Kentucky Baptists are known for showing up and helping out. Whether it is Disaster Relief work in eastern Kentucky, foster care through Sunrise Children’s Services or helping ministerial students receive training for their calling, KBC churches stand ready and willing to respond to needs.
No place has that been seen more clearly than in our commitment to fund ministry and missions through the Cooperative Program. Since 1925, KBC churches have sent more than $1 billion through CP. While CP was not officially adopted by Southern Baptists until 1925, we in Kentucky know that its origins were much earlier in the commonwealth.
The Cooperative Program is a funding pool that supports Kentucky Baptist and Southern Baptist efforts to advance the gospel in Kentucky and all over the world. CP giving resulted in, 155,000 people professing faith in Jesus last year through our international missionaries. More than 11,000 Baptist churches have been planted in North America since 2010, more than 24,000 ministerial students received training last year through our six seminaries and much more—that is all made possible because of CP. Of the 2,350 Kentucky Baptist churches that make up the Kentucky Baptist Convention, nearly 1,800 of them support missions through the Cooperative Program.
How can your church help fund SBC and KBC causes through the Cooperative Program?
1. Put the Cooperative Program in your budget: The first step for any Kentucky Baptist church to becoming a CP-supporting church is to put the Cooperative Program in your annual church budget. Budgets communicate spending priorities. When a local church puts the Cooperative Program in its budget, it allows the members to vote and say we support the decision to fund ministry and missions through the Cooperative Program.
2. Make the Cooperative Program a percentage of your undesignated receipts: The benefit of designating your Cooperative Program giving as a percentage of undesignated receipts is that, if finances are strong, your church will be able to increase its state and global gospel impact. But if giving hits a slump, then your missions giving will not negatively impact other budget priorities.
3. Grow your CP percentage to a healthy and sustainable level: Many KBC churches have viewed their CP giving as the church’s tithe to fund ministry and missions. They ask their members to give a tithe (10 percent) of their income to God’s work through their local church. The church then sets aside 10 percent of its undesignated receipts to fund gospel-focused mission work through the Cooperative Program. Ten percent is not the right amount for every church. The average of KBC churches is around 7 percent, which means some churches send more than 10 percent and some less. Prayerfully consider the amount that is right for your congregation and give accordingly.
4. Equip and educate yourself and your church to understand the impact of your CP investment: One pressing need in most churches is to help church members understand the value and impact of the gospel work they are funding through the Cooperative Program. Consider using some of the resources available at http://www.kybaptist.org/cpresources or invite a speaker from your state convention to help the church celebrate the changed lives from their gospel impact.
5. Connect yourself and your church to CP-funded missionaries and mission work: One of the most impactful ways to embrace the Cooperative Program is to see firsthand the difference your giving is making in the lives of people. You can do that by visiting Oneida Baptist Institute, Clear Creek Baptist Bible College, Crossings Camps or Sunrise Children’s Services. Or you can partner with an IMB or NAMB missionary or visit one your state’s Baptist Campus Ministry buildings on one of eight Kentucky college campuses.
Kentucky Baptists have known since 1837 that we are better when we are together for the mission. The Cooperative Program has been one way we have lived out that value. Thank you for the investment you are making in lives changed by the gospel of Christ through your Cooperative Program giving.
Dr. Todd Gray 