ABILENE—Texas Baptists’ Executive Director Julio Guarneri previewed his new GC2 Strong plan, fielded questions and received a unanimous vote to affirm the initiative he brought to the Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board at the close of his May 19 address.

While Jesus and the gospel do not change, in a changing world, “our approach to ministry sometimes needs to change,” Guarneri said.

Assumptions about how conventions operate may need to be questioned, along with the idea that conventions do “missions on behalf of the church,” when missions should be church-driven.

“Conventions should facilitate churches, but not do it for them,” Guarneri asserted.

Assumptions that churches have uniform programming also may need to be challenged. Conventions may be looked to for mentor/practitioners more than as experts.

So conventions may need to shift, providing customized resources and support to individual churches, in contrast to the “plug-and-play” model of the past.

Guarneri said Texas Baptists are building on the Pastor Strong Initiative piloted in San Antonio by beginning cohorts in College Station, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth to invest in the lives of pastors and encourage them. The expectation is the pastors will be transformed and in turn, so will their churches.

New GC2 initiative introduced

In addition to these expanded cohorts, Texas Baptists are in “the process of developing and launching something we’re calling GC2 Strong,” Guarneri said. The initiative will be led by Guarneri, Associate Executive Director Craig Christina, Treasurer and CFO Ward Hayes, and Sergio Ramos, director of the GC2 network.

GC2 Strong will have three areas of focus: churches, leaders and missions. Convention leaders want to see “multiplying churches.”

Currently, 85 percent to 90 percent of Texas Baptists churches are plateaued or declining, but to reach Texas for Christ, churches need to be revitalized—church strong, Guarneri said.

“We want to focus on leaders, develop ministers, connect them so that they can be encouraged. We want to be leader strong,” he said.

Convention leaders also want the BGCT to be mission strong and “our churches getting involved in local missions, partnering with others,” he said.

A GC2 church is a church that loves God, loves their neighbors and is making disciples. GC2 was originated by David Hardage, past executive director of Texas Baptists, as a “missional mindset,” Guarneri said.

The Great Commandment found in Matthew 22:37-38 and the Great Commission found in Matthew 28:19 fuel the new strategy for GC2—to love God, love neighbors and make disciples.

Guarneri explained GC2 has been understood as applying to churches outside of Texas who cooperate with the BGCT, but “we don’t want to have two categories of churches. We want to have one category of churches,” whether in Texas or beyond.

One component of GC2 Strong will be an assessment, or “discovery process,” of walking alongside churches to help them discover where they are in the “process of being a Great Commandment, Great Commission church” and customizing support to help them move to the next level.

A small group of churches will comprise the first group of GC2 Strong churches, who want to take on the commitment to go through the process, while “we continue to have a big family of Texas Baptists churches.”

“Hopefully, it’ll be the kind of thing that other churches get excited about and want to be a part of in the future,” Guarneri said.

Action items

Guarneri asked the BGCT Executive Board to take up two action items related to the new GC2 Strong initiative: to promote Texas Cooperative Program giving in the churches where they serve and to pray.

The BGCT staff plans to develop a resource to help Texas Baptist churches join in a season of prayer next spring, initiated by the Baptist World Alliance.

Texas Baptists will join the global Baptist family in prayer from Easter Sunday to Pentecost Sunday in 2026—praying for God to move as he did in the first century and “to help us reach the nations in our state and around the world,” Guarneri said. “So, be looking for that resource.”

In a time for questions, Guarneri addressed when GC2 Strong will begin, noting he hopes to roll it out at the BGCT annual meeting in Abilene in November.

He fielded several other questions, clarified GC2 Strong churches would have no special status within the convention, and noted the initiative is still under development.

ABILENE—The Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board at its May 19-20 meeting advanced its efforts to provide affordable property and liability insurance coverage for Texas Baptist churches.

At the Executive Board’s meeting on the campus of Hardin-Simmons University, BGCT Associate Executive Director Craig Christina announced the Texas Baptists Indemnity Program hopes to begin allowing the first round of churches to apply for a quote for coverage later this summer.

Within the next 10 days, leaders of the program will have completed the process of applying for a certificate of authority with the Texas Department of Insurance, Christina said, and they anticipate receiving approval within 30 days.

Once the insurance program is operational, churches will contract with Texas Baptists Risk Management—a separate nonprofit corporation—to receive coverage through the Texas Baptists Indemnity Program.

Christina explained legal experts advised Texas Baptists to create the two nonprofit entities separate from the BGCT to provide “layers of separation to protect” the state convention.

After major insurance carriers left the Texas market, many churches reported either being unable to renew their policies or had to absorb steep premium and deductible increases.

So, the BGCT conducted a feasibility study last year to explore forming a captive insurance pool for participating churches—a practice already adopted by some school districts and nonprofit organizations.

In response to previous action by the Executive Board last September and a motion approved at the BGCT annual meeting in November, the board in February authorized investing up to $12 million from the convention’s undesignated investment fund in Texas Baptists’ insurance program to fund the necessary insurance reserve.

Begin with churches in the feasibility study

After the certificates of authority are received from the Texas Department of Insurance and other requirements are met, the 241 churches that completed the feasibility study that led to the insurance program’s creation will be the first eligible to apply for a quote for coverage, Christina said.

As soon as possible, the Texas Baptists Indemnity Program wants to expand to receive applications from any church that gives or sets a goal to give at least 1 percent of its undesignated receipts to Texas Baptists’ Cooperative Program.

The Texas Baptists Indemnity Program plans to offer Texas Baptist churches property coverage for facilities, auto insurance and workers’ compensation.

