Terry Newland Called
To Be Synod Executive

by Jane Hines

At a called meeting on September 8, 2004, at First Presbyterian Church in Franklin, Tennessee, the Synod of Living Waters voted to call the Rev. Terry Newland to be Synod Executive and the Rev. Charles Van Devender to be Stated Clerk. Newland has been Executive in Sheppards and Lapsley Presbytery since April of 1999 and Van Devender is a commissioner to Synod from North Alabama Presbytery where he also serves as Stated Clerk. He has been Acting Stated Clerk of the Synod since the death of Richard Baldwin in December of 2003.

The report of the executive search committee was presented by Nolan Waller, chair of the executive committee. Other members of the search committee were: Don Padget, Martha Haynes, Phil Leftwich, Bill Jones, Charles Van Devender, Carolyn Jordan, Morris Taylor and Emett Barfield.

Chris Jones, from Sheppards and Lapsley Presbytery, asked Newland to speak to the Synod about his sense of call to the position as executive. He said that strong sense of call was the only thing that made him consider making this move. He said he has a passion for the mission of the broader church. "Nothing can outweigh my sense that God has prepared me and called me to be the executive of the Synod," he said.

As he comes from a presbytery within the Synod, he is already familiar with the way the Synod works in partnership with all twelve presbyteries and is well acquainted with all of the presbytery executives.

Newland has been active in the life of the Synod as Dean of the First Call Conference; serving on the Presbytery Partnership for Stewardship Development; serving on the Presbytery Partnership for Church Redevelopment and as chair of the design team for the National Mission Partnership Consultation. He is serving as moderator of the National Mission Partnership committee. He has been active on the Alabama Campus Ministry Board since 1990, which includes terms as vice president and president of that group. He was a member of the nominating committee of the Executive Presbyters Nominating Committee from 2000 to 2002.

Terry has worked in the Presbyterian Church for 37 years. He and his wife, Diane, a school media specialist, have been married for 29 years. He was ordained in 1978, after receiving a Master of Divinity degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. He is a graduate of Auburn University.

He was minister of First Presbyterian Church, an urban church of 550 members, in Anniston, Alabama, from 1989 to 1999. He was associate pastor of 700-member Shades Valley Presbyterian Church in Birmingham from 1978 to 1989. While he was attending seminary, he was youth minister at St. Paul UMC, a church with 1800 members. In 1975 he was assistant to the minister at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Birmingham. The previous year, he had been youth director at Vine Street Presbyterian Church in Birmingham.

One of the new executive's first duties will be to lead a delegation from the Synod of Living Waters to the October 26-28 meeting of the Synod of the Peninsula in Ciudad del Carmen in the Yucatan as a sister synod relationship is begun.

Newland's first meeting with the Synod Executive Committee is scheduled for November 7-9 at the Synod office in Franklin.