A Grand Heritage---Vision to the Future
In 2014 First Baptist Church will celebrate 125 years of faithful ministry! Can you imagine those faithful Christians coming in on the land run, with a vision of a new pioneer church? Organized and chartered on October 27, 1889 with eleven (11) charter members. Only 3 years later the growing congregation bought the first church property and a year later built the first church building right here on the corner of Webster and Comanche with 108 members on the roll.
In the late summer of 2011 we are approaching the end of the One Hundred twenty second year of faithful ministry and living with a strong legacy of hundreds of members who have gone before.
Can you imagine, 2 years before basketball was a game, 6 years prior to the first professional football game, 16 years before the Glenpool oilfield near Tulsa was discovered, 18 years prior to Oklahoma becoming the 46th state and 19 years before the Model “T” was introduced and priced at $850. (Statistics from Kenneth Farris’ booklet Happenings)? Faithful followers of Christ who came to the middle of the plains to start a new life, to build a community and worship the God of all creation!
Through the next 122 years many more faithful followers have come to this corner in Norman, Oklahoma to worship, to discover Jesus and be baptized, to minister to each other, and to touch Norman, our state, and the world for the sake of Christ!
Mission churches have been established and grown to self-sustaining congregations, mission efforts around the world have been completed and are ongoing, and the First Baptist Church in Norman grew in numbers, in influence and in facilities. Today we stand as recipients of this great heritage.
Historically committed to being a downtown church, from the first lots of property and that first building, to today for the use in ministry, over 175,000 square feet of facilities: sanctuary and education space, mission housing, Falls Creek cabin, parking lots, and a fleet of vans for the use in ministry, God has blessed faithful visions of those who came before us.
As we approached the 120th anniversary church members began a journey again to be God’s visionary people. Working diligently on what has become the Vision 2020 plan. Along with that, more than 100 members began looking diligently at our facilities again, to seek God’s face to understand our call to continue the legacy of those who came before.
With a focus on facility needs for those who are not here yet, untold hours of meetings, prayer, evaluating our facilities today, and seeking God’s direction for our future needs.
In August of 2011, the General Project Committee and the various facility task forces bring forth a Proposed Master Facilities plan to meet our current and future needs for facilities. It seems to be a plan that meets real needs without extravagance, provides for growing needs for enhanced education space, a new front entrance that invites those yet to come into our facilities, meets new and growing demands of new generations. What an opportunity to join with the visionary Christians of the past!
It is our continuing prayer that God will direct our visions, touch lives for His sake in the process, and allow us to continue a great heritage of being the hands and feet of Christ, on this historic corner in downtown Norman! God,… find us faithful!
Proposed Facilities Master Plan front elevation, August 2011.
A Grand Heritage---Vision to the Future
In 2014 First Baptist Church will celebrate 125 years of faithful ministry! Can you imagine those faithful Christians coming in on the land run, with a vision of a new pioneer church? Organized and chartered on October 27, 1889 with eleven (11) charter members. Only 3 years later the growing congregation bought the first church property and a year later built the first church building right here on the corner of Webster and Comanche with 108 members on the roll.
In the late summer of 2011 we are approaching the end of the One Hundred twenty second year of faithful ministry and living with a strong legacy of hundreds of members who have gone before.
Can you imagine, 2 years before basketball was a game, 6 years prior to the first professional football game, 16 years before the Glenpool oilfield near Tulsa was discovered, 18 years prior to Oklahoma becoming the 46th state and 19 years before the Model “T” was introduced and priced at $850. (Statistics from Kenneth Farris’ booklet Happenings)? Faithful followers of Christ who came to the middle of the plains to start a new life, to build a community and worship the God of all creation!
Through the next 122 years many more faithful followers have come to this corner in Norman, Oklahoma to worship, to discover Jesus and be baptized, to minister to each other, and to touch Norman, our state, and the world for the sake of Christ!
Mission churches have been established and grown to self-sustaining congregations, mission efforts around the world have been completed and are ongoing, and the First Baptist Church in Norman grew in numbers, in influence and in facilities. Today we stand as recipients of this great heritage.
Historically committed to being a downtown church, from the first lots of property and that first building, to today for the use in ministry, over 175,000 square feet of facilities: sanctuary and education space, mission housing, Falls Creek cabin, parking lots, and a fleet of vans for the use in ministry, God has blessed faithful visions of those who came before us.
As we approached the 120th anniversary church members began a journey again to be God’s visionary people. Working diligently on what has become the Vision 2020 plan. Along with that, more than 100 members began looking diligently at our facilities again, to seek God’s face to understand our call to continue the legacy of those who came before.
With a focus on facility needs for those who are not here yet, untold hours of meetings, prayer, evaluating our facilities today, and seeking God’s direction for our future needs.
In August of 2011, the General Project Committee and the various facility task forces bring forth a Proposed Master Facilities plan to meet our current and future needs for facilities. It seems to be a plan that meets real needs without extravagance, provides for growing needs for enhanced education space, a new front entrance that invites those yet to come into our facilities, meets new and growing demands of new generations. What an opportunity to join with the visionary Christians of the past!
It is our continuing prayer that God will direct our visions, touch lives for His sake in the process, and allow us to continue a great heritage of being the hands and feet of Christ, on this historic corner in downtown Norman! God,… find us faithful!
Proposed Facilities Master Plan front elevation, August 2011.