In addition to general liability coverage, the program also plans to offer professional liability insurance to protect ministers from lawsuits, directors and officers liability insurance for lay leaders in their church roles, sexual abuse coverage to reduce risks and help churches with proper responses, and cyber liability insurance to protect against security breaches or data theft.

At its May 19-20 meeting, the Executive Board granted authorization to secure a letter of credit from Inwood National Bank for the capitalization of the Texas Baptists Indemnity Program. Legal requirements demand capitalization of at least 25 percent of the first year’s premiums.

The board also voted to approve ex-officio positions for the Texas Baptists Risk Management nonprofit corporation—the BGCT associate executive director as president and chairman of the board and the BGCT chief financial officer as treasurer and board secretary.

The Executive Board also appointed Keith Warren, executive pastor of Northside Baptist Church in Weatherford as vice president and vice chair of the board of Texas Baptists Risk Management.

Christina reported both he and BGCT CFO Ward Hayes have been certified as risk managers by the State of Texas. In addition, Christina said, he has passed the examinations to become a licensed property and casualty insurance agent.

New relationship with DBU

In other business, the Executive Board approved a recommendation from its Institutional Relations Committee that would allow Dallas Baptist University to relate to the BGCT through a special agreement, pending approval by messengers to the BGCT annual meeting in November.

The new relationship agreement reduces the proportion of trustees directly elected by the BGCT to 25 percent. However, it continues to require 51 percent of the board to be members of BGCT-affiliated churches. The new agreement still requires 100 percent of the trustees to be Baptists.

“Although this reflects a change from the current 51 percent elected by the BGCT, it strengthens DBU’s ability to respond more effectively to external pressures and regulatory changes, while preserving our Baptist identity and shared mission,” DBU President Adam Wright and a group of university trustees wrote in a letter to Texas Baptists sent after the board vote.

“Please know this decision is not a departure from our support of Texas Baptists. On the contrary, we believe this adjustment will strengthen our longstanding partnership and allow DBU to thrive as a Christ-centered institution committed to academic excellence and gospel advancement.”

The letter closes with the “hope and prayer that DBU and Texas Baptists will continue to labor together in the work of the kingdom for many years to come.”

If approved by messengers to the BGCT annual meeting in Abilene, DBU will join Baylor and Houston Christian University as educational institutions relating to Texas Baptists through a special agreement.

Other educational institutions related to the BGCT are considered “affiliated” institutions, meaning at least a simple majority of their governing board is elected by messengers to the BGCT annual meeting.

In other business, the board approved:

• A recommendation to adopt restated articles of incorporation for STCH Ministries to align language in the document with the requirements of the BGCT constitution and bylaws.
• Revised policy statements for BGCT staff regarding retirement eligibility, information technology and services usage.
• A revised policy change for the Hispanic Education Initiative Council.

The board also met in executive session to discuss a personnel matter.

The Paradigm college ministry at First Baptist Church in Stephenville has seen tremendous growth this year. A story featuring pastoral staff perspectives on the ministry can be read here. How do Tarleton students describe the impact of the ministry?

Ella Murray is a senior at Tarleton, set to graduate in December with a degree to teach special education. She has served as a challenge group leader—small discipleship groups for college students that take place around the Tarleton campus and Stephenville—for a couple of years, and she works in the children’s ministry at First Stephenville.

Murray grew up in Stonegate Church in Midland and attended a private Christian high school. However, she didn’t always feel like she understood all that Christianity was or could be before she went to college and a friend invited her to a Paradigm service.

The ministry has helped her to grow in her faith and specifically has helped her understand how to study the Bible effectively, she said.

Murray’s first visit to the Paradigm worship service showed her what worship can be like when everyone who is there is intentional about worship, serious about knowing Jesus and really wants to be there.

She was anxious to become more involved with a ministry like that, she explained.

Becoming involved with Paradigm and First Baptist Stephenville changed her life, Murray asserted.

“I don’t think my life would look the way it does now,” she said, if she hadn’t “gotten plugged in” to Paradigm and First Baptist Stephenville.

She expected to go to college “and party and have all this freedom,” but she’s grateful for God’s compassion in showing her a different path, she said.

Murray believes finding her place in Paradigm hasn’t just changed her time in college, but the overall trajectory of her life.

Murray expects to make disability inclusion in the life of the church a big part of her future. She sees it as a “certain call” now that she “didn’t have before this.”

Catalyst for growth

 She also noted she’s learned to be more intentional about seeing opportunities to share her faith with the people she meets. She doesn’t miss a chance to tell someone she bumps into about Jesus.

The “immense growth” the ministry has seen this year has been notable, she said.

She’s thought about what might have been the catalyst for the extreme growth, and she believes Drake Wayland stepping into the college minster role at First Baptist Stephenville after a period of time without a dedicated college leader has been a key element, she said.

He had vision to focus on sharing Christ with others and “he’s passing that on to us.” She noted, “you can tell it’s not coming from a place of pride,” but a sense of assurance that “God is going to do this through the ministry.”

“It’s just been so cool and exciting,” to see the vision spread and the ministry grow, she noted. “I’ve just never seen anything like it.”

God is moving

Luke Torbert is a sophomore who also has been serving as a challenge group leader this year. He grew up in a Baptist church in Crawford, but he said college is where he began to get more serious about his faith.

He remembers asking God to give him a purpose in college, and “for the rest of my life.” He sees leading a challenge group for freshmen this year as “that purpose being fulfilled.”

“God has just been moving on the campus,” he said. The Paradigm worship service has grown so much it’s had to move out of the Paradigm building where it had been housed and into the worship center at First Baptist Stephenville to accommodate all the students, Torbert noted.

And he personally had several opportunities to have gospel conversations with students this year. He said even people who have no church background at all are demonstrating an openness to Jesus and a “willingness to go all in.”

