PRAIRIE VILLAGE, Kan. (BP)–Vocational ministers were urged to see their ministry as a calling, not a career. And laypeople were challenged to “go where you’ve never gone before and do what you’ve never done before” to share the gospel.
Randy Singer, executive vice president of the North American Mission Board, issued these challenges during the closing session of the 54th annual meeting of the Kansas-Nebraska Convention of Southern Baptists.
Approximately 350 registered messengers and visitors attended the Oct. 18-19 meeting at Nall Avenue Baptist Church in Prairie Village, Kan., in the Kansas City area.
A new international mission partnership — with Turkey — was approved by messengers. The convention will cooperate with the International Mission Board to share the gospel in the nation which, per capita, is the most unevangelized country in the world. With a population of 65 million, only an estimated 1,000 people are Christians.
Kansas-Nebraska Southern Baptists will have the opportunity to participate in several upcoming volunteer trips to Turkey.
The meeting also honored four people who have made significant contributions to God’s kingdom in Kansas-Nebraska and elsewhere.
Harry Taylor was honored for his 25-year career as KNCSB director of church music, church administration and minister relations. He was minister of music at Nall Avenue Baptist Church before joining the KNCSB staff. Taylor will retire Dec. 31.
In addition, three Mission Service Corps volunteers were honored for their significant contributions to missions. MSC is the long-term volunteer program of the North American Mission Board.
Norbert and Sylvia Krieger were named national Mission Service Corps Volunteers of the Year. They live in Ericson, Neb., population 110, where Norbert is pastor of Sandhills Baptist Fellowship. The Kriegers are providing Wheeler County’s first resident pastoral presence in more than 40 years.
Jeff Shelton, meanwhile, a former Kansan now living in Gatlinburg, Tenn., was honored as the state convention’s Mission Service Corps Volunteer of the Year. Shelton’s late wife, Kelley, was a leader in Kansas-Nebraska Woman’s Missionary Union before the couple left for Gatlinburg in March 1999 to serve as Mission Service Corps volunteers with Smoky Mountain Resort Ministries.
Kelley died in May of injuries suffered in a canoe accident. She was 34. The KNCSB award was named the Kelley Shelton Memorial MSC Volunteer of the Year Award in her memory. Her husband was the first person to receive the award.
Messengers also adopted the 2000 KNCSB budget of $4,758,672. This is an increase of 8.3 percent above the 1999 budget.
The 2000 budget will include a 31.5 percent allocation to the national Cooperative Program, up from the 31.25 percent during the current year.
New officers also were elected. They are:
— President, Randy Caddell, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church, Garden City, Kan. He previously served as vice president.
— Vice president, Tony Lambert, pastor of Westside Church in Omaha, Neb. This was the only contested election, in which messengers chose Lambert over James Reynolds, pastor of the host church.
— Recording secretary, Bryan Jones, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church, Junction City, Kan., who was re-elected by acclamation.
— Assistant recording secretary, Dorothy Robbins, a member of Maranatha Baptist Fellowship, Topeka, Kan. Mari Jaquith, who previously held the position, was ineligible for re-election after being elected as associate KNCSB Woman’s Missionary Union director this year.
— Historian, Tony Mattia, pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Wamego, Kan., who was re-elected by acclamation.
Next year’s KNCSB annual meeting will be Oct. 16-17 at Metropolitan Baptist Church in Wichita, Kan. North Platte, Neb., will be the site of the 2001 meeting.
