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The Christian Index conducted the following interview with Frank Cox, pastor of North Metro First Baptist Church in Lawrenceville, prior to his expected nomination as president of the Southern Baptist Convention in Indianapolis.

Cox was called to the Lawrenceville church (formerly Pleasant Hill Baptist Church) in November 1980. During Cox’s ministry the church has relocated its campus and grown from a membership of 649 to more than 5,000 with a high attendance of 2,998.

 

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The Index: Brother Frank, I know that your father was your first pastor and that you accepted Christ at an early age, but tell our readers about your call to ministry.

Cox: As a ninth grader I went with our church youth group to the Georgia Baptist Evangelism Conference. I remember hearing Jack Stanton preach and during that sermon God began to work in my heart to prepare me for the ministry. All I knew at that time was that God wanted obedience out of my life. In succeeding evangelism conferences God spoke to my heart, teaching me to die to self and urging me to allow Christ to reign supreme in my life.

When I was seventeen I was sitting in the back of First Baptist Church of Doraville with my girlfriend. My dad preached a sermon on hell and that night the invitational hymn was “When We All Get to Heaven.” It was during that service that God called me to preach. I walked down the aisle and told my preacher dad that God had called me to preach.

When he attempted to convey my commitment to the congregation, he was so overwhelmed with emotion he could not speak. He asked our minister of education to make the announcement of my commitment and he was also too emotional to say anything. Finally, they asked me to tell the congregation what God had called me to do, and when I did several began to weep. I was not sure whether God wanted me to be an evangelist or a pastor, but God made it clear to me that I was to be an evangelistic pastor.

 

The Index: Many Georgia Baptists know you, brother Frank, but I think all would be interested in you giving us a snapshot of your ministry experience.

Cox: God began to open doors for me to speak as a teenager and I welcomed every opportunity to preach. While in college I was called to be the summer worker at Calvary Baptist Church in Lilburn. This position was supposed to last three months, but lasted three years. Dick Lincoln was my pastor and became a great mentor and gave me the chance to utilize my spiritual gifts.

While I was at New Orleans Seminary I was privileged to be the pastor of Barataria Baptist Church in Lafitte, La. Some of the greatest people in the world are in that church. I am sure they endured some terrible sermons, but the were very encouraging and supportive.

In November 1980 I became the pastor of what was then called Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Duluth. It was my first church out of the seminary; and now almost 28 years later I am still pastor of the same church.

In 1995 our membership voted unanimously to relocate the church ten miles away near Lawrenceville. At that time we changed the name to North Metro First Baptist Church. It has been a wonderful experience. Charles Carter, former pastor of First Baptist Church in Jonesboro, gave me some valuable insight into growing a large church. He said, “Frank, if you’ll go to a small church and just stay put and grow it a little bit every year, several years down the road you’ll look up one day and realize God has used you to build a large church.”

Well, that is what God has done here at North Metro. Even though some consider us to be a large church, I still see myself as that small-church pastor that came here in 1980 and God has just blessed.

 

The Index: Dr. Cox, why would you want to be president of the Southern Baptist Convention?

Cox: Prior to the convention in Greensboro in 2006 a group of grassroots preachers approached and asked me to allow my name to be placed before the convention as president. I was grateful for their interest, but there were others who were going to be nominated that I greatly respected.

My wife, Mary, and I prayed about the matter and concluded that the timing was not right. The deciding factor for me was my family. I knew that if I were elected as the SBC president the pressures and demands of the office would be great and at that time my son was a rising senior in high school and my daughter was a rising junior.

I looked at my son and daughter and decided that I did not want to be a father in absentia during their last years in high school. I knew that I could not rob them of what I could not give back to them – my time and presence. So, I decided to decline any effort to nominate me in Greensboro.

Last year the same pastors began to call, saying, “Frank, we want to nominate you when we go to Indianapolis.” Once again Mary and I prayed about the matter and in November decided to allow my name to be nominated. We concluded that we would make the announcement in February.

