Are Associations Still Necessary? part 2

Because this is associational emphasis week in the SBC, I began yesterday to explore the answer to the question; are Baptist Associations still necessary?  Today I intend to give my answer.  I find it interesting that the first two responses to this post at SBC Impact happen to express opposite opinions on Baptist associations. Before I answer, in the interest of full disclosure, I should let you in on my bias today.  I serve on my associational youth team, I am an associational messenger from my church, and I participate regularly in associational ministers meetings.  (I even spoke at one.)

My church is a member of a very large association.  The NSRBA has over 100 churches spanning 3 counties.  To drive from The Bridge Community Church to Union Grove Baptist Church (one end to the other) would take well over an hour.  Many of our churches are extremely rural, and some of our churches are quite urban.  All of this diversity should benefit everyone, but there are still those who feel the association is unnecessary.

As I see it, here are some of the weakpoints of the local association.

• Big churches don’t participate – this is obviously not a hard and fast rule, but during my 12 years of ministry in 3 different associations there are very few big church pastors who feel the need to be active in the association.   I’ve never been in leadership of a church that averaged more than 150 in Sunday school so I can’t speak with certainty, but my thought on why large churches don’t participate on an associational level is that they don’t need the resources that the associations can provide
• The flat world means that small churches now have less need for what associations can provide – The training, resources in the form of media, curriculums and technology, guidance, and even the financial assistance available through associations can all be procured elsewhere
• Some associations are just not good – There are associations with poor leadership who do nothing, or who pander to every complaining pastor.  There are associations that take in churches that are cast-offs from other associations because of theology or disagreements.  And there are associations which make no effort to impact their local area for Christ

Despite those problems, I still feel that associations are viable and worthy of continuing into the 21st century. Here are just a few things that associations offer.

• Fellowship for pastors – Pastors, as God-called leaders of their congregations, need someone with which to fellowship.  Obviously they need to be a part of their church’s community, but occasionally there needs to be someone outside the church who shares the same sense of calling with which to discuss common issues and decision making.  I realize that this could be done apart from the association, but the association makes this easy, and you will find a distinct lack of this sort of fellowship when you move to independent church situations.  (Youth ministers also, are notoriously poor at this type of fellowship.)
• Vision for the community – This is where local associations can truly thrive.  Associations are broader in their ministry scope than local churches are.  But much more focused than a state convention could hope to be.  And even in an association as diverse as the NSRBA, the association can have a vision of ministry for greater Fayetteville that no single church should be concerned with.  This should guide where church plants are needed, and where specific ministries can best be focused.  This is a function that the state convention could never hope to carry out.  (Also, state conventions have a tendency to focus outside themselves and look to inter-state partnerships and even international partnerships for ministry opportunities.)
• Cooperating allows for greater ministry – This is the entire concept behind the cooperative program.  (I’ll add here that associational money is not CP money.)  The simple fact is that we can do more together than we could ever do alone.
• Cooperative local ministries – There are many worthy ministries that would be too large a task for any one church to carry out.  For example, in the NSRBA we have a ministry to the workers at the Cumberland Co. fair.  One church may be able to provide bottled water, lunches, and some counseling, but this ministry also provides a dental bus and lasts the duration of the fair.  That would be a huge burden for even a very large church.  Without a dentist and a few hygienists in membership it would not even be possible.  There are also ministries to migrant workers, a Christmas toy store for needy families, and two thrift store / food pantry ministries.  These things would simply not be possible by any single church.

The state convention could simply not do any of those things.  Fellowship with a group too large is not possible.  It could never see the need for ministry at the local level, and even if it did, coordinating thousands of churches would be too difficult.

My conclusion is that the local Baptist association is still very useful and will serve a Great Commission function into the 21^st century.

Are Associations Still Necessary? part 1

This is Associational Emphasis week in the Southern Baptist Convention.  So I thought I would write a couple of posts dealing with the following question: Is the Baptist association still needed?

One of the things being brought to our attention as Southern Baptists with the Great Commission Resurgence is the inefficient spending of cooperative program funds.  Specifically, people have a problem with the duplication of efforts.  This is a valid concern.  It is both an issue of good stewardship and responsibility.  And let’s just be honest, is there really a need for church growth experts, or evangelism trainers, or church resource specialists at the state, SBC and associational level?  I recommend listening to the most recent Insight Podcast which is an interview with Johnny Hunt.  In part 1, the host quotes Dr. Mike Day from the Mid-South Baptist Association.  Dr. Day relays an example of the same function being performed by the three levels.  This is just a real-life example of why the question should be asked.  Are associations necessary?

The most significant reason why there would be a change in the need for associations would be because the world is flat.  Allow me to explain what I mean by the flat world.  The flat world concept comes from William Friedman’s book, The World Is Flat.  The thesis of the book is that technologically and politically we have reached a point in which a place on the other side of the country or the other side of the world can be reached instantly.  We have globalized nearly everything and the distance between us has shrunk to a negligible amount.

So what dies this have to do with Baptist associations?   In order to answer his question, I’ll need to explain what the purpose of a Baptist association is and how it works. The Baptist association is a gathering of cooperating churches to do ministry on a local level.  Interestingly, because of the strongly held Baptist view of church autonomy, this is the same definition for a state convention or the SBC.  (They are just different geographically)  This connection of churches cooperate to carry out ministry on a local level and to help one another with training, resources, and historically, even finances.

This is the same definition of the SBC and the state Baptist conventions.  With the flat world making distance less significant, that explains the duplication of functions.  Many people feel that the weakest of the 3 levels is the local association.  Hence my question.

Now that the explanation is out of the way, tomorrow I plan to actually answer the question, are associations still necessary.

Before I get there, I would like to hear from you in the comments.  Do you think the local association is still needed?  Even though the world is flat?  Even though many of the same functions are performed on the state and SBC level?