The Owenses: When in Rome...
When David Owens brought his city bride, Jacqueline, to a small Bible Baptist church in Bolivar, Tennessee, in the early 1960s, they followed a long succession of short pastorates. David, however, was enthusiastic about the potential in this town of seven thousand; he had grown up only fifty miles away and knew the area.
Unlike the Franciscos, there was not a major educational gap in this case. David was a Bible college graduate; Jackie, three years younger, had done no college at all. The young couple had traveled the previous summer, speaking and singing at youth camps and children's meetings; now they were looking forward to their own church.
David set a blistering pace at first, calling, studying, praying, fasting—doing everything he could to make this church grow. He visited the local lumber yard to ask the cost of excavating a basement under the little white church for more Sunday school space. He got his figure—and later on, a two-hour rebuke from the trustees for delving into something outside his area. He was there to preach, and that was all.
Meanwhile, Jackie was quickly realizing this was a long way from 4,400-member Houston Baptist Temple where she had grown up.
I was very much a free spirit—I guess I still am. I don't like being put into a mold. I want the satisfaction of saying, "This is what I am and how I act or don't act, because it's right or wrong." I want to make the choice—not have somebody tell me, "You'd better_____ because of who you are."
Her husband calls her a prankster and a daredevil—"vinegar and life to the extreme"—and loves her for it. They had met one summer when Jackie came to visit her uncle, who pastored David's home church. On several occasions during courtship they had locked horns over ...
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