Special to the AmNews
Like most African-American churches that began shortly after the end of the Civil War and slave emancipation, Cedar Fall Baptist Church began as a worship center under a brush arbor, with no formal structure. However, on March 20, 1895, three trustees, William McRae, Scipio Douglas and John Witherspoon, went to an auction at the Marlboro County Courthouse and purchased an acre of land for $25.50. The first Cedar Fall Baptist Church building was erected on that land. Many other tracts of land have been purchased since that time and added to the original property.
After the original church burned, the members moved into a new structure in 1911, which stood for more than 100 years, with the eventual addition of a kitchen, a fellowship hall, a pastor’s study and several Sunday school classrooms. Around 1996, an outdoor recreational pool was built. A long-held dream was realized in September 2006, when the Cedar Fall Missionary Baptist Church congregation erected a new edifice and moved into the present state-of-the-art facility, which includes an indoor pool for baptism. The old sanctuary has since been demolished.
Initially, the early church offered few comforts or accommodation but underwent many changes and improvements over the years. It was originally heated by coal stoves but soon progressed to using big kerosene heaters and then individual gas heaters, gas furnaces and finally HVAC units. Lighting of the church progressed from lanterns to generator-powered lights to electrical lighting. Before indoor plumbing, outdoor toilets were the “order of the day.”
In the years just before electric fans and air conditioning, windows had to be propped open on the hot days, and funeral homes provided churches with hand fans that advertised their businesses. In the 1940s, a water pump was located down the hill as you entered the church yard, just before the graveyard, and was a popular gathering and cooling place on hot days after service. Baptisms took place at the old Drake’s Mill Pond, and trustees and deacons had to clean up the area and scare away snakes on the Saturday before the annual baptizing service. Once the outdoor pool was built, the baptisms occurred in the pool. During times of festivities, food was served on long wooden tables on the outside until the fellowship hall was erected.
There have been many wonderful leaders in the church’s history. Some of the former pastors were the following: the Revs. Calvin McRae, A.B. McPhail, J.C. Covington, W.E. McCoy, J.E. Levy, Luther Thomas David, J.J. Reid, T.A.W. Johns, J.L. Williamson and Willis C. Graham and interim pastor the Rev. Earline J. Hayes. The present pastor, the Rev. Coleman Cannon Sr., has been in service since 2000.
Certainly, much progress has been made and the Lord has surely been good to Cedar Fall Missionary Baptist Church. Now worshiping occurs in a multimillion-dollar building with all the modern-day accommodations, such as a 600-person-capacity sanctuary, 13 multipurpose service rooms, four offices and five restrooms. Also, adjoining the sanctuary is a 250-person-capacity fellowship hall with a fully equipped commercial kitchen. Opposite the kitchen near the fellowship hall is six Sunday school classrooms. The music department is blessed to be equipped with two organs, two pianos and a set of drums. In addition to all of these indoor amenities, there is a van available for those who need transportation to and from church.
The worship service is blessed with several different choirs, two praise teams, praise and worship groups, a senior missionary group, the Young Women’s Association, three different usher groups and all of the other auxiliaries that are normally present in a Missionary Baptist Church. However, the most important part of the church remains the people who fill the pews and choir stand each Sunday morning and throughout the week. Most of the members have strong ties to the community and have generations of ancestors who have worshipped together at Cedar Fall Missionary Baptist Church. This church family has been the foundation, from the brush arbor to this new marvelous facility.