[1]MANAWA, Wis. (BP)–Dennis Hansen, director of missions for Bay Lakes Baptist Association in northeastern Wisconsin, will be nominated for first vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention during the June 17-19 annual meeting in Dallas.
Hansen will be the second nominee for first vice president, following last month’s announcement that Fort Worth, Texas, pastor Miles Seaborn will be nominated by Stan Coffey, an Amarillo, Texas, pastor.
Hansen will be nominated by Tim Shrader, pastor of Celebration Fellowship Baptist Church, a mission congregation in Oshkosh, Wis.
Shrader said the SBC needs to have “someone who understands missions experientially serving in a place of influence … . Southern Baptists have always been a ‘missions people,’ we must never lose sight of that. And we mustn’t fall into the trap of just sending our money and hoping someone else will go do missions. We need others to join us in spreading the gospel of Christ in a land that so desperately needs to hear the good news of a personal relationship with Jesus himself.
“I can think of no one better to herald that message than Dennis Hansen, a man of God, a man with a heart for the lost, a man of sacrifice,” Shrader said. “Dennis has firsthand experience in ministering in missions territory. He knows, as do all others ministering in the northern states, that things are different here, and ministry must be done differently. The gospel is never compromised, but methods of sharing the gospel must relate to the culture in which we live.”
Hansen, a native of Atchison, Kan., has led the Bay Lakes association for four years. The association has doubled in size in the past two years and now has 11 churches and seven missions.
Previously he was director of evangelism for the Iowa Southern Baptist Convention for four years. He also pastored churches in Missouri and Kansas for 15 years.
Hansen has a bachelor’s degree in communications from Northwest Missouri State University, Maryville, Mo.; a master of divinity degree from Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Kansas City, Mo.; and presently is enrolled in the doctor of ministry degree program at Midwestern.
The other announced nominees for SBC offices are Tom Elliff, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church, Del City, Okla., for a second term as convention president, and J.C. Mitchell, a retired Florida pastor noted for his commitment to church starting, for second vice president.