Updated Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2008

Board names task force on senior adult ministry

By Norman Jameson

BR Editor

ASHEBORO - A special task force on senior adult ministry will be "limited only by our imagination," said Michael C. Blackwell, who worked with Baptist State Convention (BSC) staff to organize the group that will study ways North Carolina Baptists can minister to and with an aging population

The BSC Executive Committee approved a nine-member committee, to be chaired by Sandy Saunders, retired minister and member of Snyder Memorial Baptist Church in Fayetteville. Blackwell, an ex officio member and "advisor," brings the weight of Baptist Children's Homes history, staff, organization and experience to the task force.

"We want to be a part of pure and undefiled religion," Blackwell told the Executive Committee after Milton A. Hollifield Jr. announced the task force membership. "The implication of ministry to widows and orphans is incredible and the Baptists of North Carolina need to step up to that biblical mandate."

Hollifield reminded the Executive Committee members that Baptist Retirement Homes is continuing its ministry, "it just won't be funded through the Baptist State Convention, per the Convention's action" at the annual session in November.

"We are moving in a different direction in ministry in caring for senior adults," Hollifield said. "This is different from what Baptist Retirement Homes is doing." Both Hollifield and Blackwell emphasized that neither the task force, nor any ministry it may eventually recommend, will be in competition with Baptist Retirement Homes.

Because Baptist Children's Homes is "a part of the Baptist family, an institution very respected," and in which we have "great confidence and hope," Hollifield said he asked BCH to take the lead in working with a task force to help determine a "new direction" for a senior adult ministry that would "evolve over a period of time."

Blackwell said neither Baptist Children's Homes nor the task force is "starting anything."

"I'm just open to whatever the spirit directs," said Blackwell, president of BCH since 1983. "You're only limited by your imagination. You have to see what the task force brings to the table."

When it was noted that Baptist Retirement Homes had no representative on the task force, Blackwell said he could see organizations like BRH and CareNet being tapped for their expertise, "but I can't jump ahead and co-opt the task force."

"We're having to live with a new reality," said Blackwell, once a trustee at BRH. "We have best retirement homes system in the country. But there are also things we can be doing that are non-residential."

Since 1992 Baptist Children's Homes has been operating with a basic understanding that "the family is the client." Every child in care has family at some level, and often it is the grandmother who is responsible for the child. "So we are already dealing with aging adults," Blackwell said.

BRH representative Luther Osment participated in discussion about the task force in a social services committee meeting that followed.

"There is no doubt North Carolina already has the finest ministry to older adults in the nation," Osment said. "But there are many other needs for a range of services in addition to those being provided by BRH."

He likened the task to two ants eating an elephant: there is more work for each than they can accomplish.

The task force includes:

Saunders, chair; Marj Bennett, retired missionary and member of First Baptist Church, Burlington; Bobby Boyd, director of social services for Catawba County and member of Woodlawn Baptist Church in Conover; Brenda Gray, executive vice president for development at Baptist Children's Homes and member of Mills Home Baptist Church in Thomasville; Scott Eanes, pastor of Fairview Baptist Church in Statesville; Raymond Hamrick Jr., pastor of Mountain View Baptist Church in Maiden; Frank Hensley, senior adult minister at Green Street Baptist Church in High Point; Barbara Voorhees, retired director of senior adult day care and day house and a member of Morningside Baptist Church in Brevard; and Joan Mitchell, an attorney who is a member of the elder law section of the N.C. Bar Association, and who chaired the study committee on Baptist Retirement Homes in 2007. She is a member of Bethesda Baptist Church in Durham.

Ex-officio members include Blackwell, Hollifield, the Convention and Board of Directors officers and John Butler, Brian Davis and Teresa Jones from the BSC staff.