SBC President Urges Pastors to Fulfill the Great Commission at the Local Level
Bobby Welch, the president of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), said the pastors and leaders of the denomination’s 40,000 churches must take the initiative and give an elephant-sized challenge to their members.
"I think our people are looking for a new challenge and for a focus," said Welch, during a meeting with the SBC Executive Committee in Nashville, Tenn., Feb. 21.
According to Baptist Press, Welch learned that the SBC is in the “midst of a redefining change” while he traveled around the nation in his “Everyone Can” evangelism bus tour last year.
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Welch asked SBC members at each stop a series of questions to see where the denomination stands in its members’ hearts.
One question he asked, according to BP, was: “Why don't you and others like you come to more convention meetings at the state level and the SBC?"
"The answer was always this: 'There is no compelling reason to come to a Southern Baptist Convention,'" Welch said.
The second question, “Why do you look outside the SBC for ideas and programs and that sort of thing?" received the reply, "there are many more challenging and exciting things beyond the SBC."
A third question asked was, “What do you think the SBC needs most to help it today?" Leaders responded, "A challenge and focus. We're asked to do too many things and we cannot do them all. We want to do something that works the best for the rest of our lives.
"I’ve come to the conclusion that what they’re saying is, 'We want to go on an elephant hunt,'" Welch said. "They’re tired of chasing squirrels and rabbits and birds. They've done that. They want to go on an elephant hunt."
"I've been on an elephant hunt. The gun is bigger, the bullets are bigger, the stories are bigger, the danger is bigger," Welch continued. "And on an elephant hunt, it's exciting whether you ever see an elephant or not. It's a whole lot more fun than chasing rabbits, squirrels and birds. And it's worth the risk.
Therefore, Welch encouraged pastors to take hold of the time and make plans for the future.
"At this redefining stage, we must have pastors at those tables," he said, according to BP. "It cannot just be theologians and people who work at entities. We must have pastors at those tables because you have to remember this convention birthed this committee.... This convention birthed every entity we've got. [The entities] did not birth this convention. [The entities] live and exist to assist the church and the pastor and the people to do the work of the Great Commission at its full extent at the local level.
"It is not thinkable that we will redefine this convention without the pastor and the people being represented at that table where those things are hammered out," Welch said.
"But what I believe we've got to see happen among us is we've got to get those who know about it out there with those who need to know about it" -- people who are "outside the walls of the church.”
