Central Baptist Church Centennial is now just 100 days away

I am on a planning committee at Central Baptist Church for the 100th anniversary of the church. The celebration is scheduled to take place on Saturday, Oct. 23rd, and Sunday, Oct. 24th.

Don Estep is publisher of the News Journal.

On Saturday the plan calls for a “meet and greet” type of activity with a program to start at 4 p.m. Our preliminary plans call for a short program to be held in the sanctuary of the church and followed by tours of the church along with refreshments being served in the old sanctuary which will feature pictures and histories of the church.

Then on Sunday morning plans calls for the Sunday School hour and the Morning Worship to be combined with a program featuring former pastors along with special music, then followed by a potluck luncheon.

Already, the committee has heard from former staff members who plan to travel great distances to be here.

Those of us on the committee want you to share in our celebration whether or not you are a member of our church. That is why we are having an informal get together on Saturday so you can also meet and greet old friends who you haven’t seen for years.

I am looking forward to this occasion because I have been attending Central Baptist for most of my life. If you count the days when my parents took me to church when I was diapers, then I have been attending there over 80 years, thus I have a lot of memories.

I have selected to write a column about this event this week because starting Thursday (today) it will be 100 days until the 100th Centennial Celebration begins. The countdown has begun. Hopefully, this will give you plenty of time to mark your calendar to join us for this event.

I have so many memories of so many events that happened there I could fill this page with them. But to start I will begin with a time when I was about ten years old.

I can’t remember whether it was Roy Wyrick or Herbert Eaton as my Sunday School teacher, but I do remember we had a room full of boys my age.

After Sunday School there were times that some of us boys would venture a block away from the church to the Dairy Queen which was located on Main Street.

On this particular Sunday we decided to skip church and go for ice cream and then meet up with our parents as church was letting out. Most of us sat in the balcony so we thought nobody would know the difference.

However, much to our surprise, we didn’t know it was Mother’s Day and the church would give away a Bible to the family with the most members attending that day.

When it came time to recognize the winning family, the pastor, Rev. Harold Wainscott, called out the number seven, nobody stood up. Then he called out the family with six members. Again nobody stood up. When he called out the number five one family stood up along with my father, who was singing in the choir, and my mother and my two sisters.

Rev. Wainscott said, “Don, I know you are here so don’t be bashful and stand up.” Meantime, my sisters were praying, Don please stand up.

As usual I joined the crowd following the service not knowing what fate waited ahead for me. As we drove home from church nothing was said. My sisters kept praying that daddy would not kill me.

When we got home I was informed of how I had humiliated our family. Let’s just say I lived through it and learned a valuable lesson. I am still paranoid when I approach a Dairy Queen.

Other than that one instance I do not have anything but good stories about my 80 years at the church. From the early beginnings when Herbert Eaton took a group of us boys to see our first University of Kentucky basketball game until now, Central Baptist has meant everything to me.

It will be great to see those still with us, but the sadness comes when I think of the members who have passed on and of the positive influences they had on me.

As time gets nearer I will continue to remind you of the events that will take place. But it won’t be as good as it could be if you are not there.

Finally, as I have appealed to those of you who have not had a COVID shot, please do. It won’t be long until school will start and those under 12 do not have an opportunity to get a shot. Let’s make sure that we are not responsible for passing on the virus when it only takes a little shot to protect you, as well as others.

It’s free and it works! What more could you ask?