[1]LAS VEGAS, Nev. (BP)–The Nevada Baptist Convention held its 20th annual meeting Oct. 20-21 at Redrock Baptist Church in Las Vegas — the same church where the constituting sessions were held in 1978.
A total of 131 messengers and 50 visitors attended the anniversary meeting under the banner of “Find Us Faithful: Celebrating Twenty Years of NBC Ministry” and featuring a historical presentation of the convention’s first sessions 20 years earlier. Several former state convention staff members, messengers and denominational officials shared testimonies about their memories of being at the inaugural convention.
A resolution was adopted expressing appreciation to E.W. Hunke Jr., retired longtime staff member of the former Home Mission Board, for his new history book,
“Southern Baptists in the Intermountain West: A Fifty-Year History of Utah, Idaho, and Nevada Southern Baptists.”
In other business, messengers heard an explanation of a 21st Century Task Force Report presented by the convention’s executive board. This report included two proposed constitutional changes dealing with a change in the purpose statement and an increase in executive board members from 18 to 21.
A 1998 budget of $2,255,828 was approved, up from the current year’s budget of nearly $2.2 million. In Cooperative Program giving, $870,000 is anticipated from the state’s 213 churches and missions encompassing approximately 32,000 members. Of the CP budget, 27 percent will be forwarded to Southern Baptist Convention causes, a percent-of-budget increase of .25 percent from the previous year — an increase adopted by the convention the past several years.
New officers were elected by acclamation: president, Russ Daines, pastor of El Camino Baptist Church, Las Vegas; first vice president, Rene Houle, pastor of First Baptist Church, Minden; and second vice president, Eddie Hancock, pastor of Grass Valley Baptist Church, Winnemucca.
The convention’s 1999 meeting will be Oct. 19-20 at First Baptist Church, Sparks.
–30–