Skip to main content

Two Churches with a Long History Make History Again

Share This article

Two Baptist churches in Macon, Georgia, separated by a small park, are also divided by the color of their congregations.

It's a divide that is generations old but their senior pastors want it to change. Rev. Scott Dickison and Rev. James W. Goolsby joined forces to bring their congregations together and heal the long-standing racial divide.

"We're literally around the corner from each other," said Dickison, who pastors the white congregation at First Baptist Church of Christ.

"This is not a conversation of blame, but of acceptance and moving forward," said Goolsby, who pastors the black congregation at First Baptist Church.

First Baptist church member Jarred Moore and his family belonged to the black church for three generations.

"I thought, 'First Baptist, First Baptist?' There are two First Baptists right down the street from each other and I always wondered about it," Moore, a public school teacher, said.

Next month, Goolsby and Dickison are going to lead joint discussions with church members on racism in the history of the United States and in the history of their own churches.

The two churches used to be one congregation about 170 years ago. Then the church consisted of masters and slaves.

The fight over abolition and slavery eventually tore the Macon church apart and they separated by race.

In 1845 church leaders bought property a block away as a "place and habitation for religious service and moral cultivation and improvement of the colored portion" of the congregation, according to the deed. A building was erected and the black church opened.

"We don't want to be one congregation again. We want to be a family," said Jessica Northenor, a public school teacher and member of the white church.

Both congregations agreed to commit to each other at a joint Pentecost service at the black church. Leaders also pledged to work together under the New Baptist Covenant, an organization formed by Jimmy Carter.

Both pastors acknowledge they have work to do when it comes to building trust among members of both churches.

"A white person from the South — to not come to terms with our own history and experience with race is to deprive ourselves of a full understanding of the Gospel. We need to go through this kind of conversion experience of confession, of repentance, and of reconciliation. We need to have that when it comes to race, not just in the country but within the church," Dickison said.

Both pastors have spoken to their congregations, urging the opportunity for healing.

Progress has been made among the churches. The white church, the First Baptist Church of Christ, invited members from the black church to join them on a youth trip, including Rev. Goolsby's son.

"The fact that that was so easy to share — we've already made progress," Goolsby said about the trip.

At a recent Black Lives Matter, vigil Goolsby and Dickison sat along side one another on the pulpit, then stood together to speak.

Dickison compared racism to "a cancer that roams inside the body of this nation, and yes, even in the body of Christ."

Goolsby asked people to maintain hope "in spite of our circumstances," and he added, "We know there will be change."

Share This article

About The Author

CBN News