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VOLUME SIX
NUMBER TEN
THE BEGINNING OF “CENTRAL TEMPLE”
Philathea Class of Central Baptist Church, Memphis, Gives First SI,OOO to Furnish the “Central Temple Girls 9 Home 99
Dr. J. L. White, Former Tar Heel-Georgian, Planning Great “ People 9 s Church" in Tennessee Metropolis.
WO GOLDEN weeks with J. L.
White in Memphis! That is
enough to make his countless
friends in Georgia and the “Tar
Heel Empire” turn “verdant,”
with envy. For the “round doz
en” years spent by him as the
conquering leader of the “grand
old First church.” at Macon.
T
bound those royal people to him by “hoops
o£ steel;” while, as President of the Board
pf Trustees of Bessie Tift College at For
syth, he won and held students, faculty and
constituency so completely that he has
been called back more than once to the field
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DR. J. P. WHITE,
Pastor Central Baptist Church.
leadership of that great institution, and now
has dangling before him a salary big enough
to tempt any man from present duty except
one who has always wrought with a martyr
spirit and now works and dreams in the
Memphian metropolis with the positive vis
ion of a seer.
A Telegram Changed Plans.
My lecture dates were all arranged for
many weeks ahead but a wiregram of gener
ous insistence came from my old Georgia
friend that made me patronize the telegraph
company with those convenient “night let
ters,” until an “honorable release” allowed
me to go to Memphis—for I knew J. L.
PINEY WOODS SKETCHES—Page Eight
ATLANTA, GA., APRIL 27, 1911
White meant business and that the field
must be “unto harvest white.”
It was— and is! Outside of New Or
leans and foreign San Antonio, there is noth
ing else in all the South that presents such
a “down town church” problem as Mem
phis, with all its marvelous wealth, its com
manding commercial prowess, its law-defi
ance, its wanton worldliness and the siren
songs of its debauching Sunday Theatres.
The Beginning of “Central Temple.”
Right in the heart of this grinding, stag
gering problem is located the Central Bap
tist church—a massive pile of bricks and
mortar erected away back in 1868 when
Memphis was in its swaddling clothes.
Here the brilliant young Rowan preached
his promising life out and went to the skies
at the age of twenty-seven. Here Sylvanus
Landrum, the great father of the great and
only W. W. Landrum, was pastor until God
called him Home—and out yonder in beau
tiful Elmwood sleeps his sacred dust. Here
G. A. Nunnally, Georgia’s stalwart “old man
eloquent” reasoned of “righteousness and
temperance and judgment to come” until he
was called to the presidency of the Southern
Female College, at LaGrange.
The Footprints of Potts.
And here for fourteen years prior to the
coming of J. L. White, walked and worked
the Godly Thomas S. Potts, abundant in la
bors, stainless in life, plenteous in patience
and strong in the hearts of his people.
No man could be a successful pastor for
14 years in such a trying field as Memphis
without being all of these. Indeed, I heard
on every side that the most effective, far
reaching revival meeting that ever bless
ed the church was held by Dr. Potts himself,
after he had been pastor for nine or ten
years. And when the work of Financial Sec
retary of the great Tri-State, or Baptist Me
morial Hospital in Memphis was rolled upon
his heart and shoulders and he resigned his
pastorate to assume successful charge of that
mighty enterprise, it was natural that the
Central church should look for a leader who
had been, under God, master of the situation
in other fields.
The time had come for a great forward
movement on the part of this great church—
a movement that would fight back and for
ever hold in check the rising, merciless tide
of commercialism and worldliness so natural
in a city of such metropolitan strides as the
capital of the middle Mississippi valley.
By WILLIAM D. UPSHAW
It was time for an epoch-making move
ment, and to those who know his powers of
leadership it is little wonder that the com
mittee—“e’en wiser than they knew,” turned
to such a man and preacher as J L. White.
The Beginning of “Central Temple” Fasci
nated by Difficulties.
Surveying the field, fascinated by its man
ifold difficulties and impressed that God was
in the call, Dr. White turned from packed
houses and clinging hearts at Greensboro,
N. C., and came to Memphis last June to lay
his superb powers of eloquence and leadership
on the altar of A GREATER MEMPHIS
THROUGH THE KINGDOM OF GOD!
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And “the Kingdom is coming” through his
fearless and forceful ministry. Preaching to
large and growing congregations, conversions
are occurring from Sunday to Sunday, the
baptismal waters are often troubled, and
“trunk” Baptists (almost as bad as “drunk”
Baptists) are being led to dig up their church
letters, resurrect their altars and run up
their flags and show where they stand in
a great and wicked city.
His Heart is Stirred Within Him.
If J. L. White thought he had civic prob
lems to deal with during those twelve glori
ous years in Macon where he was the recog
nized leader in every battle for moral reform,
(Continued on Page 5.)
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