Church History
As First Baptist celebrated its centennial, its active organizations included Sunday School, Training Union, Women’s Missionary Society, Brotherhood, Girls’ Auxiliary, and Royal Ambassadors. The membership was 1109. The total amount given for all causes the previous year (1952) was $49,074.93.
The church’s mission work also grew under the leadership of Bro. Basden. Dr. and Mrs. R. L. Cochran began the East View Mission in 1947. The next year the church bought a lot and moved a frame building onto it for regular Sunday School and preaching services. Following a tent revival conducted by Bro. Basden in southwest Belton, the church began another mission there. By 1953 it had a building and a full-time pastor, the Rev. Gordon Sather. Meanwhile women students of the college conducted a ministry at both the County Home and the jail. And from January 1952 the church had members, the Rev. and Mrs. Joe Carl Johnson, ministering in Brazil.
In 1956 James Basden resigned to go to Brownwood. In 1957 the Rev. Charles Tope became pastor and served until he and his family were assigned to missionary service in Korea. Dr. Arthur Tyson became interim pastor until the Rev. Edwin Johnson came as pastor. During Johnson’s pastorate a new educational building was added, dedicated in 1963. When Bro. Johnson was called to another church, Leonard Holloway, president of Mary Hardin-Baylor College, filled the interim until June 1967, when the church called Dr. Leroy Kemp, religion-faculty member and Dean of Admissions at the college.
Dr. Kemp pastored First Baptist for twenty years. During his tenure church property increased on Main Street and on Pearl Street, allowing for additional parking space and building expansion. The Family Life Center was added, and the worship center was renovated.
In 1967 the church membership was 1243, Sunday School enrollment 755, average attendance 340. In 1987 total membership was 2581, Sunday School enrollment 1657, average attendance 649. From 1968 to 1987 the annual budget grew from $81,000 to $637,565. Radio broadcasts of morning services began in 1970; television ministry began in 1984 with a delayed broadcast of the morning service on public television. In 1976 a children’s day care center was established. Growth in attendance led to two morning services, with Sunday School in between, beginning in 1977, and in 1984 a second Sunday School period was added, putting the worship services back-to-back between 9:00 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. In 1967 the church still had only three full-time staff in addition to the pastor, as in 1953: a minister of music and education, a secretary, and a custodian. Indeed, the custodians by 1967 were often part time. In 1987 the staff numbered eleven, and the custodian had a part-time helper.