Torbert said it’s been neat to see the relationship between the older people in the church and Paradigm.

Some adults from the congregation come to Bible study in the Paradigm building with the college students on Sunday mornings. He said he’s never seen that before and he appreciates the wisdom they bring.

The Paradigm ministry at First Baptist Stephenville has made a huge difference in his life, Torbert said. He learned how to lead his brother to Christ, something he noted he didn’t think he ever would have done without the training he received from Paradigm.

He’s also learned how to build discipleship relationships with new believers and “help them in their new walk,” Torbert explained. The new believers’ faith and Torbert’s faith continue to grow through those connections.

Redefining the college experience for a campus

First Baptist Stephenville has become “the place to be on a Sunday morning,” so he has plenty of opportunities to keep building relationships with other dedicated disciples of Jesus.

“I think Paradigm has redefined the college experience,” Torbert said.

People think college is “getting drunk and doing all the drugs and doing all the things,” but Paradigm, “for Tarleton, is turning that culture around.”

“It’s noticeable,” Torbert asserted. Spiritual conversations can be heard all around the campus. Students are wearingshirts with Christian messages. Students are reading the Bible.

“We’re just flipping that culture of, you know, doing all the things that are supposed to be fun” and life-giving and trading them for “what does God say about life?”

And both students are grateful they got to be a part of that at Tarleton this year.

This past school year, the college ministry of First Baptist Church in Stephenville has hosted 400 to 700 Tarleton State University students each Thursday for its Paradigm worship service.

The ministry also has seen more than 136 students make professions of faith.

Students and staff involved in Paradigm college ministry are thrilled to see so many students get serious about faith, said Ken May, senior pastor, and Drake Wayland, minister to college.

Paradigm has been part of First Baptist Stephenville since 2006, when the late Jon Randles who originated the model, helped start a Paradigm ministry at the church. Randles launched Paradigm at Texas Tech in Lubbock and worked in evangelism for the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

Randles discipled a minister at First Baptist Stephenville, who discipled another minister and so on, down to the present college minister, Wayland, May explained.

“It’s just been an incredible pipeline of leadership,” he said. The ministry long has experienced year-over-year growth, but this year has seen “more growth than ever,” he noted.

Wayland said the jump in growth began with the fall 2024 semester.

How Challenge groups work

Twenty-six challenge groups—smaller-group discipleship cohorts—have been meeting weekly on Tuesdays and Wednesdays around Stephenville this year, discipling more than 300 Tarleton students.

Some of the student-led challenge groups are comprised of freshmen. These groups meet on the Tarleton campus and minister to more than 100 faithful, first-year students.

Upperclassmen challenge groups often are held in host homes of church members. Group leaders are selected from Tarleton students who are members of First Stephenville and who were faithfully committed to a challenge group the preceding year.

Leading a challenge group is a yearlong (school year) commitment, and the leaders must apply and pass several weeks of interviews and vetting.

Leaders of the next year’s groups are selected before summer break, May and Wayland explained.

In addition to challenge group leaders, service groups also are formed to help setup for events, help with security or other more task-oriented service.

All the leaders and staff help move students into dorms in the fall and invite new students to attend Paradigm worship and join a challenge group.

Challenge group leaders who show exceptional leadership may move into a leader-to-leader position. These students are responsible for helping Wayland and his college ministry associate disciple and train the challenge group leaders and help them prepare each week’s discussion.

Some students who have been involved in challenge groups since freshman year join the church staff in their senior year as ministers-in-training—interns with a stipend.

“And then we’ve had probably a dozen of them head on to seminary or to some ministry,” May noted.

He explained the congregation has established a relationship with a church in Fort Worth to help it begin a Paradigm ministry for students at Texas Christian University and other college campuses in Fort Worth.

Wayland said he and his staff and Tarleton BSM director Megan Trotter and her staff have been praying together all year on Thursdays, since Trotter reached out about establishing a cooperative prayer time.

Wayland said they pray for each other and for the Tarleton “campus to be reached for Jesus.” But, he noted, while the BSM is campus-based, Paradigm is church-based “to connect every college student to a local church, so they don’t just have faith in college, but they can be trained up and have faith for a lifetime.”

What makes Paradigm unique

“We don’t want to just put on a worship service,” Wayland said, which he noted is different from a lot of growing college ministries garnering attention recently that are strictly campus-based.

They “do the worship service,” at First Baptist Stephenville, Wayland pointed out, but the student-led discipleship groups that intentionally drive students to the local church and intend to “train-up” the students into mature, life-long disciples, set the ministry apart.

“Because not only do we have the ministry and the funding and all that stuff to support the students, but we have the people to support them as well—the church—that will do everything they can to lift up these students,” Wayland said.

He pointed out the congregation’s investment in college students affects not just the campus but the community because of how big a part of Stephenville the university is.

The posture the congregation has taken of being “deeply committed” disciples who make disciples has helped to reduce frustrations in the greater community about the changes that come with Tarleton’s growth, Wayland noted.

Quite a few of the college students involved in Paradigm also are serving in children’s ministry, youth ministry or on the worship team at the church, May noted, “so it’s been neat to see the college kids really integrate into the church and not just attend Paradigm or hang out with just college students.”

Wayland and May agreed that real life is “intergenerational or multigenerational,” and appreciate the way the Paradigm model is a move away from the “affinity groups” that often have characterized church plants in recent years, back toward a multigenerational church setting.

Tarleton is expecting an enrollment of 20,000 next year, May said the university president had informed him. And Stephenville also is growing. Some students are choosing to remain in town at First Baptist Stephenville after they graduate.

