Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas steeple raising in 1965. Provided by Wilshire Baptist Church.
Provided by Wilshire Baptist Church
Wilshire Baptist Church, a congregation in northeast Dallas known for its ministry and historic votes to include women and LGBTQ members in church life and leadership, will celebrate its 75th anniversary this weekend.
The church was founded on June 14, 1951 when a group of 55 met at a Lakewood home with the intention of building a new Baptist church. It gained national recognition during the 1990s and 2010s, when its members voted on theological issues particularly related to gender and sexual orientation.
The Rev. Timothy Peoples, senior pastor at Wilshire Baptist, said its history has been defined by drawing a wider and wider circle for its community.
Article continues below this ad
“Faith is ever evolving,” he said.
Before they had a church building, members attended Sunday service at the Wilshire Theater, then at the corner of Skillman Street and Mockingbird Lane, according to the church. Its first worship space was finished in 1954. Huber Drumwright was its first pastor, followed by Ralph Langley and Bruce McIver.
In 1991, the church voted in favor of allowing women and divorced people to become deacons, causing a rift with the Southern Baptist Convention, America’s largest Protestant denomination. The same year, Wilshire Baptist was a founding church in the movement that formed the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in 1991, a national network of which the church remains a part.
George Mason, who was senior pastor of the church at the time, said the church believed the Baptist principles of local church autonomy and “freedom of conscience” were being violated. Wilshire Baptist resisted the SBC’s moves to restrict women’s ministry for more than a decade, Mason said, before it officially left the SBC in 2000.
Article continues below this ad
Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas voted in November to grant full membership to LGBT individuals. (Jae S. Lee/Staff Photographer)
Related: Historic church in Oak Cliff’s Tenth Street district is celebrating 140 years with a party
In 2016, the church voted to grant full membership to LGBTQ congregants.The vote meant all members, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, could participate in leadership, ordination, marriage and baby dedications, according to the church.
Peoples, who was with Wilshire Baptist at the time as a ministry resident, said the congregation participated in multiple book studies, listening sessions and roundtable discussions before the vote.
“You really saw a church wrestle and struggle with theology together,” Peoples said. “There were really holy and sacred moments.”
Article continues below this ad
The move severed ties with the Baptist General Convention of Texas, also known as Texas Baptists. Wilshire Baptist was the center of national media attention and about 300 members left the church following the vote, The Dallas Morning News previously reported. The vote also drew new members to the church.
Mason said many members were grieved by the loss of relationships to other Baptists. But 10 years down the road, inclusion is normal church life now.
“To see LGBTQ+ persons in our congregation who are fellow Christians, who are following Christ and serving among us, worshiping with us, living their lives without looking over their shoulder… this is a great joy,” Mason said.
Mason retired as senior pastor in 2022 after 33 years. The church selected Peoples as its next senior pastor later that year.
Article continues below this ad
“Wilshire has demonstrated over the course of its 75 years an extraordinary amount of courage,” Mason said. “While tradition is something that gives us identity, there is always a call to examine whether we are aligned with where the spirit of God is leading us next.”
Now in his fourth year as senior pastor, Peoples was previously a resident with the church as part of its Pathways to Ministry program. Often likened to a medical residency, the two-year program founded in 2002 offers real-world experience in church ministry after seminary.
Peoples said the program aims to help ministers and chaplains build connections and skills to avoid burnout. About 45 residents have graduated through the program, Peoples said.
“At the end of the day I hope that we continue to be a church that goes outside our comfort zones and actually do what it is God is asking us to do,” he said.
The Rev. Heather Mustain, an associate pastor who has been on staff since 2013, said the church has increasingly engaged with interfaith relationship building and advocacy since the 2010s. The church runs a number of ministries and partners with immigration legal assistance, the domestic abuse shelter Genesis Women’s Shelter and with Cornerstone Baptist Church in South Dallas, which is celebrating its own 40th anniversary this year.
Article continues below this ad
Related: One year later, a weekly vigil for migrants persists in prayer
“Our way forward isn’t necessarily different from who we’ve necessarily been,” Mustain said. “But it’s a continuation of this movement toward inclusion, justice and being a bold witness for Christ in our time.”
Wilshire Baptist will host a “Homecoming Celebration” Saturday evening and a 75-minute service Sunday to celebrate the anniversary.