Texas pastor to nominate IMB missionary David Rogers for 1VP
Released June 5, 2007
TYLER, Texas – David Dykes, pastor of Green Acres Baptist Church in Tyler, Tex., announces that he will nominate David Rogers, longtime field missionary with the International Mission Board and son of legendary Southern Baptist pastor Adrian Rogers, for first vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention.
For the past thirteen years, Rogers has served as a church-planter and mobilization coordinator in Madrid, Spain.
“For 162 years, Southern Baptists have been driven by a missionary heart,” Dykes said of his reason for nominating Rogers. “Like never before, we need to refocus our convention on the fields already white unto harvest. I believe a convention that is serious about missions should have a missionary leading us.”
“Southern Baptists need a new vision to plant churches,” Dykes continued. “Who better than an experienced church planter to lead this effort?”
During his service with the International Mission Board, Rogers has focused his evangelistic efforts to plant new Baptist churches in one of the most culturally, ethnically, and religiously diverse mission fields, Dykes noted. Madrid boasts the third largest population in Western Europe at 5.8 million with with a fast-growing immigrant population pushing into the hundreds of thousands every year. Recently, North African Muslims and South American Catholics have flooded the city, though Baptist churches have struggled to keep pace.
Rogers, a 1989 graduate of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, first sensed God’s call to foreign missions as an eleven year-old boy at a Royal Ambassador camp. As a young man, Rogers obeyed the call by serving as a summer missionary among Navajo peoples in North America, and then for two years aboard the missionary ship M.V. Doulos with Operation Mobilization.
“As a pastor, I’ve made a commitment to lead our church to be on mission with God,” Dykes said of Green Acres Baptist Church, which leads the Southern Baptist Convention in Cooperative Program mission giving. Last year, Green Acres gave $1,723, 190.00 – or 14 percent of undesignated receipts – through the Cooperative Program from an annual budget of $12,240,467.00.
“We can give all the money in the world, but budget percentages don’t plant churches. Missionaries plant churches, and if it weren’t for field missionaries like David Rogers, we wouldn’t have a Cooperative Program to start with. The reason we cooperate – first and foremost – is to do missions,” Dykes said.
“David Rogers represents everything that the Conservative Resurgence was about. He believes the Bible, he believes lost people need Jesus, and he believes that hell is waiting for those who never trust Christ as their savior.”
Rogers and his wife Kelly have two sons from their marriage of 19 years: Jonathan, 17, and Stephen, 10.
The International Mission Board recommends that field missionaries maintain church membership in their countries of service. Rogers and his family are field members of Iglesia Bautista Buen Pastor in Madrid, Spain. Their home membership remains, however, with the Bellevue Baptist Church of Memphis, TN, where Rogers father served as pastor for 33 years.
“I will not ask Southern Baptists to elect David Rogers to honor his father, though his father is worthy of great honor. I will not even ask them to elect David Rogers to honor our missionaries, though they certainly deserve our honor. Quite simply, I’m going to ask Southern Baptists to elect David Rogers to honor the Lord Jesus Christ,” Dykes said.
“God willing, this convention will keep our focus where it ought to be: going to the ends of the earth to tell people about Jesus. I believe that electing David Rogers will help us keep that focus.”
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Kevin Bussey
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 1:55 pm:
David is a Godly man from a Godly family.
Alan Cross
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 2:31 pm:
Wow. David clearly has my complete support. I have the utmost respect for him as a person and a leader.
Robin Foster
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 2:40 pm:
Art
I noticed that you, Wade, and Marty posted this information at just about the same time. But of course there is no cohesive strategy here. :-D
David is a good man, I have interacted with him, and I have respect for him. But I am voting for Jim Richards. I made that decision before David came into the picture. As far as I am concerned, if either man wins, a godly man is in the position.
Art Rogers
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 2:58 pm:
Robin,
I received the release about an hour before I was asked to release it. I assume the other guys got the same. I released it because it’s news. I haven’t covered Jim Richard’s nomination, that’s true, but I think others have. I was too busy at the time it was announced.
Between the two, I’ll take David as the more representative of my hopes for the Convention. This is mostly a ceremonial role, anyway, so as a “symbolic” position, I would like a symbol that I can affirm without any serious reservation and David fits that bill nicely.
Jack Maddox
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 4:23 pm:
Art
YOU SAID “Between the two, I’ll take David as the more representative of my hopes for the Convention. This is mostly a ceremonial role, anyway, so as a “symbolic” position, I would like a symbol that I can affirm without any serious reservation and David fits that bill nicely.”
Although I will be voting for Dr. Richards, your thoughts are very simaler to mine. Scary huh?! : )
cb scott
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 4:52 pm:
Well Art, I reckon so.
