Posted on 08/25/2025 9:28:52 AM PDT by Morgana
Another church that once was among the largest in the Southern Baptist Convention is selling it 19-acre property and downsizing.
The property of Dauphin Way Baptist Church in Mobile, Ala., is now listed for sale for $28.5 million.
Current pastor Lee Merck confirmed to numerous media outlets the sale is part of a strategic plan to rethink the congregation that once was the largest Baptist church in the state of Alabama.
Notable former pastors include Jerry Vines, who went on to become co-pastor at First Baptist Church of Jacksonville, Fla., and president of the SBC; Darrell Robison, a well-known evangelist who later became a vice president of the former SBC Home Mission Board; and more recently Clint Pressley, immediate past SBC president who now leads Hickory Grove Baptist Church in Charlotte, N.C.
When Dauphin Way relocated to its current site in 1988, church membership was listed as 8,000. Today, membership is reported as about 600. According to real estate sale records, the sanctuary may hold up to 3,000 people but is currently configured to seat 1,900.
The church dates to 1904 and experienced its first boom in the 1940s and then again in the 1980s. For decades, the church appeared on lists of congregations with the largest Sunday school enrollments and largest Sunday school attendance.
Dauphin Way is not alone in this trend of decline and readjustment, which researchers say affects older churches more than newer churches. According to Lifeway Research: “Churches founded in the 20th century are the most likely to be declining, with 45% of those started between 1950 and 1999 and 39% of those that began between 1900 and 1949.”
Church growth researcher and podcaster Sam Rainer explains the context: “In the not-so-distant past, growing churches often relocated away from their neighborhoods and built large campuses at major intersections. The thought was that the drive would be worth the distance. This strategy seemed to work when these large churches were master planning their sprawling campuses in the 1970s through the early 2000s. They were championed and celebrated. Many large churches grew at tremendous rates, and many of them did, and continue to do, an incredible amount of good for the kingdom of God.
“But starting around the turn of the 21st century, the growth of many of the largest churches shifted to multisite campuses and multiple venues. The massive, single-site church was no longer the focus of their planning. … Churches with worship space for 200 to 600 are now ideal. Filling the giant rooms of megachurches is getting harder and harder.”
That is terrible.
Our Texas “megachurch” is starting to see a decline in membership. Old people dying and young people going to brunch. Finances are dwindling as well. They should go back to singing hymns and get rid of pastors with key chains on their belt loop and skinny jeans.
That is terrible.
The SBC is now broken into sub-groups. Some are still biblical.
“They should go back to singing hymns and get rid of pastors with key chains on their belt loop and skinny jeans.”
that is the problem right there! That is why people are leaving these buildings.
“They should go back to singing hymns and get rid of pastors
with key chains on their belt loop and skinny jeans.”
*********
Curious as to how or your plan to do that?
that is the problem right there! That is why people are leaving these buildings.
The tower of Babel was taken down for a reason.
Most people have no idea how expensive it is to run a church building and staff.
When membership starts a big decline, its about 5 years away from going under.
Yep, just buildings.
Wait till the Catholic Church is forced to start selling their property in CA to pay their bills. It is going to be bloody.
You probably can’t. My theory on a lot of those things is that they will be addressed only after a nuclear war, or after the Yellowstone super-volcano explodes. We might have a short period of time after such an event to reset back to normal.
But short of that, probably not much will fix it. The 19th Amendment is right in the way of that.
Not to worry. Some guy named Ackmed will buy it.
I see this was written by Mark Wingfield. Be aware he is a very far left member of progressive “Baptist” congregation. He is not part of the SBC. I would not believe him if he told me water was wet. Just saying.
The Orthodox churches have not compromised their liturgy for "modernity" and the Catholic Church seems to have curbed their more extreme liturgical revisionism.
I agree.
Exactly.
This problem began in 2003 when they ran off Steven Lawson (disgraced after admitting to affairs in 2024), who was run out of this church by a group of Arminians who opposed the Reformed theology similar to MacArthur (Lawson was affiliated with MacArthur for many years) and the Conservative Resurgence led by Albert Mohler (Southern Seminary).
This is very similar to what caused me to be run out of a local church - they went more liberal theologians and I was called out because I voted against this, then on the extended family a member was expelled from a committee on youth pastor search because she opposed the new hyper-Arminian theology more Methodist in nature.
The disgracing of Mr. Lawson hit the image of the church hard. But they are following CBF, UMG, and other questionable teachers. They did it to themselves.
Baptist News Global is CBF aligned. Many evangelical churches now use music from Mercer, a CBF university in Macon, GA. I fired warnings but nobody would agree, they just kept singing from them.
I remember at church 23 years ago they said the future is dancers replacing singers. The choir was replaced by teens who danced to pop tunes. And on occasion we sang, it was awful karaoke with techniques that Leah Hungerford (my voice teacher at the time) would never approve. If you wanted to do music, be a dancer. Choir was too old and too not for younger folk.
This was at the root of the controversy in 2003. Soteriology became an issue in 1995 when Steven Lawson was named minister. Pushing expository preaching was what caused him to be run off by 300 members who signed a petition.
They claimed the church fall began with Mr. Lawson pushing sound doctrine and expository preaching. But what about well known Reformed churches that keep growing each year and fill their rafters with sound doctrine?
The local church that ran me off over supporting Mohler and MacArthur over Osteen called Gov. McMaster “an Islamic fatalist” for being Reformed while they sang from Steven Furtick and Joel Osteen’s worship groups. They endorsed Bethel and their Kundalini spirit while pushing karaoke pop music. Their trash talking of our Governor and those who believe in sound theologians while singing from liberal Baptists at Mercer University was outrageous.
Congregants in shorts and tee-shirts and nobody wearing a jacket let alone ties. Nobody dressed like Will, Rachel, and Pete back in the day, Mike, Larry, and Darrell on race day, anything prim as we know it.
Churches spend millions on big screens and no pulpits. The rooms are dark to put the focus on the individual singers of the rock band. And all teaching is self-help. I come to church to study the Word, not be in Oprah self help.
https://themajestysmen.com/pastorgabe/reflecting-upon-steve-lawsons-failure/
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