A Brief History of BR-KC Baptist Association
The Association was formed in 1982 when messengers from the Blue River Baptist Association and the Kansas City Association voted to join forces for the Kingdom. Each of these two Associations had a long history of ministry with the Blue River Association dating to October 11, 1834. Some of the charter churches of that association are still members of BR-KC.
Dr. Melvin Hill, pastor at First Baptist Church, Grandview, was called as the first Executive Director of Missions for the new association. It was during his tenure that the current Mission Center building was erected at I-470 and Woods Chapel Road. The Mission Center has served as the offices for the staff since 1988. Shortly after completion of the building, Dr. Hill was diagnosed with cancer and passed away in 1989. Later that year the Mission Center was named The Melvin M. Hill Sr. Mission Center in his honor.
Dr. Donald Hammer was called to be the next Executive Director of the Association, but unforseen health problems caused him to have to resign the position after only six weeks of service.
Dr. Morton Rose became the third Executive Director after having served as Interim Director for two years preceding the calling of Dr. Hammer. It was under his leadership that the Association undertook a new paradigm of ministry. Prior to his administration, the work of the Association was largely driven by the program structure of the churches. Work was compartmentalized into Sunday School, Discipleship, Music, Youth, Deacons, Media Library, WMU, and other programs of the church. The Association staff divided these program areas up and each directed the work in their area.
Dr. Rose downsized the staff from four ministry directors to two Associate Directors of Missions and rewrote their job descriptions to reflect a consultative approach to ministry with the churches. The work of the Association changed from calendaring large events centered around the programs of the churches to the staff serving on-call to work with individual churches in meeting their ministry needs. With the exception of Sunday School leader training, most program area workshops were eliminated. This consultative model continues to this day. Each church in the Association is able to call on the staff or ministry teams for help in any area of ministry. The staff and ministry teams will resource the leaders needed to address the church’s need.
Dr. Nodell Dennis was called to the Executive Director position when Dr. Rose retired in 1995. Dr. Dennis came to us from San Antonio, Texas where he served as pastor. During his stay he was very active on the national level of convention life, serving as an officer and eventually as President of the Southern Baptist Convention Association of Directors of Missions. Dr. Dennis retired and moved back to Texas at the end of 2007.
In October of 2008, Dr. Rodney Hammer was called to be the fifth Executive Director of the Association. Before coming to BR-KC, Rodney served with the International Mission Board of Southern Baptists for 18 years, 10 in Asia, and 8 as Regional Leader for Central and Eastern Europe.
Dr. Hammer has led the Association to revision our ministry and reorganize our work. Assisting the Association staff now are five volunteer Ministry Teams made up of people who have a heart’s desire for local missions work. These teams are the result of over a year of strategic planning and “dreaming the dream” by pastors and other leaders in the Association. The teams are tasked with leading our ministry in the areas of Gospel Outreach, Resourcing Churches, Assisting Community Transformation, Church Planting and Equipping Leaders.
For 28 years the Blue River-Kansas City Baptist Association has been carrying forward the legacy of Baptist Associations of the last 300 years. We exist to provide opportunities for fellowship, leader training and combined missions ministries to and for our churches. Becoming a part of BR-KC is a commitment to be an active participant in this legacy. All of our churches are encouraged to give a portion of their undesignated receipts each month to the work of the Association, and to actively take part in the missions work available in this area. There is a place of service for anyone who wants to help.