MARIETTA — There aren’t just changes happening on the outside of First Baptist Church Marietta.
Along with a brand new bell tower, the church has welcomed its new pastor, Brandon Owen, from Nashville, Tennessee.
“I can tell that being the pastor of this church, people in the community care who that is, and I think that’s neat,” Owen said.
Owen is the most recent leader of a church that has been around since before the Civil War: It opened its doors in 1835, occupying different locations until settling at 148 Church St. in 1897.
From the hardwood to the pulpit
The ministry was not Owen’s first calling. A skilled basketball player in high school, he attended Belmont University in Nashville with hopes of walking on to the team.
Longtime Belmont men’s basketball coach Rick Byrd informed Owen upon his arrival at the school he would not be able to help the team as a player.
However, Byrd offered him the role of team manager and a full-ride scholarship for his service to the team.
After graduating with degrees in business and education, Owen taught Bible classes and coached basketball and golf at Brentwood Academy, a private Christian school in the Nashville suburb of Brentwood.
He was not certified to teach any core subjects, but he was well-versed in the Bible. Brentwood Academy agreed, and the school sponsored his education at Central Baptist Theological Seminary.
While he loved coaching basketball and was good at it, thanks to his experience at Belmont, Owen said he grew into teaching Scripture.
To be fair, he also grew up in it: his grandfather and father were both ministers, and his brother is also a pastor.
“I kind of knew deep down that might be what I’m not only good at, geared toward, but would really love it, too, and I grew to understand that, teaching the Bible at Brentwood Academy,” he said.
The shift from the court to…
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