The Rev. Dr. Jim Phillips remembers when he decided to go into preaching.
In 1978, during a ski trip to Breckenridge, Colorado, with friends, he went for a walk and watched the sun rise over the Rocky Mountains for the first time.
“I was moved to tears by the beauty of that sunrise in those snow-capped mountains,” he recalled. “I sensed the Lord then saying, ‘I want you to tell people about what I have done and how this is evidence of my majestic creation.’”
He had been active in church but hadn’t considered it as a career; he was thinking of being a professional fisherman. But he ended up selling his bass boat and the truck he used to tow it so he could pursue a new path.
That path later led him to Greenwood, where he has served as pastor of North Greenwood Baptist Church since 1990. During that time, he has overseen the addition of a number of ministries and facilities at the church. He also has been active in a number of community organizations, and he came up with the idea for the Delta Cross, which was placed to the west of Greenwood last year.
He says he thinks of service as “discovering what your God-given gifts and talents are and applying them to wherever the Lord leads you.”
For his use of his talents, he is the 2022 recipient of the Commonwealth’s Community Service Award, presented annually in conjunction with the Profile edition.
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Phillips, 66, was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In 1965, he moved to Clinton with his father, Chuck, his mother, JoEtta, and two sisters: Barbara, who now lives in Clinton, and Jan, who is deceased.
Phillips became involved at Mount Salus Presbyterian Church, where he accepted Christ at the age of 12. “I still have the first Bible I ever got,” he said, adding with a laugh that the name on the cover is “Jimmy Phillips,” which is how he was known until junior high.
He showed musical talents early, singing with a boys choir in Tulsa and with the adult choir while in the youth ministry in Clinton. He said he is the only musical person in his family, although his father made up for his lack of skill with enthusiasm.
“My dad never missed singing hymns in church, but he was never on key. But it never stopped him,” Phillips said. “And I’ve used that illustration in church before, because his deal was, if it was a joyful noise, whatever it was, he was going to sing. And I was very proud of him to do that.”
Phillips played football, baseball and basketball in Clinton and also enjoyed fishing and other outdoor activities. In the summer before his senior year of high school, he worked at Hale and Jones Sporting Goods in Jackson, and after graduating in 1974, he became that company’s youngest assistant store manager and then its youngest store manager.
“I never did see myself as being college material,” he said. “I saw myself as going right out of high school into a career, which I actually did.”
He was active in First Baptist Church in Jackson, having switched from the Presbyterian church. First Baptist was led by Dr. Frank Pollard, and “I just fell in love with his teaching,” Phillips said. “He signed my license; he signed my ordination.”
Because Phillips spoke up in class, he was asked to lead a Bible study and then a Sunday school class. He soon became licensed to preach, and in March 1979 he was ordained.
He said ministry was an unlikely choice for him; in fact, when he attended his 10-year high school reunion in 1984, he received recognition for having the most surprising career. “I had no idea God was going to put me in the ministry,” he said.
He preached his first sermon on a Sunday night filling in for Randy Turner, a co-worker at Hale and Jones who was pastor of Antioch Baptist Church near Hazlehurst.
Phillips said he doesn’t recall the topic of the sermon but thought it went well.“I felt very at ease in the pulpit, and I felt like I had something that God gave me to say that night,” he said.
Turner, a longtime pastor of First Baptist Church of Laurel, said he saw quickly at Hale and Jones that Phillips had the people skills and leadership skills to be a good manager. Those talents also carried over into his church work, Turner said.
“He was a great guy to work with, and we became not just professionally involved but personal friends,” he said.
They also have kept in touch over the years; Turner has spoken at North Greenwood Baptist several times and enjoys duck hunting in the Greenwood area.
Citing Psalm 37:4 — “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart” — Turner said he is glad that Phillips has been able to continue fishing and doing other things that make him happy while serving God.
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A longtime angler who fished professionally for 10 years, Jim Phillips also used tournaments as opportunities to witness about his faith.
After leaving the sporting goods business, Phillips became a full-time student at Mississippi College, also serving as pastor of Chapel Hill Baptist Church in Utica for a time. He graduated in May 1982 and also married his wife, Cynthia, whom he had met at the college, that month.
He went on to earn a Master of Divinity degree from New Orleans Seminary and then a Doctor of Ministry from Columbia Seminary in Decatur, Georgia. While furthering his education, he worked as pastor at Mount Olive Baptist Church in Meridian and then associate pastor at Calvary Baptist Church in Tupelo, and he finished his doctoral dissertation project in 1992 after arriving in Greenwood.
The schedule meant a lot of driving and a lot of work for someone who hadn’t thought he was college material — but, he said, “Once God had a fix on my life and I had purpose and direction as to why I should be in school, I became a pretty good student.”
While in Tupelo, Phillips caught the attention of some people at North Greenwood Baptist who had seen him preach on television while the senior pastor was taking a summer sabbatical.
“I was actually being watched and judged, I guess, for several weeks before I was invited to come and visit with this search committee at this church,” he said.
After meeting with representatives of North Greenwood Baptist, he decided to visit the church one Saturday without notifying anyone — but he ran into some unexpected traffic issues.
“I tried to find my way into Greenwood and find where this church was, and everything was going crazy because of the 300 Oaks Race,” he said. “I didn’t know what I’d driven myself into; it was the first time I’d ever been here.”
But he found the church and was excited about the possibilities there. He also was interested in implementing a model for attracting baby boomers, which he had devised for his dissertation.
“I put it in effect here at this church, and I think it was successful,” he said. “I think that’s part of the reason why I’ve been here so long.”
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Jim Phillips and his wife, Cynthia, have been fans of baseball’s Atlanta Braves for many years.
Over time, he helped bring about other major additions.
