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Camp Cordova: Longtime Baptist retreat has new owner, new name

By Don Wade

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Camp Cordova has a new owner, a new name and a broader mission.

But the property is staying in the family.

The Mid-South Baptist Association, which 60 years ago bought the property at 849 Rocky Point Road for about $30,000, has sold the Cordova Retreat and Conference Center to association member Faith Baptist Church in Bartlett for about $2 million.

The site covers 75.5 acres, has a 5-acre lake and 59 buildings. The grounds now will be known as The Grove at Red Oak Lake -- A Ministry of Faith Baptist Church.

"They offered some interest-free financing, which brought the net down," said Kevin Womack, director of finance and development for Faith Baptist.

Womack said the purchase of the property was made possible through "a lot of small gifts and a few large ones," adding that offerings toward the purchase of the camp had exceeded $700,000.

The camp had been dormant for two years.

"I believe there are opportunities to use it more than ever," said Neal Pflibsen, the new director of The Grove at Red Oak Lake. "Memphis, in my mind, needs to be a hot spot to bring a mission team to impact the community.

"We'd like to match up these ministries with resources and the need in Memphis. I'd love to wake 'em up, feed 'em breakfast, give 'em a box lunch and send them out to give their labor and love in the Memphis area."

Mike Day, director of missions at the Mid-South Association, said the decision to sell was "a matter of priorities."

Day said the association wanted to focus more energy on starting churches, sustaining churches and providing resources for specific churches' ministries.

"We found ourselves in a dilemma of owning a camp only about 25 percent of our churches used as a resource over the last six years," said Day, noting the association has 159 members. "We basically had to make a decision about where we would spend our money.

"From the perspective of the association, I can only describe (Faith Baptist becoming the owner) as the best-case scenario. The camping ministry will be preserved."

One local church still meets at the property, but will be finding a new location. Pflibsen said the camp's gate is often open to the public and "people fish at the lake every day."

But there is much work to be done, including having to update the necessary licenses to use the Palmer Center dining hall over the Christmas holidays.

"The grounds have been well-kept," Pflibsen said, "but some of the buildings need repair and some need to be gutted or taken down."

Womack said the church will be making annual payments over the next 10 years; long-term, Pflibsen aims to make the camp self-sustaining.

Pflibsen envisions the camp as a great place for local churches to bring youth and other groups for retreats, but also a destination for out-of-town ministry and missions teams.

He intends to be pro-active.

"It's a whole lot more than having a camp and sitting here waiting for the phone to ring," he said.

-- Don Wade: 529-2358

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