Yes. NAMB invested more than $17 million in 2020 through state convention partners. For the last 10 years, under the guidance of our Board of Trustees, NAMB has been more strategic with the funding we send to state conventions. We are grateful to our South state convention partners who helped us transition millions more dollars to areas outside the South where Southern Baptists resources are scarce.
At the same time, we believe churches plant churches, and we are shifting more of our funding for church plants to go through Sending Churches, where oversight and involvement can be more direct. This means that funding for church plants, which once passed through a state convention, now goes directly through a new church plant’s Sending Church.
In addition, beginning in 2021, NAMB is asking state partners outside the South to provide a strategy for evangelism funds before we provide funding. The same amount of evangelism funding will still be available for approved expenditures.
Because NAMB wants its resources focused on evangelism and church planting, we are also asking state conventions that are more than 30-years-old to cover their own administrative costs starting in 2022.