Church celebrates 170 successful years
One hundred and seventy years after a log cabin sermon near present-day Dam #1 on the Des Plaines River started it all, North Northfield United Methodist Church in Northbrook is still standing -- in a matter of speaking.
In the initial years after traveling preacher Jacob Boas preached Illinois' first evangelical sermon in the log home of Daniel and Mary Stanger, the congregants lacked a formal house of worship or a regular church leader. They met in people's homes, finding a preacher when they could, said Northbrook Historical Society President Judy Hughes.
Over the course of its long and storied history, the church has been called by different names, relocated several times, split into two churches with an eventual reunion, burned down and been rebuilt, and twice weathered mergers on the national level. The Stangers' log cabin is long gone.
The church, once all evangelicals of German descent, today has an ethnically and theologically diverse congregation of about 110 members, said pastor Lois McCullen Parr.
In recent years, she said, the church has evolved from a neighborhood one into one with members from various suburbs, from Palatine to Lake Zurich to Algonquin.
Still, constants remain. Since 1837 the church has spent most its life around the same intersection of what is now Sanders and Dundee roads. And at 7:30 p.m. this Wednesday, the congregation is celebrating its 170th birthday with a service, led by Bishop Hee-Soo Jung, based on John 16:22, the same Biblical text Boas used. Jung serves as the leader of the Northern Illinois Conference of the United Methodist Church.
"Our bishop is really focusing on what it means to plant a faith community in our time," said Parr. "These people were pioneers when they came 170 years ago. How are we pioneers now?"
Before the evening service, the Northbrook Historical Society and the church will present historical displays from 6 to 7:30 p.m. in the Education Building adjacent to the church.
The church's display includes items like the church's Articles of Incorporation, an old congregation Bible and the 1877 diary of then-14-year-old Simon Stanger, on loan from Daniel Stanger's great-great-grandson, West Deerfield Township Assessor Steven Stanger, 58.
The historical society's display will feature more general artifacts from that time, Hughes said, such as pairs of both high-button and wooden shoes, tax records and Indian arrowheads.
In addition, the church is hosting a pioneer potluck picnic at 11:45 a.m. today at Grove 2 of Lake Avenue Woods West Forest Preserve on Des Plaines River Road with German food and turn-of-the-century picnic games.
Steven Stanger will speak at the Wednesday service on behalf of the descendants of the church's pioneer families.
Stanger didn't know about his family's connection to the church until Parr contacted him.
"It's really something special," Stanger said, marveling that despite all the political, social and economic changes the world has undergone, "this church has remained a viable church."
Mount Prospect resident David Horneys, 75, a church member for about 20 years, shares that view.
"It's nice to be 170 years old and still strong," Horneys said. "It's worth celebrating."
Shirley McConnell, 88, of Wheeling, who grew up on a farm near where Wheeling's Chevy Chase Country Club now stands, said she finds the church's anniversary "very exciting," because the early history of the area "was closely tied to churches."
As a child, McConnell recalled, neighbors -- who in some cases lived on farms that had been in the family for almost a century -- would finish their farm chores early to attend services at North Northfield, traveling four to five miles by horse and buggy. The church "was their social life," she said.
"It informs us to know that we come from these pioneers whose commitment (to their faith) was so great," Parr said. "To know they could do these dangerous, unknown things because of their faith ... is a significant story of who we still are as a congregation."