Pastor Johnson Cook became a mentor and champion of African American women in the ministry. Sheila Denise Grimes trained under the tutelage of the Rev. Dr. Johnson Cook, and was licensed to preach the Gospel on March 6, 1988, at the Mariners’ Temple Baptist Church. She is the first woman licensed to the Gospel Ministry of this historical American Baptist church. While serving as an Adjunct Professor at the New York Theological Seminary, Pastor Johnson Cook met Henrietta Carter, a student at the seminary, and invited her to come to Mariners’ Temple as an intern through the Black Women in Ministry Project, which was sponsored by the New York City Mission Society. On March 11, 1990, Pastor Johnson Cook ordained Reverend Henrietta Carter into the Christian ministry.
In 1996, Pastor Cook resigned to plant a ministry in the Bronx. The Mariners’ Temple Joint Board elected Assistant Pastor Henrietta Carter to serve as Interim Pastor. After a careful and extensive search within the Baptist community, the Nominating Committee designated Interim Pastor Carter to be the twenty-seventh Pastor of Mariners’ Temple Baptist Church. Pastor Henrietta Carter was installed on November 1998.
Pastor Carter has been instrumental in revitalizing Mariners’. Under Pastor Carter, Mariners’ has endeavored to become a multicultural small group-driven ministry building community through evangelizing, equipping and empowering believers for service in the Church and in the community. Mariners’ Strategy is:
To grow:
Warmer through Fellowship
Deeper through Discipleship
Stronger through Worship
Broader through Ministry
Larger through Evangelism