Central Baptist Church History

Central Baptist is 91 years old and was organized in September 1917.  I am the 33rd pastor.  Of the first 21 pastors, 20 were seminary students.  The average stay of the first 32 pastors was 2.5 years.  What a tribute to Central Baptist to have trained so many pastors in the work of the ministry.

I was reading the church history on Central Baptist and ran across lots of names I recognized and lots more that I didn’t.  But here are some things I found:          

In 1920 the first electric lights were installed with a monthly electric bill of $1.00 per month.  Now those were the good old days.  In 1941 the church voted to approve a wildly optimistic budget totaling $1,000.  In 1944 the first full time pastor was hired at a handsome salary of $20 per week; with an annual salary of $1,040.  This meant that the pastor’s salary was larger than the entire church budget only 3 years earlier.  On March 28, 1950 the church burnt to the ground.  Only the pews, pulpit, piano and a picture were saved.  On September 10, 1950 the first services were held in the new church on the old land.  The cost of the new building was $6,500.  In 1957 tragedy struck again at CBC.  The Pastor and 20 members were dismissed from the congregation.  They formed the Trinity Baptist Church of Crandall.  In 1958 the first air conditioner was installed.  During the early 1970’s Sunday School attendance fell to an all time low of 39 and by the 1980’s it had only risen to 45.

In 1987 Central Baptist sold its existing land and buildings and moved to a new sight just on the outskirts of the Crandall city limits, where Bob Webb benevolently deeded five acres of land to the church.  A sanctuary and a small education space were built and occupied a short time later.  As Crandall began to show some growth, so did Central Baptist.  The approximately 85 members that changed locations had now grown to nearly 150.  In 1995 another building campaign was undertaken and a gym and more education space were constructed for approximately $800,000.  Then came another spurt of growth and Sunday School classes were set up in the gym and the morning worship went to two services.  A bus was purchased and Central began its first ever bus ministry. 

By this time, it was evident that more land was necessary to accommodate the need for a new worship center and classrooms.  In 2003 we purchased ten acres adjacent to our current location for $160,000.  Our goal was to retire all of our existing debt before we entered any additional building program.  In 2004 God’s devoted people faithfully gave, and we are now debt free.

Central Baptist is a surviving church.  It has been through hard times: financially when they struggled to make ends meet; the church was destroyed by fire; the church was damaged by a split; and crippled by low attendance.  Many crossroads have been crossed where people could have just thrown up their hands and quit.  But they didn’t.  Why?  I am glad you asked; because of devoted Christians who have always had a vision to see all of Crandall as part of the Kingdom of God.  This is a tremendous testimony of the many “overcomers” that have struggled through the years to maintain a Christian presence in a needy world.