DALLAS (ABP) — Mission work, Christian education and advocacy are the three tasks that can unite Baptists in the Lone Star state, according to the nominee for executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
Randel Everett, pastor of First Baptist Church in Newport News, Va., said he hopes to unify the group around “not just a mission statement, but a mission passion.”
Everett, 58, will be nominated as executive director at the group's Feb. 25-26 Executive Board meeting in Dallas. Charles Wade, who served eight years as executive director, will retire Jan. 31. Jan Daehnert is serving as interim executive director.
If elected executive director, Everett will lead an organization still feeling the lingering effects of recent staff layoffs and a financial scandal that involved church-starting funds in the Rio Grande Valley.
In a phone interview, Everett acknowledged he would be returning to Texas at “a challenging time,” but he also characterized it as “a time of great opportunity” for Texas Baptists. The increasing ethnic diversity of Texas and the need to engage leaders aged 35 and younger in denominational life rank among the key challenges he noted.
“I would like to help the BGCT discern, ‘Where is our unique kingdom assignment?'” he said. To that end, he outlined the primary focus of his prospective tenure:
— Missions. “Texas Baptists should make sure every person in Texas has the opportunity to respond to the good news of Christ within his or her own language and context,” he said.
— Christian education. From religious education in local congregations to high education in universities and seminaries, Texas Baptists should “make sure we are providing the resources to ensure that people grow in Christ's likeness,” he said.
— Advocacy. Texas Baptists should become advocates for the separation of church and state to ensure religious liberty for all people, and they should be advocates for the poor, he said. “There is no reason any child in Texas should go to bed hungry.”
Although he has lived outside of Texas the last 15 years, Everett said the experience has given him “a broader perspective of what is going on in Baptist life.”
Ken Hugghins, chairman of the executive director search committee, supported that notion.
“As the committee listened to Texas Baptists and talked with excellent leaders and candidates across our state, a description of the kind of leader Texas needs emerged. Randel Everett matches that description and more,” said Hugghins, pastor of Elkins Lake Baptist Church in Huntsville, Texas.
Everett served nine years as president of the John Leland Center for Theological Studies in Arlington, Va. His last three years at the Leland Center overlapped the beginning of his four-year pastorate in Newport News.
Everett also served five years at Columbia Baptist Church in Falls Church, Va., a 3,000-member congregation in suburban Washington, D.C. He served from 1992 to 1996 at First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Fla., after a pastorate at University Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas.
Everett was chairman of the Baptist World Alliance's education and evangelism commission from 2000 to 2005. He served on the BGCT Executive Board from 1978 to 1979.
Other denominational leadership posts include president of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention Executive Board, moderator of Peninsula Baptist Association, trustee of Florida Baptist College, and member of several committees at the Baptist General Association of Virginia.
Everett has been a guest chaplain for the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives, and he has taught at the Pentagon Bible study.
He earned doctorate and master's degrees from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a bachelor's degree from Ouachita Baptist University. He also holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Richmond.
Everett and his wife, the former Shiela King, have been married 35 years. They have two children: Jeremy, 32, who works as a community ministries director with Baptist Child and Family Services in San Antonio; and Rachel Froom, 28, of Ramrod Key, Fla. They have two grandsons.
Everett was born in Arkansas, but his family moved to Fort Worth when he was in third grade so his father could attend seminary. His father, Kenneth, went on to serve as a Baptist pastor and director of missions.
Two of his three brothers — Tim of Central Baptist Church in Spring Hill, La., and Neil of First Baptist Church of Calhoun, La. — also became pastors. His other brother, Tommy, is a pharmacist in Hope, Ark., and his sister, Janie Schroeder, lives in McKinney, Texas.
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— John Hall contributed to this story.