By Will Hall, Baptist Message executive editor
RICHMOND, Va. (LBM)—In a Feb. 3 press release, Paul Chitwood, president of the International Mission Board, celebrated “record-breaking offerings” and the appointment of 52 fully-funded missionaries.
Chitwood cited improved giving through the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering as well as the Cooperative Program as evidence that support for international missions is growing.
According to the imb.org statement, for the first four months of the current fiscal year:
— LMCO gifts are up 16.1 percent compared to the same timeframe last year.
— CP gifts are up almost 10 percent for the same referenced period.
— Overall, combined revenue from all sources is running 13.6 percent ahead of the previous year’s pace.
Despite the financial windfall, field missionary numbers continued to remain about the same as the 1985 tally of 3,597, although up from the nearly four decades low of 3,485 missionaries who were on board at the end of the first year of the pandemic.
In reply to an inquiry from the Baptist Message, Julie McGown, IMB’s assistant vice president for communications, shared that there were “3,507 fully funded IMB field personnel” at the end of January 2022.
Personnel numbers vary month-to-month. However, numbers have lulled since the departure of 983 missionaries from the field and 149 stateside personnel under David Platt, during 2015-16, when missionaries who were 50 years old with five years of experience were targeted for early exits while IMB was still commissioning new missionaries. Platt also closed the Richmond communications office of 30 writers and photographers.
Meanwhile, McGowan shared information indicating the Richmond support staff numbers had largely recovered from the losses under Platt. Prior to the large-scale field personnel reduction stateside support persons numbered about 450, according to a January 2016 statement by McGowan. In her recent reply to the Baptist Message she shared that the Richmond support staff numbered 436 at the end of January 2022.
