Missouri Update

by T. C. Pinckney                                                                                     Vol. XV, No. 9, October 2002

Missouri is currently one of the front-line states in the continuing Southern Baptist battles for doctrinal integrity, and PTL conservative biblicists have been winning in the state. This facts in this article are condensed from several Baptist Press releases and brings you up to date on recent developments in MO. Judgments are my own.

SBC Executive Committee action: At the Ex Com’s 17 September meeting the committee declined to recognize the newly formed and “moderate” Baptist General Convention of Missouri as a collecting agency for the SBC. Also, responding to a motion referred to the committee from the June convention, the committee declined to recommend limiting the number of state conventions recognized by the national body. The action came after Bruce Prescott a June messenger from FBC, Norman, OK, was allowed to speak in behalf of his motion.

Background is that in MO conservatives have won state convention votes for the last four years and now have majorities on the MO general board. “Moderates”, despairing of rewinning control, recently organized the Baptist General Convention of Missouri with ties to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship but also wanted to retain at least formal affiliation with the SBC ... presumably the better to lure MO churches into joining the BGCM.

Prescott noted that Virginia and Texas both have two state conventions, setting a precedent for two in MO and, perhaps, other states. But that argument considers only the numbers, not the substance. In both VA and TX the new state conventions were formed because the older ones were (and are) moving further and further from the SBC. The new conventions in VA & TX are staunchly pro-SBC; in fact, they send a higher percentage of their CP receipts to Nashville than any other state convention. It would be the height of stupidity for the SBC to endorse a state convention devoted to opposing the SBC Cooperative Program, mission agencies, and seminaries.

MO convention asks court to nullify breakaway charters of 5 entities: This aspect of the dispute centers on whether trustees to the five entities -- disgruntled with the conservative direction of the MBC -- have the right to secretly amend their charters to give themselves sole authority in naming their successors, thus removing MBC churches from that historic process. The five entities are the Missouri Baptist Foundation, with managed assets of approximately $131 million; The Baptist Home, a multi-facility retirement center with an endowment in excess of $35 million; Windermere Baptist Conference Center with its 1,300 acres of timberland and 3.5 miles of shoreline along the Lake of the Ozarks; Missouri Baptist College, historically regarded as a theologically conservative institution located in St. Louis; and the 106-year-old Word & Way newsjournal.

Trustees for the five estranged entities said they amended their charters to protect the institutions from liability concerns and convention politics. MBC leaders dispute that, saying the trustees' action was nothing more than a power grab to thwart the inevitable conservative majorities on each board thanks to a string of conservative victories in the last four MBC presidential elections.

Because the entities’ trustee boards have repeatedly refused Christian arbitration, a petition for declaratory judgment was filed in a Missouri state court Aug. 13 by the Missouri Baptist Convention (MBC) asking a judge to rule on the MBC's right to elect trustees to five breakaway entities that have repeatedly rejected offers of Christian arbitration.

    The lawsuit also asks for an injunction to protect nearly $200 million in Missouri Baptist ministry assets connected with the five entities, MBC leaders said. They stressed that the petition is not directed at individual Christians and does not seek monetary damages. The five non-profit corporations had charters that guaranteed the convention's continued right to govern via the exclusive right of the convention and/or the Executive Board of the MBC to elect agency trustees."

The petition asks the court to rule the amended charters "null and void" and declare the five entities accountable to the MBC and its executive board.

The five estranged entities have made at least two legal threats against MBC individuals. In November 2001, the Baptist Home lawyer threatened to have MBC-elected trustees arrested for criminal trespassing if they attended an open meeting of the entity trustees. Later, the entity lawyers threatened to sue the MBC and individual executive board trustees for the money which was budgeted for entities but which has been held in escrow until the unauthorized charters are rescinded.

Messengers to the 2001 MBC meeting in Cape Girardeau voted by more than 3-1 in October to escrow approximately $2.1 million earmarked for the five entities after trustees refused to rescind their actions. MBC leaders said no escrowed money will be spent for legal fees and that all escrowed money remains in an interest-bearing account until the entities rescind their actions or until MBC messengers reallocate the funds to other ministries when they meet in convention Oct. 28-30 in Springfield. In addition, the MBC executive board recommended in June that no money be escrowed in 2003 and Cooperative Program funds that would have been earmarked for the five institutions be redirected to entities loyal to the MBC.

The MBC obtained legal opinions earlier this year from three Missouri law firms. All of them independently concluded that the five entities' trustees broke Missouri corporate law when they amended their charters to become self-perpetuating.

No court date has been set for the case.

David Clippard new MO executive director: JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (BP)--David Clippard, 53, was chosen by the MO executive board as the new executive director of the Missouri Baptist Convention. Clippard is a Cape Girardeau native currently serving as an associate executive director for the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma.

Clippard succeeds Jim Hill, who resigned in October after he determined he could no longer work with conservatives who now hold a strong majority on the executive board. Hill is now president and chief executive officer of Springfield-based RDI Consulting, a fundraising and strategic planning consulting business geared toward nonprofit agencies.

Born Jan. 1, 1949, in Cape Girardeau, Clippard graduated from Jackson High School in 1967 and the University of Missouri in 1972 with a bachelor's degree in agricultural economics. After working in real estate for several years, he was ordained into the gospel ministry in 1981 while serving as associate pastor/evangelism for Southcliff Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas. He earned a master of divinity degree from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1984.

Clippard was vice president of North American ministries for Evangelism Explosion International in Fort Lauderdale, FL, from 1983-88. During that period he also served on staff as interim minister of adult education at First Baptist Church, Fort Lauderdale, FL, with O. S.. Hawkins, then the church's senior pastor and now president of the SBC Annuity Board.

Clippard was pastor of Sarasota (FL) Baptist Church from 1988-96.

Since 1996, Clippard has served the BGCO. He began as director of evangelism during the time the convention was in the process of restructuring into ministry teams. As a part of the restructuring, Clippard was named one of three associate executive directors working directly under the executive director. His management responsibilities included the areas of evangelism, church planting, and Baptist collegiate ministries (37 campuses) throughout Oklahoma.

The hiring of Clippard, who still serves on the board of directors for Evangelism Explosion International, is part of the continuing quest by conservatives to move the state toward more active evangelistic and church planting efforts.