He added a Wednesday night supper. He oversaw projects including the addition of an elevator, a larger fellowship hall, the Recreational Outreach Center, a child care facility and more parking. The church added a youth house, where his children took part in activities; now called the Grace House, it serves as a meeting place for a Hispanic mission and is rented for gatherings.
He also wanted to make a difference outside the church’s walls, and he found he was able to do it.
“I never had any problem connecting with this community,” he said. “I have through the years known of folks who have struggled to try to identify with Delta culture; it never was a problem for us.”
He connected with other outdoors enthusiasts by adding Sportsmen’s Banquets. A longtime member of the Exchange Club, he has helped with its youth sports activities. He has been active in the Greenwood-Leflore Ministerial Association and was in the first planning group that helped bring the Community Kitchen to town. He also has been active in planning the annual community Thanksgiving service, National Day of Prayer observances and the Roy Martin Delta Band Festival and Christmas Parade.
Terry Barnes, associate pastor of North Greenwood Baptist, who joined the staff in 2009, said he could see during his interview process that Phillips was enthusiastic about his work.
“He has a lot of energy, and it can certainly be a challenge to keep up with him,” Barnes said.
Phillips also is “a big-picture guy” who has a vision for the church’s future and demonstrates his faith through his actions, Barnes said.
The Rev. Dr. Calvin Collins, pastor of New Zion Missionary Baptist Church, who has known Phillips more than 20 years, said he is “a good man who means a lot to me.”
Collins has worked with Phillips often in organizing community Thanksgiving services and other activities, in addition to the planning for the Community Kitchen and the Delta Cross.
He said that in dealing with others, Phillips is interested in the whole person — “concerned about what happens in life, not just their church attendance.”
For 28 years, Phillips has taught Bible classes at Pillow Academy, where he currently instructs eighth graders.
Termie Land, a former Pillow headmaster and North Greenwood Baptist member who now is headmaster at Madison-Ridgeland Academy, said Phillips has been “a foundation and cornerstone in Greenwood — not just for North Greenwood Baptist Church, but for the whole community.”
Pillow’s Bible classes initially were taught to high school students by four pastors, including Phillips, with each one teaching for nine weeks. After Phillips expressed an interest in teaching younger students, he was given the opportunity to do so for an entire year, Land recalled: “It was his idea, and he thought it would be very influential and impactful.”
Land said the move got good results because, in addition to being a good teacher with a depth of knowledge, Phillips relates to people well.
“Everyone’s very comfortable around him,” Land said.
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Phillips said he got the idea for the Delta Cross, a structure at the intersection of U.S. 82 and U.S. 49, after seeing a cross had been erected in Eupora to give people a place to pray and reflect.
“I just put on my Facebook page, ‘Anybody ever thought about seeing something like that in Greenwood?’ And my Facebook page blew up over a couple of days,” he recalled.
He put out feelers about creating a nonprofit for the cross, secured a location and raised the money in about 18 months. The eye-catching structure, which was erected in May, has received a good response, and Phillips still goes there a couple of times a week himself. “It’s still something I’m very proud of,” he said.
Phillips has played a prominent role in bringing a number of nationally known Christian musical performers to Greenwood, including Newsboys, Casting Crowns, Jason Crabb, Michael W. Smith, Amy Grant, Nichole Nordeman and Ellie Holcomb.
Scheduling these performances can be difficult now, but he has a concert by pianist Gordon Mote lined up for later this year, is trying to bring Holcomb back and is open to other opportunities if they come up. After all, he said, “music probably had as much to do with bringing me to Christ back in my college days as anything.”
Jim Phillips, president of the Delta Cross nonprofit, celebrates the signing of the deed to receive a 1.33-acre plot of property from the Pillow family in 2019 to erect the Delta Cross. On the right are Dale Pillow and Walter Pillow Sr.
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Phillips said his health is good as far as he knows. He has scaled back some of his activities but is still active in the ministerial association and the Exchange Club.
“I wake up sometimes in the middle of the night with the strangest ideas or thoughts about doing something in this community or bringing something to this church,” he said. “My mind, that’s just where it goes: ‘Where can I make a difference? Where can I use my contacts?’”
A professional fisherman from 1995 to 2005, he no longer has the stamina to travel to multi-day fishing competitions but does go to one-day events sometimes. He served as a chaplain on the Bassmasters circuit years ago and led Thursday night services, and he made some lasting friendships.
“Several touring pros who are still very famous fishermen today, who do that for a living, still stay in touch with me,” he said. “They’ll be traveling from tournament site to tournament site, and they may call me one night late driving — just needing somebody to talk to, needing somebody to pray with, needing to talk about their families.”
He and his wife have three sons: Jonathan, who lives with his wife and two children in Clinton and works for Blue Cross Blue Shield; Stephen, who lives in Nashville and is a field producer for “Headhunters TV” on The Outdoor Channel; and Kevin, a former Auburn University punter who lives in Jacksonville, Florida, and is personal assistant to former NFL quarterback Tim Tebow.
Phillips spent a lot of time with his sons as they grew up while his wife was working as a night nurse, and he considered it a privilege. Also, he said, “it’s a very rare thing for a pastor to get to raise three children and never have to relocate — and it’s something I’ve been very, very thankful for all these years.”
He plans to continue preaching in Greenwood as long as God wants him to do so. Because of his church’s television ministry, he’s a well-known figure who is accustomed to being approached by strangers at Walmart and elsewhere.
“Even if I retired, I don’t know that I would leave Greenwood,” he said. “I feel like I would be coming back here for years conducting funerals and weddings, and so as long as the Lord tarries and as long as I feel like he’s effectively using me, I have no plans of leaving any time soon.”
- This article first appeared in Profile 2022, a yearly publication of The Greenwood Commonwealth.
