SCHEDULE OF OPEN HOUSE SUNDAY
9:15 a.m.: Ministry tables will be set up for members and guests
10 a.m.: Combined Sunday School in auditorium
10:30 a.m.: Sunday School ends and ministry tables are available for visitors
11 a.m.: Main service begins
Noon: Ministry tables are available for visitors
12:15 p.m.: Service ends
12:30 p.m.: Lunch at the shelter
1:30 p.m.: Mission quartet performance
HISTORY OF GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH
Feb. 3, 1945: First service held in a leased store building on Yankee Road under the direction of Audley Turner and E. Fred Jones.
June 9, 1945: At the close of the revival meeting, the mission was organized into Grace Baptist Church with 23 charter members.
April 29, 1947: The Rev. Howard Sears accepted the call to pastor the church.
1948: First building program began on Wilbraham Road and took five additional building programs to complete.
Dec. 7, 1953: Church celebrated a mortgage burning.
1966: 34 acres of land were purchased on Interstate 75 in anticipation of a sixth building program.
July 1967: First meeting at the I-75 property under a tent.
Oct 10, 1971: Groundbreaking
1972: Middletown Christian Schools established
July 8, 1973: A large procession left the former church building to the new building on I-75 and the first service was held.
July 15, 1973: Open house
June 14: 70-year celebration and open house
During the last 70 years, services at Grace Baptist Church have been held in three buildings, on three sites, but the church’s foundation has remained solid: the Bible.
On Sunday, Grace Baptist Church, 3023 N. Union Road, will celebrate its 70th anniversary with an open house, and Pastor Max Fernandez said the church has “a rich history.”
Then he turned in his office chair and added with a smile: “I was not alive then.”
But he and the church are alive and well now, he said.
“I think how good the Lord has been to the people here at Grace,” said Fernandez, who joined the Grace staff in 2000 as youth pastor and was named pastor in 2013. “The fact that it’s in such a prominent place makes for a great future potential. I thank the Lord that we are in the middle of it. We have a lot of opportunity.”
When asked to name his proudest moment at Grace, Fernandez hesitated at first because there are “a host of different things.” Then he talked about some of the students who have attended the church its school, Middletown Christian School, which is located on the same grounds.
“Just seeing the young people experience the Lord,” he said. “Some of them came from horrible home situations and we offered stability and support. Now some of those students have their own families. Looking back it’s a great honor.”
Ground was broken on the Interstate 75 site on Oct 10, 1971. Since that time, the church also opened a k-12 school on the same property. Fernandez said the 31 members of the Class of 2015 received more than $1 million in scholarships. The goal of the school, he said, is to the provide “a solid education” and help them experience a Christian world.
He said the church financially supports missionaries who are serving around the world planting churches and orphanages.
Fernandez said he has chartered out the next 25 years at Grace, and it doesn’t look much different than the first 70.
“We want to hold to the scriptures,” he said. “We want to reach out, train and teach people to know the Lord.”
He was asked how Grace has survived for 70 years. He said that answer can’t be found within the walls of the church.
“To give credit to anyone or anything other than the Lord with be giving the honor in the wrong place,” he said. “The community needs to know God’s work and the longevity that he has allowed. It’s good for them to know God’s work.”
Right now, maybe more than ever, he said the church’s role in the community needs to be understood.
“We want to lovingly present the gospel,” he said. “We want to see the gospel take root in their lives and change the systematic things in our community whether that’s drugs, work ethic, entitlement. The answer has to start with the gospel. If the symptoms are treated but the gospel is never presented then we will run into the same symptoms again.”
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