Patton recommended as next AZMN executive director

The search committee for a new executive director of the Arizona Mission Network of Southern Baptists has recommended Monty Patton, currently associate executive director, for the post.

Mark Mucklow, AZMN president and search committee chairman, notified the Convention Council on May 28 of a special-called council meeting on June 17 at 10 a.m. “for the purpose of presenting and voting on our candidate Dr. Monty Patton.” The meeting will be conducted through Zoom video conferencing, as have some previous council meetings.

According to Arizona Southern Baptists’ constitution, the executive director must be elected “by a two-thirds favorable vote of the Convention Council and approved by a two-thirds favorable vote of the messengers in Annual or Special Session.”

News about the council’s decision will be posted on the AZMN website at azmn.org/portraits/, in the Network News biweekly e-newsletter and on the AZMN’s Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) pages.

If the outcome is favorable, information and messenger cards for a called convention will be mailed to AZMN churches. The information will also be shared through social media. The Constitution requires that a notice stating the date, time and place of the called convention be sent to all churches “not less than 10 nor more than 60 days before the date of such session.”

The eight-member search committee “began with an empty slate with no preconceived notions … about who should be selected,” Mucklow, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church at Sahuaro Ranch in Glendale, told Portraits. “We determined to select the person we each believed was the best person for this position, but particularly who we believed was God’s choice.”

After 30 days of soliciting applications and input, including suggestions from executive directors in other state conventions, committee members “studied the resumes, scheduled interviews and made our decision,” Mucklow said. “It was a unanimous decision.”

Patton’s experience in the AZMN and work with the facilitators and agencies was “a big help in his favor,” Mucklow said.

“I believe it was our extended interview with him that sealed the committee’s final decision that he was God’s leader for this next chapter in our history,” he said. “Monty shared he has learned a love for the entire state of Arizona and its many Southern Baptist churches in all of their uniqueness, diversities and commonalities.”

Patton came to Arizona in 1996 to plant Mountain Ridge Baptist Church in Glendale. For about four years while serving as pastor of Mountain Ridge, he also worked part-time with the North American Mission Board as the Send City missionary for Phoenix. He resigned from Mountain Ridge in 2017 to continue as the Send City missionary in a full-time capacity.

In 2020, Patton became the director of Send Network Arizona with NAMB, a post he held until joining the AZMN staff in 2023.

Prior to moving to Arizona, Patton was pastor of churches in Oklahoma and Missouri.

He holds a bachelor of arts degree from Oklahoma Baptist University, master of Christian education degree from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a doctor of ministry degree from Trinity Theological Seminary.

If elected, Patton would succeed David Johnson, AZMN executive director since 2013, who announced in March his intention to retire after the election of his successor.

Then, in early May, Gateway Seminary trustees approved Johnson as director of the doctor of ministry program and professor of leadership formation. He will start the new position this fall, but he said he still planned to continue in his present position until his successor is elected.

In addition to Mucklow, the search committee members are Lauren Belcher, a member of Challenge Church, Flagstaff; Simone Lake, a member of Church on Randall Place, Pine; Whitney Walters, senior pastor of Willow Hills Baptist Church, Prescott; Stephen Yee, English pastor of Northwest Chinese Baptist Church, Phoenix; Fernando Amaro, pastor of Iglesia Bautista Resurrección, Scottsdale; Chad Garrison, lead pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, Lake Havasu City; and Roland Pierce, pastor of Broadway Missionary Baptist Church, Phoenix.

“I was pleased as the chairman to see the great effort each member of the committee brought to the group for each of our meetings,” Mucklow said. “The professional and prayerful manner in which we carried out our responsibilities, with excellent dialogue between all, was a rewarding blessing from God.

“It was an exercise in Christian integrity that all Arizona Southern Baptists would appreciate knowing. I am grateful to God for making our work Spirit-led and clear to all the members.”