Treasure in Earthen Vessels
A Contextual History of the First Baptist Church in McAdoo, Texas 1919–2019
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Is the work primarily a local history about the unforgettable, hard0scrabbled who built an unpretentious church or is it an academic analysis of geographical, historical, cultural, political, technological, and socio-economic forces that shaped the churches and communities of the Great Plains? The volume is intended to be a careful blend of both—the never before published family histories who characters could easily be found in a Charles Dickens serial, a Mark Twain short story, or sitting on the Scopes jury as well as a hundred years of unrelenting external forces that shaped them. The two separate strands, hopefully, connect and wind around each other, like a double helix of DNA, to form a single structural narrative. (from the Introduction) Some counties (of the Great Plains) have lost as much as 80% of their residents over the decades. Death rates have long exceeded birth rates. Entire counties lack hospitals, doctors, lawyers, and banks. Downtowns, once bustling with mercantile shops, grocery stores, restaurants, movie theatres, and car dealerships prominently bivouacked on wide boulevards are now shelled out store fronts. Cotton gins and grain elevators once humming with activity during harvest season, now sit idle, gutted of machinery…schoolhouse belfries crumble and Pisa-like steeples that once sat proudly atop houses of worship are but unwelcomed grave markers to what once was. (from Chapter Eleven – Decline)
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About the Book
Unlike most local church histories oozing with self-congratulations, Treasure in Earthen Vessels is an honest, critical assessment of a rural congregation that built a small, unpretentious church in a community that subsequently withered under the strain of economic realities and labor-saving technologies. In September of 1919, two Baptist families met in an old, creaky, three-room wooden schoolhouse to organize a church in the newly-established community of McAdoo, Texas. This book details the contributions of legacy families committed to living a simple Christian life through the struggles and joys of a rural Baptist congregation. The congregation also must navigate the geographical, social, cultural, political, religious, economic, and technological forces often arrayed against them. By exploring the contextual history of this Baptist congregation as a case study, the book not only chronicles what happened to rural churches and communities experiencing the depopulation of the Great Plains over the past century, but also why a cherished way of life simply vanished.
About the Author
Jimmy Neff is a native of McAdoo, Texas. Over a span of twenty-five years, Neff pastored three Baptist churches where his sermons were anticipated for their scholarship and his ability to spin an unforgettable story. He holds a divinity degree and two graduate degrees, including the PhD. Neff is also a retired philosophy professor from West Texas A&M in Canyon.