Bestselling Church

Early each Sunday, 800 members of the Akron Baptist Temple faithfully arrive at the twelve-acre garden of blacktop and buildings that is their church. They are not the congregation, but merely the staff of deacons, teachers, janitors, ushers, singers, pianists and parking-lot attendants. Once on the job and in uniform-choir in their Sunday best, car hustlers in white--they are ready to receive the crowds who come to hear their pastor.

Dr. Dallas F. Billington. 59, preach his down-home sermons from the pulpit of his 5,000-seat auditorium. "God is real --see how he has blessed us," he often says. "This li'l ol' Kentucky preacher boy made good, and all the credit goes to God." The conviction that "God is real has carried Dr. Billington from one triumph to another since he came to Akron. A square-built six-footer, he recalls an uncertain beginning back in Kentucky, where he smoked and drank in the pool halls of Paducah. He quit drinking in 1924, when he became a Christian, and quit smoking in 1927. when his son was born. When prayer ("Dear Lord, if you will let my dear baby Chuckie live") saved his son from a serious illness, Billington, then an Akron rubber worker, promised to preach. True to his word, he began "Bible searching'' after work, found a job as an usher-bouncer in a revival temple. By 1932 he was broadcasting sermons over "Radio Station WJW--Watch Jesus Win." Two years later he was ordained.

God in Akron. In a new book, appropriately titled God Is Real, Billington tells his whole onward-and-upward tale.

Beginning with a congregation of 13, Bil lington now has 17,000 parishioners, presides over Sunday crowds that surpass 10,000 in church and Sunday school, supervises an annual budget of $620,000 drawn from weekly collections that average $10,750, supports the work of 160 missionaries, and draws vast plans for expansion. A new, $500,000 addition will soon be made to the $6,000,000 temple's four red brick buildings.

His magic with his congregation is a simple matter of "plain-talking them," he says. He may discuss morals: "You can't tell me that a young fellow can go swimming with girls in those skimpy suits and keep his mind on his Sunday school teaching." Or he may deal with the state of religion: "Nobody but God really knows if true Christianity is on the upswing." Billington believes that "there's too much 'churchianity' and not enough Christianity, too much debate about fine points of theology. People want stories about how God can help in their lives."

Simple Life. Thus even in his huge temple, where a mural depicts the River Jordan flowing into the baptismal font. Dr. Billington maintains a simple approach to God and to the world. He works tirelessly for a salary of $145 a week-tithes more than a full share. When church officers tried to press a Cadillac upon him, he refused it with the explanation: "Sure, you gave it to me," he said, "but how will I ever get such a story across to Akron's tire builders? I'll continue to drive that Olds or Buick."

Just as three heart attacks have scarcely slowed him, success has scarcely spoiled him. His plain and simple sermons attract crowds to the temple from all over northeastern Ohio. "They tell me they just like to come to hear the old man go," says Billington.

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