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Issue: Spring 2017 | Posted: June 1, 2017

A Love for the Word, A Heart for the City

Seven Jackson pastors share how Union equipped them to serve the church faithfully

By Nathan Handley ('15)

BACK ROW: (L TO R) Lee Tankersley, Jonathan Baine, Justin Wainscott, William Watson, Grant Gaines. FRONT ROW: Russ Pflasterer, Andy Neely

LEE TANKERSLEY sat at a table at Davis-Kidd Booksellers preparing a sermon.

He was in his first year as pastor at Cornerstone Community Church and his final year as an undergraduate student at 51����. He was overwhelmed with his new responsibilities and discouraged by feelings of discord at the church.

Greg Thornbury, then a professor in Union’s School of Theology and Missions, stopped at Tankersley’s table, handed him a small pamphlet and told him it would help him in his ministry. The booklet was “9 Marks of a Healthy Church” by Mark Dever.

Lee Tankersley officiates a wedding for a church member.

“This was outside of class, outside of campus, but he knew what I was experiencing and knew how to encourage me,” Tankersley says. “It’s that kind of thing that makes Union such a special place.”

Tankersley has now been pastor at Cornerstone for more than 17 years, and he says it has been one of the greatest blessings of his life. Though he faced many difficulties entering the pastorate at age 21, he says the blessings have far outweighed the struggles.

“As a pastor I get to see things happen behind closed doors that not everyone is aware of,” Tankersley says. “I’ve seen marriages that were about to end that have persevered, persevering in obedience, growing in love for the gospel, conversions, all those things and more.”

Tankersley is one of many lead pastors at Jackson churches who graduated from Union. He says he has seen Jackson churches move toward a healthier place under the leadership of these men.

“There are at least a handful of churches if not more that if my child were to come to Jackson, I would be happy for him to join,” Tankersley said. “Churches where the membership loves the gospel and the leaders exposit the Scripture.”

Justin Wainscott introduces the speaker at the West Tennessee Pastors and Wives Banquet in the Carl Grant Events Center September 2015.

JUSTIN WAINSCOTT, pastor of First Baptist Church in Jackson, says he sees Union’s impact on Jackson every day. He says the university’s dedication to the authority of Scripture and emphasis on excellent teaching has had a positive impact on Jackson churches, moving them from unhealthy institutions to growing, active bodies.

“There is a very high view of the Word and the authority of the Word as it is preached and taught,” Wainscott says. “Flowing out of that is an emphasis on the Great Commission, on living out your faith and understanding that Christianity is not just a private religion.”

Wainscott graduated from Union in 2002 and also served as pastor at Pleasant Plains Baptist Church in Jackson. He says over the past 10 years, he has seen an increase in churches serving together rather than being in competition with each other.

ANDY NEELY, pastor of West Jackson Baptist Church, says this comes from a clearer understanding of God’s kingdom.

Andy Neely leads worship in Union’s chapel in October 2012.

“I’ve seen our church as well as other churches realize that we’re not just here to build bigger buildings or build our own individual kingdoms,” Neely says. “It’s all about the kingdom of God. Sometimes you have to open your hands a little bit to not think everything’s about you.”

Neely graduated from Union in 1995. He says pastoring a church like West Jackson, with its extensive history and impact on the city, provides a unique set of challenges. He says West Jackson planted a lot of the churches in the area and has a long history with Union and the Jackson community. Along with that blessing comes some baggage.

“The challenge is to embrace that legacy and understand all that God has done here but also lead in a way where we can continue to be effective in the future,” Neely says. “We can rejoice in what has been done here in the past, but we have to continue that work today.”

Neely, Gaines, Baine and Tankersley fellowship together.

RUSS PFLASTERER, pastor of City Fellowship Baptist Church in downtown Jackson, has had opposite struggles. Pflasterer helped build City Fellowship from the ground up in 2007, and he says each year the church grows, he realizes more how much goes into running a church.

“We ask a lot of a pastor,” he says. “We ask him to be an administrator, a teacher, a counselor. There’s a need for strong theology and biblical understanding, but they also need organizational leadership skills.”

Russ Pflasterer leads worship in Union’s chapel April 2015.

City Fellowship has grown over the last nine years and has an increasingly diverse membership. Pflasterer says his desire for ministry was born after seeing the racial divide in Jackson. He graduated from Union in 1995 with an art degree and taught art in the Jackson-Madison County School System for 15 years before becoming a pastor. During that time, he says he saw the schools re-segregate.

“We asked God from the beginning to let this church be a place of racial diversity,” Pflasterer says. “Racial issues are such a foothold for the devil in this community, we wanted to face that reality head-on.”

Pflasterer says he struggled initially with whether a Southern Baptist church could be a place that fostered racial diversity. He said the denomination’s history with slavery and racial tensions seemed like a barrier at first, but he came to recognize it as an opportunity for God to be glorified.

“I think there’s something really redemptive about Southern Baptists working toward racial reconciliation and letting God change us from the inside,” he says. “Things don’t have to be the way they were.”

Wainscott says while First Baptist has made steps toward racial reconciliation, there is still much room for growth. He says he would like to see churches take a more active role in pursuing and fostering racial reconciliation.