But the ministry also has seen many of its alumni go out from Stephenville to build “co-missions” in partnership with churches near colleges lacking a strong Christian presence or a Baptist, Bible-based college ministry on campus, May and Wayland explained.

These “co-missions” are a network of Paradigm-like ministries who work with established churches, or sometimes church plants, but they are not part of First Baptist Stephenville.

They are new ministries established by leaders, “about a dozen guys,” May said, who were discipled and provided discipleship to others through First Baptist Stephenville’s Paradigm ministry. The co-missions are in Texas and in other parts of the country, including Bowling Green, Ky., and Washington, D.C.

“It’s just churches starting churches,” he noted, “which is what Baptists have always done,” May said, and with First Stephenville serving in the role of “sending church,” Wayland clarified.

A full-circle answer to prayer

Wayland noted when the Paradigm ministry was established in 2006, its founders prayed for it to flourish and grow. The incoming freshman last year were born in 2006, so he sees the growth this year as a “full-circle moment,” and as an answer to the 2006 prayers.

The vision for the year was to see 1,000 gospel conversations and see 100 students saved, May and Wayland said. The ministry has recorded more than 800 gospel conversations this year, resulting in 136 decisions for Christ.

Wayland said, “It’s been incredible to watch.” He explained how Paradigm and First Stephenville had been transformative in his own life when he was a student at Tarleton.

He felt called into ministry through all of this, he said, and he “didn’t want a single student” to walk across the campus of Tarleton and “not know who Jesus is and how they need to follow him for a lifetime.”

The Dallas Cup Hospitality Center in mid-April received more than 2,000 visits from youth soccer players and coaches from around the world.

It also presented the opportunity for those athletes and their families to see Christians working together for a common goal as volunteers from local churches provided meals and engaged in conversations through an outreach sponsored by the Dallas Baptist Association.

“The nations came to us, and I am proud that our denomination was ready to meet their physical and spiritual needs,” said volunteer Joy Mooneyham of Rockwall. “It was a blessing to be a small part of that.

“My favorite part of this event was getting to be the hands and feet of Jesus. Serving with this team was like getting to take an international mission trip without ever leaving DFW.”

Several local churches covered shifts and provided volunteers to be onsite throughout the week at the hospitality center, including First Baptist Church in Richardson, First Baptist Church in Rockwall, Hillcrest in Español in Cedar Hill and North Irving Baptist Church.

“We typically have about 75 church volunteers that are utilized throughout the week, just serving at the center,” said Chelsi Hoard, who serves the director of strategy for the Dallas Baptist Association.

“We have eight different shifts, and different churches will take the lead on each shift. We also have a countless number of volunteers at local churches that help prepare meals, donate Bibles, give and specifically pray for this event.”

‘Volunteers represented Christ well’

The outreach event could not have happened without local church volunteers,” she said.

“Volunteers prepare and serve meals, greet teams, set up chairs, clean tables, take out trash, sweep, mop, mix Gatorade and lemonade, refill ice chests, pick up and sort the many Uno cards, checkers, pickleballs and Connect Four pieces that are used, make coffee for the coaches, help with chapel services, go on grocery runs and wash dishes,” Hoard said.

“Most importantly, our volunteers represent Christ well. They create a welcoming environment and connect with the teams that walk through the doors of the center.”

As a result, 375 decisions were made to follow Christ, and 500 Bibles were given out.

“From watching friendships form amongst athletes from different countries over a game of Giant Jenga, teams running to greet familiar volunteers, to someone excitedly looking through a new Bible, there are so many great moments that happen at the hospitality center,” Hoard said.

“One of my favorite things is watching churches come together to tangibly demonstrate the love of Christ to people from so many nations and then seeing these teams experience that love, some for the very first time.

“All throughout the week we hear comments about how the churches are so welcoming, kind, generous and loving. It is so great to watch people from so many nations experience God’s love in this way.”

Seeing God at work

Hoard noted one of the most exciting things during the soccer outreach was seeing how God was at work throughout the week and continuing to make connections with athletes they met last year.

“All throughout the week, we have the privilege of seeing God move, as people make faith decisions, pray together, attend chapel with our chaplain, develop cross-cultural friendships, receive and read Bibles,” Hoard said.

A few returning athletes who had received a copy of the Scriptures from volunteers the previous year returned to say they read the entire Bible, she added.

“We also get to see glimpses of God’s goodness and provision as we start to run out of a specific item during a shift and then see that the previous shift had left just enough extra behind,” she noted.

On some occasions, a volunteer who had been to a specific country was serving “right when a specific country’s team comes through and they are able to talk and connect,” Hoard said.

Other times, the volunteers had “the exact number of chicken sandwiches left for a group that came in at the last minute,” she noted.

“In big and seemingly small ways, God continues to bless.”

Volunteers greatly enjoyed participating in the outreach and look forward to future opportunities to serve at events like this one.

“The gospel was clearly presented to all who would hear, and we were able to show the love of Christ to each person who came through the line,” Mooneyham said.

“We were able to do the hands-on work and provide hospitality and smiles so that others could effectively and boldly present the gospel in the heart language of the players.”

The Texas Senate unanimously approved a bill to abolish the Texas Lottery Commission and move administration of the state lottery to a different state agency.

The Senate voted 31-0 in favor of SB 3070. The bill would dissolve the Texas Lottery Commission and transfer oversight of the lottery—as well as charitable bingo—to the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation. It also establishes a lottery advisory committee.

Sen. Bob Hall, R-Edgewood, author of SB 3070, previously had introduced legislation to do away with the state lottery altogether. In presenting SB 3070 in a Senate Committee on State Affairs hearing on May 13, Hall called the current bill “the next best thing.”

The measure places limits on the number of lottery tickets a retailer may sell to one individual in a single transaction and limits the number of lottery terminals any given licensed retailer can have.

