First Baptist Church of Plant City (FBCPC) Associate Pastor Tommy Warnock this year celebrates 40 years with the congregation. Born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, his journey to Christ was one defined by stepping into the light that God placed before him.
Reflecting on his early years, Warnock recounts how he grew up in a family that didn’t attend church but he started attending Memphis’ Broadmoor Baptist Church, admittedly more for the pretty girls than the gospel instruction. Then, one Sunday evening in August 1973, something happened that shaped the 15-year-old’s future. Pastor Charles Dill, a guest preacher was speaking to the congregation. “I don’t have a clue what he said that night, it wasn’t the message but the cumulation of messages that I had heard,” said Warnock, who also witnessed seeing Jesus reflected in the lives of the young men and women at church.
At the end of the service, there was an opportunity to respond and congregants could walk down to where the preacher was standing and you could have a short conversation with him. Warnock walked up to Dill and told him that he wanted his life to be like theirs (he pointed at the other youth in the congregation).
“Right there in front of everybody that big ole’ man and I got down on our knees and he showed me how to pray,” said Warnock.
As Dill whispered words into his ear, Warnock prayed that God loved him, admitted that he’d been living life his way instead of God’s way, he thanked God for what Jesus did that nobody else could do and that he was making a choice to accept His gift and choose to make Him the boss of his life.
Ten months and many lessons and Sundays later, Warnock found himself on a mission trip in Coal Valley, Illinois. He was sick most of the trip but one memory stands out. A little girl walked up to him and said she wanted Jesus in her heart. He quickly looked around for help but saw nobody else around. He showed the little girl what he had done 10 months ago to bring Jesus into his own heart. “That sweet eight or nine-year-old girl in her difficult circumstances she was in said a prayer in her own words and in her own way accepted Jesus’ gift of salvation,” said Warnock.
As he boarded a bus, he looked up and saw that Dill was the bus driver. Warnock told him about his experience with the little girl and then Dill threw his arms up in the air and said ‘praise the Lord, I’m a grandfather.’ Warnock was puzzled at his reaction.
“He told me I had walked with somebody else to the Lord, and because he had walked with me that made him a spiritual grandfather,” he said. “I’m 65 years old and I’ve never forgotten that and the desire to do that again.”
After graduating high school and while working towards a bachelor’s degree from Memphis State, Warnock got a call from Oscar Calhoun at FBCPC about working at the church as its summer youth director. The year was 1980. He performed his duties well, loving those he served, met a beautiful young woman and parishioner named Pam Connell, but returned to Tennessee at the end of the summer to complete his last semester at Memphis State.
Months after returning home, FBCPC leadership reached out and offered him a full-time job.
“I wanted to be a mortician and had a girlfriend in Memphis,” recalled Warnock, but after his girlfriend broke up with him, he made the decision to return to Plant City. He arrived in Jan. 1981 and spent his time assisting with the children’s church, working with youth and college-aged students, holding services at nursing homes and even leading music (once, he joked).
He also started dating Pam Connell. “I wasn’t supposed to date girls in the church but I liked her and already had thought I could marry this girl,” he said. “She was so strong and she didn’t need me and that was so attractive to me.”
After going on a date to Flagship Restaurant in Clearwater, he marched into the preacher’s office the following Monday and told him about his feelings for Connell, who gave him his blessing as long as it didn’t affect his work. The couple never sat together in church and didn’t go anywhere in Plant City together alone.
Two months later, Warnock gathered all the money he could get his hands on and gave it to his pastor, who was visiting the Holy Land. While in Bethlehem, he purchased a diamond for Warnock. On April 26, 1981, he popped the question. Connell said yes and the couple married on Jan. 2, 1982.
During the same time, wonderful Christian people began to encourage him to go back to school. In the fall of 1981, he attended Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Ft. Worth, Texas. While attending school, he worked at a church in Plano, Texas but leadership at FBCPC continued to stay in contact with the young preacher. “I got asked several times about coming back to Plant City but said no every time,” Warnock recalled.
Then, in early 1984, the pastor flew out to see him and spent the day with him. By the end of the visit, Warnock agreed to return to Plant City.
His first day as youth pastor at FBCPC was March 18, 1984.
FBCPC Senior Pastor Dr. Brian Stowe, who has served with Warnock since 2013, joked that Warnock has been at the church one out of every four days its been in existence (it was established in 1866) but his example and service have made a huge impact on the congregation. “He has brought a level of devotion, commitment and a genuine humble spirit that loves people where they are,” he said. “He helps people where they are get closer to Jesus.”
Warnock said his lengthy service at FBCPC has brought with it several blessings. He said he’s been able to see generations of families come to know Christ, witness baptisms and weddings for parishioners and their children and even their children’s children. He’s also had the chance to work with a whole host of staff members, who he said are some of the most wonderful people in the world.
It’s also satisfying when he sees members have a ‘grandfather’ moment like he had so many years ago. “To lead somebody to Christ and help them learn how to walk with Christ and then for them to lead somebody to Christ and help them walk with Christ is biblical,” he said. “That’s 2 Timothy 2:2.”
Warnock, who is now associate pastor, is also a resource for the Plant City High School football team, where he’s stood on the sidelines and assisted with their growth for 40 seasons.
Through the years, he’s grateful to God for every moment. “I’m just so grateful for my journey and I hope it doesn’t end anytime soon,” he said. “This church has endured world wars, depressions, recessions and we’re still here and I thank God that as Plant City’s population increases, we’re here to help all these new and wonderful people come to a relationship with Jesus. This is the coolest thing in the world.”
Warnock plans to walk in the light He gives him for years to come. “I’m where I’m supposed to be,” he said.