Steve Gaines wraps up his term as president of the Southern Baptist Convention this week as the denomination continues to look for ways to address a lingering slide in membership numbers.
The annual convention will be held Tuesday and Wednesday at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, and chief among the issues facing Southern Baptists is a decline in numbers for the 10th-consecutive year.
Gaines, senior pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church in Cordova, Tenn., was chosen as president over David Crosby of Louisiana and J.D. Greear of North Carolina during last year's convention.
It took an unprecedented three rounds of voting to decide who would replace Ronnie Floyd, the senior pastor of Cross Church in Northwest Arkansas, as president of the largest Baptist denomination in the world and the largest Protestant organization in the United States.
Gaines, 59, has spent the past year juggling his duties with the ministry of Bellevue Baptist Church and those of the Southern Baptist president.
He has preached at five of the convention's seminaries as well as at a number of state convention meetings, and in a statement earlier this year released through the convention's publication, SBC LIFE, expressed his appreciation for the roles the conventions have played in helping Southern Baptist churches work together to "win America to Christ."
Gaines will speak Monday evening at the Pastors Conference, which is held before the convention's annual meeting. He will be the final speaker in a series of pastors who will preach about the book of Philippians -- a sermon known as the common ground testimony.
"I know he's running 100 miles an hour," said Jimmy Meek, pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in El Dorado, who was on staff with Gaines at Bellevue. "We've known each other for years, so it's great to have a preacher like that in your corner."
Before his election last year, Gaines, who declined an interview request for this article, spoke in his blog about his desire to emphasize a "spiritual awakening" within the country. He also emphasized soul winning, or leading people to Christ, and stewardship, the idea that "we don't own anything; God owns everything."
Gaines added a fourth objective in a statement May 1 -- prayer, in keeping with the convention's 2017 theme of "Pray! For Such a Time As This."
Yet despite Gaines' call for a spiritual awakening, the number of Southern Baptists in the United States has continued to decline over the past decade.
Member numbers from 2015-16 dropped to just more than 15.2 million -- a change of about 77,800 -- and the number of baptisms nationwide decreased by more than 14,000, according to statistics released Thursday in Lifeway's Annual Church Profile.
Membership numbers also have slipped in Arkansas. According to the annual church profile, Southern Baptist membership decreased by 6,460 statewide and 102 fewer people were baptized between 2015 and 2016.
Meanwhile, the number of Southern Baptist churches nationwide continued its 18-year climb, with nearly 500 new churches in 2015-16, following the almost 300 that were added in 2014-15. In Arkansas, the number of Southern Baptist churches remained steady at 1,431, according to the annual church profile.
Various Southern Baptist associations will hold conferences today and Monday in advance of the convention. Members will address finances during the convention, vote on resolutions that will guide Southern Baptists, and nominate and elect national officers, including a president, among other activities.
Gaines could be elected to a second term as president if he is nominated again. Floyd, the previous president, served two one-year terms, which is the maximum allowed by the convention's governing body.
Either way, Gaines is sure to stay busy this week in Phoenix.
Roger Oldham, executive editor of SBC LIFE, described the convention as a "dizzying time" for its president.
"You're preparing your own sermon where you're going to be preaching on Sunday at your ministry as a pastor, and you're getting ready for all these other places where you're going to have anywhere from three minutes to five minutes to seven minutes of readings to give a challenge to all these groups," Oldham said. "On top of that, you have the fact that [you're] going to be presiding over what may be the largest unscripted, open-microphone deliberative body that meets annually in the United States.
"And it's all live-streamed."
State Desk on 06/11/2017