It also encompasses provisions of SB 28, a bill Hall introduced early in the legislative session. That bill bans lottery couriers—third-party vendors who enable buyers to purchase lottery tickets through their websites or mobile apps. The Senate unanimously passed SB 28 in February.

Bill moves to Texas House

The measure to abolish the Texas Lottery Commission and move its regulation now moves to the Texas House of Representatives, where it must pass out of committee by May 23 for the House to vote on the bill before the end of the legislative session.

The House already had eliminated funding for the Texas Lottery Commission in the budget it approved for the next two years.

The bill mandates a limited-scope Sunset Advisory Commission review of the state lottery during the next fiscal biennium. Unless the lottery is continued at that time, it will be abolished.

If the lottery operates under the administration of the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, it will “be under a bright light for the next two years,” said Rob Kohler, consultant with Texas Baptists Christian Life Commission.

The Texas Lottery Commission currently is the subject of several investigations and lawsuits.

In February, Gov. Greg Abbott ordered the Texas Rangers to investigate both an April 2023 bulk purchase of lottery tickets that enabled a group to claim a $95 million jackpot, as well as a more-recent $83.5 million win involving lottery couriers.

Attorney General Ken Paxton also announced his office was launching its own investigation into the Texas Lottery to determine whether any state or federal laws were broken.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala.—Alabama pastor Jared Cornutt has announced his intention to nominate Craig Carlisle for second vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention in June when the convention meets in Dallas.

Carlisle, director of missions for Etowah Baptist Association in North Alabama, is currently serving his second one-year term as Alabama Baptist State Convention president. He is a member of First Baptist Church Gadsden, Ala.

“Dr. Carlisle has been many things in my life: my pastor, my mentor, and one of my closest friends,” said Cornutt, pastor of North Shelby Baptist Church in Birmingham.

Cornutt said when he was in college and sensed a call to vocational ministry, he drove to Gadsden from Tuscaloosa to meet with Carlisle.

“He was the first person I told and the first person I sought wisdom from,” Cornutt said. “That day in February of 2011, Craig made me a promise: he would be my biggest supporter and help me however he could.”

‘A pastor to pastors’

Fourteen years later, Carlisle is still doing that, Cornutt said.

“But what’s remarkable is this—my story is not unique,” he said. “There are countless pastors across Alabama and beyond who could say the same.

“Craig Carlisle is a pastor to pastors. Every month, he faithfully prays for hundreds of ministers by name. He answers the late-night calls. He gives generously of his time and wisdom. He walks with pastors through their highest joys and their lowest valleys.”

Carlisle also has revitalized the historic School of the Prophets conference and has gone out of his way to make bivocational ministry a priority in his association and the state, Cornutt said.

‘Believes in the Southern Baptist Convention’

“Also under his leadership, many churches have increased their support of the association or have begun to support the association when they previously were not,” he said.

Carlisle chaired the state convention’s Sexual Abuse Task Force and was instrumental in founding the Alabama Young Pastors Network. Currently he is a trustee for the SBC Executive Committee.

“Craig Carlisle is humble, gracious, kind, generous, concerned and loving,” Cornutt said. “He believes in the Southern Baptist Convention and in the mission of our churches. Not only that, he also believes in the pastors who lead those churches.”

Carlisle said he is honored to be nominated for this role.

“I love Southern Baptists. I’m grateful for what God is doing through us in these days,” he said. “I’m humbled that some would consider me a candidate for this position. It would be an honor to serve our convention.”

During the 2024 Annual Church Profile year, First Baptist Church in Gadsden received $1,538,073 in total undesignated receipts and gave $131,232 (9.84 percent) through the Cooperative Program.

The church gave $15,467 to the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering, $35,189 to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering and reported 285 in average worship attendance and five baptisms, according to the ACP information provided by the church.

So far, one other nominee for second vice president has been announced—Tommy Mann, pastor of Highland Terrace Baptist Church in Greenville, who will be nominated by Jim Gatliff, associational missionary for Hunt Baptist Association.

This article originally appeared in The Alabama Baptist. Baptist Press contributed to this report.

Hal Reese Kirk, a deacon and Bible study leader, died May 9 in Plano. He was 86. He was born Nov. 27, 1938, in Fillmore, Ill., to Hal Curtis Kirk and Wilda Marie Kirk, as the eldest of five children. A gifted athlete, he played football and basketball at Nokomis High School, where he started on varsity basketball beginning his sophomore year. He began college at Bradley University but took a brief detour after spending more time on the basketball court than in the classroom. Later, he returned to graduate with a degree in civil engineering. He held a variety of jobs, ranging from working in a ski shop to driving bulldozers at Caterpillar’s proving grounds. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves and worked for the Illinois Highway Department before beginning a long and successful career at GTE (later Verizon). His career took him from Normal, Ill., to San Angelo, and finally to Carrollton, where he worked until his retirement in 2000. While in Illinois, he and his wife Joyce helped plant College Avenue Baptist Church in Normal, where he served as a deacon, occasionally filled in as a preacher, and led Bible studies. At First Baptist Church in Carrollton, he continued his ministry through teaching, serving as a deacon, delivering Meals on Wheels, and lending a hand to widows and others in need. Later at Stonebriar Community Church, the Kirks found joy in serving both their local community and people across the world. In retirement, his greatest joy came from supporting his grandchildren, offering his faithful and loving presence at their basketball, tennis, volleyball and soccer games; track meets; band and children’s choir concerts; piano recitals; ballet performances; cheer competitions; and school plays. He is survived by his devoted wife of 66 years Joyce Marie Kirk; daughter Rachelle Crawford and husband John; son Brent Kirk and wife Mindy; beloved grandchildren; sisters Dana Hoffman, Mary Herren and Debbie Hanabarger; and brother Myron Kirk.

