Survey the Presidents of the Southern Baptist Convention and snapshots appear coinciding with key historical events both of the United States and the wider evangelical world outside the geographic region of America’s South. Whether it is William Bullein Johnson’s address in 1845 in Augusta, Ga., where  he called for "the extension of the Messiah’s Kingdom and the glory of our God" to Edgar Young Mullins address – Southern Baptists at a Crucial Hour in 1922 to Lee Rutland Scarborough’s address in 1939  - Vital Essentials Worth Preserving and Perpetuating, there seems to be a longstanding pattern that the Southern Baptist Convention is constantly re-evaluating its reason for existence. Southern Baptists have seemingly always feared that a denominational hierarchy could easily usurp the authority and primacy of local congregations who voluntarily cooperate, as it says in the words of the preamble to the constitution of the SBC, to elicit, combine, and direct the energies of the denomination for the propagation of the gospel.

Such a purpose statement requires that management of money, personnel, and programs be coordinated by some sort of denominational administration insofar as that operation is regulated and guided by the transparent oversight of local churches who are the legitimate missionary force both training and supplying the ministers commissioned to execute Great Commission causes.

Over the years, the Southern Baptist Convention has grown from humble beginnings to the largest non-Catholic denomination in the United States. Its denominational infrastructure spans the North American continent with seminaries, agencies, state conventions, local associations, and myriads of outreaches established for gospel purposes.

Following a period known as the Conservative Resurgence where the denomination’s boards, commissions, and agencies were intentionally staffed with those who adhered and professed the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy, a further process has been put into place whereby the gains by the Conservatives would extend to usher in a vast number of conversions and growth. For some reason or reasons, this has not happened. A group of Southern Baptist leaders under the leadership of the current Convention president have launched what they term “a Great Commission Resurgence” which is to be, in their words, "the next step in the renewal of our denomination."

The current president of the Southern Baptist Convention and Senior Pastor of the First Baptist Church of Woodstock, Ga., is the guest for the inaugural edition of Koinonia – the podcast outreach of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina.

Part I
The Great Commission Resurgence – What is it? Who authored the document? What is the purpose of the document? Changes in the document since April 27, 2009; Southern Baptists – losing the gospel?; The Baptist Faith and Message 2000 and the Abstract of Principles: Competitive or Complimentary?; Theological triage – a Biblical concept?; Southern Baptists, first-order issues, and third order issues; Article IX – associations, state conventions, duplication; Article IX: Feedback and pushback.