WHEATLAND – Time magazine, the BBC, Stouffer’s, State Farm Insurance and Jaguar are just a few of the names of companies that began in 1922.
Alongside these startups was the small and ambitious congregation that formed under the name of First Baptist Church in Wheatland.
Pastor Phil Benson who hails from Salem, Oregon, and graduated from high school in 1991 has been the Pastor of First Baptist Church for 11 years.
When Benson started, he says that he didn’t know what God wanted him to do, so he attended a community college and listened intently for the leading of the Lord.
“I took some different classes in elementary education and then some medical classes just to see what kind of things resonated,” Benson said. “I ended up getting my degree at the community college and one thing I learned was that that I loved working with the youth.”
The church he was with at the time took him on as a youth pastor and suddenly his ministry was taking shape.