The priesthood of believers not only serves as a doctrinal distinctive for Baptists, but also operates as a guiding principle for daily living and for “being the church,” Baptist World Alliance President Tomás Mackey told a gathering at Dallas Baptist University.

“It holds a distinctive and central place in Baptist ecclesiology, not merely as a doctrine that is stated, but as a living conviction that shapes the church’s identity, mission and structure,” said Mackey, a longtime Baptist leader in Argentina.

“The priesthood of believers of all believers is not just a doctrine. It is a way of life.”

Mackey spoke May 15 at the third annual Lecture Series on Baptist Distinctives, sponsored by the Center for Baptist History and Heritage at DBU.

Singular and plural

Baptists believe both in the priesthood of each believer individually and in the priesthood of all believers collectively, he emphasized.

“The term ‘the priesthood of the believer’ emphasizes the biblical truths of individual responsibility and soul competency. And the term ‘the priesthood of all believers’ highlights that Christians collectively form a holy priesthood,” he said.

“For Baptists, the priesthood of all believers is more than a Reformation doctrine or a Baptist distinctive. It is a way of being the church,” he said.

Drawing lessons from the doctrine

Mackey pointed to four lessons Baptists draw from the doctrine.

• All believers have direct access to God.

Quoting Baptist theologian E.Y. Mullins, he said, “All believers have equal access to the Father’s table, the Father’s ear and the Father’s heart.”

“Each individual is competent and responsible to respond personally to God without coercion or the need for any intermediary,” Mackey said, citing Mullins.

“Baptists hold that every believer is called, gifted and responsible for actively living their faith within the church and in the world.

“Each person has a God-given ability to know and follow God’s will. Each person can and should read and interpret the Bible for himself or herself without relying on religious officials to dictate what they should believe.”

• The church is a priestly community.

“The New Testament refers to the holy priesthood of the whole people of God who are responsible for serving him through their spiritual gifts,” Mackey said.

“Baptists understand worship, preaching, the ordinance of communion and witness as congregational acts carried out by the entire church. The church is not governed by a select clergy class but by the Spirit-led discernment of the whole congregation.”

Ministry is the “shared calling of the entire church,” he said. “Leadership is responsible and accountable both to God and to the congregation.”

• Every believer is a priest.

“Baptists insist that all who believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior are believer-priests,” he said.

Mackey emphasized Christ’s priestly role as providing the foundation for believers’ role as priests.

“We must be Christ-centered,” he stressed.

The doctrine of the priesthood of believers “grounds all Christian ministries in Jesus’ saving work,” he said. As churches make decisions, they must seek to know “the will of the great High Priest.”

• Christians are called to be priests to the world.

The doctrine of the priesthood of believers overcomes artificial divisions between the sacred and the secular, Mackey said. It affirms daily work as a vocation in which believers live out their mission, calling and giftedness, he noted.

All believers have the responsibility to “represent Christ in the world,” Mackey said.

“Every believer is a missionary,” he said.

Mackey noted potential risks if the priesthood of believers is misunderstood and misapplied.

It can lead to an “overemphasis on individual autonomy.” It can “undermine the unity of the church.”

And it can be used to “dismiss or undervalue the role of ordained leaders” in the church, he said.

Implications derived from the doctrine

However, the benefits derived from the priesthood of believers far outweigh its risks, Mackey noted.

“The priesthood of believers emphasizes the value of every individual and the equal worth of every person in the eyes of God,” he said.

The priesthood of believers has broad implications for human rights and religious liberty, because it emphasizes “the dignity of the individuals in making moral and spiritual decisions without external coercion,” Mackey said.

The doctrine also has social implications as Christians make their voices heard in the public square, he added.

“The priesthood of believers encourages the church to become agents of change in society,” he said.

“The priesthood of believers advocates for a unified and purposeful community that reflects the values of justice, peace and equality.”

Because Baptists believe in the priesthood of believers, they have a responsibility not just to enlist church members but to make disciples who will serve both within the church and in the world, Mackey said.

He particularly stressed the importance of discipling the rising generation of Christian believers.

“In many parts of the world, we are losing the young people,” Mackey said.

Baptists have a responsibility to “train young priests who will use their vocations as instruments of God to serve in the contemporary culture,” he said.

Hardin-Simmons University’s speech-language pathology program will adopt a new therapy program in the fall to support individuals living with Parkinson’s and related neurological disorders.

After completing the necessary training to become a certified Speak Out Therapy Program provider through the Parkinson Voice Project,  HSU will launch the Speak Out Therapy Program—expanding services, empowering students and filling a vital gap in West Texas.

“Our goal is just to help individuals with Parkinson’s have all the tools they need to maintain their speech over the course of their disease,” said Christine Sanchez, instructor of speech language pathology and assistant graduate program director for Hardin-Simmons University.

The program began at HSU with a conversation between the university’s physical therapy and speech-language pathology departments.

Jill Jumper, program director and associate professor for the Department of Physical Therapy, recognized a need for speech services among the Parkinson’s community and approached Sanchez about a potential partnership.

“I looked into getting Speak Out certified and saw that they had a clinical grant that universities could apply for. I waited until that grant opened in January, applied and got it,” Sanchez explained.

The grant allowed two HSU faculty members to be certified in the program and gives students free access to professional-level training—opening new clinical opportunities for both students and patients.

What sets Speak Out apart

Unlike general speech therapy models, the new program specifically is designed for individuals with Parkinson’s disease.

Built around the concept of “speaking with intent,” the therapy focuses on helping patients strengthen their voices through purposeful effort.

