Beeson’s Timothy George among Executive Committee’s advisory team on Calvinism

An Alabama Baptist is among those named to the advisory team who will help Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Executive Committee President Frank Page craft a strategic plan to bring together various groups within the convention who hold different opinions on the issue of Calvinism. 

Timothy George, dean of Beeson Divinity School at Samford University in Birmingham, is one of 16 members. The group will conduct its first meeting Aug. 29–30 in Nashville. 

“My goal is to develop a strategy whereby people of various theological persuasions can purposely work together in missions and evangelism,” Page said. The list was announced Aug. 15. 

At some point in the coming weeks and months, he said, “most likely there will be the crafting of a statement regarding the strategy on how we can work together.” 

“I want to be very clear: this is not an attempt to redo the theological consensus that we have in the Baptist Faith and Message 2000,” Page said. “It is practical in nature, not doctrinal.”

Page emphasized that the group is “not an official committee” of the convention. He also said additional names could be added to the group. 

“It’s a group of helpers helping Frank Page come up with some sort of strategy document,” he said. 

David Dockery, president of Union University in Jackson, Tenn., helped Page put together the list.

“We wanted people who truly represented the various constituencies involved in this theological discussion,” said Page, who in May and then in June publicly said he was working on naming such a group. 

Along with George and Dockery, the other 14 members are:

• Daniel Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Wake Forest, N.C.
• Mark Dever, senior pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, Washington.
• Leo Endel, executive director of the Minnesota-Wisconsin Baptist Convention. 
• Ken Fentress, senior pastor of Montrose Baptist Church, Rockville, Md.
• Eric Hankins, senior pastor of First Baptist Church, Oxford, Miss.
• Johnny Hunt, pastor of First Baptist Church, Woodstock, Ga.
• Tammi Ledbetter, layperson of Inglewood Baptist Church, Grand Prairie, Texas.
• Steve Lemke, provost and director of the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.
• Fred Luter, senior pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church, New Orleans, and SBC president.
• R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Ky.
• Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas.
• Stephen Rummage, senior pastor of Bell Shoals Baptist Church, Brandon, Fla.
• Daniel Sanchez, professor of missions at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas.
• Jimmy Scroggins, senior pastor of First Baptist Church, West Palm Beach, Fla.

In early August Page was part of a panel discussion where he and other panelists said Southern Baptists should and can unite despite differences on the issue of Calvinism. (BP)

______________
 

UPDATED: In announcing the advisory team in mid-August, Page said additional names could be added to the "group of helpers helping Frank Page come up with some sort of strategy document."

Team members added later were David Allen, dean of the school of theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas; Tom Ascol, pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Cape Coral, Fla.; and David Landrith, senior pastor of Long Hollow Baptist Church in Hendersonville, Tenn.