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RIDGECREST, N.C.—Accented by news of The Gospel Project Bible study curriculum’s early success, LifeWay Christian Resources trustees heard an encouraging report during their Aug. 27-28 meeting at Ridgecrest Conference Center as product sales in several categories and cost-savings measures improved the bottom line.
The positive forecast will allow for a 3.7 percent increase in next year’s operating budget of $509.5 million.
Noting economic challenges and methodological changes in churches, company President Thom Rainer said, “I have never been more challenged at LifeWay, and I’ve never been more optimistic.”
“For most of our history, LifeWay has been a print organization,” he said. “Now we’re moving rapidly into a time where digital is not just a transitional stage. It is the new reality. Digital resources are where our churches and individuals are and will be.”
Now in its third printing, Rainer said The Gospel Project serves as an example of meeting the needs of churches and individuals. With over 17,000 people downloading the preview material the summer, over 7,000 churches have ordered the three-year systematic curriculum. An estimated 500,000 people will be using the material by the end of the year, LifeWay reported.
Gospel Project general editor Ed Stetzer, a LifeWay vice president, told SBC messengers last June that it answered a request for “something that goes more in depth in theology” while staying within “the parameters of the Baptist Faith & Message.”
“We’re not going to stop with The Gospel Project,” Rainer told trustees. “We’re planning other curriculum launches and re-launches. We’re not going to be satisfied until we’ve brought curricula to the bride of Christ that is deeper and more relevant to churches and individuals.”
Church Resources Division Vice President Eric Geiger told trustees of changes that will occur in two popular curricula as well. With the relaunch of current offerings over the next two years, Geiger said church leaders who prefer different starting points will be able to choose from lines that focus on theology via The Gospel Project, life application with Bible Studies for Life and the text with Explore the Bible.
While all three options will contain the key elements of theology, life application and text, LifeWay is also piloting a customized line described at discipleshipincontext.com to help churches align curriculum with what’s being taught from the pulpit.
GLORIETA STUDY
Rainer spoke briefly of the challenges remaining at Glorieta Conference Center.
“The decision last year to find another owner for Glorieta was very hard,” he said. “We thought we’d found a potential buyer, but there are some questions to be answered theologically.”
He told the TEXAN that LifeWay and prospective buyer Olivet University had agreed on asking the National Association of Evangelicals to serve as a third party to review the theological compatibility of the two entities. Currently, Olivet is renting previously unused facilities at Glorieta for 200 students, faculty and staff.
Concerns were raised about Olivet’s relationships and theology, particularly its association with The Christian Post, an Internet news site which has been criticized by some Southern Baptists and Olivet’s founder, David Jang, who has been accused of teaching beliefs contrary to the gospel. (A Baptist Press article, dated Aug. 17, details the concerns.)
Conversely, Ridgecrest Conference Center is enjoying record occupancy at camps with a waiting list for some age groups reserving space next summer. The 1,300-acre North Carolina campus was the only Christian conference center named among the 15 top properties receiving the 2011 Praise Award from the Religious Conference Manager Association.
B&H PUBLISHING
Rainer said he is encouraged with “the incredible turnaround of B&H Publishing Group, which was once an afterthought but is now a strategic part of our organization”; with LifeWay Research where “pastors can find out what is taking place in churches and the culture”; and, with acquisitions like WordSearch, Student Life and Auxano consulting.
“Our reward is not financial though,” Rainer said. “Our reward is seeing what God is doing in churches and individuals through our resources. It is exciting to wake up every morning and see how LifeWay resources are impacting the bride of Christ.”
ACQUISITION OF STUDENT LIFE CAMP
LifeWay’s recent acquisition of the Birmingham-based StudentLife, as well as earlier receipt of World Changers and Power Plant from the North American Mission Board, and continued offering of Centrifuge and M-fuge camps, brings their scope of influence to over 130,000 students.
LifeWay’s management of World Changers and Power Plant will eliminate redundancies while increasing efficiencies and economies of scale in the areas of registration, marketing, summer staff recruiting and warehousing of materials, according to a NAMB release.
