Richmond, Virginia
May 11, 1967
77?
The Foreign Mission Board met in regular monthly session on Thursday, May 11, 1967,
at 3:00 P.M. in the chapel of the Foreign Mission Board with Rev. J. Walter Martin
presiding in the absence of the president and vice-presidents.
Present: State Members: Virgil Clark, Indiana; Charles Lassiter, Michigan; Ralph M.G.
Smith, Missouri; Local Members: T. F. Adams, Wade Bryant, Curtis English, V. Allen
Gaines, David S. Hammock, Mrs. Clyde V. Hickerson, John W. Kincheloe, W. Rush Loving,
J. Walter Martin, J. Leonard Moore, John L. Moran, James E. Rayhorn, Hunter Riggins,
D. 0. Rose, Edwin L. Shattuck, Dalton Ward. Staff : Baker J. Cauthen, Rogers M. Smith,
Frank K. Means, H. Cornell Goerner, Franklin T. Fowler, Joseph B. Underwood, E. L. Deane,
E. L. Wright, Jesse C. Fletcher, Edna Frances Dawkins, Louis R. Cobbs, Truman S. Smith,
Samuel A. DeBord , W. David Lockard, E. L. Hill, lone Gray, G. Norman Price, Harold G.
Basden, Floyd North, Emily Lenz.
Dr. Charles Lassiter read a Scripture passage and led in prayer.
The minutes were approved as printed and previously mailed to members of the Board.
Dr. Cauthen gave the following report of the Executive Secretary:
REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARY
Announcement has been given through the Press that the final total of the 1966 Lottie
Moon Christmas Offering has reached the sum of $13,760,146.80.
It is impossible to express adequately our great appreciation of this sum of money
which exceeds the previous Offering by the sum of $565,789.48.
Most of this money has already been appropriated by the Board. Final lists totaling
$724,239.04 will be presented for consideration at the July meeting of the Board.
It is also encouraging to note that the gifts through the Cooperative Program have
continued to increase. The funds received by the Southern Baptist Convention for
the Cooperative Program have increased 7.287, from January 1 through the close of
April over the corresponding period of last year.
We are grateful for being able to present a splendid group of missionary appointees
at this meeting.
We are looking forward to the appointment of more than 45 missionaries at the July
meeting of the Board. Indications point toward 1967 as reaching a new peak in the
number of missionary appointments.
Within a few weeks the first group of Missionary Journeymen will begin returning
from their overseas assignments. These young people have devoted two years of their
lives in witnessing for Christ in many lands. The work they have done has been of
high significance, and missionaries are grateful for their contribution. We feel a
deep sense of satisfaction as we review the Missionary Journeymen undertaking. We
congratulate Mr. Louis Cobbs in particular upon the splendid service he has rendered
in shaping up the Missionary Journeyman Program. This marks a very strategic develop¬
ment in the life of the Foreign Mission Board and in the cause of worldwide mission
work.
We are glad to announce that The Commission, official magazine of the Southern Baptist
Foreign Mission Board, won the Missionary Magazine award and in the General Story award
this week in Chicago at the annual convention of the Evangelical Press Association.
The Missionary Magazine category is one of several classifications for periodicals
included in the Association's yearly Periodical-of-the-Year competition. The organi¬
zation of more than 150 publications and publishers in the United States and Canada also
conducts a yearly contest under the heading Higher Goals in Christian Journalism. In
this competition the judges chose the story "Where Beauty Has Died," written by Sou¬
thern Baptist Missionary, Eric Clark, and published in the April (1966) issue of
The Commission.
Before the Board meets again, we will have been engaged in some very important meetings.
First, there will be the Conference for Furloughing Missionaries held in Miami Beach,
prior to the meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention. This is an important gather¬
ing to which Dr. Rogers Smith gives major leadership.
It will be followed by meetings of the Convention and auxiliary meetings in Miami Beach.
Foreign Missions Night will be on Thursday, beginning at 8:10 P.M. In addition to
adopting the Report of the Board, the Crusade of the Americas will be given special
emphasis. Dr. Frank K. Means and Dr. Wayne Dehoney will speak with regard to the
Crusades of the Americas. The purpose is to share with the Convention, both what
the Crusade is meaning in the mission fields, and what it can mean throughout the
entire hemisphere. Missionaries Bill Lewis and Bill O'Brien will speak, and Bill
O'Brien will sing a solo. Dr. Claude Rhea will sing immediately prior to the
