Early History Of United (Before it was "United")

It is an interesting fact that both the Baptist and the Free Baptist elements of United had their beginnings in the same year. The Rev. James Potter, Baptist, of Bowdoinham, probably the first clergyman of any faith to visit this place, made his famous missionary tour to the plantation of Lewiston early in 1783. His preaching met with success as regards converts, though no church was organized until 6 years later. Likewise in 1783 Benjamin Randall, the founder of the Freewill Baptist Church, came from the mother church at New Durham, NH, and won a large number of adherents to the Lord. During the 50 years following, each church became well developed through a series of different societies, earlier organizations being absorbed by later and stronger ones.

In the course of the history of the Freewill Baptists, the year 1838 saw a powerful revival. The new impetus gained prompted the brethren to drop their old organization, which had fallen into a debilitated state, and form a new and fresh society. Since December, 1820, the Freewill Baptists had held their meetings in their own house of worship, located on Main Street, north of Mountain Ave. known as the Barker's Mills Church. The new church was organized on May 22,1838, with a membership of 44, the number increasing rapidly during the next few months. In order to accommodate the shifting population, it became expedient to move the meeting house to Haymarket Square, at the corner of Main and Chapel Streets. Here we have the Main Street Freewill Baptist Church, worshiping in the building later occupied by the Heskell Implement and Seed Co. The church continued to worship here for 17 years, ministered to by a group of godly pastors: Silas Curtis, Isaac Libby, Daniel Jackson, George W. Bean and Jos. S. Burgess. As the church grew, a new building was planned, to occupy the corner of Main and Bates Streets. This new structure, which housed the Main Street Free Baptist and its successor, the United Baptist Church until the year 1921, was dedicated February 14, 1856 by the pastor, Rev. J. S. Burgess, assisted by Rev. M. J. Steere of Great Falls, NH. The lot had been presented by the Franklin Co., and a stock company was incorporated by the society to raise the necessary amount for the building. The cost was about $20,000. Ministers following Mr. Burgess were John A. Lowell, W. H.. Bowen, O. D. Patch, C. E. Cate, Martyn Summerbell, and Ashmun T. Salley. Dr. Salley served the church devotedly during the last 18 years of its existence as a Free Baptist Church.

In 1869, 13 years after the Main Street Free Baptists moved into their new church, a crowded membership and the growing need for a church to minister to a different section of the city gave rise to the organization of a daughter church, which came to be known as the Pine Street Free Baptist Church, or more popularly as "Little Pine". 52 members were dismissed from the Main Street Church and were organized on January 3, 1869, by a council composed of Pres. Oren B. Cheney, Prof. B. F. Hayes, both of Bates College, and J. A. Lowell, then pastor of the Main Street Church. The house of worship of the new society was dedicated on December 9, of the same year, by their pastor, Rev. J. Burgess. The church was located at the corner of Pine and Blake Streets, and was a substantial wooden structure, costing $14,000. Rev. Burgess, the same man who had so well served the Main Street Church at an earlier time, continued his work at the Pine Street Church with great success for a number of years. Succeeding pastors up to te time of the amalgamation in the United Baptist Church include the names of R. L. Howard, A. C. Hogbin, J. B. Jordan, 0. L. Gile, W. J. Twort, S. A. Blaisdell, E. W. Ricker, Jos. E. Wilson, A. A. Rideout, M. L. Gregg, J. L. Tabor, David Jack, S. A. Blaisdell, returned for a second pastorate and continued until his death, just a few months before the union.

To return to the year 1847, a little handful of Baptists resolved themselves into a vigilance com?mittee to take a census of all the Baptists in Lewiston who were interested in forming a church. The "Old South," a Baptist church formerly so vigorous, had become at this time practically extinct. The end of the work of the vigilance committee was the organization on June 3, 1847, of the First Baptist Church of Lewiston. The society then numbered 25 members. Meetings began immediately in a schoolhouse near Lowells Corner, later known as Hospital Square. The church underwent many changes of location, meeting in public halls, schoolhouses, a chapel built by the church itself, etc., until in the spring of 1853 the erection was commenced of a church at the head of Lisbon Street. This house, which cost about $10,000, was dedicated December 9, 1853, by the Rev. L. B. Allen, of Yarmouth. The society continued to worship in this house until May, 1870, when they moved into their edifice on Bates Street, dedicated by the pastor, Rev. E. M. Haynes on May 18. This handsome building of brick with granite trimmings, of English Gothic architecture, cost, including the lot, $54,000. This Bates Street, or First Baptist Church, has also furnished the nucleus of the First Baptist Church of Auburn, dismissing for that purpose nearly half its membership on April 13, 1860. The pastors who so ably served the First Baptist Church during its existence as such were George Knox, N. M. Wood, George W. Holman, E. M. Haynes, W. T. Chase, G. B. Ilsley, W. C. Barrows, C. C. Tilley, D. T. Wyman, W. N. Thomas, N. M. Simmonds, H. B. Hutchins and J. G. Osborne

Early in the 20th Century, particularly after 1910, a movement toward union and federation in religious as well as other organizations, had come to the front in American thinking. Baptists and Free Baptists, following the example of other denominations, united their activities in the field of missions. Individual church societies joined forces to form a community church. Thus, the Baptists and Free Baptists of Lewiston saw the vision of one larger and stronger church working for the Kingdom of God in one program and housed under the same roof. The union of the Main Street Free Baptist and the First Baptist Churches, on May 1, 1917, created the United Baptist Church. A few months later the Pine Street Free Baptist Church joined the united church This three-fold society worshipped in the building of the Main St. Church until the summer of 1921, when they moved to the Chapel of Bates College (making partial use at the same time of the Park Street and Hammond Street Methodist Churches) to allow the demolishment
if the Main Street structure, and the erection of a new house of worship on that site. Rev. George F. Finnie was called to be the pastor, in Nov. 1917, of the United Baptist Church. The beautiful new edifice was dedicated on Sunday, November 26, 1922. 

Recent History Of United

Although the very early roots of United were conservative, being grounded in the Truth of Scripture, there was a gradual drift toward liberal theology, even from the end of the 19th Century. This drift became less and less gradual as the decades of the 20th Century unfolded, and by the 1940s, the church was clearly in the camp of theological liberalism, having strayed far from a firm commitment to the Word of God. Sadly, social involvement had come to replace the teaching and proclamation of the Gospel.

Starting in about 1990, though, there came into the church a new awareness of the Bible, and the necessity of the church bringing itself into alignment with it. In the closing years of the century, by the Grace of God, the church began the process of re examining its purpose and mission. More and more, there was a desire to preach and teach the full counsel of Scripture and salvation through Jesus Christ alone. This was not a trouble-free process, and there was a considerable amount of disagreement and conflict, but the faithful believers who held to the authority of Gods Word endured, and today are able to enjoy the blessing of a true Family of believers, united together in their faith in Jesus Christ as eternal God, Lord, and Savior. The church is enthusiastically and expectantly moving ahead in the 21st Century committed to worshipping and glorifying God, to building up one another in love and the Word, and to reaching those who do not yet know Him.