History

A local Philipsburg church group was in need of a pastor during the mid 1950's and a group of godly women from that church group reached out to Village Missions about sending a missionary¬ pastoral family to Philipsburg. Village Missions responded by sending Ray & Arlene Cheyney and family to Philipsburg.

After a year or two, pastor Cheyney invited an evangelist by the name of Troy Costlo to come and hold a revival service in town. As a result, the Lord saved several people, including Flossie McCale! Some time after the revival services concluded it was decided by some of the people that were meeting together that they wanted to be recognized by the name "Philipsburg Community Church" so that all the people from the community who believed in Jesus Christ as Savior could freely meet to hear God's Word.

So, in 1958, the Philipsburg Community Church was born and the people gathered together for a brief time in the Old Legion Hall building just south of the four way stop in the downtown district. While the people of the Community Church were meeting in the Legion Hall building, the Lord prompted newly-saved Flossie and yet-to-be-saved William McCale to generously and graciously donate our current property as the site for a new building to hold services!

The Lord used pastor Cheyney to oversee the hot, dirty, labor intensive job and provided many different people like local rancher and founding member, Ralph Buchanan, to help out. Ralph excavated the site for the building, several women labored during the daytime, many husbands joined in the evenings after work and the Lord brought many other people from the community to help construct the new building. The first service was held in the spring of 1959 with dirt floors inside, 16" of snow outside and seven people huddled around a wood stove near the eastern wall of the new building. And as a testimony to the Lord's goodness, many people that were part of the long and difficult work during that time have said that this was the best time of their lives! Many seasons have passed since the first service in our building and much has happened. Nine pastoral families from Village Missions have served here; multiple board members have led this body of people; three to four hundred different people have attended services through the years; weddings and funerals have taken place; people have gotten saved; people have been baptized; God's Word has been taught and people have grown!

This brief history was recounted by Flossie McCale. Flossie had been told as a child about Jesus Christ and His death, but, she didn't get saved until her early twenties when she finally heard and understood that Jesus had died for her sins and rose again to give her life! Flossie's husband, William, was saved a few years after her at a revival that was held in the Philipsburg Community Church building!