with Charles Wade
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This week marks the beginning of Charles Wade's tenure as executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas. As he embarked on this new role, the Baptist Standard asked Wade to reflect on his task and what he sees ahead for Texas Baptists.
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What are your goals
for the BGCT?
___ That all of us who work with the BGCT continue to see our task as helping the churches fulfill their vision and calling. The churches do not exist to make the BGCT strong; the BGCT exists to help the churches be strong.
___ That we help all the churches see themselves as the body of Christ in their communities, being the presence of Jesus in the place God has put them. When a church begins to see itself as the very presence of Jesus in its neighborhood, it begins to minister to people in the way Jesus did.
___ That prayer and a growing relationship with God will remain at the heart of all our hopes and plans.
___ That we not abandon any church in trouble that wants our help in overcoming its problems.
___ That wherever a church is needed in Texas, we look for ways to help churches and associations establish and nurture new congregations. New churches are needed in our state in places where there is no Baptist church. We also need new churches that focus on some of the special needs that a particular group might have. In order for this to happen, we are going to need the dedicated participation of our lay ministers, the capable cooperation of bivocational ministers, the called-out ones from every language group and stepped up efforts in leadership training and theological education.
___ That we enhance our ability to relate to one another across language and cultural barriers so that the BGCT, which already has churches representative of 41 different ethnic and language groups, becomes truly a place where we are all one in Christ.
___ That we continue to deepen our sense of responsibility for and appreciation of our wonderful institutions of higher education, child care, medical centers and aged care. Every year, people are won to Christ in and through these institutions whom a local church probably would not have reached. These institutions do ministries that grow out of the heart of Christ that we could never do alone, but that we can together.
___ That we continue to speak to the ethical issues of our time so that our society and our state will behave in Christ-like ways on behalf of the children, the poor, the alienated, the unprotected and all the people in our state. We want a just and merciful social fabric.
___ That the Baptist vision which grows out of the authority of God's holy word, and holds dear the idea of spiritual freedom and responsibility, will be passed whole and powerful to the next generation. We want to be able to articulate clearly and live out fully our commitment to the truth of Scripture, the uniqueness of Jesus who alone can save, the power of the Holy Spirit to convict and teach, salvation by grace through faith, believer's baptism by immersion, the autonomy of the local church, the priesthood of all believers, the freedom of conscience before God, religious liberty and the separation of church and state, and obedience to the command of Christ to love God, to love neighbor, and to go everywhere making disciples.
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