California Southern Baptist Convention

The California Southern Baptist Convention (CSBC) is the state convention of the Southern Baptist Convention in California.^[1] The CSBC controls and financially supports California Baptist University.^[2][3]

Leadership

CSBC has an annual meeting with messengers from member churches around the state. Churches may only send messengers if they have given funds toward the Cooperative Program or the California Mission Offering within the last year. At this meeting, messengers elect nominated members of the Executive Board. This board oversees the work of CSBC throughout the year and elects the CSBC Executive Director, who leads the day-to-day operations.

CSBC Executive Directors include:

• R.W. Lackey (1940-1944)
• A.F. Crittendon (1945-1950)
• S.G. Posey (1951-1960)
• Grady Cothen (1961-1965)
• Robert D. Hughes (1966-1984)
• C.B. "Bill" Hogue (1985-1994)
• Fermin Whittaker (1995-2017)
• Bill Agee (2017-2022)
• Pete Ramirez (May 2022-present)

Structure

The Business Services Team^[4] includes the Chief Financial Officer, Controller, Accountant, and Applications Data Specialist.

The Church Matters Team provides tools and resources for local churches to stay healthy. They focus on church ministries, SBC partnerships, church revitalization, building repair grants, pastoral coaching, pastoral search, and legal matters such as bylaws, mergers, state compliance, insurance, and legacy plans.^[5]

The CSBC Communications Team keeps churches informed about ministry in the state and important updates in the convention.^[6] This includes the weekly email newsletter (This Week), the Great Commission Collective Podcast, news published on the website,^[7] and resources articles from denominational leaders.^[8]

Other teams include Evangelism, Missions, and Disaster Relief.

Name

CSBC was founded in 1940 as the Southern Baptist General Convention of California.^[9] The convention changed its name to its current name in 1988.^[9] Several times in recent decades efforts to change the name of the convention to remove "Southern" have failed.^[3][10]