by Sandy » Thu Mar 15, 2012 11:34 am
The last church I served in Houston was SBC to the core, and unanimously voted to affiliate with the SBTC in 2009. It had, among its active membership, a group of older WASP folks in their late 60's, 70's, 80's, a few 90's and at least three in their 100's, who accounted for about 40% of the attendance, a group of non-Spanish speaking families who accounted for another 40% of the active members, but about 90% of the pre-schoolers, children and youth,and the other 20% of the active members being about equally divided between African Americans and Asians, mostly Indians and Chinese. In addition to that, we had a booming Spanish-speaking congregation of about 80 people, and a new African American church plant that grew from 15 to 80 in a matter of eight months.
Electing Luter will go a long way toward putting some of the stereotypes to rest, and toward pointing out that what happens in the SBC, from a church growth/evangelism perspective, is much more a matter of what the churches are doing than it is a result of any kind of denominational initiative or program. Sometimes, those in the denominational headquarters, and those who receive salaries from denominational pocketbooks, are not on the same page as those in the churches. That was certainly the case up until 1979.
While Luter would be the first African American SBC president, I'm not sure that the convention will remain as it is today. There is zero growth, and in fact, actual decline taking place among the predominantly white, predominantly older congregations in the Deep South. The numerical growth, including baptisms, is happening in inner cities in the Northeast, Midwest and West Coast, and among Hispanics in Texas and the Southwest. As this article points out, and as William suggests, the percentage of ethnic members as part of the whole will continue to increase fairly rapidly. While most of them are as theologically conservative as the old Southern whites, their political perspective is much different. That will be a big change. Likewise, the day will come when ethnic minority members represent a significant percentage of SBC support. That will change things.