By Will Hall, Baptist Message executive editor VANCOUVER, Wash. (LBM) – Executive directors representing five Western state conventions and a Midwestern one have written a passionate letter, Aug. 12, 2020, addressed to Kevin Ezell, president of the North American Mission Board, and his trustees, as well as the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee and its president, Ronnie Floyd, repudiating what they describe as a lack of partnership in the new “Strategic Cooperative Agreement” that NAMB presented to “non-South Baptist state conventions, dated June 26-30, 2020.” The six leaders include Randy Adams (Northwest Baptist Convention), Bill Agee (California Southern Baptist Convention), Joe Bunce (Baptist Convention of New Mexico), Randy Covington (Alaska Baptist Resource Network), Jack Kwok (State Convention of Baptists in Ohio) and Chris Martin (Hawaii-Pacific Baptist Convention). Saying “we work most effectively when working in collaboration and harmony, especially in our non-South states where the local context and cultures of our mission fields can vary so significantly,” they described NAMB as becoming increasingly centralized and unilateral in its strategies and relationships with state conventions, adding … [Read more...]