“It’s very structured and very targeted for people with Parkinson’s disease,” Sanchez noted. “There’s a lot of research on it, which is nice because there are a lot of techniques that we can use and apply to many different people.”

Compared to other programs, the Speak Out program is shorter in duration yet delivers similar outcomes, making it more accessible for patients.

“The thing about Parkinson’s is these people are going to have to exercise for the rest of their lives. If they stop the exercise process, they will return to baseline,” Sanchez said.

“Speak Out creates a motivating community that helps patients continue to work on their speech so they don’t lapse back.”

Building a community of support

Although weekly group sessions are not set to launch until fall, the therapy model begins with six weeks of one-on-one sessions, followed by a weekly maintenance group.

These ongoing group meetings offer encouragement and accountability, helping patients stay consistent with their vocal exercises and sustain long-term progress.

“It’s not just about therapy. It’s about giving people a space where they can keep working on their speech and feel supported,” Sanchez shared.

HSU’s collaboration between speech and physical therapy services also creates a coordinated care model, offering a one-stop location for multiple types of rehabilitation.

“We have a gentleman who was going to the PT program, and he complained about his speech. So now, he comes to speech therapy and then goes straight to exercise,” Sanchez said.

“It’s nice that it works out for his schedule and that our services are treating the whole person, not just part of the problem.”

Sanchez noted that speech-language pathology, at a basic level, is focused on restoring relationships through communication.

“Relationships with God and neighbor are what this life is all about,” she observed.

So, at HSU, the therapy also incorporates faith. Therapy providers utilize Scripture as stimuli.

“At Easter, one of my graduate student clinicians was working with a gentleman with Parkinson’s disease on improving his speech and voice,” Sanchez said.

“She used the final words of Jesus as stimuli for him to practice speaking with intent. This allowed him to engage with the session in a more meaningful way.”

Sanchez said she’s thankful for HSU, where “our students have the opportunity to provide spiritual support to the clients we serve in our university clinic.

“In our aphasia support group,” she noted, “students pray with clients, sing hymns with them, and work to promote the dignity of each person as a child of God.”

Taking this approach allows clients with communication barriers to “feel seen, known, and loved in our clinic.”

A growing impact

The new speech therapy program expands HSU’s clinic, which launched an aphasia support group for stroke survivors and their care partners in 2022. With Parkinson’s services added, the clinic is reaching a broader population.

“Parkinson’s is the second most common neurodegenerative disease, and there are a lot of people in the Abilene region who aren’t being served,” Sanchez explained.

Along with helping the broader region gain access to therapy services, HSU’s Speak Out program is transforming education.

Graduate students now can receive training that mirrors professional certification, preparing them to enter the workforce with specialized clinical skills.

“You can’t be officially certified as a student, but you can go through the exact same training as a certified SLP [speech language pathologist],” Sanchez explained.

“When they graduate, they’ll have that experience, and it will make them more marketable.”

How to get involved

Individuals diagnosed with Parkinson’s or related disorders are encouraged to reach out for therapy services. Enrollment will be handled through direct faculty contact to ensure each participant is matched appropriately with services.

“This is about making sure people can live their fullest lives,” Sanchez said. “It’s about keeping people connected to their families, to their communities, and to their voice.” 

With additional reporting by Calli Keener. The second paragraph was revised after the article originally was posted.

NASHVILLE (BP)—In an order issued May 12, Judge William L. Campbell Jr. announced the jury trial in the lawsuit brought by Johnny Hunt against the Southern Baptist Convention and others has been canceled. The trial was set to begin June 17.

Campbell stated his decision was “due to the parties’ pending motions to reconsider.”

The judge issued a summary judgment last month dismissing all but one count in the lawsuit. That lone count concerned a 2022 social media post by then-SBC President Bart Barber, pastor of First Baptist Church in Farmersville, about the allegations against Hunt.

Hunt, a former SBC president, prominent Georgia pastor and North American Mission Board vice president, was seeking more than $100 million, claiming lost salary and speaking engagements, reputational harm and emotional distress.

The case stemmed from Guidepost Solutions’ report in May 2022, which was the result of an independent investigation requested by Southern Baptists at the 2021 SBC Annual Meeting to look into allegations of mishandling cases of sexual abuse within the convention.

An incident involving Hunt and a younger pastor’s wife was discovered during Guidepost’s investigation and included in its report.

In his initial summary judgment, Campbell wrote Guidepost’s report did not intentionally single Hunt out but addressed issues of public concern.

The report “… relates to broad issues of interest to society at large, rather than matters of purely private concern,” he wrote.

“Specifically, the issues the Report highlights—allegations of sexual abuse involving clergy members and how allegations of such abuse were handled—are matters of public import.”

He also wrote a jury could not find “that Guidepost failed to act with reasonable care” in its investigation and Hunt had failed to provide evidence of “mental and emotional injuries.”

The court will set a new trial date and pretrial filing deadlines by a separate order, Campbell wrote.

(RNS)—During their annual meeting in Dallas next month, Southern Baptists will sing, bless missionaries, pass a budget, listen to sermons and engage in lively debate about a host of issues.

Among those issues: what to do with the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.

For nearly a decade, the ERLC has been a source of controversy as the SBC has navigated the cultural and political divides of the Trump era.

While Southern Baptists, like many evangelicals, have been strong supporters of President Donald Trump in the voting booth, some of the president’s policy decisions and personal conduct have clashed with Baptist ethics and beliefs.

That’s left the ERLC, which speaks to ethical issues and public policy debates, occasionally at odds with the denomination’s 12.7 million members, leading to three attempts to disband or defund the agency over the past decade.

