By example and through his ability to help shape the convention’s powerful missionary, policy and governing boards, Mr. Luter hopes he can give the minority recruitment goals a boost during his two-year term.

“I want to carry that torch,” he said. “When I go to evangelical conferences, I’ll be Exhibit A.”

But he is well aware that many black evangelicals remain skeptical of the Southern Baptists, preferring to remain in separate associations like the largely black National Baptist Convention U.S.A., which has 7.5 million members.

Southern Baptist leaders acknowledge having a lot to answer for. “We were a segregated, virtually all-white denomination as late as the 1960s,” said Richard Land, president of the convention’s policy arm, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Mr. Land is the convention’s most prominent public face, often speaking out pungently on conservative causes like opposition to abortion, same-sex marriage and big government.

Mr. Land has been known for seeking racial reconciliation and was one of the authors of a resolution, adopted by the convention in 1995, that apologized for “historic acts of evil such as slavery” and for condoning “racism in our lifetime” and asked forgiveness “from our African-American brothers and sisters.”

But an episode this spring showed the lurking potential for racial misunderstandings. Many blacks were outraged when Mr. Land accused President Obama of trying to capitalize politically on the Trayvon Martin killing in Florida, called the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the Rev. Al Sharpton “race hustlers,” and suggested that racial profiling was justified.

A few pastors in the convention called for Mr. Land’s punishment or removal, and in the end he apologized and was sharply reprimanded by the church. Mr. Luter, who worked with Mr. Land on the convention’s 1995 apology, called the comments an unfortunate aberration but said he hoped Mr. Land would stay on.