KNOWN BY MANY as “the little white church at the corner of Humphrey and Ranck,” the church formerly known as the Yacolt Full Gospel Community Church changed its name to the Historic Yacolt Community Church in early November.
Yacolt’s “little white church on the corner of Humphrey and Ranck” has gone through a few name changes since its founding in 1903, but there has always been a constant.
“The word ‘community’ has always been a part of the name,” says Georgene Neal, the church’s secretary.
The church started out as a Methodist congregation, but then, in 1945 the congregation bought the church and renamed it the Yacolt Community Church. A few years later, in 1961, the congregation joined an Open Bible group and the church had another name change — the Open Bible Community Church.
In 1978, the group changed again. This time, they were the Yacolt Full Gospel Community Church. That name stuck around, but, eventually, the congregation started to question whether the “full gospel” part of the name accurately depicted what the church is today.
“We had decided that we needed to change the name and we didn’t know if full gospel fit with what we did,” Neal says.
The small congregation of 12 wanted to build membership, connect with the community and draw attention to their church’s storied history in Yacolt. The new name needed to reflect all of this. And so, as of Nov. 6, the church is now called the Historic Yacolt Community Church.
The name is solid, but many people still know the Historic Yacolt Community Church as “the little white church on the corner of Humphrey and Ranck,” Neal says.
“That’s what my grandmother always called it,” she says. “And I think that’s how a lot of people know it.”
Neal’s grandmother, Esther Messner, was a major force in the church’s history. She joined in 1927 and stayed with the church through thick and thin until the late 1970s, when she moved out of town to be closer to family.
“My grandmother was instrumental in keeping the church going and her name is on the original papers for incorporation,” Neal says. “In fact, they used to have an ‘Esther Messner Day’ to remember her.”
Following her grandmother’s lead, Neal and her fellow and sister congregants have devoted themselves to keeping the little church going no matter how dire their situation.
“Our philosophy is that the doors always stay open,” Neal says. “Not literally, of course, but we always have a Sunday sermon, even when there are only six of us in the congregation.”
In fact, four of the congregants, including Neal, have been taking turns leading the Sunday sermons since the church’s pastor, Jerry Heldman, died in 2013.
“Each Sunday it’s a little different,” Neal says. “Sometimes an idea just comes into my head. I lead the second sermon of the month and Jerry’s wife, Julia Heldman, does the first Sunday of the month.”
The church congregation is hoping to grow its numbers, and Neal says the Historic Yacolt Community Church is a great place for people who want to belong to a friendly, informal congregation that still does things the old-fashioned way — singing out of hymn books, praying for community members in need and serving cookies at major town functions — in a lovely historic building.
“We used to serve a lunch after church, but now, because there are so few of us, we usually go to the Double L cafe and one of us will pay for everyone’s lunch … so we can support the local business and still have fellowship after our services,” Neal says.
The church will soon have a new sign in front marking its name change and its historic, 1903 founding date.
Interested in checking out this historic piece of Yacolt’s religious community? The Historic Yacolt Community Church, located at the corner of West Humphrey and South Ranck streets in Yacolt, holds Sunday sermons from 11 a.m. to noon each week, as well as Bible study groups each Tuesday at 3 p.m., Caring for the Heart Christian counseling groups each Thursday at 7 p.m., and an open mic night for musicians and other artists on the first Friday of each month, starting at 7 p.m.
