“He is exactly what we need as president of the Executive Committee at this historic moment,” R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, told Baptist Press in February.
Unlike other Southern Baptist seminary leaders, such as Mohler, Iorg has operated largely out of the limelight during his 20 years at Gateway Seminary.
“Jeff has managed to do a great job at Gateway Seminary while simultaneously avoiding the internecine fighting of the SBC,” said Ed Stetzer, dean of the Talbot School of Theology at Biola University and a former Southern Baptist leader. “That probably makes him one of the few candidates who can unite all sides in 2024.”
Gateway has experienced slow but steady growth under his leadership. When he was named president of the seminary in 2004, the school had 696 total students and the equivalent of 403 full-time students, according to data from the Association of Theological Schools. In the fall of 2023, the most recent semester for which data is available, the school had 1,499 total students — the equivalent of 783 full-time enrollees.
Iorg also oversaw a move from San Francisco, where the school had been known as Golden Gate Seminary, to Ontario, California, in 2016. According to Baptist Press, Iorg had asked the school’s trustees to begin searching for his successor as president last fall.
The newly elected president said he planned to fly to Nashville on Thursday to begin searching for a place to live. He also said he and his wife plan to buy a home in Portland, Oregon, where his wife’s parents live, and that he would likely spend much of his time as Executive Committee president on the road rather than in an office.
In his new role, Iorg will lead a committee facing fiscal and legal challenges. In recent years, the committee’s legal costs have skyrocketed in response to the denomination’s abuse crisis. At their last meeting, the Executive Committee approved a budget that included drawing on more reserves to make up a deficit.
The committee will also play a role in deciding the fate of a series of abuse reforms approved by local church representatives at the denomination’s annual meeting. Currently, there is no long-term plan to fund those reforms, which have stalled.
Giving to the SBC’s Cooperative Program, which funds international and national ministries, is down, and trust in the denomination’s leadership has been frayed in recent years.
Iorg said that as a seminary president, he has long benefited from the Cooperative Program and plans to enthusiastically promote it.
A former pastor and state convention leader, Iorg is the author of eight books and holds degrees from Hardin-Simmons University, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Ann, have three children and five grandchildren.
This article originally appeared here.
