Saturday, May 24, 1997

Church to honor pastor, wife

By ROY A. JONES II / Senior Staff Writer

WINGATE - The Rev. Charles L. Myers and wife Dorothy will mark 100 years worth of special memories here Sunday.

The Abilene couple is not only celebrating 60 years of marriage but also 40 years of service to Wingate Baptist Church.

Myers, 83, undoubtedly is the longest-serving "interim" pastor in the nation, having led the Wingate Baptists since 1957. Mrs. Myers has been the church's pianist and organist for the entire period, too.

The couple will be honored with a public reception at the church from 3-4:30 p.m. Sunday. Myers, who is overcoming a stroke and carpal tunnel surgery on both wrists, said he plans to continue to preach "as long as the Lord sees fits to let me."

The bi-vocational minister agreed to be "interim" pastor of the Wingate church in 1957. The understanding with the church was that in case of any schedule conflicts he would have to give first priority to his full-time job as chief chaplain at Hendrick Memorial Hospital, now Hendrick Medical Center.

Neither he nor the church has seen fit to change the arrangement, even after he retired from the Hendrick staff in 1982. He served Hendrick 25 years.

Mrs. Myers is a native of Brownwood. She and her husband are both graduates of Howard Payne University and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. They have one son, Ed, an Abilene attorney.

A strong believer in missions, Charles Myers has led the small Wingate church to give as much as 73 percent of its annual budget to mission causes. The church once sent him to Africa to oversee the construction of a church it paid for. The church has been honored several times by the Southern Baptist Convention for its mission giving.

"This church has a missionary vision to match any church in the world, regardless of size," Myers has said.

Myers also led the small congregation to build the present brick building in 1960 and to expand and remodel it in 1983-84. The church celebrated its centennial in 1992.