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HARLINGEN — It started as a small wooden church with services in English and German.
A century later, St. Paul’s Lutheran Church at 602 Morgan Blvd. is celebrating its centennial anniversary in a fine brick structure and an ongoing construction project.
“It’s exciting, and it’s given opportunity to just look back with gratitude over the last 100 years of this congregation,” said the Rev. Nathan Wendorf, who has served as the church’s pastor for 12 years.
“I’ve been looking back at some of the original minutes of the old voters meeting, the first one from 1923 when 11 men signed the constitution of the congregation,” he said. “I didn’t realize until last week that when it was started in 1923 it was the Evangelical Lutheran Congregation of Harlingen.”
From the simplicity of spiritual beginning began a journey through changes, deliberations and innovations for the unpredictable and the unforeseen: freezes destroying crops, stock market crash of 1929, The Great Depression of the 1930s, the closing of Harlingen Air Force Base in the early 1960s and the COVID-19 pandemic.
“When the church made the move to this campus, it was about 60 years ago,” Wendorf said. “They were building this new church, and eventually, a parish school over here. They made the decision to build this campus, and then the news came out about six months later they were closing the Harlingen base. They lost about 40 percent of the congregation.”
Wendorf and his wife hail from the Mid-West and first spent six years in McKinney, Texas, where he was pastor before moving to Harlingen, where they’re now raising their four children.
Many of his congregants have attended St. Paul’s their entire lives.
“I have been blessed to be a part of St. Paul for the majority of my life,” said Daniel Hensz, director of discipleship.
“I was baptized, raised, confirmed, and went to school from Pre-K through eighth grade, where I met my now wife, all at St. Paul’s,” said Hensz, 34. “I’m now blessed to have the opportunity to work at the church that helped raise me and encourage me in my faith.”
For Quentin Anderson, 60, St. Paul’s church and school has been a family tradition since its early years.
“My mother was in the first eighth-grade class,” Anderson said. “She was born in 1936 and moved as a child to Harlingen. It’s a great experience being a member of our church and school that’s been in the community for 100 years.”
He warmly recalled how he married a teacher in the school and four of their children attended there.
“It’s been integrated in every aspect of our lives,” he said.
The school recently closed after serving children for a total of 69 years, Wendorf said.
“The school ministry was a big part of the ministry at St. Paul’s,” he said. “Five years ago, the congregation made a decision, just due to declining enrollment and rising costs in education, that we could no longer do that part of the ministry.”
With the conclusion of that ministry, which served the needs of a particular time period, church leaders asked, “Now what’s next?”
What’s next has been happening quite awhile actually, with activities which invite the community to enjoy fellowship and outreach ministries to help those in need. Nativity Nights each December attract thousands to see church volunteers dressed as shepherds and wise men and the Holy Family.
The church also holds Fall Fest, Easter Fest and Vacation Bible School.
“Just recently we had our Living Last Supper on Maundy Thursday,” Wendorf said. “We try to bring the story of Jesus’ last Passover with his disciples to life.”
It’s a supper much celebrated and filled with pain and confusion as Jesus says one of them will betray him. They wonder with great concern who it will be. This dilemma is played out in the reenactment on Maundy Thursday – with a purpose.
“We kind of play off that idea,” Wendorf said. “All 12 of the disciples are wrestling with ‘Are they the ones who will betray him?’”
The message is that even today people betray Christ, and he still loves us.
“That’s our goal in his service, and everything we do is to keep pointing people to Jesus,” Wendorf said. “It’s about His work for us with His life, His death, and His resurrection.”
My mother was in the first eighth-grade class. She was born in 1936 and moved as a child to Harlingen. It’s a great experience being a member of our church and school that’s been in the community for 100 years.
The church continues to confront adversities and pursue its mission.
In 2009, church leaders decided on a new construction project to offer more welcoming environments in climate-controlled indoor areas. In the midst of this project the pandemic struck, altering timelines for construction and shuttering services and activities for extended periods of time.
But still the project continues.
“The new construction will provide a new west main entrance creating a unified entrance for ministry happening seven days a week,” Wendorf said. “There will be 3,100 square feet of indoor gathering and hospitality space as well as indoor play space.”
Wendorf said Christianity should focus more on fellowship and personal contact with the community. In that perspective St. Paul’s has a number of ministries.
One of those is Backpacks of Love.
“We are in partnership with two or three local elementary schools to help some students who are at food risk,” Wendorf said. “We make sure they are treated with dignity first and foremost and that they are given backpacks to take home filled with nutritious food over the weekend.”
Those children also receive Thanksgiving baskets and Christmas presents.
And there’s more. There’s the Early Childhood Center, the work in Mexico, mission trips to Costa Rica, journeys to the Holy Land, and the development of a new app for daily scripture readings.
To see more, view Brownsville Herald photojournalist Denise Cathey’s full photo gallery here:
Photo Gallery: St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Harlingen celebrates 100 years
