Foreign Mission Board Chapel
November 8, 1956
The Foreign Mission Board met in regular monthly session at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday,
November 8, 1956, with Mr, Jenkins presiding.
Present: L. H0ward Jenkins, Oscar L. Hite, H, B. Tillman, Emmett Y. Robertson,
Mrs. Kenneth Burke, Mrs. Earl Brown, Mrs. Clyde V. Hickerson, Perry Mitchell,
Baker J. Cauthen, George W. Sadler, Winston Crawley, £>. L. Hill, ^imer S. West,
E. L. Wright, Fon H. Scofield, Rogers M. Smith, E. L. Deane.
Mr. Mitchell led in prayer.
Dr. Cauthen gave the following report:
REPORT OF EXECUTIVE SECRETARY
Following the October meeting of the Board, we had the pleasure of a visit to
Richmond by the sub-committee appointed by the Convention Survey Committee of
Southwide boards and institutions. It was possible for only two members of the
committee to come — Mr. Carr P. Collins of Dallas and Dr. Houston Smith of Pine-
ville, Louisiana. The time spent together was very enjoyable and profitable. It
was possible for all the work of the Board to be reviewed, and we were grateful
for splendid suggestions made and opinions shared.
We always welcome the coming of committees to study the work of foreign missions
because we are confident that the more study is given to the task of world missions,
the greater will be the determination of Southern Baptists to press forward in a
larger way with this vast responsibility.
We are now in the midst of a study of capital needs. The Convention is following
a capital needs program which has been set up for several years, and now is at the
point of having to make new plans for the future. The needs for capital development
throughout the whole world are so great that the Convention has undertaken to chan¬
nel money as liberally as possible for this purpose. Much of our effectiveness
abroad depends upon our being able to help churches to have buildings, provide facili¬
ties for medical work, schools, and other very urgently needed operations.
This is a period when Southern Baptists are able to channel their funds through the
Cooperative Program in a special way for world missions. The Southwide Budget of
the Cooperative Program was reached early in October. From that point until the
end of the year, all money received in the office of the Executive Committee in
Nashville is divided 75 per cent for foreign missions and 25 per cent for home mis¬
sions. Last year the Foreign Mission Board received more than $1,800,000 of money
from this advance section of the Cooperative Program. It is our hope and prayer
that this year the amount will be considerably more than the figure last year.
As we look forward to the advance funds from the Cooperative Program and the Lottie
Moon Christmas Offering, we are aware that these two sources of money provide our
main possibilities for meeting capital needs throughout the world. Last year we
had approximately
$3»
000,000 of capital requests we were unable to meet. W'e are
hoping and praying that the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering this year as well as
the advance program funds will be larger than before, and will enable us to meet
as far as possible the needs which are so pressing.
Attention has been focused by the whole world in recent days upon developments in
the Near East. Dr. Sadler will have more to say in his report concerning this
situation. It has been a great joy to observe the stability and faith with which
missionaries have carried on amid these disturbing situations. We have been in
constant telegraphic communication with the missions in the Near East. Some of
the mothers and children have withdrawn to Beirut, but the doctors, nurses, and
others are remaining at their places of responsibility. There have been no losses
to property nor injuries to any of our people, and we are grateful for the blessing
of God upon all of them. Missionaries in the Near East are meeting these emergen¬
cies in the same fine way missionaries of this Board have met like situations in
other parts of the world.
Dr. Means is absent from the meeting of the Board today because of a special trip
to Peru and Costa Rica. We are grateful for the fact that air transportation makes
possible a close contact between the Foreign Mission Board administration arri the
work on the fields in a way that otherwise would be an impossibility. In many cases
a quick trip on the part of one of the Board’s secretaries to the fields is effective
in saving thousands of dollars for foreign missions in studying possibilities for de¬
velopments. In many cases such journeys enable us to work out problems in mission
work which otherwise would handicap the labor of God’s servants on their fields.