Mission Waco has been a cornerstone of the Waco community for decades. Even before the official creation of Mission Waco, founders Jimmy and Janet Dorrell worked hard to make a difference in the impoverished neighborhood of North Waco.
After originally meeting while working at the Waco State Home when Janet was a Baylor student, the Dorrells found their way back to Waco in 1978. They purchased a large, dilapidated house in North Waco with the express purpose of living among those they planned to serve. They began slowly fixing up the home and getting to know those in the community. Beyond the weekly kid and teen clubs they set up, the couple also worked closely with the Campfire organization and Reconcilers Fellowship of Waco.
The Dorrells’ initial incursion into Waco outreach lasted only a year, as they moved to Houston in 1979 for a few years so Jimmy could study under a local pastor experimenting with the idea of cell churches, or smaller home churches, to help spread the gospel throughout large communities. From there they traveled with their firstborn around the world for three months on an exposure trip, learning about poverty and struggle around the world. Upon their return to the United States, as Janet was pregnant with the couple’s second child, they moved back into their home in North Waco with a deeper understanding of poverty and all the more eager to serve those around them. They continued their grassroots community outreach and urban missions for a little less than a decade.
It was not until 1991 that the Dorrells saw the need to form an official nonprofit to support and expand their neighborhood ministry, and they founded Cross Culture Experiences Inc (CCE). The initial intent of this organization was to get middle-class Americans out of their comfort zone and plugged into service and mission work. This goal birthed some of the Dorrells’ first national and international ventures, Poverty Simulation, and “exposure trips.” Poverty Simulation is designed to give people a taste of what it is like to be homeless. Participants sleep in the backyard of a Mission Waco building, find food around town with no money, and much more. The exposure trips were designed to give Americans a window into poverty beyond what they could see in their own towns, true third-world poverty. The Dorrells also continued their neighborhood ministry and Bible clubs while launching CCE. That same year, the Christian Missions Concerns (CMC) Foundation saw the good work the Dorrells were doing in Waco and beyond and decided to fund a new program under the Dorrells’ leadership, Mission Waco. The new program exploded and was quickly brought under the CCE umbrella with continued support by the CMC. Every year since then the Dorrells have launched new projects and learned how to meet the needs of the Waco community in diverse ways.
In the next couple years, Mission Waco made some big moves in the neighborhood. First, the Dorrells purchased an old carpet store next to their home and made it the home base for Poverty Simulation. But the most significant purchase came when they bought the entire shopping center on North Fifteenth Street and Colcord Avenue (on map below). The shopping center was notoriously seedy, housing four low-end bars and a pornographic theater, the Capri. Mission Waco completely renovated the center and began using it for job training, GED. classes, and more. The Dorrells also turned the Capri into a children’s theater and meeting place for the community. Named Jubilee Center, it runs programs like Urban Expression and Prelude Gloria, visual arts and classical music programs for kids. The center even houses a twenty-eight-foot rock climbing wall as well. The building next to the shopping center then became the Youth Center and is a hangout for high-risk and at-risk youth to play video games, pool, and foosball; lift weights; and even hop into the later-added recording studio and let their voice be heard. The initial renovations earned Mission Waco the 1994 “Audrey Nelson Community Development” award, one of five awarded each year nationally. In the coming decade the center would become home to the main offices of Mission Waco and the Mission Waco World Cup Café and Fair Trade Market, located at the intersection of Fifteenth Street and Colcord Avenue. The café and market not only support artisans around the world through fair trade and train locals in food service, they bring middle- and upper-class people into the area and spread awareness of poverty in Waco. By 2000 the Dorrells also founded the Waco Community Development Corporation to bring similar economic development to the area and help provide affordable housing like the Mission Waco-owned Ark Apartments.
The mid-nineties also saw the arrival of Church Under the Bridge and Friday Morning Breakfast. It all started as a Bible study with five homeless men, and Jimmy would also take these men to breakfast on Friday morning. The Bible study grew quickly, as those who were not comfortable within the walls of a church felt accepted in this group of peers. It eventually grew so large that Mission Waco named the gathering Church Under the Bridge, and it met every Sunday morning under the I-35 overpass. When the group grew too large for Jimmy to accommodate for breakfast, First Lutheran Church stepped in and started the official Friday Morning Breakfast gathering at their church, run by volunteers. Church Under the Bridge too became its own entity separate from Mission Waco and now boasts a congregation of three hundred people. This work with the homeless and impoverished shed light on the problems of drugs and alcohol addictions among the homeless population and led to the founding of Mission Waco’s Manna House, an alcohol and drug recovery home, and the Lighthouse, a transition home for those coming out of Manna House. Mission Waco would later found a homeless shelter of its own, My Brother’s Keeper, but not until a decade later in 2004.
