It was never just about chicken or church planting; it was about God’s sovereignty.
Stephen Watson grew up in Camden, S.C., riding four-wheelers and exploring the woods. He trusted in Jesus as His Savior at a revival service when he was 7 years old. He doesn’t remember anything about the service except that he needed Jesus. Watson said no one intentionally discipled him, but he did what he knew — he prayed, read the Bible, and served the church.
One Saturday night in high school after reading God’s Word and thinking about his life, he drove to his pastor’s house to talk through what he was experiencing. His pastor asked if he’d ever considered if God was calling him into ministry.
That seed was planted in Watson’s heart, but years of experience took place before Watson planted a church.
Watson went to college at The Citadel in Charleston, starting as a political science major, changing to an education major, and then finally graduating with an English major. After college, he went to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, to train for ministry. While at seminary, he served college students and young adults at a local church that experienced much growth.
Watson said he didn’t know how to handle the growth and felt burnt out. Due to his burnout, he didn’t finish his seminary degree and moved back to South Carolina to work for Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
While in South Carolina, he married his wife, Darci, whom he met while working at the church in Texas. Watson worked with FCA for several years but eventually he and his wife moved back to Texas to finish his seminary degree because of his desire for pastoral ministry.
“That’s kind of what I felt called to, not really campus ministry but pastoring,” said Watson.
But after graduation, Watson returned to campus ministry. He became a Baptist Collegiate Minister with the South Carolina Baptist Convention and served three campuses: The Citadel, the College of Charleston, and The Medical University of South Carolina. After serving in Charleston, he and his family moved to Clemson to continue doing BCM and joined Utica Baptist Church.
Speaking of campus ministry, he said, “All those experiences combined to make me the pastor I am today.”
That spring, a church planter named Ken Lewis requested to meet with Watson. Lewis shared his desire to plant a church in Clemson. Watson, who often heard from aspiring church planters, assumed it wouldn’t happen. But he was wrong.
That summer, Crosspoint Church was planted — the church that would later equip, fund, and send Watson to plant Renewal Church of Anderson. But Watson couldn’t see that far ahead yet. For now, Watson agreed to let the new church plant use the BCM building for gatherings.
After serving as the BCM director at Clemson for a couple of years, Watson and his family moved back to Charleston to pastor the same church they attended while previously living in Charleston. But because of the church’s unhealthy state, Watson began working at a local Chick-fil-A full time, though his original intent was to be bi-vocational.
He said, “Our goal was to be bi-vocational and to kind of help plant a church or be a part of a church plant. And that didn’t come about as quickly as we thought it would.”
But after a short season there, Chick-fil-A corporate asked him to travel and manage other restaurants across the country. Planting and pastoring were put on hold. The family moved to Ohio, Alabama, Florida, and Pennsylvania in just a couple of years. But the Lord had a purpose in all of it.
Watson said, “There were times where I would have loved for things to have moved along quickly or in a different direction, but hindsight is 2020.” He continued, “It’s only when we look back are we able to see the hand of the Lord. … He doesn’t show us everything in the midst of it, but one of the things we do learn is, ‘I’m not trusting my circumstances; I’m trusting the Lord.’”
Two circumstances where they saw the Lord’s hand was with Darci’s parents. While they were in Texas the second time, for Watson to finish his seminary degree, they were able to spend quality time with Darci’s mom, who lived in Fort Worth before she passed away from cancer.
Another work of God’s providence was when Watson’s Chick-fil-A job caused them to move to Tampa, Fla., where Darci’s father lived. Moving to Florida allowed them to reconcile a broken relationship with Darci’s dad.
Reflecting on all of their experiences, Watson said, “It’s really God’s story. It’s His story and how He’s orchestrating our lives.” He continued, “And it wasn’t just about us pastoring a church, or us planting a church, or being a part of Chick-fil-A. It was really God’s work on our hearts and lives too.”
But would Watson ever become a church planter?
Back to Crosspoint Church … That aspiring church planter Ken Lewis and his buddy Jeremy Chasteen (from the first story in this series) called on Watson to be their family pastor at Crosspoint. Watson accepted the offer and, lo and behold, they moved back to Clemson, only to move to Anderson two years later to plant a church.
While Watson was the family pastor, he recalled being assigned two membership interviews with people living in Anderson. So, the Crosspoint Church leadership team began to pray about planting a church in Anderson when they realized that about 50 of their members lived in Anderson and traveled to Clemson for church. About 30 of those members agreed to plant the church, alongside Watson and other leaders.
Watson became a planter and pastor of Renewal Church of Anderson at 40 years old.
Roughly 12 years later, Watson, sitting across from two young reporters, said, “Our response is either: I won’t trust the Lord and I’ll be mad about it — or I’m going to trust that He is sovereign, good, and wise and where He has me is where He wants me to be, and where I am He’s going to use to make me into the pastor He wants me to be.”
Yes, even if it involves a couple of years of overseeing fried chicken.