The 2021 launch of Destination Missions, a YouTube channel created by CBM to challenge and inform viewers about all things missions, has been a real adventure! Along the way, we have developed an even deeper appreciation for the vision of the Mission’s founder, Reverend Arthur Glen, who recognized the value of not only telling people about the great work of missions, but also showing them:

“The director of the Mission is able to tell of the work as to the individual needs and also the work in general when he is in deputation work to individual Churches and Missionary Conferences. He also shows pictures of the work and workers. We have over 800 feet of very good colored pictures which is used for this purpose…” (Rev. Arthur Glen, circa 1950)

Videos are no longer measured in feet but in minutes, so we should understand that Arthur Glen, first Executive Director of what is today Continental Baptist Missions, was offering to share a 24-minute video presentation—in the 1940’s and 50’s!

Four reels of those presentations are among the treasures in the CBM archives. We marvel at the thought that Mr. Glen owned and operated a 16mm movie camera during the days of the Depression, that he invested in purchasing and developing film, then spent hours filming, editing, and shipping film reels, and finally waiting weeks for the finished product—all because he valued the means of presenting the story of what God was doing through the missionaries he represented!

Seventy-plus years later CBM missionaries had to step into video-ministry in a big way as the coronavirus closed in-person services for a time. That experience has pushed us as an agency to be much more intentional about using available technology to tell the story of CBM. But as we do, we are mindful that we are not breaking new ground. We realize, in his own way, Arthur Glen was here before us.

Click here to watch more about CBM's unique history of Missions in Motion with CBM field director, Brad Hoff.