BLAST FROM THE PAST

The church office phone rang just before 5 p.m. last night (Monday).  It’s unusual for me to be in the office at that time, but I’d been preparing for Monday night’s Board Meeting.  The name and number on the Caller I.D. were not familiar to me, so I let the machine answer the call.  On the line was a woman wanting some old church records- I quickly (a little embarrassed) picked up the receiver and spoke to her.  It seems she’d attended our church for quite a number of years in the distant past.  Her brother in New Hampshire is converting to Roman Catholicism and needs proof of his 1948 baptism at our church.  

Our little church was founded in 1922- well, they began “unofficially” meeting in late 1921 and were officially incorporated in early 1922.  There is an old hard bound, handwritten church record book with records and information from the early 1920s through the late 1930s.  We have pretty good information from 1972 to the present and very good information from 1987 to the present.  The caller was very pleasant, but disappointed.  

“I was the Church Secretary for a number of those missing years,” she said,
 “I kept the records.  Where are they?  What happened to them?”

I had to tell her I have no idea.  I have been pastor since 1987, but I can’t take responsibility for before that time.  We’ve been in our present church building (former United Auto Workers Union Hall on South Street, Framingham) since 1994, but previously the church owned a small wooden church building at Hartford & C Sts. for decades, and I live in the 40 Harrison Street parsonage, purchased in 1946.

“You know the cross in that old church building?” she inquired.

I did.  It was kind of cool.  It was hollow inside and contained fluorescent bulbs which made it kind of pretty when lit.

“My Uncle MADE that.” she announced, and continued, “When we were between houses, we lived with our three little children in that house at 40 Harrison Street.”

It was like talking to some long lost relative from the Canadian Maritimes (where most of my long lost relatives are) that you never knew existed.

Currently, the “oldest” church members date back to 1982.  There was a couple who’d joined the church in 1967 that had held the record for longest church members for a significant period of time, but they switched to the Assembly of God in Marlboro about ten years ago and he’s since passed away.  It is kind of interesting to think about WHEN a church really begins or ends.  It’s kind of like that philosophical matter of, “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is present to hear it, did it make a sound?”

No one at our church remembers anything at the church prior to 1982, yet there was a hearty and gutsy group of Pentecostals who incorporated the church almost eighty-five years ago.  Until 1961 the church was called “Pentecostal Church of Framingham” and in fact, that’s the name on the house deed.  The Assemblies of God is the largest Pentecostal group in the world.  Sometime in its early history, the church became an Assemblies of God church, and took the name “First Assembly of God” much later, in 1961, I suspect partly because the name “Pentecostal” has negative connotation to a lot of people.  Also, the name “First Assembly of God” was probably the most popular church name for “A/G” churches in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s.  That’s not true today.  Many “newer” Assemblies of God churches have names like, “New Life Christian Center”.

Well, she was pleasant, and kind of disappointed, and a blast from the past that kind of got me in a reflective mood!

“And he changeth the times and the seasons...” (from Daniel 2:21)