When it was announced in January that Al Mohler would allow his name to be placed in nomination, Mary and I took a deep breath and re-evaluated our decision, because of our love and admiration for Dr. Mohler.

We went on a mountain retreat for a week and prayed it through again and God gave us peace about going forward with the nomination. He has never promised us that I would win. He just gave us the green light to proceed and I am allowing my name to be placed in nomination out of obedience to God.

I firmly believe we need a fresh touch from God in our convention. As I meet with young pastors they are growing more frustrated in churches that allow memories and traditionalism of the past to take on a stale reality in the present. In most situations it stifles and kills the fresh move of God, which many times results in church decline.

Twenty-eight years ago I inherited such a church. It was through great struggle, pain, and constant prayer that our congregation began to be transformed. I earnestly hope that we might seek the Lord and experience a fresh move of God in Southern Baptist life – the kind of movement that would usher in a great awakening resulting in a new urgency in evangelism and missions as well as a great church planting movement to reach our great urban centers for Christ.

 

The Index: You mentioned that grassroots pastors have urged you to consider having your name placed in nomination. In your thinking is there any special significance to that?

Cox: To be honest, the small church pastor is my hero. Those pastors deal with issues that the pastors of large churches have forgotten about, because they have staff members who can attend to all the minutiae and mundane chores that the pastors of small churches have to attend to themselves. They know what it is to sacrifice.

In my office I have a picture of a shanty on stilts down in Louisiana. It reminds me of some of the homes of my church members when I pastored down there during my seminary days. It reminds me of where I came from. I have pastored a small church, a medium sized church, and a large church, but it was the same church.

However, we are basically a convention of small churches. I was a guest at a LifeWay trustee meeting several years ago when I heard an interesting statistic – over 32,000 of our SBC churches have less than 200 in attendance in Sunday School. Yet, these churches provide great strength and stability to our work as Southern Baptists. There is a common thread that binds these churches and they understand the need of working together.

I heard Adrian Rogers say, “There are no insignificant pulpits in the kingdom of God!” And Vance Havner used to say, “We won’t know who the big preachers are until we get to heaven.” I believe that every church and pastor in Southern Baptist life is important and the pastors of those churches are my heroes.

 

The Index: Dr. Cox, I know you have had your share of trials and heartache. Your first wife, Debbie, was a young wife and mother when she died of a brain tumor. How did that impact your life and ministry?

Cox: I discovered that the sufficiency of God’s grace that I had been preaching about was a glorious reality. Most people have no idea what a pastor and his family have to go through. We often look at a pastor and say, “He has been successful in ministry,” but we do not know the price he has paid in order to have a measure of success. Faithful pastors often have to endure criticism, opposition, fatigue, turmoil in the church, and sometimes even the death of a loved one.

During Debbie’s illness and death Job became my greatest friend. Job lost everything, but God replenished everything he had lost. There was a great truth that undergirded me during those trying months: “God is too good to be unkind. He is too wise to be mistaken: And when you can’t trace His hand, you can trust His heart.” When I thought I couldn’t go to another deacons’ meeting, take another criticism, or endure another disappointment I found that God’s grace was sufficient.

I also discovered that God knows our hearts and needs even better than we do. He ultimately brought Mary into my life and with her entrance into my life He brought back the joy, the laughter, and fulfillment I so desperately needed.

 

The Index: Let us turn this discussion in a different direction. Some have concluded that there is a resurgence of Calvinism in our denomination. What is your view of Calvinism and the impact it is having on our convention?

Cox: First of all, I would say that there has always been some Calvinistic theology throughout our denominational history. Every few generations there seems to be a resurgence of Calvinism with a healthy discussion of the sovereignty of God and the view of the responsibility of man. Personally, I am a Biblicist. I arrived at my understanding of God’s Word from the faithful instruction of dedicated lay people and from digging into the Bible myself.

