Our Story

In the summer of 1856, a small group of dedicated Methodist Christians met in south-western Marshall County where they organized the Pleasant Grove Methodist Episcopal Church, South.  Twelve adult members formed the church:  Mr. and Mrs. R.P. Finney, Mr. and Mrs. G.W. Anderson, Mr. and Mrs. S.T. Green, Mr. and Mrs. John Vaughn, Thomas Jefferson Green, Jacob Brazel, Isaac Washam, and Nelson Owens.  They constructed the first building of logs on a plot of ground near the Waller Cemetery.  It was thirty feet by twenty feet in size.  

In 1873, founding member Thomas Jefferson Green donated the land for the present site at Harvey.  Later he was to donate land for the Pleasant Grove Cemetery too.  Again, they raised a building of logs.  This building lasted to the turn of the century.  Around 1900, a new building, semi-gothic in design, was built of masonry blocks.  These blocks were handmade at Soldier Creek, were one foot by one foot by twenty inches, and weighed some eighty pounds each.

On Sunday, November 11, 1911 supposedly at the eleven o'clock morning service, a tornado took the roof and upper structure from this church building.  The strong block walls remained firm and were soon covered again, and that building was used until 1948 when the present building was built.  A parsonage was added in the summer of 1965.  Front and back additions have been added to the sanctuary since then, and the new fellowship hall was constructed on the east side of the sanctuary in 2002.  In 2012, a new activity building for children and youth was built on land donated by the Henson family, joining their farm behind the parsonage and the Pleasant Grove Cemetery.

Of course, the building wasn't the only thing that grew and changed over the years.  The congregation grew too.  For many years Pleasant Grove was a part of the Oak Level Circuit and then the Brewers Circuit, but finally became a station church in 1965.  Twelve founding members in 1856, 116 in 1876, 188 members in 2011 and 193 in 2015.  We have grown by the grace of God.

Pleasant Grove Church is an Independent Wesleyan Congregation.