Cecil Brown (on the left) presenting Pastor Lilly with a plaque.

50th Anniversary Service pictures.

On Sunday April 22, 2007 we celebrated our Pastor's 50th Anniversary of preaching. He started preaching in April of 1957 at the tender age of 14. We had a wonderful service and a great time of food and fellowship afterwards. Brother Cecil Brown, one of our Deacons here at Friendship, presented our Pastor with a beautiful plaque. Our Pastor's daughter, Kim Ball her husband Richard along with their son Aaron and daughter Amanda sang for us as well has Barb Range, Peggy Ledford, and Mary Shelton from our church. Bro. Tim Clouse Pastor of the Troy Free Will Baptist Church spoke to us for a few minutes about his memories of when Rev. Lilly was his Pastor at the Chapel Free Will Baptist Church in Madison Heights. To hear what Bro. Clouse had to say Click here. Bro. Rudy Shankle from the First Free Will Baptist church of Ypsilanti preached for us. ( To hear his message go to Guest Speakers page. Below is an article from the Michigan Free Will Baptist Menorah written By Rev. Charles Cooper about our Pastor and his 50th Anniversary Celebration.

"Who would have thought that a shoeshine boy from the East side of Detroit in the mid fifties would be recognized fifty years later for anything? The boy I am thinking of lived with his mother, who was in poor health and unable to work. The money he made shining shoes was much of the support for he and his mother, for you see his father had gone away and had not been heard from for some time.

At the age of 14 he visited the East Side Free Will Baptist Church on Glover Street where Rev. Calvert Morgan was Pastor. In one of the services, the young boy went forward and received Jesus Christ has his Savior ( I happened to be leading the invitation song). The next day the young man rode his bicycle throughout the neighborhood inviting people to church. Just a short time later he answered the call to preach. His first sermon was to the Wednesday night crowd and it lasted no more then five minutes. Is it possible that a five minute preacher would "stay the course" for over fifty years? Would he become discouraged and quit? not this young man! He was built out of tougher material then that. Maybe some of his toughness came from the hills of West Virginia where he was born, or maybe from living on the streets of Detroit, or it could be from standing his own from his older brothers in sibling rivalry. All of these things no doubt helped in shaping this young man. However, I'm convinced that he possessed this resiliency because he was totally surrendered to serving Christ who endured him with the power of the Holy Spirit.

When his father returned, he move the family back to West Virginia where they lived until the boy's mother died. He and his Dad moved back to Detroit where the young preacher finished High School and Trade School. While in West Virginia a preacher friend, Rev Carson Whitaker in Tennessee, invited him to come preach. While there, he preached in several churches, giving him some good exposure to other ministers. He also preached on the radio for the first time.

After coming back to Detroit, he assisted me where I was pastor of the West Side Free Will Baptist (a church that would later become his first church to pastor). As one might expect when he began dating, he only dated Christian girls, and God provided him with a Godly Christian young lady who became his wife. They decided to go west and lived in California, where he worked and assisted in a church. Their only daughter was born there, but there two sons were born after they returned to Michigan.

A bi-vocational pastor among Free Will Baptists in Michigan was normal at that time, and this is how he began pasturing the West Side Free Will Baptist Church while working in a machine shop. The church he was pasturing moved out of Detroit to Auburn Hills and later moved to Ferndale where he remained until the church merged with The Free Will Baptist Chapel. He remained there until he was called to his current pastorate in Flint, Michigan.

To complete this article and write about the interesting events we know about Rev. Curtis Lilly and his accomplishments would require a book. He and his Wife Shirley are the proud parents of one daughter, Kim (Richard) Ball and two sons, Sam (Julie) and Randy (Angie), nine grandchildren and one grandson in law. We congratulate Curt for having now preached the gospel for fifty years of "staying the course" in the ministry. He has been faithful to his Lord, his family, and his denomination. May God continue to bless."

By Rev. Charles C. Cooper