Another monumental addition for Mission Waco came in 2005 with the opening of the Meyer Center for Urban Ministries. Mission Waco calls the Meyer Center its “one-stop-shop for the poor and marginalized.” Funded by the Paul and Jane Meyer Family Foundation, this center in downtown offers showers, laundry, clothing vouchers and shelter vouchers, along with a computer lab, job training, and job search aid. The clothing and shelter vouchers can be redeemed at My Brother’s Keeper and Mission Waco’s voucher center, where people can exchange vouchers for free clothes. Mission Waco also runs The Clothesline, selling donated clothes to support other Mission Waco ventures, and it shares a building with the voucher center. In 2011 the Meyer Center also added mental health and relapse prevention services with the help of the Baylor University psychology department. The Meyer Center would later open a chapel for weddings and events in 2013 to help pay for its other services.
In 2012, Mission Waco adopted the name Mission Waco Mission World to better reflect the organization’s work. On top of the many programs Mission Waco operates in the local community, it also still works with partners in Haiti, Mexico City, and India. Mission Waco also continues to take groups to these locations on exposure trips to serve the local populations.
A very important addition to Mission Waco’s ventures was the Jubilee Food Market in 2016. Operating within a known “food desert,” meaning no grocery store existed within walking distance of the neighborhood, Mission Waco wanted to provide low-income families with fresh and healthy foods. Produce is grown behind the store as part of the Urban R.E.A.P. program, allowing the store to sell fresh vegetables at a low price.
In 2018, Jimmy Dorrell passed the executive director position on to John Calaway, but Jimmy remains president. Mission Waco has undeniably changed the face of the city and helped thousands of its residents. Its facets and programs extend beyond those mentioned here, and it continues to provide every service possible to break the cycles of poverty and empower those in need.
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]]>First Presbyterian Church of Waco is one of McLennan County’s oldest Protestant congregations, formed several years before Waco’s incorporation as a city.
On April 20, 1855, a group of Presbyterians in Waco Village petitioned the Central Texas Presbytery for permission to organize a local church. After receiving permission, the first nineteen members of First Presbyterian of McLennan County began to meet in a Methodist and Episcopal shared building on South Second Street.
Church members banded together to finance the construction of their own place of worship in 1870, spending $5,500 to construct a small brick church at the corner of Second Street and Jackson Avenue. The congregation soon outgrew this small building and purchased a lot on Austin Avenue in 1882. That same year on April 25, the church called Dr. Samuel A. King to serve as its first permanent pastor. Workers completed construction on the church in 1884.
As the congregation continued to rapidly expand toward the end of the nineteenth century, the church became increasingly focused on community service in addition to serving as a worship center. A choir was organized by the late 1880s, as well as a Women’s Working Society, which later became the Woman’s Auxiliary. Church members pursued local mission work while continuing to collect money in support of foreign missionary efforts.
By the time of the installation of Rev. Charles T. Caldwell as pastor on September 27, 1903, it was clear that the church needed to expand once again. After initial construction plans came to a halt when the Waco Street Railway Company announced intentions to lay tracks near the location for the new building in May of 1911, the church sold the lot for a profit and purchased new property at the corner of Austin Avenue and Eleventh Street. Church leaders contracted Fell & Ainsworth Construction of Waco to construct an English Gothic-style church designed by F. M. Mann. Dr. King returned to preach at the inaugural service on April 14, 1912.
Although the church continued to rapidly expand and develop, change was on the horizon. As World War I brought an increased military presence to Waco, First Presbyterian members sought to provide soldiers with a “home away from home” through prayer services, social events, and charity drives. Later, just months after the church executed an elaborate two-day celebration of its Diamond Jubilee in 1930, the effects of the 1929 stock market crash began to be seen around Waco. In order to conserve resources, Rev. Caldwell cut his own salary and reduced the church’s expenditures.
