Prepared for the church's 150th anniversary, November 2009

The story of St. John-St. Matthew-Emanuel Lutheran Church begins in the mid- to late 1800s in Brooklyn, where three separate congregations were building communities of faith in a bustling city.

The old St. John's Lutheran Church, 1868 to 1899.

The oldest of the three was St. Matthew Evangelical English Lutheran Church, which was organized in 1859 to meet growing demand in Brooklyn for English-speaking Lutheran churches. But the first efforts to offer services in English met with resistance: Some German-speaking congregations were displeased, and financial support from the larger church was sometimes withheld.

The church grew for the next several years, yet the young congregation struggled to find stability. Pastors turned over rapidly, and by 1871, the congregation had begun discussing selling its building on Atlantic Avenue. In 1875, the church rented out its existing property and moved into a building on State Street owned by Elm Place Congregational Church, renting with an option to buy.

Some problems were still apparent years later when the Rev. T.T. Emmett accepted the call. Emmett, who served from 1890 to 1893, lamented that "the congregation was scattered all over the city." He felt that "the social life of the people was thoroughly worldly. The prayer meeting was almost nil..."

Attempts to move the church failed repeatedly. "Why," Emmett asked, "do they insist on crippling the only English-speaking Lutheran church in this city by holding it down, preventing its growth and limiting its influence?"

But within a few years, progress was at hand. The church finally sold its building in 1895 and, for $13,000, bought a lot on the corner of Sixth Avenue and Second Street. The following year, the congregation dedicated a new building on the site. The church's growth mirrored that of its borough: Only two years after the dedication, Brooklyn became part of New York City. St. Matthew's would remain at that location for nearly 50 years - and the tenures of four pastors.

But in the years after World War II, the church suffered declining membership, as did the congregation of nearby Emanuel Lutheran. In 1948, the two churches agreed to go forward together.

Emmanuel Lutheran was founded in 1884 as a church "in which people could worship their God in the way they were taught in their fatherland." The building was originally on Seventh Street between Fourth and Fifth avenues in a building first rented to the congregation by the Brooklyn Athletic Club. But the property most closely associated with the congregation was on Seventh Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues. It was purchased in 1903 for $50,000.

The church's culture remained strictly German for many years, as its founders would no doubt have preferred.

As St. Matthew and Emanuel churches took shape, another Lutheran congregation was also putting down roots. St. John's Lutheran Church was organized in 1866. The congregation worshipped in neighboring churches until it purchased three lots on Middle Street (now Prospect Avenue) and erected a small, white frame structure in 1867.

Years later, several families left to form Emmanuel Lutheran, which was committed to maintaining its German heritage, despite moves toward English elsewhere.

St. John's, on the other hand, became a bilingual German- and English-speaking congregation in 1896, when English services were introduced on the last Sunday evening of every month. In 1899, a new, larger church was built. This is the building we worship in today.

The new church and parsonage, 1910s.

Gradually, English began to dominate. By 1909, the English Sunday school was so large that all evening services were conducted in English. In 1911, the parsonage was built. In 1920, all confirmation classes were conducted in English, and all minutes were written in English.

Under the leadership of the Rev. Werner Jentsch, German services  were reduced to one a month, probably during the 1950s. Worship in German continued until the late 1960s, when St. John's was one of the last bilingual German- and English-speaking churches in the New York synod.

The fire, 1955.

In 1955, having just endured the building of the Prospect Expressway, St. John's caught fire. Worship and Sunday school took place at St. Matthew-Emanuel until the church was rebuilt and rededicated on Pentecost in 1957.

Cleaning up after the fire, 1955.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the two churches drew closer. In the late 1960s, St. John's held joint services and Sunday school programs with St. Matthew-Emanuel as the congregations became "yoked" together for two years under Pastor Thomas E. Anderson. A 9 a.m. Sunday service would be held at one church, followed by an 11 a.m. service at another.

Talk soon began about consolidating St. John's, St. Matthew-Emanuel and a fourth congregation called St. Marks. At the last minute, St. Marks withdrew out of concern that their church was geographically too far from the others. But the two Park Slope congregations, having had overlapping relations for nearly a century, joined as one in February 1974 at the Prospect Avenue location.

"Everyone was open to it," recalled Fae Lock, a member of St. Matthew-Emanuel's council at the time. "Never was I aware of in-fighting based on past allegiance."

However, a single major obstacle remained: the name for the consolidated church. Longtime members of both congregations felt strongly that the name of their church must be retained. They had been baptized and grown up in the church, married there and watched as their children did the same.

So the first vote was to approve or reject the union of the two churches. The second vote was to choose the name. Three choices were suggested. The winning name was St. John-St. Matthew-Emanuel Lutheran Church.

Later in 1974, the newly united church organized the Prospect Hill Senior Services Center to offer meals and activities for seniors. It remains an integral part of our ministry today.

In 1994, under the leadership of Pastor Richard A. Miller, St. JME voted to become a Reconciling in Christ Congregation, affirming gay and lesbian persons and welcoming all to full participation in the life of our church.

St. JME now numbers among the 230 churches in the Metropolitan New York Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). Our pastor today, the Rev. David Parsons, was called in 2002 and, together with congregants from throughout the Park Slope community, carries the traditions of all three original congregations into the 21st century.

The church in 2009.