Missionary appointment services are always inspiring.

As I witnessed the International Mission Board ceremony at First Baptist Church in Jacksonville Sept. 16, I was moved by the missionaries’ powerful testimonies, recognizing that many of the 60 new missionaries are going to regions of the world where physical danger to those bearing the Gospel witness is not theoretical. In fact, one couple appointed is going to an area so dangerous they could not even publicly participate in the service.

Mac and Debbie Brunson and the entire First Baptist Church family were wonderful hosts for the service. Florida Baptists offered valuable leadership during the service, including John Sullivan, executive director-treasurer of the Florida Baptist Convention, and IMB trustee Richard Powell, pastor of McGregor Baptist Church in Fort Myers.

The appointment service took place only a few hours after the retirement announcement of IMB President Jerry Rankin. Coming merely one month after the forced resignation of North American Mission Board President Geoff Hammond, and in the midst of a monumental re-evaluation of how well Southern Baptists are doing to fulfill the Great Commission by the SBC-authorized Great Commission Resurgence Task Force, speculation about a merger of the IMB and NAMB has been heightened.

The concern among many Southern Baptists that greater resources need to be directed to the “end of the earth” (Acts. 1:8), fueled by the announcement earlier this year that the IMB is unable to send prospective missionaries ready and waiting to go because funds are lacking, has intensified calls for structural changes in our denomination to re-prioritize Southern Baptist missions funding.

The first public call for a new missions structure came this spring in response to the Great Commission Resurgence Declaration issued by SBC President Johnny Hunt and Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary President Danny Akin. The Declaration, which did not explicitly address a possible merger, ultimately resulted in approval of the GCR Task Force by the SBC in Louisville.

Tim Patterson, pastor of Hillcrest Baptist Church in Jacksonville and trustee chairman of NAMB, signed the GCR Declaration in his capacity as trustee chairman, telling Florida Baptist Witness when asked if he favored an IMB-NAMB merger that it was indeed time for Southern Baptists to have a “singular world mission agency,” stating publicly what many have talked about privately for some years.

Signing the declaration as NAMB chairman was “to make a personal statement that from my personal perspective as the chairman, I see the need for a Great Commission Resurgence.”

Explaining his decision to sign the GCR Declaration, Patterson said, “We duplicate properties, personnel and programs and thus are not good stewards.”

Because “North America is now just as much a foreign mission field as any other country or continent” with diverse people groups and cultures, Patterson said, “We need a singular world mission agency that does not lessen its emphasis on missions in North America or any other part of the world, but enhances it.”

Patterson added, “The way we structure, fund and administer our work is overly bureaucratic and bloated. If we combine our efforts and funding, we could be much more effective and become better stewards of God’s resources.”

Patterson later, along with the rest of NAMB’s trustees, approved a resolution affirming the “crucial” role of NAMB. Still, post-SBC talk about the merger has only continued.

In a July interview with the Witness, Hunt was unwilling to comment on the relative wisdom of such a merger, but said such a topic would be a good discussion for the task force he “would love to hear.”

Later, Hunt and GCR Task Force Chairman Ronnie Floyd, pastor of First Baptist Church in Springdale, Ark., confirmed the task force is considering a missions funding analysis undertaken by a Southeastern Seminary staffer on his own time which found that Southern Baptists spend 33 times as much to reach relatively Gospel-saturated North America than they do to reach the rest of the world. First reported by the Witness, some have seen the analysis as further evidence of the need for radical restructuring of Southern Baptist missions resources.

Now, in September, Jerry Rankin, 68, has announced his retirement slated for next July after 40 years of missions service. Without endorsing a merger, Floyd reacted to Rankin’s announcement by saying Southern Baptists were in the midst of a “God moment” with both mission board presidencies coming open, according to the Virginia Religious Herald newspaper.

Recognizing his announcement in the wake of the vacated leadership of NAMB would only increase speculation of an IMB-NAMB merger, Rankin addressed the matter head-on in a Sept. 17 telephone news conference.

Most interesting to me was Rankin’s utter rejection of a merger – because IMB and NAMB are too radically different entities to simply combine – but his clear openness to the creation of an entirely new “global mission board,” without explicitly endorsing such an entity “until I see how it actually is going to be designed and function.”

Rankin strongly endorsed the GCR movement as a “kairos [Greek for propitious moment for action] moment in which some significant changes in organization and structure and find tuning, vision and focus can come out of this….”

The 16-year leader of IMB was also careful to note the “trickledown effect. And ‘trickledown’ may be an understatement for the ramifications” on state conventions and associations of a new global mission entity. He also commended as valid everything the denomination does. “I can’t throw stones at any of it. It’s good.”

However, Rankin added, “But I think that it is imperative that we do examine the priority. … The question is, ‘Are we doing everything that we ought to be doing to fulfill God’s mission in reaching every nation, language and people with the Gospel?’ And when you look at the disproportionate use of resources, yes, I think some adjustments need to be made there.”

It’s impossible to predict what the GCR Task Force – whose deliberations are being held in private – may recommend relative to a new global mission entity, to say nothing of many other issues under its purview. It seems clear, however, there is momentum, perhaps like never before, for a possible new mission board entity.

The Task Force has requested prayers for its work (www.Pray4GCR.com). So far, more than 5,400 Southern Baptists have committed to intercede on behalf of this critically important body. The extraordinarily difficult assignment faced by the Task Force demonstrates how desperately these leaders need our supplications.

Indeed, as the motion which created the GCR Task Force urged, may the result of this effort help Southern Baptists to “more faithfully and effectively together” serve Christ “through the Great Commission.”