ABOVE: Bethel Evangelical Free Church is celebrating 125 years this Sunday.

FAIRMONT– Bethel Evangelical Free Church in Fairmont is marking 125 years with a special service and celebration this Sunday, Sept. 22. While the church has had three different locations, it’s currently at 1125 S. State Street.

Pastor Seth Watson, who has been with the church since 2019, shared that the church itself was first incorporated in 1899 by Peter Shellman and by about 1901, the first church was built on 4th and Elm Street. He noted that a house is still located there.

“A lot of this area was settled by people from Sweden or Norway so at that point all of the services were in Swedish,” Watson said.

From early on, the church offered Sunday school classes and had serval different pastors come through. By the early 1930s, the church began to struggle but a younger pastor, Reverend Lester Nelson, came in and started doing services in English which resulted in the church growing.

“By the early 1950s, they had outgrown that building so they purchased the East Chain EFC building and they moved it into town,” Watson said.

The church was set at 5th and Orient Street, which the First Assembly of God Church is now located.

“The church continued to grow throughout the 50s and 60s and they outgrew that building. They purchased the property here at 1125 South State Street,” Watson said.

He referenced a Sentinel article from that time which included a picture from a sign in that location that said “future home of…” And there was no hospital or high school there yet, but just prairie.

In 1968, the first part of the current church building was built, which included some classrooms and a main worship space.

“The church continued to grow through the 60s and 70s and by the early 80s they decided they needed a bigger space to have services,” Watson explained. “In 1993 they finished the space that is our worship center today, which we just finished remodeling.”

Throughout the 90s the church was still growing and at that time the great hall/gym was added, as well as more spaces for classrooms.

“The building was built in three phases,” Watson said in summary.

While the evolution of the building itself is one thing, Watson pointed out the church is more about the people. A large number of pastors have come and gone throughout the 125 years, some notable ones being Reverend Nelson, Reverend Rudolph Messerli and Pastor Rich Reynertson. In addition, the church has pretty consistently had a youth pastor since 1975, the first of which was John Lund.

The congregation is strong with an average attendance of 430 people between the two weekly services offered, plus an additional 180 participating online.

The online offering started at the emergence of Covid because that was the only way churches had to broadcast a weekly message during restrictions, but Bethel has decided to keep the online offering in the years since.

“We livestream our service. The 8:30 a.m. service is in person and live online. I was talking with a member a few weeks ago who recently had a tragedy and was away and he said he liked that even if they couldn’t be here, they could still participate. It’s valuable for that and also new people who are looking for a church,” Watson said.

In addition to the church services, Bethel offers “connections” which are classes between services for both adults and children.

“We basically have stuff for birth through people to their 90s,” Watson said.

Merlin Quiggle, a member who helped put together the history of the church, said that the church has long been multi-generational, which it is proud of.

Annually, the church puts on a women’s event in December, which is called Nativi-tea, and in the spring it puts on a men’s steak fry, which pulls in several hundred participants.

“Almost every year, the Sunday after Easter we host Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge, which works with people recovering from drug and alcohol addiction. They bring a choir in and it’s really well-received.”

On Wednesday nights, Bethel puts on AWANA in the great hall.

“There’s an incredible number of kids that come. It’s broken up into three different sessions. There’s classes and trainings and we’ve heard of kids who have come to that and ended up being part of the church family as a result,” Quiggle explained.

The great hall– and the rest of Bethel’s space–is used for far beyond just church activities. In fact, Bethel has long opened up its space to the broader community. While Small Sprouts is the church’s preschool program, it has allowed Fairmont Christian School to utilize its space for its school, which is currently grades kindergarten through 6th.

It has also allowed Project 1590’s Kids Just Want to Have Fun committee to host its annual father-daughter dance there and it also lets the Fairmont Area School District have different retreats there, including the annual senior retreat.

The partnership with the school district is so positive that for Bethel’s 125th celebration this Sunday, Fairmont High School is allowing use of its Performing Arts Center for the special service.

“We’re planning on 500 and we can’t fit that many. I contacted (Superintendent) Andy Traetow and asked him and they’ve graciously allowed us,” Watson said.

At the single service, there will be some information shared about the history of the church, both in music and in speaking. There will also be some memories shared by former pastors and a message from some other guest speakers. Following the service, the celebration will return to the church.

On celebrating the milestone, Watson said, “I think it’s important. We’re going to celebrate and look back on the past. When they started it in 1899, they had no idea. There was a few families and they didn’t know that we’d still be here today in a building like this. We have no idea, it could be this church in another 125 years celebrates 250 years,” Watson said.

He hopes that the church will still have a strong presence in the community 125 years from now.

“We’re trying to be a blessing to the community. That’s one of the reasons we like to open the building to different groups. We love Jesus and we want to share that love with our community. That’s what I’d like us to be known for,” Watson said.