Community

Historic Olalla Bible Church needs thousands in repairs, faces uncertain future

The Olalla Bible Church has been a prominent staple of the community for over a century, but an estimated $130,000 in repairs threatens its future.

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Pastor Dave Campbell said the congregation discovered the damages while replacing the chimney.

“When they took that down, behind the chimney at the bottom there was a spot, probably two feet wide, that we saw these timbers down there that were rotted,” Campbell said. Contractors found more rotted wood underneath the foundation of the church.

“We started getting estimates of the repair, found out they had to jack the church up in order to replace those and so it turned out to be thousands of dollars,” Campbell said. “When you do that, you mess up the church.”

Community members started a fundraising campaign to collect donations.

Community members are rallying to try to save the historic Olalla Bible Church. Photo by Ronan Lynch

Fundraising drive

“If the community wants it, then the community is gonna have to help,” Campbell said. He said Olalla Bible Church  at 13053 Olalla Valley Road either needs to be repaired or it eventually will collapse.

The Olalla Bible Church promises to return donations if it doesn’t raise enough money by the end of the year. The fundraising page hopes to collect $45,000 to start repairs. The congregation has collected $10,725 so far.

“We have a small congregation. Historically it’s been bigger. I don’t know if the church ever could have raised that much money; I doubt it,” Campbell said.

Campbell said that contractors suggested weighing the pros and cons of raising so much money for an old building. He said the current church is a little small for the increasing population of Olalla.

The Olalla Bible Church is more than a century old. The congregation wrote the first draft of its constitution in Norwegian. Photo by Ronan Lynch

A new, up-to-code building could accommodate more churchgoers.

“It would be nice to have a bigger building, but it’s a historical landmark. It’s been here since 1906, and the community loves this building,” Campbell said.

Church history

The Olalla Evangelical Lutheran Congregation drafted the building in September 1906, building a wooden-frame church to support a bell tower. Today, that bell still rings on Sunday mornings.

“It’s amazing, and I love it,” Keryl Roberts-Manning said. She moved to the area about five months ago and always wanted to attend a church with a steeple.

“I was going to a big church in a different town, I was sitting by myself, I was by myself,” Roberts-Manning said. “Here, it’s not that way, it’s just nice here.”

Early Sunday morning, cars peel into the gravel parking lot. People walk up the cement steps and into the church building. There is a certain warmth in the lively atmosphere as new and old faces welcome each other, talking and laughing with each other like a family.

The church’s worship service on Sundays starts at 10 a.m. and lasts for about an hour. After, attendees can walk downstairs to the church basement and socialize with others over food and coffee.

“You walk in there and you feel like you can come in there for forever, know the people forever,” Barbara Gilstrap said. “It’s a simple church, but it feels very welcoming.”

Click here to participate in the church’s fundraising drive. The church’s phone number is (253) 851-4222 or it can be contacted at [email protected].