Pisgah ARP Church Celebrates 225 Years of Ministry! By Rev. Rick Lewis


he year was 1796, and George Washington was in his second term  congregation that later came to be known as Pisgah ARP Church  In that day, there were very few houses of worship and even fewer ordained ministers to hold regular services. When the opportunity arose, people would come from miles around to join hearts and voices in worship. Presbyterians in what is now Lincoln County (NC), Gaston County (NC), Cleveland County     there were only four places in the area where regular worship was held: Long Creek, Beersheba, Goshen, and Bethel. Our Associate, Reformed, and Associate Reformed ancestors would often join with other Presbyterians at one of these gatherings for worship until they were able to establish a church of their own.  Creek, Beersheba, and Goshen. 


T


   at that site today.] Almost immediately, the congregation felt it was mutual-   Thus, this mother church divided to form what are now Bethany and Pisgah ARP Churches. With the birth of these twin churches, the folks in the Gaston/Cleveland County area formed a congregation now known as Pisgah, moved to a property  congregation remained at this location from 1796 to 1855. This was also a log - tenance of that old cemetery continues. Of particular note regarding the old cemetery is that soldiers who fought in the Revolutionary War now rest there. 


- tinue that (Old Pisgah) as a place of worship among which was inaccessibleness   -


  what would become the city of Gastonia.  was a white clapboard building that sat just north of the present cemetery.


It


was during these years that Rev. Ebenezer Erskine Boyce, DD shepherded this  the road into a new brick building and again to the present building in 1951. In 1961 a new manse was built just across the grove from the church. The con-  completion of the R. B. Elliott, Jr. Center. Then the Family Life Outreach Center 


26 The Associate Reformed Presbyterian


News In Brief


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