https://cbfblog.com/2018/02/26/while-bg ... a-pastors/Looks like the BGAV will also stop forwarding receipts for CBF through the state convention.
It looks like the Illumination Project isn't going to please anybody. The governing board was soundly criticized by those who favored eliminating the hiring restrictions on LGBTQ persons altogether, claiming that they were being treated as second class citizens, and though most of them had supported CBF during a time when there was no compromise at all on the issue, now that there is one that moved in their direction, they've become rigid and intolerant, and churches are pulling their funding because they didn't get exactly what they wanted. The response from the more conservative side is that the compromise crossed a theological and spiritual line that they can't accept, so they are pulling their funding because they didn't get what they wanted.
The exec director has come out with some flowery-worded statements about being disappointed in the moves of the state conventions, but celebrating the fact that "beautiful cooperation" will continue with the churches. Except that many of those churches aren't going to go around their state convention to continue supporting CBF. If you think about it, many of those executive board members in those state conventions that made the decisions to stop being a pass-through for CBF are from the churches within their convention that support CBF.
CBF has spent a lot of time and effort on re-organizing and restructuring their leadership, consolidating the decision-making power in a governing board much smaller than the coordinating council used to be, and moving away from the consensus of the general assembly. We had a few discussions here about the push to change the hiring policy before, and the potential it had for being divisive. Does the will for unity exist? CBF has been on a very fragile financial footing for a decade, with declining revenues and dependence on the timing of a couple of major donors. I don't believe CBF can be sustained, at least, not anywhere near its current level, without the support of its more conservative wing. It probably could survive without its far left wing. I've never seen CBF's leadership do anything other than to accept the
fait accompli and then downsize to ensure at least some salaries of prominent leaders continue. If there was real confidence in this decision, then where are the governing board members and exec protesting what these state conventions are doing, and standing up for principles they claim are "prophetic"?
Or, is this the end of CBF?