Baptist Briefs: Leonard stepping down at Wake Forest

Leonard to step down as Wake Forest dean. Bill Leonard, the founding dean of the Wake Forest University Divinity School, is stepping down next year, school officials announced. Leonard will retire from that post June 30, 2010. But he will continue to teach full-time as professor of church history and Baptist studies in the divinity school and professor of religion in the university’s religion department. Leonard, who recently turned 63, said the university has established a standard tenure of 10 years for deans. It has been 14 years since he came to Wake Forest, and next year will be the 10th year since the divinity school held its first classes in the fall of 1999. “It was time to move along as dean and back to full-time teaching and research,” he said.

Former Criswell College president named seminary VP. Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary trustees approved the selection of former Criswell College President Jerry Johnson as vice president of academic development during their meeting in Kansas City, Mo. Johnson, in addition to his election as professor of ethics and theology, was named chief academic officer to succeed Thorvald Madsen, who becomes dean of Midwestern Baptist College, SBC. Johnson, 44, joins Midwestern after serving nearly five years as president of Criswell College in Dallas, where he also taught theology and ethics and hosted a daily syndicated radio program on ethics and public policy. He earlier served as dean of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s undergraduate Boyce College in Louisville, Ky., and also taught Christian ethics and worked in development while working toward a Ph.D. from the seminary. He also holds a master’s degree from Denver Seminary and an undergraduate degree from Criswell College. Johnson’s early pastoral experience was in Texas, serving Ireland Baptist Church and interning at First Baptist Church in Dallas, then moving to Colorado to serve as pastor of churches in Aurora and Littleton. He and his wife, Rhonda, have two children, Isaiah and Eva.

Kentucky seminary honors Hinson. The Baptist Seminary of Kentucky honored one of its founding professors for 50 years of teaching by launching an endowed lecture series in his name. The free-standing Baptist school on the campus of the Disciples of Christ-related Lexington Theological Seminary established the E. Glenn Hinson Lecture Series to honor the life and work of its senior professor of church history and spirituality. Future lectures will build on Hinson’s legacy of study in spiritual formation, church history, ecumenism and Baptist history. Before coming to the Kentucky seminary, Hinson taught at Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond from 1992 until retiring in 1999.