I’m going to be brutally honest here (hope Ronnie Floyd doesn’t read this!). I’ve heard Ronnie Floyd speak several times and always felt he was long on passion and short on content. The first two times he ran for SBC president, I opposed him. The first time (2006) I was a blog commenter who had no forum to speak out but I traveled to Greensboro to vote for a man I’d never heard of – some guy named Frank Page.
I thank God for Greensboro, because Frank Page was elected, then became our EC President, a friend, and someone I think has had a remarkable effect on the direction of the Southern Baptist Convention.
In 2014, I became heavily involved in the candidacy of Dr. Dennis Kim and when the election took place, having talked to a lot of people, I thought perhaps that we were going to win that one as well. It was close – way closer than anyone ever thought it would be. A relatively unknown (to the SBC at large) Korean pastor took about 42% of the vote in that election. We were amazed and just a little disappointed.
As thankful as I was to God that Frank Page won the 2006 election, I am now just as thankful that our efforts to promote another candidate failed and that Ronnie Floyd was elected president of the SBC in 2014. I cannot remember my impressions and opinions about a man changing as dramatically and quickly as they have with our president.
He has done a good job. The 2015 Columbus convention was the best I’ve been to in many ways. The night of prayer was one of the best evenings of convention life I’ve ever experienced.
And then there was this message – preached Tuesday morning at the chapel at Midwestern. I told Ronnie afterward (he doesn’t know me, I’m quite sure, but he knows “bloggers!”) that he gave us bloggers ammunition for discussion for 6 months to come. But there was nothing vague about this. It was specific. Dramatic. Concrete.
I encourage you to watch this video. If you are Southern Baptist and care about the future of our denomination, it is worth your time. I am not endorsing every one of his proposals. I may disagree with him on some of those things he is suggesting. But we need to interact with what Ronnie is saying.
He said things we need to talk about. Not argue about. Just discuss!
2015 SBC Symposium with Dr. Ronnie Floyd from Midwestern Seminary on Vimeo.
PLEASE take the time to watch this. I have notes in a previous blogpost. Also, Rodney Hammer has interacted with this in his post yesterday.
