Portraits of the Pulpit is a new recurring feature for BrownwoodNews.com and will highlight a different church and pastor every week. If you would like your church to be included, please email us at ben@mitdil1.dream.press
Written by Ben Cox – Sitting just across 10th street from Brownwood High School is First United Methodist Church of Brownwood. A long-standing church in Brownwood, its bell can be heard in the neighborhood as it tolls on the hour.
Dr. Don Scroggs, the pastor at FUMC Brownwood, is the longest serving pastor in the church’s history. The second longest-serving leader spent six years in the pulpit before the days of WWII, while Scroggs has served 13.
The church, which moved to its current location in 1967, has three services. A small, intimate chapel service at 8:30 as well as two services that run simultaneously at 10:40 every Sunday morning.
FUMC’s “Common Ground” service is referred to as non-traditional, utilizing a modern praise and worship team with song lyrics digitally displayed on a large screen. Common Ground, led by Pastor Joey Wilbourn, meets in the revamped gymnasium area of the church, known as the Christian Life Center.
The church also offers a traditional United Methodist service meeting in the sanctuary with an organist, choir and hymnals. The time-honored songs rise through the ornate rafters. Scroggs, who is retiring at the end of June after 43 years in ministry, is the Senior Pastor of the church and leads the 8:30 service as well as the 10:40 traditional service.
Scroggs grew up in a military family, and “moved around a lot,” coming to Methodism from another denomination during his senior year of high school. His father retired from the Army and became a professor at Baylor, so naturally after Scroggs graduated high school he attended “Jerusalem on the Brazos” as he lovingly refers to the University.
Scroggs wanted to be a doctor originally, as well as a star football player, “but then reality set in.” He had completed most of his pre-med studies, when he “felt there was a calling” to go into ministry, leading him to be one of only two Methodist ministerial students on campus.
Scroggs started in ministry with Young Life on the Baylor campus during his freshman and sophomore years. He then spent the next seven years in school, earning a Masters and a Doctorate before being ordained and appointed to his first church in January of 1977.
Pastors are appointed in the Methodist church, rather than hired as in most Protestant denominations, which makes Scroggs’ longevity at FUMC Brownwood such an accomplishment. Most pastors in the United Methodist church can expect three to five-year appointments according to Scroggs, and he says his 13-year tenure at FUMC has been “a dream appointment.”
When asked if the church having three different services under two leaders was a plan of his, he described it as “building a bridge as you’re walking across it.”
The Common Ground service originated out of a need to reach people that were not as interested in a traditional service, and all three services were led by Scroggs at one point.
Speaking to pastor Joey Wilbourn, he says one of the things he enjoys most about the Common Ground service and the church in general is “the people, and their willingness to contribute.”
Wilbourn was the pastor of Midtown Baptist Church in Brownwood for almost seven years, working full time for Brownwood ISD at the same time. He retired from Midtown to focus on his family, as his boys were growing up and he wanted to have time with them.
Wilbourn came back to ministry at FUMC, being called to fill in for departing pastor Scotty Crawford, who founded his own church in town. A fill-in position became permanent, and he has been leading the Common Ground service for about a year.
The church is at 2500 11th St, across from Brownwood High School and has services at 8:30, and two at 10:40. They can be visited on their website: www.fumcbrownwood.com
