Oldest church on the stump

The oldest Baptist Church west of the Mississippi River is celebrating its 207th anniversary today. The church holding that distinction is Calvary Baptist Church in Bayou Chicot.
“I have a professor from Lake Charles coming to do a service, and there will be a dinner on the ground afterwards,” said Pastor Wayne Holston. “We’ll have the kids play outside and do horseshoes.”
Holston, who has been at Calvary Baptist for 10 years said, “The man who started the church was Joseph Willis. He came from the Carolinas by horseback and came to this little spot in Bayou Chicot. He started having Bible studies in peoples’ homes and finally got a church started. He had to travel back to Mississippi a couple of times to get ordained because the Catholics in Opelousas wouldn’t ordain him, but he stayed on that horse.”
Randy Willis wrote the following of Joseph Willis in The story of the first Louisiana Baptist”
“Joseph Willis preached the first Gospel sermon by an evangelical west of the Mississippi River.”
“He crossed the mighty waters astride a mule and rode into the Louisiana Territory before Oct. 1, 1800, the date Napoleon secured the vast expanse of land from Spain.”
“He was born a Cherokee slave (in North Carolina) to his own father, and the obstacles intensified when his family took him to court to deprive him of his inheritance in a battle that rose to involve the state governor. Ultimately, the state legislature resolved the matter in Joseph’s favor, but not to the full restitution he should have received.”
“Nevertheless, he fought in the Revolutionary War under the most colorful of all the American generals, Francis Marion, ‘The Swamp Fox.’”
“As the first Louisiana Baptist, he preached a Gospel message that put him in constant moral danger due prohibitions against all religions except Catholicism.”