A Congregation Forged Since 1867
Central Christian Church began in Waco in 1867, when eighteen people gathered in homes for worship. The church was chartered three years later, and new converts were baptized in the Brazos River. A Sunday School was organized in 1874, a building went up in 1875, and a new church was constructed at 11th Street and Washington Avenue in 1886. The congregation relocated to its present home at 4901 Lake Shore Drive in 1980, where it continues to serve Waco and the surrounding community as a member of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), a Protestant denomination that the church describes as identified with the mainstream and widely involved in social concerns, with about 700,000 members across roughly 3,700 congregations in the United States and Canada.
Sunday Morning: Relaxed Traditional Worship
The church describes its Sunday worship as "relaxed traditional," and the sanctuary bears out that phrase in unusual ways. One of the finest pipe organs in Waco fills the room, joined in services by guitar, piano and orchestral instruments. Twelve stained glass windows line the walls, while two eighty-inch monitors carry announcements, hymn lyrics, videos and sermon notes. Hymns written in 1707 sit alongside hymns written in 2016, and choral, solo and ensemble anthems fill the offering. Children and youth regularly take part in worship leadership, and every week the children are invited forward for a moment especially for them.
The Lord's Supper, sometimes called Communion or the Eucharist, is celebrated every Sunday. The church teaches that taking the broken bread and the cup is a reminder of Christ's saving acts, and that the presence at the Table by faith forgives and frees into abundant and eternal life. The Table is open to everyone who calls on the Lord for healing, hope and salvation.
Visitors can expect a service of about one hour. Dress runs the full range, from Sunday finest to t-shirts; whatever a guest wears is welcome. Full services are livestreamed on the church's Facebook page and on its YouTube channel, and shorter clips, sermons, choral offertories and children's moments appear on Facebook as reels.
Bible Study, Fireside Fellowship and the Nursery Wing
Sunday mornings begin earlier than the 10:30 worship hour. At 9:15, Bible Discovery meets via Zoom or in person for leader-led teaching and discussion. At 9:30, two more adult classes run back to back: Serendipity, which uses one or more Christian-authored articles for each four-to-eight-week series, and Seekers, which works through a chapter of a group-selected Christian book each week. At 10:00, the Fireside Fellowship opens with coffee and light breakfast items before worship.
Children and youth join the same rhythm. Those in fifth grade and younger gather for Bible lessons taught by a team of caring adults, then join the sanctuary for the full worship service. The church holds that children are always welcome in "big church," but a nursery in the Children's Wing, staffed by trained adults, is available for newborns through age four. Children's worship bags in the Narthex help younger children engage more fully in the service.
Wednesday Evenings, Pickleball and Small Groups
On Wednesday evenings, Senior Pastor Rev. Brian Coats leads a book or Bible study from 5:30 to 6:30, with the first half hour spent in his presentation and the second half hour given over to breakout groups. The chancel choir, directed by soprano Alissa Ruth Suver, rehearses at 6:30 on Wednesdays and warms up before worship on Sundays. Children's Choir meets on Wednesdays during Advent.
Pickleball and Prayer gathers on Mondays at 5:30 in the Teel Center, where two indoor courts are set up for open doubles play and the evening closes with a time of prayer. On Sunday evenings, children, youth and adults participate in intergenerational home-based small groups centered around table fellowship, sharing highs and lows and considering precepts from God's Word. New small groups form about four times a year.
Waco's Pumpkin Patch Church
Central Christian Church has been "Waco's Pumpkin Patch Church" since 2006. Every day during October, from 11:00 in the morning to 7:00 in the evening, the grounds fill with pumpkins priced by size from seventy-five cents to fifty dollars. Cash and credit are accepted, there is no admission fee to walk the Patch, and restrooms are available. All proceeds benefit the church's children and youth ministries and a long list of missions and outreach efforts, including toys for the Mission Waco Christmas Toy Store, the annual Do Good Friday meal packing event with Kids Against Hunger, Vacation Bible School, summer mission trips, summer camps and retreats, and college scholarships.
School groups are welcome. A Storyteller reads a few books and discusses safety in the Patch before children, parents and teachers explore. Backdrops are available for individual and group photos, and smaller pumpkins run from seventy-five cents to four dollars, with large carving pumpkins from six to fifty dollars.
