Lexington Memories

 In 1969 I was graduated from Duke University Divinity School and, after spending a year as Associate Minister at First United Methodist Church in High Point, was given my own first church. It was called, in Methodist terminology, a “two point charge,” meaning that I actually had two churches.

This was in Lexington, North Carolina, and the churches were Wesley Heights and St. Timothy’s United Methodist Churches.  Both of these churches were founded on 1959 in a period of active church expansion and when I got them they were very much adolescents.  When I arrived both were in the middle of their second stage building programs.

We lived on the west side of town in the parsonage that was beside Wesley Heights.  It was the “big” church that had worship at 11:00 on Sundays.  St. Timothy’s was the “little” church across town and they had worship at 9:30 on Sundays.  Each Sunday I would drive across town for the 9:30 service and then back across for 11:00.  

I was there for three years before being appointed as Director of the Cherokee County Parish in far west North Carolina.  It was a good time and our first son, Doug, was born there.

As Trish and I started out on this trip to Texas, our first-day route took us right by Lexington.  I knew that St. Timothy’s had to be right off of I-85 and so we drove over the hill to have a look.  

On our first pass we missed seeing the church as the trees had grown so much in the last fifty years it was partially obscured.  We turned around and, there it was!  We drove up and discovered that it looked just like it did all that time ago but the sign now said it was a Free Will Baptist Church.  Well, things change, don’t they?  I had heard that St. Timothy’s closed, but had no idea what had happened since.  Here before our eyes we saw the answer.