President says ERLC fate not up to him

Clint Pressley, president of the Southern Baptist Convention, said he has spoken to a number of Southern Baptists about the ERLC—including Pastor Jack Graham of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, a past critic of the agency.

Some like what the agency is doing, he said. Others don’t.

While he suspects there will be a motion to close the agency at the denomination’s annual meeting in June, Pressley said the future of the ERLC is not up to him. Even if he had concerns about it, he has no power to make a decision. Instead, that power rests with church representatives known as messengers.

“I think those concerns about the ERLC will be answered by the messengers,” said Pressley, pastor of Hickory Grove Baptist Church in Charlotte, N.C. “I can’t do anything about the ERLC.”

Pressley added that his role as chair of the SBC’s annual meeting means he cannot take sides in any debate over the ERLC.

Online dialogue about ERLC heats up

In recent months, both the ERLC and its critics have engaged in an online public relations war over the agency’s reputation and future.

The Center for Baptist Leadership, a startup activist group with ties to American Reformer magazine, has run a series of articles, podcast episodes and social media posts critical of the ERLC, primarily for its stances on immigration reform and lack of close ties to the Trump administration.

The ERLC has promoted its ties to House Speaker Mike Johnson, a former ERLC trustee, and its support for defunding Planned Parenthood, as well as its opposition to gender-affirming care for minors and “radical gender ideology.”

“The ERLC team has been diligently working to advocate for Southern Baptist beliefs in the public square while also providing meaningful resources that help our churches navigate today’s cultural challenges and gospel opportunities,” Scott Foshie, chair of the ERLC’s trustees, told RNS in an email.

“Southern Baptists have supported an ethics and public policy entity for over a hundred years. We need an effective, responsive ERLC now more than ever.”

Discontent dates back several years

Discontent with the ERLC has been festering for years—and much of it dates back to the tenure of former ERLC President Russell Moore, who led the agency from 2013 to 2021.

A popular figure at first, Moore faced intense backlash from Trump allies such as Graham, a former SBC president and megachurch pastor, when he refused to back Trump’s first run for presidency and criticized him instead.

In 2017, Prestonwood and about 100 other churches withheld their donations to the SBC’s Cooperative Program in protest of Moore’s action. A pair of leaders of the SBC’s Executive Committee also clashed with Moore over his criticism of Trump.

While Moore resigned in 2021, tension over the ERLC has remained a constant in SBC life. The agency has also faced internal conflict. Last summer, a former ERLC chair announced the agency’s president, Brent Leatherwood, had been fired after a social media post praising then-President Joe Biden. The following day, that chair was ousted and the entity’s board announced Leatherwood was still on the job.

There have been three votes to defund or disband the ERLC since Trump took office the first time. All of them have failed, but between a quarter and a third of messengers at the 2024 annual meeting appeared to support closing the agency. The SBC’s rules require two votes in successive annual meetings to shut down an entity such as the ERLC.

Consider where ERLC fits into overall mission

Randy Davis, executive director of the Tennessee Mission Board, told Religion News Service in an interview he still believes the ERLC plays a helpful role for Southern Baptists. He said the ERLC, for example, had worked closely with Tennessee Baptists on issues such as sexuality and gender. Tennessee Baptists, like the ERLC, support a state law that bans gender transition surgery for minors.

Davis doesn’t think the convention floor is the best place to decide the future of the ERLC. Instead, he’d rather a commission be set up to discuss the SBC’s ministry as a whole—and where the ERLC fits into that mission.

“I think Southern Baptists would appreciate that kind of careful collaboration and consideration, rather than being divided on the floor of the convention,” he said.

The ERLC set up a church engagement office after the vote at the 2024 SBC meeting—and encouraged staff to abide by a set of guidelines in deciding what issues the entity should speak to.

“We have sent surveys requesting feedback, hosted pastor calls, led groups of pastors to meet with elected leaders in D.C., and intentionally attended events where pastors and other ministry leaders were gathered,” Miles Mullin, an ERLC vice president, said in an email.

Mohler has ‘grave doubts’ about ERLC usefulness

Al Mohler, a former ally of Moore and the ERLC and president of the SBC’s largest seminary, is now among those who have doubts about the entity’s future.

Mohler, a former “Never Trumper” turned supporter of the president, told a popular SBC podcast recently that he had “grave doubts” about the usefulness of the ERLC—and that having an entity that addresses controversial cultural issues is “a risky proposition.”

“Other entities and the churches themselves have grave doubts about the utility of the ERLC,” Mohler told the “Baptist 21” podcast last month. Mohler added as the head of an SBC entity, he could not lead any effort to disband the ERLC.

Pastor Andrew Hebert of Mobberly Baptist Church in Longview said he’d like to see the ERLC limit itself to speaking only about issues that are directly addressed in the denomination’s statement of faith—the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message—or in recent resolutions passed at the SBC’s annual meeting.

He outlined that proposal in a recent article on The Baptist Review, a website that discusses SBC issues and theology. Those boundaries, he said, could help the ERLC from stepping on land mines.

Hebert admits his solution isn’t perfect. For example, the SBC has passed a series of resolutions on immigration that call for both border security and humane treatment of immigrants—praising churches that assist immigrants and refugees—as well as calling for “a just and compassionate path to legal status.”

Yet the ERLC has been criticized for its involvement in immigration reform—as well as for refusing to back legislation that would jail women who choose abortions.

The ERLC will deal with some controversy, Hebert said. But he hopes for the most part, the ERLC will speak on issues where Southern Baptists have a “broad consensus.”

Something has to change for the ERLC to continue, he said.

“I think the writing is on the wall that there is a trust and credibility issue,” he said. “My motion is an attempt to provide a solution without defunding or disbanding the ERLC.”