Noah's Ark Preschool and Parent's Day Out
The church runs Noah's Ark Preschool and Parent's Day Out as a Texas Health and Human Services fully licensed facility serving children from six weeks to five years of age. The school is part of the mission of Central Christian Church to reach out to Waco and the surrounding communities, and it operates Tuesday through Friday during the school year from 8:45 a.m. to 2:15 p.m., with morning extended care beginning at 7:30 a.m. and afternoon extended care ending at 4:00 p.m. Every Thursday, the preschool gathers for a twenty-minute Chapel service led by Jenny Akin, the Director of Children's Ministries, with Bible story time, prayer and singing.
Curriculum combines the Active Learning Series with objectives from the Children's Learning Institute at UT Health in Houston, focusing on listening and speaking, physical development, creative activities and learning from the world around them. The PreK class supplements that work with Texas Education Agency guidelines. A monthly Bible curriculum, complete with memory verse, Bible truth, story and activities, runs alongside the rest. Cosie became director of the preschool in June 2025, having served previously as Lead Teacher and Social Media Manager.
The Memorial Garden: Honoring Ten WWII Servicemen
Dedicated on May 29, 2022, the Central Christian Church Memorial Garden honors and remembers CCC members, friends and families who paid the ultimate sacrifice in service to their country. In particular, the space marks the service and sacrifice of the ten CCC members killed in action during World War II. Landscaped and lit, with benches throughout, the centerpiece is a large rock engraved with the words, "There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends." Visitors are invited to spend quiet time in the garden in prayer and reflection.
The ten honored include Brigadier General Claudius Easley of Waco, killed on Okinawa on June 19, 1945, while checking his troops' progress against the last Japanese positions; 1st Lt. John Arthur Stout III, lost at sea when LST-460 was hit by a kamikaze in the Philippines on December 21, 1944; 1st Lt. Oliver Goldsmith, a Baylor graduate whose plane collided mid-air over England on September 10, 1942; 2nd Lt. William Fred Nalley, killed in service with the 32nd Bomber Squadron in Italy on June 26, 1944; Msgt. Reginald T. Burrage, who died Christmas Day 1941 following an automobile accident in Waco; Sgt. Robert E. Davis, killed in the Battle of San Pietro in Italy on December 16, 1943; Corporal Herbert Gibson, killed on Peleliu Island on September 17, 1944; PFC Hugh "Chinkie" Schrader Jr., killed in the province of Ilocos Sur in the Philippines; PFC John D. Hanna, who died in a plane crash near Blackland Army Air Field on February 2, 1943; and Edward Richard Kubow, a Marine who served in both World War II and the Vietnam War.
Outreach Across Waco
Central Christian Church partners with a wide circle of local organizations. Once a year, the entire congregation takes part in "Church Has Left the Building," a single morning when the church scatters into eight to ten work sites around Waco for about an hour and a half of service after the regular worship service. Every Good Friday, the church hosts "Do Good Friday," packing thousands of meals for Kids Against Hunger. Once a month, members serve lunch at Church Under the Bridge, a ministry the church has supported for nearly thirty years.
Financial and hands-on support also extends to Caritas Food Pantry of Waco, Compassion Ministries of Waco, The Cove, Family Abuse Center, Friends For Life, Fuzzy Friends Animal Rescue, Gospel Cafe (Cross Ties Ministries), Habitat for Humanity, Juliette Fowler Home, Kairos Prison Ministry, Mission Waco/World, the Salvation Army and the Talitha Koum Institute, among others.
Mission, Vision and Values
The church frames its life around a vision of being "an authentic, relevant family of faith sharing life and love in the name of Jesus Christ." Five values shape that vision: intergenerational mission and ministry, with children, teens and adults sharing every part of church life; a commitment to being #knownandnamed, where everyone is known to the whole body; the call to know, serve, follow and believe in Jesus Christ as a holistic way of life; passionate compassion for the least, the last and the lost; and prayer, which the church describes as leading and undergirding everything it undertakes.
Central Christian Church has stood in Waco for more than a century and a half, and the rhythms of its week - the 9:15 Bible studies, the 10:00 Fireside Fellowship, the 10:30 relaxed traditional service, the Wednesday book study and chancel choir, the Monday pickleball and prayer, the October Pumpkin Patch and the year-round preschool - continue to give that vision a daily shape on Lake Shore Drive.