ACT OF GOD

ACT OF GOD

There are only two possible explanations for what happened in 1876. It was either the most phenomenal coincidence that ever occurred, or it was, literally, an Act of God. The events of that day are supported by numerous sworn statements and legal documents.
Swan Quarter, North Carolina is a lowland community. When heavy rains come, the residents closer to sea level fair better than those further away.

In the 1870s, the Methodists of Swan Quarter had no church. The only land available to them, on which to build a church, was a piece of low-lying property on Oyster Creek Road. It was not by desire, but by necessity, that the Methodists acquired the land and construction began.

The church was to be a small, but sturdy, white clapboard-framed building propped up on brick pilings. In 1876, the building was completed. On Sunday, September 16, a dedication ceremony was held. Three days later, on Wednesday, a terrible storm ravaged Swan Quarter. All day long the wind howled as torrential rains poured down upon the quiet community. The townspeople could only wait out the storm helplessly as it continued its ruinous damage. By nightfall, devastated by the force of nature, the town began to flood as many roofs were ripped from homes by cyclonic turbulence. The storm raged through the darkness of night into the bleak light of day.

By Thursday afternoon, the wind subsided as the rain diminished, leaving behind, in its wake, an eerie calm. One by one, weary citizens threw open their shutters and doors and emerged from what was left of there homes.

Most of the people walked into the flooded streets or peered from there windows to witness a desolate waterscape, a community savagely rocked by nature. But those within, in sight of Oyster Creek Road, looked upon a more astonishing sight: the church --- the newly constructed Swan Quarter Methodist Church --- the whole building, intact, was floating down the street! The flood waters had gently lifted the entire structure from the brick pilings, on which it had rested, and had launched it slowly, silently, down Oyster Creek Road.

Within minutes, stunned, concerned townsfolk were wading in and sloshing about in waist-high water, in the street, fighting the rushing current, trying desperately to reach the journey-bound church so that they could moor it with lengths of rope.

The ropes were fastened to various structures, but to no avail: none were sturdy enough to withstand the weight of the church being swept away in the flood waters. The traveling chapel attracted other onlookers who immediately joined the struggle to secure the building. The church moved on.

By now, the church had floated to the center of town, still on Oyster Creek Road. And then, as if this phenomenon had not already been an amazing sight to behold, the church, as helpless townsfolk watched, spellbound, made an inexplicable right turn and continued down that road. It was as though the chapel were alive --- as though it had a mind of its own.

For two more blocks, the townspeople fought, with the ropes, to gain control of the church, unsuccessfully. And then, in the same decisive manner in which it had moved, all along, the church veered off the road, heading for the center of a vacant lot ... and there ... stopped.

While the flood water receded, the church remained --- and is there to this day --- almost a hundred and thirty years later.

But that's not the end of this incredible story. You see, that most desirable piece of land where the church settled, on that fateful day in 1876, was the first choice, of the Swan Quarter Methodists, for the site of their church. However, the rich, unsympathetic landowner, whose property it was, originally refused to sell his land to the Christian churchgoers.

On the morning after the flood --- after discovering the church in the middle of his lot --- that landowner went to the Methodist minister and, with trembling hands, presented him with the deed. --From Carolina, My Sweet Home, by Allen Ball