Many of the World Changers and nearly all of the PowerPlant projects next year will be in NAMB’s Send North America cities including New York City, Indianapolis, Chicago and San Francisco.
SUBSIDIARY FOR CHINA
Trustees addressed a number of business issues during the meeting, including approval of a for-profit subsidiary “to facilitate ministry operations in the country of China.” The new company, to be called LifeWay Global Inc., will help “make Bibles, Bible study materials, training and other expertise available to churches and Christians in China,” according to background information given to trustees.
LifeWay Chief Financial Officer Jerry Rhyne explained that creation of a for-profit subsidiary is necessary because China is not granting registration for not-for-profit companies.
In response to a question from Texas trustee Kenneth Carter, associate pastor of Southcrest Baptist Church in Lubbock, Rhyne assured trustees “dividends from a for-profit company will not jeopardize LifeWay’s tax-exempt status. In fact, it will help safeguard our nonprofit status.”
Creation of subsidiary companies of SBC entities requires approval of the Southern Baptist Convention or the SBC Executive Committee so the issue will be referred to the Executive Committee.
SBC MOTION ON 2011 NIV
LifeWay trustees passed a motion declining to reopen a study of whether to sell the 2011 NIV Bible translation in its LifeWay Christian Stores, over the objections of two trustees—Lynn Snider, director of missions for South Texas Baptist Association in Spring, and Dale Clayton, associate director of athletics at Carson Newman College in Morristown, Tenn.
The action was in response to a motion from Tim Overton of Halteman Village Baptist Church in Muncie, Ind., referred by the 2012 Southern Baptist Convention, requesting that LifeWay reconsider its decision last February to continue selling the updated 2011 NIV translation.
Board chairman Adam Greenway, who chaired the special task force that studied the request, reiterated to trustees what he shared in the spring. “Our decision to make the 2011 NIV available for purchase at these retail outlets does not constitute an endorsement of the 2011 NIV. We endorse what we publish and the translation we publish is the Holman Christian Standard Bible. It does not mean, however, we should not carry the 2011 NIV.”
Greenway described Overton’s motion as a request that “we perhaps expand our horizons,” adding that “perhaps unintentionally the maker of the motion thought we didn’t do due diligence.”
Speaking for the task force, Greenway insisted, “I can assure you we did do due diligence. We heard from voices that would have been very much against us selling the 2011 NIV and those very much in favor of selling the 2011 NIV. No attempt was made to exclude or not consider any relevant or pertinent information to help us, as a board of trustees, do our due diligence in making decisions about products we carry at our retail chain,” he added.
The motion takes issue with public criticism of the 2011 edition, noting, “The translation does not use gender-neutral wording for the names of God and contains no gender changes with respect to God’s name.” With some biblical scholars affirming the translation methodologies used in producing the newer NIV, the motion added that even some who do not prefer that translation agreed LifeWay should provide it as a choice to customers.
Through passage of the motion by a 51-2 margin, the board reaffirmed the earlier decision to “carry the translation alongside other versions of the Bible, while endorsing only the HCSB as our translation of choice.”
Snider told the TEXAN he did not agree with the gender-neutral approach of the NIV translation, a perspective shared by Houston Baptist University English professor Louis Markos, who described gender-neutral language as an “enforced agenda” in an article for the spring 2012 Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.
“I didn’t agree with it then,” Snider said in reference to the earlier vote, adding that he intended to cast a negative vote but may have failed to do so since that February vote has been recorded as unanimous in allowing the sale of the 2011 NIV in LifeWay stores. When the chance arose to cast a stand-up vote opposing reaffirmation of the decision, both Snider and Clayton stood at the August meeting.
“I don’t think LifeWay ought to be selling Bibles that aren’t as close to the original autographs as we can get them, though it’s obviously politically correct.”
—Marty King is director of communications for LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention. Tammi Reed Ledbetter is news editor for the TEXAN.
