There's a Fire in the Church!

Last Sunday, the church I attend, Littlejohn United Methodist, caught on fire. The United Methodist symbol has a flame surrounding a cross, so fire is part of our DNA. It was also Pentecost Sunday, the day when God sent flames to quicken his people by bringing the Holy Spirit upon those believers who gathered together in prayer after Jesus left them to ascend into heaven. It is a special day of days in the liturgical calendar when we're supposed to catch afire, renewing ourselves in Christ's teachings.

But not really this way. 

Fast forward some two thousand years after that first Pentecost Sunday, and Littlejohn witnessed a fire of its own. Here's what happened. My husband and I were the "greeters" at the front door for the entire month of May, which means we arrived earlier than the nine o'clock time we usually start the service. Except this time, the pianist's husband greeted us, running down the front steps, with his own greeting. "Turn around, the church is on fire!" 

He and his wife had arrived early to set things in motion as usual. When they opened the front doors, thick black smoke gushed out. Instead of an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, they were met with the stench and misery of the reality that our church was indeed on fire, and not in the Biblical sense. He had already called the fire departments and the pastor. We stood together, watching white smoke billow from behind the main sanctuary. 

Within minutes...no, make that within seconds...the first responders arrived, and then the fire trucks from our own Gamewell Fire Department, followed by nearby Collettsville Fire Department, the ladder truck from the city of Lenoir's fire department, emergency responders from all three entities, plus the county's disaster official. Our parking lots were overflowing by the time members of the congregation arrived. But we made room, and we stood in awe and prayer as we turned our church over to God...and to the men springing into action before their trucks came to a stop.

In the end, it turned out to be an electrical shortage in the wiring of the old section beneath the choir room. It was smouldering, ready to burst, and would have, had it not been on an early Sunday morning, just before church service was to begin, when we would be there at exactly the right time.

We can muse on the "What if's" all day, but I'm not going there. It could have been worse. Much worse. I firmly believe our church was saved by the hand of God and by the dedicated emergency personnel who responded to our call.

Last August, we at Littlejohn celebrated two hundred fifty years of being called by God. This Pentecost we got the call again. Amazing! Our church is on fire!!! 

We held hands in a circle, and the minister led us in a corporate prayer, echoing what we in our hearts were pleading, for the protection of those who rushed into danger and for the restoration of the meeting place of our congregation. 

Many in our group, and many of the emergency personnel who talked with us after all was well, asked about the history of the building. When I got home, I started going through the first book I ever wrote. It was back in 1978 and I had forgotten an awful lot.

I'm sharing with you below the email information I sent people about the buildings that housed the congregation we call Littlejohn. If you have anything to add, please do. We want as much information as possible. Most of all, we want this fire that was lit last Sunday to be the spark that starts a new greatness.

Catch of the day,

Gretchen

The History of a Church Building

Our first structure was built in 1775 as a meeting house and was a log house with a “weight pole” roof, poles propped to hold up the roof. Dirt floor. It stood in what is now considered the “old” part of the graveyard. At that time the road between Lenoir and Morganton went directly beside the churchyard and the second structure was on the opposite side of the road, about fifty yards from the first. The third log structure was built in 1825 back across this road in the present location of the current building. The building itself was not destroyed during the Civil War, although the deed to the land where it is located was destroyed when the Burke County Courthouse was burned. A new deed that included three and three-fourths acres of land was created in 1868.

This 1825 structure was torn down to build a new frame church in 1868. The logs from the 1825 building were moved to the Andrew Hull Courtney home and used in the 2006 construction of Courtney Chapel at Lelia Tuttle Memorial Park.

 

Harriett Green drew this picture
of what we think the 1868 church looked like. 

This fourth building was dedicated in August of 1869. This building had two front doors one for the men to enter and one for the women to enter. The furnishing were simple with wooden pews. Men sat on one side, and women sat on the other.

A church conference was held March 20, 1914 to discuss opening a new congregation growing from Littlejohn in the community of Gamewell. Two separate building projects were accomplished, both framed with lumber, one at Gamewell and one at Littlejohn. Our 1914 structure was built on the same foundation as the one already in existence. The sills and sleepers as well as the beams that were hewed in 1868 were retained and are still a part of the current structure. The flooring and framing of the 1868 church were kept, but the exterior was torn off. Two windows replaced the two doors and a single front door was added along with a steeple. Two wings were added to each side of the main buildings with folding doors separating the sections. Two classrooms were added immediately behind the pulpit. (Where the couch is located today.) Heat for the church was supplied by two pot-bellied stoves, one on each side of the sanctuary. This new building was dedicated in 1919.

In the late 1940s the two classrooms were updated with sheetrock. A basement was dug by the men of the church using a team of horses to drag away pans of dirt. The wood stoves were replaced with a furnace that was in this basement.

Two back classrooms (choir room and flower room today) were built in the early 1950s. Johnny Waddell added the nursery and bathrooms shortly thereafter. In 1961 the Methodist Men started repair work on the basement by adding walls and a hallway, creating classrooms and a small kitchen and fellowship hall.

The current education building and the Clay Fellowship Hall were built in 1977.