Today we’d like to introduce you to Chris Simmons.
Hi Chris, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
I came to Dallas to attend Dallas Theological Seminary. In my 3rd year, I was praying about a place to serve while still in school. One day in the Student Center, I saw an opportunity to serve in a small inner-city church in the South Dallas community. I applied and was hired to work as a summer urban missionary. My goal was to complete my education in Dallas and return to my home in Washington, DC. When I applied to serve at Cornerstone, I did not realize that the church was in an area that the Dallas Morning News had called a “war zone.” The drive-by shooting, drugs, gang activities, prostitution, and other societal ills have caused a rapid deterioration in a neighborhood that was once a vibrant African-American community.
Because of the designation of the area as a “war zone,” many of the residents, businesses, and churches left the neighborhood to escape the blight and violence. We as a church had to ask ourselves, as everyone is relocated out of the neighborhood if we were to leave, would anyone miss us? That question catapulted us to really think about how we can express our love and concern for our neighborhoods because we realized, “People would not care how much we knew if they did not know that we cared for them.” And although the church had a number of outreach efforts in the neighborhood such as literacy classes, after-school programs, citizenship classes, es, and other community programs, we decided to drastically increase those efforts.
Today, the church has several outreach programs in order to meet the needs of the neighborhood. Some of these include:
The Cornerstone Kitchen – serving about 13,000 meals a month
The Cornerstone Clothing Closet and Shower Complex serves about 1,000 individuals each month
The Medical Clinic
Transitional Housing for the formerly incarcerated and homeless teen moms
Educational Programs for children and youth
A Bike Resource Center
Community Development Initiatives to revitalize the neighborhood
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It has been a relatively smooth road given the context in which we are located. Many did not expect the church to be “successful” in the neighborhood, and in fact, the community has responded to the ministry and programs of the church in amazing ways.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I serve as Pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church. I started serving with the church in May of 1988 and was called as Pastor in September 1989; the question we are always asking as a church is, “How can we better serve the South Dallas/Fair Park community.” This has led us to develop a number of ministries and programs that are specifically geared to meet the needs of the community. I think what sets us apart from others is our strong community focus. We strongly believe that the church “should exist for those who are not a part of it, yet.”. Thus, we are often engaging the community in conversation about what are some of the needs and challenges and trying to figure out how we can address them. We are most proud of the community response as evident in the number of lives that have been impacted and changed because of the church’s outreach in the neighborhood.
Do you have any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
As a child, my biological parents were foster parents. They fostered 100’s children over a 30-year span. My favorite memory is always growing up in a home with a number of children … many of who were from distressed situations, but my parents had an ability to make them feel a part of the family. Although my parents are deceased, many of the children, now adults, are still connected.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.cornerstonedallas.org
- Facebook: Cornerstone Dallas
- Youtube: Cornerstone Dallas
