I was early for once and nobody was there.
Pastor John Norman of First Baptist Church Four Oaks had kindly agreed to meet with me at the church office at 2 pm to talk about the church’s upcoming 125th anniversary homecoming and no matter how many times I knocked, nobody came to the door.
I looked at my watch: 1:55 pm. Preachers never stand people up! Isn’t that in the church by-laws somewhere? In King James English?? I tried to look purposefully nonplussed in the usual ways – doodling around on my phone, striding confidently back to my car and doodling around on my phone – but the minutes continued to tick by and there was no sign of anybody in the building or the parking lot. Finally, at five after, I gave up on looking coolly nonchalant and called the church office. John’s cheerful voice answered after the first ring.
Turns out, if you don’t keep up with certain aspects of the old neighborhood, things have a way of changing. Though I had been to church at First Baptist many times since marrying and moving to Raleigh five years earlier, it had somehow eluded my notice that the church offices had moved into a house on Church street across from the fellowship hall, and what had been the church office in the main building was now a classroom in the church’s bustling preschool every day from 8 am to 12 pm.
Feeling somewhat embarrassed, I walked down the block and crossed Church Street where John stepped out the front door to meet me on the porch of the house. We chatted outside for a bit, enjoying the bright fall sunshine and the cool breeze before I followed him inside. We passed through a cheerful reception area containing the secretary’s desk and a fireplace and stepped into a cozy room filled with sunshine and a door to the outside. A large bookcase filled with books dominated the wall across from John’s desk and two comfortable looking chairs flanked a small table in front of the window. Classical music played softly from a radio in one corner and I would’ve been happy to sit and read in that atmosphere for a couple hours.
We settled into the chairs and, as is easy to do with John, started chatting comfortably about what life was up to for each of us, what had changed, and what changes were likely coming. John had been my pastor for fourteen years and knew just what to ask about in my life, as usual, despite my living 40 minutes away.
I’d been coming to First Baptist Four Oaks with my parents since childhood and, as churches often do after years lived in and just outside of its walls, it feels like the house of a close relative. All the nooks and crannies, hallways and doors are well known and the setting for lots of past memories. For instance, I know that if you get there late, there’s almost always a seat in the balcony, and if you push the swinging door into the sanctuary too fast as you go in it’ll squeak. The stairs from the vestibule into the basement are carpeted, but they squeak too, so it’s tough to pass up or down them unnoticed. The sanctuary is always a little chilly for me so I never fail to bring a sweater, and I can bet on a smile from my dad, who sits in the back row of the choir.
Whether or not you know everyone by name, count on your hand being shaken and people welcoming you with a smile and sometimes a wink. This place is a home. It’s home to a large family who’s always happy to welcome newcomers because they won’t be newcomers long.
Enjoying the genial sunshine in the chairs in the pastor’s study, we talked about how John came to be a member of the First Baptist Four Oaks family. At the time, Michelle had been working at the divinity school at Gardner Webb and John had started a degree program at Duke.
“Michelle and I ended up moving to Cary in 1997. The day that we moved, we rolled up with the moving truck, unloaded boxes, and a couple that we knew called to welcome us to the area and offered to take us out to eat. Before we went out, we hooked up our answering machine and when we came back, we had two messages. One was from some friends just checking on us and making sure the move went okay, and the other was from a gentleman by the name of Russell Lee who was chair of the Search Committee at First Baptist Church in Four Oaks,” John smiled at the memory.
“He said he had gotten my name or resume and was wondering if we would be interested in talking to them about the possibility of coming to the church. So we said, ‘Okay, we’re not going to unload anymore boxes, we’re just going to kind of leave them tucked in the corner,’” he laughed.
“That was in the late summer of 1997. In November, we came and I gave a trial sermon and the church voted on us. The first Sunday in November that year is when they voted on us coming in and I was installed the next Sunday.”
Coincidentally, First Baptist Church of Four Oaks will celebrate its 125th anniversary Homecoming the first Sunday of this November. On the same day, John and Michelle Norman will celebrate 19 years with the church. With two such anniversaries on the same day, I was interested in how they planned to celebrate.
“The history committee has been working on some things to present that day and we’re going to dedicate the new elevator wing. We’ve invited back former members of the choir so we’ll have a reunion choir, and our youth will be singing as well.” His expression grew more earnest as he continued, “What we’re trying to do is blend together this idea of past, present, and future: acknowledging the past, celebrating the present, and living into the future and knowing that God’s not done with us yet,” he smiled. “It’s going to be a good day.”
I was eleven years old when the church celebrated it’s centennial in 1991. As I recall, there was a short play written by congregant Mrs. Dorothy Parker about the church’s history, and the town of Four Oaks’s history as well, since the two are entwined and their centennials fell within two years of each other (Four Oaks turned The Big One-Oh-Oh in 1989). I had a starring role as “townsperson” and wore a long skirt and white blouse of my mother’s, feeling very grown up.
