century, CP has proven effective through unified, regular, and systematic giving, worthy of enthusiastic participation by SBC churches. CP is worthy of the ongoing education required to keep new believers and new Baptists informed on what their CP offerings accomplish worldwide. CP continues effectively today. How well it continues tomorrow depends on your vision for reaching the world with the gospel of Christ.
– Scott Harris is IBSA Mission Team Leader
The sun never sets on Southern Baptist missions. With SBC missionaries on every inhabited continent, baptizing, teaching, and making disciples extends to the ends of the earth, just as Jesus said.
20,000+
93
Illinois Baptists engaged in mission work annually prior to the pandemic
new people groups and urban centers engaged by SBC missionaries last year
67,187
3,532
IMB missionaries serve worldwide
3,720
military and hospital chaplains endorsed by NAMB
81
IMB missionaries call Illinois their home state
global leaders received theological training
421
missionaries appointed or commissioned by IMB in 2021
176,795
new believers through the work of IMB missionaries
3,175
UUPGs (Unengaged, Unreached People Groups) still remain