Rick Speas, senior pastor of Old Town Baptist Church, Winston-Salem and a former president of Baptist State Convention of North Carolina (BSC), said, “I am happy announce that I will nominate Joel Stephens to the office of 2nd vice president of the BSC. I believe Joel is a dedicated servant of the Lord. He is a strong supporter of North Carolina Baptists and the Cooperative Program, and he has served our convention in many capacities already.”
Joel Stephens, senior pastor of Westfield Baptist Church, will be nominated by Rick Speas this November at the annual meeting in Greensboro. |
As senior pastor of Westfield Baptist Church, Westfield, Stephens said the church is active in reaching the surrounding community and has taken the challenge to investigate ways to impact lostness in the Piedmont Triad area through the BSC’s new strategy.
Stephens said, “Our congregation has also supported me whole-heartedly in my role as a founding faculty member of the Roma Bible Institute – a school established by North Carolina pastors to train Roma pastors in Hungary, Romania and Ukraine that partners with Baptists on Mission and Hungarian Baptist Aid. Beyond all this, Westfield gladly gives over 11% to the Cooperative Program.”
Speas believes Stephens “will bring great insight and vision to that position and to our convention. It will give me joy to stand before our convention in November and nominate him.”
Stephens received his master of divinity and a doctor of ministry degrees from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. In 2007, he began serving on the BSC Board of Directors and as a member of the Council on Christian Higher Education – now the Christian Higher Education Special Committee. Stephens was elected in 2009 as chair of the Christian Higher Education Special Committee placing him on the Executive Committee, also. In January 2012, he was elected to serve as the chair of the Committee on Convention Meetings, and has filled that position the past two years.
He said, “I am so excited about what God is doing through our convention, and I whole-heartedly support the new strategy and the leadership of our convention. God’s hand is blessing and moving among us in these days.”
He and his wife, Lisa, have four children: Carson, Carrie, Cooper and Cathryn.