Editor’s note: According to LifeWay Research, the average tenure of a Southern Baptist pastor at a single church is seven years. (The median tenure is four years.) Many pastors stay longer, and a very small few serve one church for a lifetime. This is the second in a series of articles profiling a remarkable brotherhood of South Carolina pastors who have led their churches for 40 years or more and continue to do so. We know of three such active pastors: John Arthur, Boyce Whitman and Richard Alderman. If you know of others, please share their names with us by e-mailing butch@baptistcourier.com or calling 1-888-667-4693.
If you’re under 50 and have attended Little Rock Baptist Church your whole life, the only pastor you’ve ever known is Richard Alderman.
Richard AldermanIn 1959, Alderman, then a 23-year-old freshly minted graduate of Southeastern Baptist Seminary, was staying with his parents in Sumter when his pastor, Knox Lambert of Grace Baptist Church, Sumter, drove him to the South Carolina Baptist Convention building in Columbia and exhorted the staff to “get this boy a church.” In a short time his name came before Little Rock’s search committee. After a trial sermon, the church called him as pastor in July 1959.
This year, Alderman, 72, will observe his 49th anniversary at Little Rock, a small rural-community church a few miles up the road from Dillon. A key to his longevity? He cites two commitments he offered during the interview process with the church: 1) that “unashamed expository preaching and teaching” would be honored, and 2) that as pastor to the people he would “always be available and loyal to them.” (He remembers a church member telling him once that he “even beat the doctors to the hospital.” “That’s the human side of being with the people,” he said.)
He also remembers a time when, as an enthusiastic young pastor who was “pushing pretty hard” to implement a headful of new ideas, a church member took him aside and said, “Preacher, we believe you’re right, but please give us a little time.” “And I said, ‘I’ll give you time and you give me time.’ A real partnership was formed.”
Alderman also credits his extended service at Little Rock with the church’s strong commitment to world missions. In “A Little Church in a Big World,” one of five books Alderman has authored, he notes that when he arrived at Little Rock, the annual budget was $6,700, with $300 earmarked for missions. “We began to pray for the Lord to open the minds and hearts of our people to the great need for the gospel around the world. The church did not need a new program but a new heart for missions.” Total receipts grew from $6,700 in 1959 to $406,000 in 2006, with $301,000 – or 73 percent of the total church income – designated for missions.
Such a continued outpouring of support is all the more remarkable in light of the size of the church, which averages about a hundred worshipers on a given Sunday. “God never embarrasses true faith, a lesson our church has learned well,” said Alderman. “Little things and small people in the hands of a powerful Lord who desires to save the lost and build his church throughout a big world, that is the essence of the church’s purpose and service.”
Alderman’s ministry at Little Rock is a family affair. Alderman leads the choir, and his wife, Martha, whom he married when he was 17 when both were active in Youth for Christ, serves as organist. Son Christopher has served with his father as co-pastor of Little Rock since 1989. Son Jay, a school teacher, is the church’s pianist. Another son, Kevin, lives in Texas with his family. The Aldermans’ daughter, Kathy, died at 26 in a plane crash while serving as a missionary in Alaska in 1980.
As he approaches the half-century mark in his service at Little Rock, Alderman muses lighthearted on his lengthy tenure. “They say you can’t fool all the people all the time, but I guess I’ve done it.” He also jokes that his wife has told him that she doesn’t want him in the pulpit “when you start losing your mind.”
Alderman – his mother is 93 and still works as a nurse – walks 30 minutes a day, is in good health and “puts in a full day.” “I want to stay active as long as I possibly can,” he said. He first felt a call to preach as a boy of 8, and he believes God has allowed him to do some of his most effective preaching in the past five years.
He has preached in more than 100 prophecy revivals and conferences and has developed some of the themes from his presentations into books he has published. Titles include “The Second Coming of Jesus Christ,” “The Return of Jesus Christ,” “Spirit of God,” and “Once Saved Always Saved: Do You Have the Assurance?”
Alderman said he encourages other pastors to “stay where they are planted and develop a ministry there.” “A church begins to take on the character of the pastor if the pastor is committed to the work,” he said.
He desires no credit for himself for his nearly 50-year-long ministry at Little Rock. “There’s no secret to success except that the Lord put his hand upon me,” he said. “I give him all the praise.”