by Jon Konnerup
The Baptist Bible Fellowship International has been around for 60 years with a goal to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to the entire world. Pastors and churches have come together as a Fellowship to join efforts to train new leaders through our colleges, send missionaries served by the Mission Office, and plant churches across our country with help from the National Church Planting Office. All our efforts and other pertinent information are reported in our magazine, the Baptist Bible Tribune.
It is also good to note that those initiatives started 60 years ago continue today. Just as important is the fact that we still hold to the same beliefs and practices as those who have gone before us. We still have confidence today in who we are and what we do.
The BBFI is a fellowship — not a convention, denomination, or mission board. We are a fellowship of pastors who are Baptist and hold to historic Baptist distinctives. We are Baptists who hold firmly to the Bible, the origin of our Baptist distinctives and our 20 Articles of Faith.
We are also independent in that each congregation is autonomous, and we believe no organization should interfere with it. Each congregation in our Fellowship should govern its own affairs, own its own property, call its own pastor, and have the freedom to cooperate with churches of like faith. Take all the strands of our DNA — our Bible stand, our view of the church, our hold on the Baptist distinctives and the Articles of Faith — the things we hold in common, and you can easily see how we may cooperate together in reaching our world with the Good News.
We also believe the Great Commission demands we start new churches in every state of our Union, and that those same churches raise and send men and women to reach the unreached from every people group in our world. Our first mission director, Fred S. Donnelson wrote:
From the very beginning of this new Fellowship (the Baptist Bible Fellowship) it has been felt that it must be missionary to the core. Not simply named missionary but missionary in fact; not using the name missions to promote a hundred varied activities, as is possible if one is not careful; but for the purpose of fulfilling the commission of the Lord Jesus, “even unto the uttermost parts of the earth.” We had heard missions preached without being practiced. Now we felt that in our new beginning we should place the clear command of the Lord Jesus Christ before us as an order to be obeyed, as a mission to be fulfilled. Therefore, from the very beginning, missions has been our “meat.” – Baptist Bible Tribune, September 1952.
After the extensive screening process by the Mission Office, the pastors of our Fellowship approve Baptist missionaries who are sent from local Baptist churches affiliated with the BBFI. They agree with our philosophy of evangelizing the lost and planting Baptist churches. These churches should reproduce themselves in an effort to have local church planting initiatives in every part of the globe. To date there are 3,100 churches in the U.S.A. and nearly 7,000 churches outside the U.S.A. affiliated with the BBFI.
It has always been understood and believed that the local church is the center of worldwide missions. The Mission Office is not the sending agency of the missionary. The final authority of the missionary is the sending church. The Mission Office is the service center for the missionaries sent from Baptist churches affiliated with the BBFI. It also serves the churches themselves to whom the Great Commission was given. We at the Baptist Bible Fellowship International Mission Office continue to be Baptist.
As we start this new year 2011, we continue to charge ahead as our early founders and leaders did — reaching our country and our world with the gospel of Jesus Christ; doing it together as a fellowship of pastors whose churches send out missionary evangelists around the world; staying always true to the Articles of Faith and our Baptist distinctives. We move ahead with confidence knowing we are staying true to God and His Word, and we invite all likeminded to come along with us!