Our Pastor

The Reverend Dr. Daryl Ward serves as Senior Pastor of the Omega Baptist Church. The membership of Omega Baptist Church has grown from 100 to more than 4,000 since he became the pastor in May 1988. Its budget has grown from $30,000 to almost $2,000,000. The congregation has 46 active ministries including an after school program, prison ministry, a full service bookstore and a community development corporation. The Omega School of Excellence, Community/Charter School for grades 5 through 8 will open in August of 2000. The “Omega Movement” television ministry reaches more than 500,000 potential households several times per week.

Reverend Ward served on the administration/faculty of United Theological Seminary in Dayton from 1986 to 1996. During his tenure at United Reverend Ward held the titles of Director of Admissions, Executive Vice-President and President/Chief Operating Officer and Dean of African-American Ministries. He was responsible for the creation of an African-American Ministries Program where the African American presence rose from 1 to more than 35% of the student body. At its height the program was considered to be one of the largest and most successful of its kind. Reverend Ward now serves as President Emeritus and Distinguished Teaching Fellow at the seminary

From 1996 to 1998 Reverend Ward served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Urban Outreach Foundation. This non-profit organization sponsored national and regional educational events for hundreds of pastors, christian educators and lay leaders of urban congregations from throughout the country.

In February of 1999 Pastor Ward led the Omega congregation in a series of visioning sessions to brainstorm about its direction for the new millennium. These sessions led to Omega’s successful partnership with the Dayton Metropolitan Housing Authority (DMHA), the City of Dayton, Montgomery County, the Dayton business community, and local public and private charities for a $44 million HOPE VI grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

This HOPE VI grant will revitalize a 12-block area in one of the city’s most crime-ridden neighborhoods. Improvements will include 150 new, mixed-income, single-family homes, rehabilitation of current housing and reconfigured streets and infrastructure. Omega will anchor this new community by building a new Worship Center and a Family Life Center in the heart of the neighborhood. The Omega Community Development Corporation (CDC) will operate the Family Life Center and provide other social services to the community in partnership with HUD and DMHA. Reverend Ward received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of Wooster in 1979. He earned his Juris Doctorate from Georgetown University Law Center and was inducted into the Ohio State Bar Association in 1985. He obtained his Master of Divinity from the Colgate Rochester Divinity School and was ordained to the ministry at Holy Trinity Missionary Baptist Church, Rochester, New York in 1986. Reverend Ward did further graduate study at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education, Institute of Educational Management in 1994.

As a community leader, Pastor Ward currently serves on several boards including the United Way of the Greater Dayton Area, KeyBank Board of Directors, Victoria Theater, Arts Center Foundation, Payne Theological Seminary, University of Dayton Board of Directors and Executive Committee, and Parents Advancing Choice in Education [PACE]. He has served on a number of other boards including Dayton Museum of Natural History [Boonshoft], NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People], Racial Fairness Implementation Task Force – Supreme Court of Ohio, NCCJ [National Conference for Community and Justice], Miami Valley Schools, Catholic Social Services of the Miami Valley, Good Samaritan Hospital, Congressional Advisory Council for Congressman Tony Hall, Culture Works, United Way Public Policy Committee, Hospice of Dayton, Dayton Free Clinic, Suicide Prevention Center, College of Wooster Alumni Board, Dayton Council on World Affairs and City of Dayton’s Citizens Drug Commission (Chair). Pastor Ward is the host of “Black Impact,” a weekly call-in radio talk show with national guests such as motivational speaker Les Brown and poet Maya Angelou on WROU-FM/92.1 radio. He is also the co-host of “WHIO Reports”, a weekly television talk show on WHIO TV/Channel 7. Pastor Ward’s awards include: Honorary Chief of the Ekumpfi Asokwa Village in Ghana, West Africa, United Theological Seminary’s Daryl Ward Scholarship (named in his honor), Dayton National Conference for Community and Justice Humanitarian Award, Morehouse College Martin Luther King Jr. Board of Preachers, Dayton Top Ten African-American Men and Doctor of Divinity Degree from Simmons Bible College in Louisville, Kentucky.

Reverend Daryl Ward is sought nationally as a speaker for colleges, conferences and churches. He and his wife, Reverend Vanessa Oliver Ward, have one son, Joshua, and two daughters, Rachel and Bethany.