How did we get here?
Our History
Early Years
Our Founding
Though Center Chapel United Methodist Church was originally established in 1893, its history dates back to 1730 when John and Charles Wesley, two students at Oxford University in England, gathered a small group of students to spread what became known as the Methodist movement. Moving across Great Britain and Ireland and preaching outdoors, John Wesley helped form and organize small Christian groups (societies) that developed intensive and personal accountability, discipleship, and religious instruction. He appointed itinerant, unordained evangelists—both women and men—to care for these groups of people. Wesley’s ideas spread to the United States and to the frontier, and when Iowa became a state in 1846, Methodist churches were already well represented in the Midwest.
We Gather together…
Original Building
The congregation constructed the original building in the same year as the church’s founding, in 1893. Sited in rural Warren County, it served mainly as neighborhood church for the farm families of the immediate area. By 1908, there were 60 area children and adults attending Sunday school, and there were 49 church members. In September of 1941, lightning struck the building and started a fire that destroyed the church. Undeterred, the congregation rallied and a new building was dedicated on June 7, 1942. Three services were held that day, and at the evening service Iowa Bishop Ralph McGee dedicated the new church in front of a standing-room only crowd, raising enough money to complete payment of the new church.
Good Old Days
Post War
Throught the 1950s and 1960s, the small congregation continued to grow, and by 1966 worship service and Sunday School attendance forced the congregation to explore expansion plans. With help from the Iowa Methodist Conference, Center Chapel acquired the building materials of the unused Pleasant Hill Church, and in October of 1967 the Center Chapel lay a new cornerstone and celebrated the addition of a narthex, belfrey, and five new Sunday School classrooms.
To Ask the Lord’s Blessing
Today & into the future
On October 16, 2005, Center Chapel held its first service led by Rev. Ted Lyddon Hatten, in a newly constructed church on land south of the original building. The pulpits, baptismal font and stained glass cross were all designed by Rev. Hatten, and stained glass from the 1942 church were used in the cross. The church hired a construction firm to build the structure, but much of the inside finishing was completed by volunteers from the church, the community, and the NOMADS, a group of volunteers from around the country who provide labor and tools for church projects. Stained glass windows behind the pulpit were placed in 2011, the United Methodist Flame & Cross was added to the exterior in 2013, and in 2015, the church’s bell (which began its service in 1890 as the bell of the Indianola Fire Department) was erected inside a new bell tower in front of the building. With the help of many generous contributions, a different type of fire was started when Center Chapel held a mortgage burning and dedication ceremony on November 8, 2015.
Our church today continues to be a supportive extended family. In the spring of 2006, we were recognized by the Igniting Ministry, Methodist Communications, as a United Methodist Welcoming Congregation.
We are a church of open minds, open hearts, and open doors.