In recent days, the leadership, character and integrity of our friend, Dr. Bob Reccord, has been the subject of controversy. The purpose of this letter is to express our support for Bob as a godly man of uncompromising integrity.

We love Bob as a friend, have had a chance to ask him questions about the events reported in the media, and have heard him share his heart. He has acted with integrity and character throughout his nine year tenure as NAMB's President and never more so than in these last tumultuous weeks. Where he has made misjudgments, he has freely acknowledged them and assumed responsibility. But these are mistakes of the head, not the heart—the kinds of misjudgments that innovative leaders make in an effort to accomplish things that have never been done before.

They by no means negate Bob's demonstrated commitment to lead with integrity nor the accomplishments we've seen under his leadership at NAMB.

Bob's visionary leadership, both as chairman of the task force that led the implementation of the restructuring of the Southern Baptist Convention and as President of NAMB, has re-energized many and resulted in significant new initiatives that will have a permanent impact on the face of North American missions. He led Southern Baptists into an unprecedented focus on reaching our large metropolitan areas, resulting in more than 320 healthy new church starts in strategic cities alone. His vision launched the Nehemiah church planting partnership with each of our SBC seminaries, training hundreds of new church planters to reach the most desperate areas of our continent. He provided the impetus for growing the World Changers program—high school students rehabilitating inner city homes—from a total of 9,000 ...