Southern Baptist Leader Fred Luter Lays Down the Path

*The Rev. Fred Luter knew that his election as the first African-American president of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination would make headlines, reports the Montgomery Advertiser.

But he couldn’t have predicted the whirlwind that his life has become over the past two months.

“It’s been nonstop, it’s been engaging, it’s been enlightening,” Luter said this week before preaching to a large crowd at Lakeview Baptist Church in Auburn. It was one of many sermons he’s delivered recently to churches in the predominantly white Southern Baptist Convention.

His election earned phone calls from President Barack Obama, and GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s office, along with personal letters from former presidents Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter. He’s been interviewed by several major media outlets and TV news magazines.

And three weeks ago, he was an honored guest at the North Carolina home of evangelist Billy Graham, an experience Luter described as “like meeting Moses for the first time.”

Read the full story at the Montgomery Advertiser.