We vote the same this year, finally. Who said we tell each other what to do?:-)
cb
"John"
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 5:15 pm:
Robin,
Just a quick question: How did you decide to vote for Jim Richards while he was the only candidate announced at the time? Where is the objectivity in this? I do not intend to demean you, but I wonder if you can explain your logic. Doesn’t Proverbs remind us to hear all sides of the story before we cast judgment?
“John”
Tim Rogers
on Jun 5th, 2007
@ 7:08 pm:
Brother Art,
I know that CP giving is important and that you and I agree. Can you tell me why, and it appears you along with Brother’s Wade and Marty all have used the same press release, it is so necessary to point out the person making the nomination’s CP giving? Also if you look at the BGCT Budget plan they are more of a Societal giving instrument than a CP giving instrument. Because the BGCT allows churches to choose what part of the SBC they desire to support, the only part that would be considered CP giving would be the portion that goes to the Executive Committee.
Blessings,
Tim
Art Rogers
on Jun 6th, 2007
@ 9:22 am:
Jack,
Scary is one word for it. :)
Tim,
The Press Release is simply that – a press release. The same release goes to various media outlets, and at least some people consider me, Marty and Wade to be media outlets. I reproduced the release in a post with no editorial comments by me. I think Marty did the same. I noted Wade added his two cents – after the close of the press release.
This is not the first press release I have reproduced on my blog. If you remember, I also posted the Press Release by Bill Dodson that said he was, yet again, nominating Wiley Drake for 2VP last year. A press release comes in advance and then has a time of release designated when the media source is free to let the information out. This one had “For Immediate Release” at the top, but the email I received had a noon release time in it, so I honored the time.
It really isn’t that big a mystery. The honest truth is, that Wade, Marty and I enjoy significant readership compared to most other blogs in the SBC blogosphere and it is no big stretch to assume that we would support David Rogers’ candidacy over Jim Richards’. This makes it a “no brainer” to send us the releases in hopes that we would get the word out.
If it makes you feel any better, I only heard that David was running a few hours before I received the release and I never talked to Marty or Wade about it.
So that is why the BGCT giving is in the release, which I scanned briefly before publishing. I honestly, as I write this, can’t tell you what the numbers are, nor even that I realized they were BGCT numbers until you mentioned them. I am working hard getting ready to leave town and have not had much time for blogging. This was an easy post, because it required no writing from me. I have spent on this answer 10x what I spent on the original post.
As for the BGCT, that model of giving, if I remember correctly, was an effort to satisfy the various convictions of all who resided in the BGCT before the SBTC broke off to form its own convention. Apparently they have kept it.
Art Rogers
on Jun 6th, 2007
@ 9:28 am:
Well, Tim, I just reread the release and can’t find the BGCT mentioned at all. Are you saying that the Green Acres Baptist Church designates its money away from the national convention – or are you saying they have the option?
I honestly don’t know the answer to that question.
Tim Rogers
on Jun 6th, 2007
@ 9:24 pm:
Brother Art,
You three receiving and posting the same news release is not the point to the comment. I merely pointed that out to say that I could not find any further information as to the reason to making such a huge issue out of the person nominating. This is the first time I can remember the person doing the nominating expressing their churches CP giving over the person being nominated.
As for the BGCT, anyone doing any research can find quickly that GABC is solely affiliated with the BGCT. Through the BGCT website you can find that 79% stays in the state of Texas and 21% is available to be designated to world missions. Therefore, a church in the BGCT can designate their 21% to the CBF and count it as CP giving.
The only point I was trying to make was that saying a church is the highest giving church in the SBC to the CP is a little misleading especially if any portion of that 21% is given to the CBF.
Blessings,
Tim
stuart
on Jun 6th, 2007
@ 11:23 pm:
Tim,
Actually, a quick check of the BGCT website reveals serveral different giving plans, the “default” of which is 79/21. A little further checking produces information that Green Acres still gives using “old” (i.e. pre-SBTC days) BGCT percentages of 67/33. A little further checking reveals that of the 67 that would normally go to the BGCT, much of it has been retained to support a local ministry recently defunded by the BGCT. A little further checking reveals that the same church gives upwards of $400,000 to Annie/Lottie, money that goes directly to the SBC. A little further checking reveals a missions budget in addition to all of the above (what’s 15% of $16,000,000 anyway) of around half a million more dollars.
Is 33% as much as 54%? No. But I’d put that church’s commitment to missions up against any church in the denomination, especially that of most of our so-called “flagships”.
Geoff Baggett
on Jun 7th, 2007
@ 6:36 am:
I still say this nomination is part of a vast conspiracy …
;)
Ron
on Jun 8th, 2007
@ 12:23 am:
What does the 1st VP Do? Just wondering? If anyone can enlighten me. It sounds to me, from what I’ve been able to find, is that this is primarily a post that doesn’t have much power? Am I wrong?
Thanks, I’m new to the SBC hierarchy!
Ron