For nearly as long as anyone can remember the ever-sturdy bell at St. John’s United Church of Christ, located at 1213 Washington St. on the eastern fringes of Genoa, has called faithful parishioners from the village, nearby Elmore and points beyond to worship.

On Sunday, Sept. 18, the beacon of hope will beckon both longtime church members and new parishioners alike to the church to celebrate the church’s 50th anniversary.

The bell tower, the church’s cavernous sanctuary and its more intimate chapel all were originally dedicated between Sept. 17 and Oct. 1 in 1961.

“The important thing is, we want to make certain we’ve invited the public to the celebration, and that they feel welcome to come to the church,” said Mary Ann Wilkins, a lifelong St. John’s UCC member and spokesperson for the anniversary committee. Through the years, Wilkins has tirelessly served the church in various capacities, including stints on the Call-to-Care committee, the evangelism committee, the pastor-search committee and the church consistory, the latter of which is a type of church governing council.

“We’ll have one worship service that day at 10:30 am, for which our own Harold Steindam will come back to be the speaker,” Wilkins said. Steindam, a Genoa native who now lives in Columbus, is one of several church members to go on to pursue a life in the ministry.

“And then afterwards, we’ll invite everyone down to the Fellowship Hall for a covered-dish meal, where there will be the sharing of some of our favorite recipes,” Wilkins said. “Our praise band is scheduled to perform a little later, along with our traditional choir, and hopefully even the bell choir. There will be a video presentation of people sharing their personal St. John’s reflections.

“But again, we really, really want the people of the various communities to come to the celebration so we can all share our favorite St. John’s memories together, promote where our church is going and look back on where it’s been over the years,” she said.

Taking a personal look back at her history with the church, Wilkins says she recalls attending Sunday School in the old damp basement at St. John’s first home, located on the corner of Superior and Sixth streets. She recalls negotiating the building’s steep, precarious staircases and  enjoying both church “Talent  Night” and the wonders of services presided over entirely in German, which the old church usually did once a month.

There was excitement over the new building located about six blocks and a few hundred yards over off Washington, Twelfth and Thirteenth streets – its current location. The impressive structure was designed by local architect Robert Powers, contracted out to the (Harry) Johnson Lumber Company of Williston, and was forged out of handsome earthen-colored stone for a price tag of $220,000, including furnishings and landscaping.

Her recollections are as colorful as the church’s striking stained glassed windows, which were the vision of the new building’s pastor, Rev. Paul E. Rohrbaugh, with the help of a designer, and tell, among other things, the stories of the iconic “I Ams” of Jesus, the 12 disciples and the UCC’s Statement of Faith.

For instance, Wilkins recalls the early days of the curiously named "9:09 Club," whose membership included a good number of the church’s most-active male members. The men would make calls around the various neighborhoods for donations to help fund the new church building and then report back to the church at precisely 9:09 to report on their progress, with the most-successful receiving a coveted "red tie" for quotas reached.

She beams at the memories of caravans of headlights as they snaked down  highways into the night, on Christian missions to such locales as the state of Missouri and to an Indian reservation somewhere in the wild Dakotas; and in recent years to the devastated area of Back Bay, Miss., in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The missions were pioneered by Rev. Paul Deppen, were carried on by successor Rev. Robert Waidmann and others to this day.

Wilkins dabs at a tear recalling countless hours of tending to the church’s locally-famous roses with her late husband Henry, who for years served as groundskeeper and was a gifted soloist and member of the St. John’s UCC choir for over 50 years until he passed away in 2002.

Other highlights of the church’s history include the St. John’s UCC basketball team back in the ‘60s; the annual church ham and chicken dinner, which has been put on every November and has become as much of a local rite of passage in the fall as Genoa Comet football games; and visiting Bench’s Greenhouse for late corn and pumpkins; as well as the fellowship of playing dartball for the late beloved Opfers; the warmth of “children’s moments” with Rev. Waidmann on the sanctuary steps, and the peace that settled in over the congregation like new-fallen snow every Christmas Eve when the lights were dimmed and “Silent Night” filled the air.

“It’s been a good life, a long, full life here through St. John’s UCC, and we’ve grown to know a lot of good friends and families, as well as good couples we’ve even traveled with,” Wilkins said. The church has offered us a good social life, and an even better spiritual life.”

"It’s not like it was 50 years ago,” she said, adding that numbers are down from the church’s heyday, with an approximate membership of about 500 today.

"Back then, the Sunday school rooms were full, and there was a real buzz, a real vigor around the church, because everyone was involved, but I think that’s not just true of St. John’s UCC, but also of traditional churches worldwide,” she said. “We still have a lot of good people here, and I still think they really enjoy our time together. I think they’re excited about the future of the church, and their future together."

For more information on the St. John’s UCC 50th Anniversary celebration, call 419-855-3906, or 419-855-4220.

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