55 Years Of Serving With Thanksgiving

55 Years of Serving with Thanksgiving

Rev 1:19

Today we are celebrating 55 years of service to the Lord at Trinity Baptist Church

Before I get into my message, I want to thank Ms. Betty Nevins, Ms. Darlene Hardin, and Mrs. JoAnn Malaise for work on book

And for our Kitchen committee for all of their hard work and preparation

I think it’s appropriate that as we celebrate today we look Rev 1:19 & Ezra 3:11

Rev 1:19

Write, therefore, what you have seen, what is now and what will take place later.

Ezra 3:11

With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the LORD : "He is good; his love to Israel endures forever." And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD was laid.

Read / Pray

We have some wonderful thanksgiving food waiting for us after the service so I don’t want to take too much time

I know the more Amen’s I hear the faster I and shorter I will preach

First our passage in Rev 1:19 says to write what you have seen…so it is good to…

1. Remember Our Past

We have a rich history here at TBC

This church was organized in the home of C.O. and Edna Griffitts at 1420 37th Street

On 18 Nov 1951, almost 55 years to the day, the first Sunday services were held in the Owens & Brumley Funeral Home chapel

Trinity was accepted into the Wichita Archer Clay Baptist Association on Sept 15, 1952

Mr. Frank Hursh and family donated the lot in Feb 1953 that the current building now sits on

Groundbreaking began for the TBC building on April 25, 1954

The church had 90 members at this time

The first pastor of Trinity was Rev Arvil Richardson, who was one of only 9 pastors that have served here

The longest serving pastor for 20 years at one time was Darius McKay and the second longest is me for almost 9 years now

Trinity has only ordained three pastors with me being the last one

One of the first deacons of the church was brother Art Hoeffner, which was one of the first ordinations of the church

Several other deacons have been ordained throughout the years to serve Trinity

Trinity also used to be on television channel 6 which lasted 30 minutes

Trinity has been involved in the ministry of community evangelism for years

This community over the years has been given bibles, tracts, and the gospel message

There has been food pantries where over 100 families were fed

Then on that terrible Tuesday, April 10, 1977, the church building was completely destroyed

The building which now exists was built after the tornado and was occupied on August 26, 1979.

There is a lot more of rich history you can read about in our Anniversary Book

Needless to say, you can see that a solid foundation was laid for the ministry of Trinity…not even a tornado that completely demolished the church building could destroy it

That was what has happened in the past but now let’s look at

2. What is Now

I was called to be the pastor of Trinity on January 28, 1998…and was ordained by Trinity on May 17, 1998

We have had over 40 baptisms in the last 8 years which is about 5 per year

Unfortunately, many of our elder members have gone on to be with the Lord…but they have left us with a strong legacy AMEN

Our men have been going to Mardi Gras now since 1999…and we now have other men from other churches looking at going this year

We have totally redone our sanctuary with $26,000 worth of upgrades to include a new stage area, carpet, and refurbishing our pews

We bought a beautiful well-lit sign to get the attention of those passer-by’s

We have had two young men recently called to the ministry from our church, TJ Conwell & Keith Laude

We have a thriving congregation that is alive and excited and desires to live for the Lord

We continue to strive to reach the lost in our community and strive to serve the Lord in all facets of ministry

That’s what we have seen in the past and also the present but now…

3. What about the Future?

Well, the Lord miraculously blessed us with $40K to purchase the land behind us

Now, with that land, we have a vision to build a beautiful gymnasium that we hope to use to again reach out to our community

We plan on updating our screen and projector soon and also building a sound booth to house our sound

We plan on continue to take men to Mardi Gras so they can learn to be a witness and to be better men