Pastor Bo WagnerThe first Sunday of June is always a very special day for Dana and me. June 1, 1997, was the day the Cornerstone Baptist Church was born. It was us and one old couple up in their 70s that just a few weeks before had been commissioned by our home church to start the new work.
Most new churches, sadly, do not make it. Just in my area I have seen at least 50 startups fail over the past 22 years. Of those that do make it, very few retain the founding pastor for more than a few years. So for God to have allowed me more than two decades thus far thrills me beyond measure.
My church has been so good to me. They allow me to maintain a fairly full schedule of revival and evangelistic meetings, youth rallies and marriage conferences. They take very good care of us. They have been loving and kind to my wife and my children.
But 22 years in one place does not just produce “Hallmark moments”; it also produces a great many “Twilight Zone moments.”
In our original building, an abandoned former fish camp, we had more renovation work to do than you could imagine. One project we undertook was the building and installation of a steeple. We used the large back room as our construction site and labored over it for days. Just as we were finishing it, my dear wife came in, took one look at it and its 48-inch base, then looked at the 36-inch door it had to go through and said, “How do you intend to get it outside?”