By Diana Chandler Baptist Press PHOENIX (BP) — Messengers and speakers attending the Southern Baptist Convention 2017 Annual Meeting in Phoenix are encouraged to dress appropriately for daily temperatures surpassing 100 degrees. “Because of the severe heat in Phoenix during the summer months, I encourage all messengers to the 2017 Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting to dress casually,” SBC President Steve Gaines told Baptist Press. “Men should feel free not

Baptist and Reflector ABERDEEN, Miss. — The North American Mission Board has filed an official response to a lawsuit by former Baptist Convention of Maryland/Delaware executive director Will McRaney, who alleges NAMB wrongly interfered with his separation from the BCMD in 2015, engaged in “slander and/or libel” and attempted to interfere with his speaking engagements. NAMB’s May 18 filing with a U.S. district court in Aberdeen, Miss., acknowledged notifying the

Baptist Press PHOENIX — Tennessee pastor Steve Gaines will be nominated for a second term as president of the Southern Baptist Convention, his son Grant announced May 17. Gaines “has led the convention faithfully” over the past year and been “marked by … godly traits,” Grant Gaines, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Jackson, wrote in a statement to Baptist Press announcing his intent to nominate his father at the

By David Roach, Baptist Press and Marilyn Stewart, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary RIDGELAND, Miss. (BP) — Grady Cothen — the former chief executive of a state convention, a Southern Baptist university and two Southern Baptist Convention entities — died May 19 at The Orchard retirement home in Ridgeland, Miss. He was 96. Among his service to Southern Baptists, Cothen was executive secretary of the Southern Baptist General Convention of