Church Revitalization MIDWEST


Church revitalization returns churches to their first love


The Gift By Tobin Perry


In 1962 John F. Kennedy was still president. Chatty Cathy dolls and Etch-a-sketches were under many Christmas trees. Sony was producing transistor radios—not video games. Lebron James’ mom wouldn’t be born for another six years. You could buy a new home for $12,500, 32 cents bought a dozen eggs and 28 cents a gallon of milk.


And 800 SE 3rd Street was the place to be on Sunday mornings in Evansville, Ind. Just a few blocks from the city’s life- blood—the Ohio River—Calvary Baptist Church reached young families like few other churches in the growing river city of the 1950s and 60s. In 1962 about 1,400 people packed its pews on a typical Sunday. In 1966 Calvary gave the State


Convention of Baptists in Indiana its largest one-time gift from a church to


date—$3,000 earmarked for the Lot- tie Moon Christmas Offering®. The church’s pastors were leaders in Southern Baptist life—serving as state convention presidents and holding SBC committee positions. In the early 1960s the forward-looking


church leadership built a beautiful new sanctuary to house the growing congrega- tion. The new building was not just a gift to the burgeoning congregation but to the community it was now engaging.


Fast-forward half a century and the numbers told a different story. Like hundreds of Southern Baptist churches in cities throughout North America, in two generations the once thriving and now


9 Winter 2013 • onmission.com


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