MOTELS SAY AREA EVENTS FILLED ROOMS

There are no rooms available at the inns in Cape Girardeau.

"We're sending people to Perryville and Sikeston for Sunday through Wednesday bookings," said Cathy Crites of the Convention and Visitors Bureau. "All rooms are booked here those nights because of the Missouri Baptist Convention, which starts here Monday."

Visitors to Cape Girardeau this weekend may also have problems finding a place to stay.

"We're full Friday and Saturday," said Pete Poe of Drury Inn. "A lot of people from the Steel Cure II earthquake exercise are here this weekend, we have a home college football game, and there's a Missouri Council of the Blind convention here."

A spokesman from Holiday Inn said that facility was also full Friday, but as of Thursday a couple of rooms were available for Saturday.

In addition to other events, four overnight tours have been booked into the city this weekend, said Crites. "The bus tour business has been good this month; we have had 40 tours in October, and 25 of them were overnight."

"I think every room in the county is booked Sunday through Wednesday," said Crites. "Bed-and-breakfast operations are full and we understand that all campsites at Trail of Tears are full."

A total of 790 motel rooms are in Cape Girardeau and Jackson. "That does not include bed-and-breakfast operations," said Crites.

The 158th annual Missouri Baptist Convention is expected to have as many as 3,000 people in attendance, said Crites.

The meeting is the convention's first in Cape Girardeau in 15 years. "We have needed to take the convention to Southeast Missouri for some time, but have not had adequate facilities," said Willard Zeiser, program coordinator for the MBC. "But the Show Me Center's seating capacity, expansive concourses and large parking lots will accommodate messengers comfortably now," he said.

Adoption of a $15.2 million budget for 1993 and election of officers will highlight the 158th annual meeting of the MBC, with all activities to be held at the Show Me Center.

The Monday session begins at 7 p.m. with a "Parade of Flags" and call to order. Tuesday and Wednesday sessions start at 8:30 a.m.

The convention will conclude at 7 p.m. Wednesday with a concert by Ken Medema of San Francisco, Calif., and a mass choir of about 150 youths from Southeast Missouri.

The concert is free and open to the public.

Convention keynote speakers include Donald Wideman, Gerald Davidson, Wallace Jones, A. Jack Green, Tillie Burgin, William O'Brien, and Vernon Armitage.

Wideman will speak at 7:40 p.m. Monday. He is executive director of Missouri Baptist Convention, serving since 1987. As executive director he oversees the work of the convention executive board staff and convention business activities. He was previously pastor of four Missouri Baptist churches.

Davidson will address the convention at 8:25 p.m. Monday. He is president of the convention and pastor of First Baptist Church in Arnold.

Jones will deliver the annual sermon at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday. He is pastor of Fee Fee Baptist Church in Bridgeton, Missouri's oldest Baptist church in continuous existence.

Green, executive director of South Texas Children's Home in Beeville, will speak at 4:10 p.m. Tuesday.

Burgin, minister of missions at First Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, will speak at 8:35 p.m. Tuesday.

O'Brien will speak to the group at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday. He is director of Global Strategies Center at Samford University in Birmingham, Ala.

Armitage, pastor of Pleasant Valley Baptist Church in Liberty, will speak at 4:10 p.m. Wednesday.

Convention messengers will also elect officers. Convention bylaws limit officers to one, one-year term.

Churches "cooperate with" or are "affiliated with" the Missouri Baptist Convention. The churches have not delegated authority to messengers they elect to attend the annual meeting; instead, a certain church's messengers may vote for a particular convention policy, but the church is not bound to observe it.

Each "cooperating church" is entitled to at least one messenger. It is entitled to one additional messenger for each 100 members. The limit is 15 messengers per church. People who are not messengers may also attend but cannot vote on business presented to the convention.

The churches in the convention are banded into 74 district-level associations throughout the state. Each association is independent of, but cooperates in, the work of the state convention. The state convention has no jurisdiction over the association.

In its annual meeting, the convention meets in a different part of the state each October to conduct its business. The 1993 convention will be in Joplin and the 1994 meeting will be in St. Louis.