North Knoxville Baptist Church is a revitalization story in the works.
Like many other Tennessee Baptist churches, they’ve transformed resources and everyday circumstances into golden opportunities for ministry.
Pastor Jim McNeal has led the church to open their facilities for two other churches to meet there. One is a new Presbyterian church, Christ Community Church, set to begin in April with around 100 members; the other is nondenominational, Ironworks Church, which has about 15 members.
“I think it’s an opportunity for all three churches to work together in harmony, to reach out to our community and just show the love of Jesus Christ in a practical way,” McNeal said.
North Knox itself is a large facility with 42 Sunday School rooms, seven church offices, a gymnasium, and a sanctuary that seats 576. Seeing they had so much room, McNeal proposed to the congregation in October of 2023 the idea to open the church for others to meet.
“And that was a unanimous vote,” he said. “It was just obvious that’s what we should be doing to help grow the Kingdom of God.”
Growth, declines, resilience
The church celebrated its 95th anniversary on Jan. 19. But also like many Tennessee Baptist churches, North Knoxville’s story is one of growth, declines, and resilience.
Their roots begin in 1930, at the brink of the Great Depression. Fifteen members under the leadership of pastor Jimmy Day got together, sold some of their furniture to collect $300 — enough to build a small frame church with a sawdust floor on a lot just west of where the current church stands.
By 1940, they had more than 500 members. That frame building sufficed until 1953, when they opened the first brick church on West Oldham Avenue. By the 1960s, they had over 1,100 members on the roster under pastor Guy Milam.
A fire in the early 80s caused damage but the congregation rebuilt and renovated the church to how it is seen today.
Roots
Not only do the roots go way back for North Knox’s history, but also for people within the church.
Unknowingly, before joining North Knox in 2023, McNeal had family roots in the church. There’s even a room in the church dedicated to a Jim McNeal, a paternal cousin whom McNeal is named after.
“I didn’t even know that this was an old family church,” he said.
McNeal, who began as the full-time pastor in March of 2024, has a background in church planting. He’s also been a part of the revitalization team for the Knox County Association of Baptists.
While gazing at a wall hosting the pictures of previous North Knox pastors, McNeal wondered what their frame of mindset would have been.
He asked, “Did they think that 95 years from now, where would the church be? And in the ups and the downs and the struggles and the successes. How did they figure it out?”
McNeal surmises the church grew when it did because it was in a densely populated area, two miles from downtown Knoxville.
Today, North Knox averages around 70 to 80 people on a given weekend, according to McNeal.
“The church right now is currently elderly. The average age is older, but our community doesn’t necessarily reflect that,” McNeal said. “And we’ve got to understand that the people who live in that community now are not the people who live in that community even 30 years ago.”
By sharing the North Knox facilities with the other two churches, they also share the cost of utilities, helping to reserve resources for much-needed community outreach that actively connects with the neighborhood.
“I want to focus specifically on the 37917 area and just show them the love of Jesus in a practical way and earn that opportunity to share the gospel with them,” McNeal said. “There’s a lot of halfway houses around the community, and so we are intentionally developing a strategy to connect with them and we’re being successful so far.”
A way forward
McNeal hopes their partnering with other churches could serve as a model for congregations facing similar resource challenges.
He explained that the idea is to show other churches how to get resources ready so that if a church doesn’t grow, then there’s still a way in which the Kingdom will grow in a community even long after a church is gone.
“My goal is that we just simply prepare the church for the next generation in everything we do,” he said. “And the way that we build the church is through relationships.”
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Zoe Watkins and originally published by the Baptist and Reflector.
