Jeff Iorg, retiring president of Gateway Seminary, was elected as the next Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee president/CEO during a special-called trustee meeting in Dallas on March 21.
Iorg transitions to the new role after 20 years at Gateway. His election comes 2 1/2 years after Ronnie Floyd resigned from the role in October 2021 and after other attempts at naming a president failed. (Read more here, here and here.)
Iorg’s nomination was announced March 1.
Sixty trustees were present at the March 21 meeting held at the Grand Hyatt in the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport. The vote to call Iorg was unanimous. He will begin his new role May 13.
“Southern Baptists are a force for good,” Iorg said following the vote. “I am grateful to Southern Baptists for how they have impacted my life over the last 50 years.”
‘Calm demeanor’
“Jeff Iorg is who we have been praying for,” said search team chair Neal Hughes, director of missions for Montgomery Baptist Association.
Iorg’s “calm demeanor, communication skills, executive administrative ability and thorough knowledge of Southern Baptist life will be a God-send to the SBC,” he noted.
Hughes also thanked Alabama Baptists for their prayers and support for the team and for himself during the search process.
“Alabama Baptists played a very strong role in being concerned but prayerful, being challenged but hopeful, and we now see God doing an amazing thing,” he said, noting the “historical” unanimous decision” and that the “opportunities for Southern Baptists are wonderful.”
EC chair and search team member Phillip Robertson said he was “beyond excited” at the news and called Iorg “a leader that all Southern Baptists can unite around.”
“I have known Jeff Iorg for more than 25 years. During that time, I have observed with keen interest how he has grown into a stellar leader among Southern Baptists,” said Rick Lance, executive director of the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions. “He has earned the respect of our Baptist family from across the landscape of SBC life. Personally, I believe Jeff is in the top tier of statesmanlike leadership in the SBC.”
Leadership tenure
Iorg has been president of Gateway Baptist Theological Seminary since 2004, when it was known as Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. In 2016 he oversaw the completion of the seminary’s move from Mill Valley to Ontario, California, and the launching of an online campus while continuing to grow the endowment from $16 million to $60 million without incurring debt.
Before becoming the president at Gateway Seminary, Iorg was a pastor and later executive director of the Northwest Baptist Convention. He is a graduate of Hardin-Simmons University, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.
He and his wife, Ann, married in 1980 and have three children and five grandchildren. He is the author of eight books on biblical leadership, character development, evangelism, marriage and leading through change.
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