Mission Mid-Atlantic Identity Document Process Announced!

The Mission Mid-Atlantic Board sent out a survey to our pastors earlier this year.  One recurring theme was present in the responses and that was our identity. Our identity has been the elephant in the room for many years, especially following the collapse of the effort to unite our three sister organizations, CBAmerica, WorldVenture, and Missions Door.

We began to address our identity several years ago when we made the shift in name from MACBA (Mid-Atlantic Conservative Baptist Association) to Mission Mid-Atlantic. We retain the name MACBA for corporate purposes and continue to align ourselves in covenant relationship with the seven other CB regions through CBAmerica.  Now we need to do the hard work of defining who we are as a region so that we can identify those things that bring us together. 

During their February meeting, the Board agreed to create an Identity Document that will address the relational aspect of our identity. CB Northwest implemented this process a number of years ago and has agreed to assist us in this process.  The Identity Document will contain four key components: Covenant, Doctrine, Polity and Philosophy. We have already completed drafting the first two components of the document based upon our current covenant and doctrinal statements. To set the stage for future growth and expansion of Mission Mid-Atlantic, we have initiated the process to complete the final two components of the Identity Document, Polity and Philosophy.

Once the Mission Mid-Atlantic Board creates the first draft, the Identity Document will be critiqued in focus meetings throughout the region where members will share their comments, questions, insights, and fixes. This critique will lead to a second draft by the Board. We will then engage in the second critique of the document following the same structure. The second critique will lead to development of the final draft. The final draft of our Identity Document will be presented at our 2013 Annual Conference next April. During that conference, our churches will have the opportunity to vote to approve the Identity Document provisionally for one year with a view to adopting it in 2014. 

This process is critical for our region because we must find a way to relate to one another in the covenant relationship that we affirm each year through the Mission Mid-Atlantic Covenant. We have not yet realized how to live in community with one another, but we believe that creating this identity document will begin to move us to live out what we affirm in our covenant.

Your prayer and participation are appreciated as this document is crafted. We believe this process will lead us to establish deeper covenant relationships in Christ.

~ Jim