75 Years of Spreading the Gospel
Grace Phillips
The Ashland Beacon
In a time when church attendance is declining and many are closing their doors, one church in Ashland has stood the test of time. Wildwood Baptist Church will be celebrating 75 years of sharing the light and love of Jesus — and it all began as a vision of the congregation of Pollard Baptist Church.
The church owned some property on Charles Street in South Ashland and believed there needed to be a church established there. Records of important events has been passed down through the years of the church’s history, including the following poignant statement written by the Pollard church when Wildwood was started. “God spoke to his servants, go spread forth the big tent on your lots at Charles Street. God’s servants at Pollard Baptist obeyed. They spread forth the BIG TENT and sent for a pastor to come and God blessed them.”
On Aug. 8, 1948, forty-four people who felt led by God to leave Pollard and begin the new work on Charles Street met for the first time under the “big tent.”
Jane Parsley Layman was at that first service although it would be several years before she would remember the church. Her parents were charter members of Wildwood. She was born on July 6, 1948 …. just 4 weeks before her mother took her to the first service of the new Wildwood
Baptist Church. Jane is still a faithful member at the church these 75 years later she also has an older brother, Larry Parsley, that is still a member of the church.
Jane said, “They kept a lot of records back then. They would write down things about every service … how many attended, who preached … so many facts.” She continued, “One thing I found amusing was a note from their first business meeting … they noted they had $128 in the account. That seems like a very small amount of money to us but we do need to remember this was 1948 and at that time, that was probably a lot of money.”
The first stage of the church was to build a basement that they could move into. After it’s construction was completed, the first service in the basement was on Feb. 10, 1949. Bear in mind, from that first service in August until February the congregation had still been meeting in the tent. A lady in the congregation at that time wrote a note, “Good news …. This is the day the Lord has made, let us be glad and rejoice in it. Today is the day we said goodbye to the big tent and we did rejoice in it. But we, who spent all those hot summer days and cold ones will hold only the fondest memories of a time when we were doing God’s will and He in turn was blessing his church in a mighty way.”
In the years to come the church was completed and served the congregation for many years. Under the leadership of Pastor Quentin Lockwood, the church membership swelled to approximately 350 members in the mid 1950s. The original sanctuary was eventually replaced with a new one 13 years ago but the same spirit and desire to share the gospel with their community has not changed in 75 years.
Pastor Tom Leach and the congregation has planned a weeklong celebration Aug. 6 — 13th and invites everyone to join them. The week kicks off on Aug. 6 with Sunday service in the sanctuary and a community cookout complete with hot dogs, hamburgers and all the fixings.
Going back to their roots, the big tent will be erected again and revival services will take place Sunday — Wednesday night with Michael Baer preaching. Reverend Baer is a former youth pastor at the church, now pastoring in Georgia. There are also special singers scheduled each night. Thursday night will move back inside the church for a movie night showing The Jesus Revolution. A Gospel Song Fest is planned for Friday night featuring Chosen 4:13, Nancy Banfield and Sam Sampson. The “Homecoming” celebration will conclude on Sunday, August 13th with former Pastor Jim Nichols preaching and longtime former Pastor Wayne Kuhner speaking with dinner to follow the service.
Wildwood Baptist Church is located at 3414 Charles Street, Ashland, KY.
