Three Forks Baptist Association will host a special 182nd semi-annual meeting on April 25 in the Watauga High School auditorium. The celebration will feature nationally renowned Appalachian worship and bluegrass artist Chosen Road and Phil Neighbors, pastor of Valley Baptist Church in Bakersfield, California.
The association began in 1841 when 10 churches left a mountain Baptist association and joined together to emphasize prayer, evangelism, Christian education and missions.
Celebration and reflection
This will be both a night of celebration and reflection on God’s work through Three Forks Baptist Church, one of the oldest churches in the association, and Phil Neighbors’ family as they moved across the country planting churches as they went.
“The Three Forks Baptist Church was the first church established in Watauga County in 1790,” Neighbors said. “My ancestors were charter members and early pastors from this church. These families migrated into the mountains from churches that had been established by John Gano and Shubal Stearns. These two early Baptist leaders and church planters set in motion the expansion of Baptist work in North Carolina that has spread to the entire world.
“My family eventually migrated west from Watauga County and started churches in Tennessee, Kentucky and Oklahoma. In 1985, I relocated to Bakersfield, California, and became a founding pastor of the Valley Baptist Church,” Neighbors noted.
According to Three Forks Association, the meeting will also be a “great reminder of what God still desires to do today in and through churches in the Three Forks Baptist Association as we continue to work together, sharing the gospel, planting new churches and revitalizing existing ones.”
Following the celebration at the high school, they will gather for refreshments and an historical display at Three Forks Baptist Church.
For more information, contact the Three Forks Baptist Association in Boone, North Carolina at office@3forksassoc.org, wesley@3forksassoc.org, or 828-264-4482.
Find the event on Facebook here.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was submitted by the Three Forks Baptist Association.