Consequently, I learned that man is sinful; and that God in his sovereignty and great love for His creation sent His only Son, Jesus Christ, to die upon the cross for our sins. I also believe that every man has a free will. I also believe the Scriptures teach that God is not willing for anyone to perish, but that all should come to repentance and faith in Christ. I believe when the Bible says that Jesus died for all that it means just that. I believe that “whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

Some have wanted to label me as an anti-Calvinist, but those who know me also understand that term does not define me. Some of my friends are Calvinists. We have fellowship. We discuss theology. They know where I stand. We love one another.

However, I think it is wrong for a pastor who embraces Calvinistic theology to go to a church under false pretenses, never identify himself as a Calvinist and yet teach that doctrine. That can only bring strife and discord. That concerns me.

Those who hold Calvinist views ought to be transparent and honest with the church that is calling him, just as those pastors who believe “whosoever will” ought to be up front to those congregations that hold to reformed theology. I also believe pastor search committees must be thorough in their responsibility to investigate prospective candidates more so they can have a reasonable understanding of what the candidate believes before they make a recommendation to the church. There is a mutual responsibility on both the pastor’s part and the congregations’ part in dealing with this issue.

 

The Index: What would be the major emphases of your presidency?

Cox: My passion is for revival – to see a fresh movement of God in our SBC life. Great revivals have often started with our young people and spread to others. I can envision our places of training and equipping of future church and denominational leaders becoming seedbeds for revival.

I would challenge our national and state denominational structures to focus on spiritual awakening through prayer. I believe God has a fresh work for Southern Baptists, but it must be birthed on our knees before God.

Then I would attempt to give evangelism and missions the highest priority. Last year there were 8,749 of our churches, or 23% of Southern Baptist congregations, that baptized no one. The North American Mission Board is about to launch a ten-year initiative that will lead us to reach our nation with the gospel. It will take everyone working together to evangelize America; and we will work to make that happen. I am particularly concerned that we work with NAMB to reach our cities with the gospel with an aggressive church planting movement.

Furthermore, we need to engage our churches to partner with the International Mission Board to reach our world with the gospel. The IMB has indicated that there are 6,000 unreached people groups who have yet to hear the gospel. It would be great for our churches to adopt one of these people groups and partner with the IMB to reach them for the cause of Christ.

If elected I will do all I can to champion the Cooperative Program. Prior to 1925 Southern Baptists came to the conclusion that the societal approach to our ministries and missions was not the best way. Southern Baptists came to understand we are at our best when we come together to evangelize our nation and our world. At that time our convention established the Cooperative Program as our means of partnering together to accomplish our objectives in the Lord’s work.

I have heard it said that if we didn’t have the Cooperative Program we would have to create something like it to get the gospel to the ends of the earth. Our strength is in our togetherness. My church is capable of doing mission work, but not worldwide. I am seeking to lead my church to engage in evangelism and missions, but when we give 13 percent of our church’s undesignated receipts through the Cooperative Program we are touching not just certain areas of the world, but also 150 nations of this world.

I am participating in reaching all corners of America. I am supporting over 10,000 home and foreign missionaries. I am helping to fund six seminaries where preachers and missionaries are being trained to fulfill their calling. Through cooperation I can do so much more than what I can do alone. Furthermore it gives me the opportunity to partner with some 44,000 other congregations in carrying out the Great Commission.

I would champion the Cooperative Program. Twenty years ago our churches gave an average of 10.7 percent to our Cooperative Program missions. Last year the average church gave 4.46 percent. We can no longer ignore this issue. To ignore it will have dire consequences in the years ahead. Southern Baptists have always understood that we do best what we do together. Each church should be inspired to do their best.

Do I believe churches ought to be mandated to give a certain percentage? No, but I do believe we can do things to inspire our churches through our convention meetings, publications, and media to celebrate how God is using Southern Baptists around the world. The pastors in [all our]congregations have a desire to lead their churches to do their very best.

Finally, young leaders are important to our convention. I will do my best to get young men and women involved in the life of our denomination. We need seasoned leadership, but at the same time we need to include these rising young leaders in the work of our convention. Our future depends upon it.