Bellevue Baptist Church is a Baptist megachurch in the Cordova area of Memphis, Tennessee, United States. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Bellevue was once the largest church in the Memphis area. Bellevue's goals are to "Love God, Love People, Share Jesus, and Make Disciples." The church's head pastor has been Steve Gaines since 2005.
History
Bellevue Baptist was founded in 1903 by Central Baptist Church as a mission church on the outskirts of Memphis. With a small $1,000 gift from member Fannie Jobe, Pastor Thomas Potts led the congregation to build a one-room stone chapel at the corner of Bellevue and Erskine Avenues. The first service was held on July 12, 1903 with Bellevue's first pastor, Henry Hurt. Thirty-two founding members signed the official charter on August 9, 1903. The church completed a 3,000 seat building located at 70 N. Bellevue in 1952, which was one of the first air-conditioned churches in Memphis. Bellevue became one of the largest Southern Baptist churches in the United States in the 1950s with more than 9,000 members. The church relocated to its current building (2000 Appling Road), which seats 7,000 in the main sanctuary, on a campus in Cordova, a Memphis suburb, in 1989. Bellevue is ranked 80th in the largest and fasting growing churches in America by LifeWay Research for Outreach Magazine. The attendance has been up to 6,567.
The church's location near Interstate 40 is marked by a display of three crosses. A ceremony held to dedicate and light the crosses took place on New Year's Eve, 1999. As the clock ticked down the final moments of the millennium, the Bellevue family worshipped at the foot of the cross. At the stroke of midnight, the crosses were illuminated. They are visible from several miles away. The center cross is tall, flanked by two crosses.
Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary is located on across the street from Bellevue ( were donated by Bellevue). However, Mid-America operates independently from Bellevue. Nevertheless, the Seminary has maintained a close relationship with the congregation ever since it moved to Memphis in 1976; former Bellevue pastor Adrian Rogers was an influential figure at MABTS.
Leadership
Bellevue has been led by only four pastors since 1927. The first service was held on July 12, 1903 with Bellevue's first pastor, Henry Hurt, saying that he hoped the new church would become “one of the greatest powers for good” that the city of Memphis had ever seen. Hurt served as pastor for the first 11 years, resigning because of poor health in 1914. When his health improved, he later served as pastor of Union Avenue Baptist Church in Memphis. He also served on the building committee for Baptist Memorial Hospital and as commissioner for the Memphis Housing Authority. A two-story wooden frame building was added to the original stone structure in 1910, with evening services sometimes held on the rooftop. Richard M. Inlow served as pastor from 1915 to 1920, followed by William M. Bostick, pastor from 1920 to 1927. Because of the growth in membership, a 1,000-seat auditorium was constructed on Bellevue Avenue, replacing the stone chapel. Dedication for the new building was March 16, 1924.
Robert G. Lee (1927–1960) On December 11, 1927, Robert Greene Lee preached his first sermon to the congregation at Bellevue. The membership was 1,430 when he became the church's fourth pastor. Lee was born in a log cabin on November 11, 1886. The son of a South Carolina sharecropper, he worked his way through school, ultimately graduating with a doctorate in international law from University of Chicago Law School in 1919. Lee preached the sermon Pay-Day Someday more than 1,200 times at Bible conferences, in state capitol buildings, churches, universities, youth camps, and ballparks across the nation and around the world.
At the time of his death on July 20, 1978, an estimated 3 million people had heard him preach Pay-Day Someday. To accommodate the crowds that came to hear Lee preach the hour-long sermon each year on the first Sunday in May, Bellevue moved services to Ellis Auditorium in Memphis. In 1954, Westminster Films captured him in Technicolor delivering his signature sermon. Lee authored 56 books, written primarily from his sermons.