(RNS) — Morris Chapman, a longtime leader of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, died Monday. He was 84.
“In a world where so many have fallen, he was faithful to the end,” current SBC President Clint Pressley posted on social media in tribute to Chapman. “Southern Baptists like me owe men like him a debt of gratitude. Praying the Lord is close to his family and especially his widow Jodi in the days ahead.”
Chapman led the Nashville-based Executive Committee from 1992 to 2010, during a time when conservatives solidified their control of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination. Before that, Chapman served two years as SBC president during the tail-end of a long battle between conservative and moderate Southern Baptists.
James Merritt, another former SBC president, said Chapman helped the denomination get back on track after the end of that battle by focusing on the Cooperative Program, the SBC’s long-running program for funding missions and national ministries.
He referred to Chapman as a “Christian gentleman” who was devoted to the SBC.
“Morris came out at a very strategic time,” said Merritt. “Healing needed to take place. He struck a good chord, trying to bring people together.”
When he was elected in 1992, Morris said that he saw his role as rallying Southern Baptists together.
“I see myself as carrying out the will of the majority and carrying out genuine healing among Southern Baptists,” Chapman said after his election was announced during a February 1992 meeting of the Executive Committee, according to the archives of Baptist Press, a denominational publication.
As president of the SBC, he also emphasized the need for the SBC to focus on evangelism and prayer and called the church around the country to pray while he was SBC president.
“The desperate need for spiritual awakening in this nation has been ever present in my thoughts,” he said at the time.
A lifetime Southern Baptist, Chapman grew up in Kosciusko, Mississippi, then graduated from Mississippi College and attended Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He went on to serve as pastor of churches in Texas and New Mexico. Before being elected to the Executive Committee, he was pastor of First Baptist Church in Wichita Falls, Texas.
In 1984, while at the church in Wichita Falls, he asked members of his congregation to pray for each of the denomination’s more than 30,000 churches, part of his commitment to denominational life.
“No man could be more blessed than to conclude his ministry among Southern Baptists as president and chief executive officer of the Executive Committee and treasurer of the Southern Baptist Convention,” he said when announcing his retirement. “Had I not lived it, I would not have believed it to be possible.”
Ben Cole, a longtime friend of the Chapman family, referred to the Rev. Chapman as a denominational statesman.
“Dr. Chapman never saw himself as the commanding officer nor the Executive Committee as the flagship of the Southern Baptist Convention,” Cole said in a text message. “Neither did he serve as captain of a denominational battleship forever stirring waters of strife among his brethren. He will be fondly remembered by honest churchmen as a trustworthy ballast during seasons of theological retrieval and institutional realignment.”
Unlike other leaders of the so-called conservative resurgence whose ministries ended in scandal, Chapman was known for his personal integrity.
He was not above controversy, especially when clashing with those he thought might undermine the convention or the Cooperative Program. In 2009, during his speech at the Southern Baptist Convention, he criticized then-popular megachurch pastor Mark Driscoll as someone whose behavior was unfit for pastors. He also criticized a move to cut funding to the Executive Committee.
Chapman, while he denounced abusers, opposed starting a database to track abusive church leaders.
During Chapman’s tenure, giving to the Cooperative Program remained strong.
“Total giving through CP to state Baptist conventions reached a record high of $548,205,099 in 2007-08,” according to Baptist Press. “Even without an adjustment for inflation, that is 23 percent higher than the most recent year.”
Jeff Iorg, the current president of the Executive Committee, paid tribute to his predecessor, whom he had known for years.
“He was a champion for cooperation and our global mission. He was also a friend who encouraged me for many years – including after my election as president of the EC. We honor him and pray for his family in their loss,” Iorg told Baptist Press in a story announcing Chapman’s passing.