The turmoil of the mid-twentieth century proved First Presbyterian’s commitment to what members described as “sympathetic Christian charity.” During World War II, the church once again opened its doors to support Waco’s military population. Congregants also sent supplies to aid efforts of hospitals and the Red Cross between 1941 and 1945. The church served as the Red Cross headquarters for six weeks during the early stages of Waco’s recovery from the devastating 1953 tornado. Individual members’ contributions continued to support efforts in Waco such as Meals on Wheels, the Family Abuse Center, and the support of a Vietnamese refugee family. In 1971, First Presbyterian became the official home of Caritas, an interfaith agency for the poor.
On November 17, 1991, the congregation voted to borrow $1.4 million for its “First into the Twenty-First” campaign, which funded a much needed renovation of the church and the construction of extra wings for religious education. The church launched a yearlong celebration of its vast history in 2004, culminating in the sesquicentennial day on April 20, 2005. Today, First Presbyterian Church of Waco works to meet the spiritual, social, and practical needs of the community through its commitment to Christian charity.
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]]>On May 31, 1851, four charter members established the First Baptist Church of Waco. These members reached out to prominent missionary and Texan Rev. Noah T. Byers, offering him a salary of seventy-five dollars per year to pastor the church. The church initially was composed of only fifteen members and met in the meeting place of the First Methodist Church until obtaining a brick building of their own at Fourth Street and Mary Avenue in 1857. The construction of this first building was a community effort. Church member B. D. Arnold provided the brick from his own brick-laying company, and committees within the congregation ensured that the church’s basic needs such as lamps and pews were fulfilled. When completed, the church was one of the most impressive structures in Waco at that time.
A fire demolished the brick structure in 1877, and construction on a new church began almost immediately. Though the building efforts were not completed until 1883, the base floor was finished by 1880 and in use by the congregation for worship. At this time the church entered a period of innovative change under the leadership of B. H. Carroll. For the first time, women were allowed to serve as deacons in the church and worshippers implemented the use of musical instruments in their services. Carroll was known throughout the Baptist community for his profound theological knowledge and fierce leadership style. In 1870, the congregation appointed him pastor after he gained recognition in the local community for a revival hosted at New Hope Baptist Church earlier that year. He regarded his position as pastor as a commitment to be deeply honored and missed only one Sunday service throughout his time as pastor at First Baptist Church. In 1883, the First Baptist Church of Waco was invited to attend the Southern Baptist Convention in Richmond, Virginia, for the first time. Carroll served as pastor at First Baptist until 1899, when he was called to serve as a secretary for the Texas Baptist Education Commission.
In 1915, First Baptist Church’s longest-serving pastor, Dr. Joseph Martin Dawson, began his tenure. Dawson primarily focused upon social issues, as well as the church’s budget. During construction of the new church in the late nineteenth century, the church had incurred a significant amount of debt. Dawson worked to eradicate this, focusing on the budget even during the Depression, sacrificing his own salary in order to save the church money. During the Southern Baptist Convention’s 75 Million Dollar Campaign from 1914 to 1924, the First Baptist Church was assigned to raise $200,000, the largest portion given to any church. Dawson often preached about social justice issues such as racial and gender prejudice, as well as about the separation of church and state. In addition to his position as pastor of First Baptist, Dawson held many other leadership positions in the Baptist community. For instance, he served as the president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas in 1922, the chairman of the Southern Baptist Committee on World Peace in 1945, and the chairman of the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention from 1945 to 1946.
First Baptist Church of Waco was highly involved with the establishment of quality education in Waco. It has been credited with the establishment of the Waco Classical School, which later became Waco University. This school was the first coeducational university in the South, and the second in the United States after a department for girls was added in 1866. In 1886, Waco University merged with Baylor University. First Baptist Church also aided in the creation of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth and the George W. Truett Seminary located at Baylor University. The church also contributed to the founding of the Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in 1919.
Today, First Baptist Church continues to serve the Waco community through its dedication to worship, social justice, and commitment to higher education. Baylor University and First Baptist Church have retained a strong relationship since 1886 through Baylor’s many students, administration, and staff who worship at the church. The church continues its legacy of supporting the Waco community through ministries which aid groups such as Waco’s schoolchildren, disabled, and low-income families.
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