Homecoming that year was a day of great celebration. Jeff Clark was pastor then and there was singing, the play, lots of visitors, and a ton of food at a potluck lunch on the lawn between the church and the parsonage. Kids ran through the grass, dodging the adults, and the picnic tables of food seemed to stretch for miles. It was a beautiful sunny day and even though we kids might not have fully understood what the big deal was, we were happy to celebrate with our church family.
The story of First Baptist Church Four Oaks starts with Mr. and Mrs. Ezekiel Creech, who lived in the countryside and were members of Oliver’s Grove Baptist Church. Mr. Creech wanted to move to town to open a store. Mrs. Laura Creech, as legend has it, agreed to go only if Mr. Creech would build her a church. And he did.
In 1890, the land for the church was purchased on the west side of Main Street, two blocks from the railroad tracks.
“When you look at the original deed, it doesn’t say it was deeded or sold to First Baptist Church Four Oaks because that name didn’t come along until around the 100th anniversary when they incorporated the church and changed the name from Four Oaks Baptist Church to The First Baptist Church of Four Oaks, Inc.,” John told me. “The deed also does not say Four Oaks Baptist Church. It says the land is deeded to the Missionary Baptist Church in Four Oaks, which at that time distinguished us from the Primitive Baptists in the area.”
Noting my raised eyebrows at this new-to-me information, he explained: “Primitive Baptists don’t theologically support missions in the same way that Missionary Baptists do. So the church was originally referred to as the Missionary Baptist Church in Four Oaks.” His expression turned thoughtful. “That idea of missions, even in the early naming of the church, has followed the church all the way through—trying to live that identity as a Missionary Baptist Church.”
Construction on the church building began in 1891. Ezekiel Creech contributed most of the lumber for the church, though he himself was never a member. I learned through resources in the church’s history room that Mr. Creech operated a sawmill in Elevation Township at the time and hauled lumber to town to sell, as well as to build the church. He built his own home next to the church lot on the site where the parsonage now stands.
The original church was a one-story wooden structure under a pointed roof, with a wide doorway in the front flanked by two windows, and four windows down each side.
“The brick sanctuary we have now was built in the late nineteen-tens,” John continued. “The story behind that is that they dug the foundation and basement for the church and about the time they were doing that, the United States entered World War I. All building resources were cut off because everything was going to the war effort. So somehow, they put a covering over the basement and met there until the war was over and they could complete the structure.”
The completion of the church building started in May of 1917 and was finished and ready for services within eight months. I learned in my reading in the history room that “when the Armistice came November 11, 1918, the bell was ready to help proclaim it from the tower of the new church”. This knowledge impressed me and made me proud. What a great story to have as a part of church – and Four Oaks –history.
I also read that, “The basement of the church was used by the public school for a few years before a new school was built at the north end of Main Street in 1923.”
The tradition of education continues today in the church’s preschool, which opened in 2007 and currently serves around sixty kids.
“We felt that it was a ministry we were being called to as a congregation, and there was a need in the community,” John said. “It has, in some sense, become the face of the church to the community because a lot of people that maybe don’t have a relationship with our church, or with a church at all—the preschool becomes the face of First Baptist Church to them. Their kids go there or their grandkids go there.”
He described trips the kids took to the Police Department, the fire station, Town Hall, strawberry picking, the pumpkin farm… I found myself volunteering to tag along some time.
“We’re very pleased with where the preschool is right now and with their leadership,” John said. “They’re doing some really neat things.”
The preschool reinforced my thoughts of the church as a big family, one with lots of kids and adults who had fun keeping them busy. That’s how families and churches both seem to work best. People take interest in each others’ lives; the older and the younger, grandmothers and teenagers, teenagers and toddlers, fathers and sons.
“The idea of family is important to our congregation as a whole. Now, just like a family, we don’t necessarily all think the same way. We’re not always on the same page and we may even have disagreements sometimes,” He paused with a knowing smile and a raise of his eyebrows. “But we’re still a family.”
Our conversation was winding down and I knew I’d soon be heading home—my other home, in Raleigh. But I was reluctant to leave such a cheerful place on such a beautiful day as John continued with a closing thought.
“The church, our past, our history is very important to us,” he seemed to look through the wall of books behind me to the church building itself. “We’re probably not very different than the church was a hundred years ago. Technology has changed, the building has changed—a lot of things have changed. But the family aspect has remained.” He paused in thought for a moment before continuing, “Not just the family of Four Oaks, but as a part of God’s family—being sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters of Christ and of each other—and what exactly that means, how it looks, and how we live that out together. We don’t have anybody that is part of the church now that was here originally, of course, yet still the dream that they had in starting a Missionary Baptist Church still lives on through our members.”