“I resigned my pastorate yesterday. There is a little ring of influential men in the church here who insist on living lives of sin, and because I opposed the things they were doing, they set to work to block my efforts and to get rid of me. I have held out against them for more than a year and I got to the place where I did not propose to keep on working and accomplishing nothing.
“They tried to drum up sentiment against me by lying on me when they could not do it otherwise. They were continually misquoting me and they just kept everything in a mess.
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“My friends of all denominations tell me that I could have won them over by compromising with them, but I will die before I will ever do that. This is an old community and these families think they own the church and the preacher, and I have been told that they did pretty nearly own him prior to my coming.
“At any rate I have resigned. If no suitable pastorate opens up before the fall, I shall go to the Seminary for a post-graduate course. If you have it in your power to know any supply work, I shall appreciate it if you will do so.”
George Thomas Waite, a native Virginian and pastor of a church in Alabama, wrote in June 1917 about his plight in a letter to George W. McDaniel, the influential pastor of First Baptist Church of Richmond. In a day before the state Baptists hired a consultant for pastor-church relations, key pastors including McDaniel acted as counselors and even placement agents for troubled pastors seeking a change.
Waite had been a ministerial student at Richmond College, the Baptist school, at the time McDaniel began his Richmond pastorate and no doubt the student had attended services at First Church.
McDaniel must have struck the wrong tone in his initial reply to the minister. “In reply to the suggestion that a man resigning without a call usually suffers,” wrote Waite, “I should like to say that when it comes to the point of having to drug my conscience, sacrifice my convictions and self respect to hold a pastorate, then I [will] go into some other kind of work. I am not preaching for bread, and when it gets down to that, I will preach no more.
“I have endured a good deal already hoping that things would get right. I don’t want to seem to defend myself, but I want to say to you that the whole church with the exception of a handful, is not only with me but indignant at the way these few have acted. The trouble with the situation is just this, in a word — the church has been run by a few families, and they have had the preachers to line up with them, and let them control them, or they had no use for them.
“Now, if the character of these people were above reproach, then it would not be quite so bad. But the reverse is the case. For example, the man who was superintendent of the Sunday school when I came here is a whiskey drinker, a gambler and a profane swearer. His brother — a big man in the church — is absolutely unreliable. Another deacon who runs with them is a whiskey drinker, according to general rumors, and I know I have caught him [making] two or three damaging falsehoods against me.
“Now do you mean to tell me that a man has to compromise with such as that in order to preach the gospel of Christ? I could tell you much more but it is not necessary. These as I said are supposed leaders, and being against me they have made it impossible for me to accomplish anything. I did not have to leave. The majority voted not to accept my resignation, despite the fact that I told them that it was final and irrevocable.”
In his early 30s, Waite possessed a “vigorous, lively” personality and he had completed a successful pastorate in a country church in Virginia prior to the disappointing pastorate in Alabama. He was well educated and held considerable promise of future usefulness. But in the summer of 1917 he had hit rock bottom. Instead of enduring the unpleasant situation as it was described, he resigned without any place ready to receive him.
McDaniel was constantly besieged with letters from pastors seeking a change. Some of them pleaded that they could not support a family on the meager wages offered by their present church. Some were climbing the career ladder and interested in the next opportunity. Some were in trouble and Waite had experienced the worst nightmare of a pastor when an influential group in the church had turned against the preacher for no good reason.
McDaniel already had been fielding letters of inquiry from several ministers about a church on the north side of Richmond in a suburb called Barton Heights. The Baptist church had been constituted in 1890 and, though small, it showed promise. Their pastor had resigned to serve as a missionary.
McDaniel likely recommended that the search committee consider Waite; by year’s end, he was the pastor of Barton Heights Baptist Church. Everything that had troubled the minister in faraway Alabama was left behind. The future became bright for pastor and people in the Richmond suburb.
The church grew by leaps and bounds. The membership enlarged and soon a building program was launched. Under Waite’s leadership, the church built a large imposing Greek temple with an attractive auditorium and numerous classrooms.
“We have been told,” wrote Waite, “that we have one of the best-adapted buildings for the work of the Kingdom in all the South” and cautioned that “instead of causing pride, this ought to send us to our knees with a burden of responsibility.”
In 1928 another opportunity beckoned. Waite became the executive leader of Virginia Baptists, serving the Baptist General Association of Virginia and its Virginia Baptist Mission Board. He led Virginia Baptists at a time of great growth as well as denominational strains and stresses. The man who had experienced terrible troubles soon knew tremendous triumphs.
Fred Anderson ([email protected]) is executive director of the Virginia Baptist Historical Society and the Center for Baptist Heritage and Studies.