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Several years ago a teenager struggling with the call to ministry came to Dallas and boldly made an appointment to see W. A. Criswell. The great pastor listened with empathy and interest as the young man recounted the difficulties he was facing. When their conference was ended, Criswell knelt beside the young preacher with his arm around his shoulder and invoked the presence of Christ on his life's work. When he returned home, the young man told his pastor what he had done.

"What?" he exclaimed, "you really prayed with Dr. Criswell? Man, you have seen the Pope!"

Wallie Amos Criswell was born in 1909 in the dust-bowl town of Eldorado, Oklahoma, to a cowboy-barber and his beautiful wife. Born in obscurity and raised in poverty, this wind-swept lad of the plains would become in time the most famous Baptist pastor in the world. When he died earlier this year at age 92, he was extolled as a passionate preacher, a powerful evangelist, and a redoubtable defender of the faith. He was all of that and more.

Criswell began his pastoral labors during his student days at Baylor University. He served small congregations in such places of renown as Devil's Bend and Pulltight, Texas. Even then he was known for his pulpit exuberance. On a clear night, it was said, you could hear Criswell preaching five miles away. After graduation from Baylor, Criswell moved to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, where he studied the Greek New Testament under the great A. T. Robertson. On Valentine's Day in 1935 he married Betty Mae Harris, the pianist at the church he served part time.

Following two pastoral charges in his native Oklahoma, Criswell was the surprise choice to succeed the venerable George W. Truett as pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas in 1944. Criswell honored the memory of Truett, but the contrast was unmistakable. Truett was a legendary figure in the religious world—the Harry Emerson Fosdick of Southern Baptists. Refined and dignified in the pulpit, Truett exuded the confidence of aristocracy.

Criswell, on the other hand, was a holy roller with a Ph.D. He would shout, spit, weep, plead, and pound. He preached with the bombast of Billy Sunday and the urgency of Savanarola.

In his inaugural sermon, Criswell promised the congregation that its greatest days were yet to come. We'll have a Sunday school with 5,000 in attendance every Sunday, he said. We'll give more money to missions than ever before. Criswell delivered on his promise. During his tenure at First Baptist, the church grew from 5,000 members and an annual budget of $150,000 in 1944 to 26,000 members and a budget of more than $11,000,000.

But statistics alone do not tell the complete story. Criswell reached out to the down and dirty, as well as the high and mighty, of Dallas. He organized missions and led the church to pioneer social ministries. He was an organizational genius, and his way of leading a church became a model for many others. "Most people think of tradition when they think of Criswell, but actually his ministry was incredibly innovative," says Rick Warren, whose call to pastoral ministry was confirmed in an encounter with Criswell. "It only became traditional after everyone copied him."

One important Criswell innovation was developing the church as a center for family activities. First Baptist Dallas built one of the first church-sponsored family life centers in the country, a remarkable facility with a gym, skating rink, bowling lanes, track, and basketball court. Under Criswell, the church also developed an outreach and educational ministry to the deaf. And, at a time when many conservative Christians refused to go to the movies, Criswell rented a downtown Dallas theater for his famous all-night preaching marathons.

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March 11 2002, Vol. 46, No. 3