Church History

In 1927 the Lord placed in the hearts of thirteen individuals to start a church in the Opal community. Those thirteen individuals have all gone on to be with the Lord, but the work the Lord put in their hearts continues.

Union Valley Baptist Church was officially organized on August 27, 1927, and met in a two room school house. The first pastor was L.C. Langley, and the church was a Missionary Baptist Church. In November 1934 the church voted to rent 10 acres of cotton ground and work it for the benefit of the church. Later In the 1930's the school consolidated with El Paso and the building was taken over by the church. Pews were added to one room for the sanctuary and the other room was torn down and class rooms were added. At one point during the early years the church did not have a pastor and almost had to close it doors. But two of the members, Roberta Hill and Hettie Fisher, went to the Associational office and pleaded with the director until they got a pastor.

In the 1970's the congregation had outgrown the white frame church and needed a larger church. So a new sanctuary and classrooms were built. The ordinal white frame church was moved off the church grounds, and was remodeled into a private home.

By the late 1990s the congregation was again outgrowing the church building. So a bigger sanctuary was built onto the existing building and the old sanctuary was converted into class rooms.

In the 2000's the church membership exploded. We built a Family Life Center in 2002 to facilitate the large number of activites we have and to give us extra Sunday School rooms. This building included a gym, industrial kitchen and class rooms. Our church has been able to invite the community to many different events in the large center. As a testimony to the Lord's blessings on our church we paid the Family Life Center loan off February 2005. In 2006 we built a Youth Building behind the main church building. Then we added an addition to the Family Life Center in 2007 which added 10 classrooms and a new kitchen.

During its history, the Union Valley Baptist Church of Beebe, which began in a small two room school house, has seen six different church building programs, 31 pastors, and presently has a congregation of around 800. The present pastor, Thomas Miller, has been here since November 1, 1986.