“You can see evidences of reaching out to brothers and sisters of other ethnicities, and that’s something to rejoice in,” Wainscott says. “But you can see we’ve got a long way to go. There’s so much need for healing.”

One of the ways Wainscott has seen that healing play out is in his relationship with WILLIAM WATSON, pastor of Historic First Baptist Church in Jackson. Watson met Wainscott through a phone call in 2011, when First Baptist was celebrating an anniversary. They wanted to include their brothers and sisters at Historic First Baptist in the celebration.

William Watson speaks in Union’s chapel March 2017.

“In a way, we are sister churches, connected by way of the Emancipation Proclamation,” Watson says. “The families who started this First Baptist were the slaves of those who were at First Baptist North Highland.”

Watson says he and Wainscott have continued to partner in ministry and share each other’s pulpits regularly. He says finding the time to be intentional about developing the relationship between the churches is difficult, but it is vital to the health of the churches and of Jackson.

“A healthy city is predicated on the churches being healthy and continuing to be intentional about crossing those lines,” Watson says. “We’re still not crossing lines as much as we should.”

Watson says churches must continue to work on both strengths and weaknesses and place the gospel at the center of the conversation. He says the gospel speaks to all cultures, generations and contexts.

“If anything is going to change, it has to be changed in the gospel of Jesus Christ, which crosses all barriers and all lines, which changes hearts and minds,” he says.

Each of these men studied at Union University, and they all say Union has had an incalculable impact on their ministries. Nathan Finn, dean of Union’s School of Theology and Missions, says healthy institutions and healthy churches reinforce the growth of each other.

“Often you find that when a university becomes spiritually and theologically and missionally healthier, that has a positive influence on churches around the university,” Finn says. “Then as those churches become healthier, they reinforce what’s happening at the institution, and they help keep that institution focused so that it doesn’t begin to drift.”

Wainscott, Watson and Pflasterer enjoy fellowship inside Modero Café in The Logos building on Union’s campus.

Finn says churches in Jackson are eager to invest in students, providing internship opportunities and giving them responsibilities as church members. He says Union wants to have close relationships with local churches and come alongside them in equipping students spiritually.

“While we have chapel, and we have discipleship groups, we know that ground zero is the local church,” he says. “Institutions come and go, but it’s the church that endures until Christ returns.”

Grant Gaines leads worship in Union’s chapel in November 2011.

GRANT GAINES, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, graduated from Union in 2005. He says he sees the benefits of Union through the students who worship at Calvary. He says Union students see the importance of the local church and are serious about church membership. This places a large responsibility on the church to teach and train the students in the short time they are in Jackson.

“Our goal for college ministry is to not make it youth group part two,” Gaines said. “Instead, we treat you like anyone else in the church, and hopefully your time here at Calvary teaches you how to be a good, faithful church member so that we can launch you out into whatever city you end up in to be a blessing to a local church there.”

Tankersley says he sees Cornerstone as a hub and a launching pad, and this is made possible by the students at Union.

“Because people come from everywhere to Union and into our churches, then we can affect the world,” he says.

He says the church must be about the work of training, equipping and sending out individuals to take the gospel and what they’ve learned all over the country in the cities where they work and live. He says Union students have a passion for the needs of the world and want to do ministry, even if they are not in the School of Theology and Missions.

Neely says his time at Union was pivotal not only for his biblical training, but also his individual spiritual growth. He says his fellow students were passionate about their faith and showed it in how they lived.

“I’d never really been in an environment with other young men who were living out their faith and loved the Lord,” Neely says. “I had other guys who were sharpening me.”

Neely says his professors lived out their faith as well. They taught Scripture and continually pointed their students to Scripture, but they also lived as examples of what Scripture teaches. They spent extra time on campus and opened their homes to students.

“Professors knew who their students were and that they were people and not just bodies in a classroom,” Neely says.

Gaines says Union’s Christian studies program gave him a solid foundation for his seminary education and an immense respect for the authority of Scripture.

“Every week when I do sermon preparation, it’s the fruit of the seeds that were sown at 51����,” Gaines says.

Jonathan Baine

JONATHAN BAINE graduated from Union in 2002. He serves bi-vocationally as pastor of Pleasant Plains Baptist Church. He says Union taught him to let the Word of God be his theme in everything he does, whether he is pastoring a church or working elsewhere. He says professors at Union taught him to be a scholar of the Bible.

“We love God by loving his Word,” Baine says. “To be an effective pastor, a pastor must be a theologian. He must be a man who loves the Word.”

Baine works most weekdays in schools, providing character-based training for students. He says serving bi-vocationally has its own set of challenges, but it has taught him not to look at the church like he would a job or career. He says the membership of Pleasant Plains serves him as much as he serves them, supporting the mission of the church in prayer and volunteer ministry.

“God has revealed his grace by being faithful over my time,” Baine says.

Watson is currently a Christian studies student at Union. He says he came to know Union through his relationships with Wainscott and Pflasterer, and he has learned much through the relationships he has made in the School of Theology and Missions. He says his professors serve as mentors, teaching him to better exposit the Bible.

“They’ve taught me to let the text speak for itself,” Watson says. “Not to add to it or take away from it but to present it as it is.”