Members:
Fire at Tenn. Disciples church called 'suspicious'
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (1/5/05) — Fire officials believe a blaze that destroyed First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Oak Ridge, Tenn. on Dec. 31 was set deliberately.
The officials called the fire "very suspicious." One fire occurred upstairs in the church; another, downstairs. According to a report on the church's website, arson investigators on Monday confirmed that the fires were intentionally set, and identified other locations within the building where attempts to set fires were not successful.
Jack Russell, the church's pastor, received a call around 2 a.m. Friday telling him the church building was on fire.
Some church members gathered in the parking lot as firefighters attempted to put out the blaze. Four hours later, Russell and the church members moved to the church parsonage next door to grieve their loss and begin discussing a plan of recovery.
Russell remained optimistic early Friday morning. "This is just a building," he told Disciples News Service. "I don't know how, but I truly believe something good will come from this. When God closes a door, He opens another one."
On Jan. 2, First Christian held its Sunday morning worship services in the lobby of Methodist Medical Center in Oak Ridge. A congregational meeting/lunch at a local restaurant was held after the church service.
Yesterday, demolition crews began the process of tearing down and clearing what remained of the sanctuary.
The congregation was able to save the church's bell, a wooden chalice, and three recently-installed air conditioning units, but lost its communion table, baptistry, organ, piano and sanctuary cross to the fire and water damage.
The church also housed the offices of the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity and served as the rehearsal site and archives for a community band.
Week of Compassion sent a solidarity grant to the church on behalf of the entire denomination. Johnny Wray, Week of Compassion director, was ordained at First Christian in 1979 and served as its pastor for eight years.
The congregation's original members began meeting in a private home in 1949. The following year, 85 people signed its charter. In 1954, after meeting for several years in a building known as the Arkansas House, the congregation moved to its present location on Michigan Avenue.
The city of Oak Ridge, situated on the Tennessee River west of Knoxville, was built by the Army Corp of Engineers in the early 1940s. There, Atomic Energy Commission plants separated the uranium isotope used in building the atomic bomb.
