[2] He entered Texas A&M College at 16, and after graduation studied to become a lawyer, but a dramatic religious experience under the preaching of Major William Evander Penn caused him to pursue a career in foreign missions.

Following his time in Baltimore, Mullins settled into pastoral work in New England, far from his alma mater, which was embroiled in a bitter theological controversy with its third president, William Heth Whitsitt.

When Southern Seminary sent an agent to his doorstep in Newton Centre, Massachusetts, to offer him its presidency, Mullins expressed initial shock at the thought of stepping into that difficult post.

In 1926 a handsome academic and residential complex was completed in classical Georgian architecture, with a distinctive clock tower in his honor atop the main administrative building, Norton Hall.

Mullins helped prevent a split in the denomination through the development of a consensus doctrinal statement called The Baptist Faith and Message, adopted in 1925, which has been updated several times as the convention has turned steadily more conservative in recent years.