"Where two or three are gathered together in my name,
I will be in the midst of them." - Matthew 18:20

The First Baptist story is intrinsically woven in the fabric of the development of the Black Baptist Church in America and in the life of the New Brunswick, Piscataway and Franklin Township communities. The population of African Americans descendants of both Freeborn and slave was scattered throughout these towns. During the 1933-37 years the Founders met and began the process of establishing and building a church.

As it would happen, a group of worshippers separated from the Macedonia Baptist Church, located in the New Brunswick Heights section of Piscataway, New Jersey. They formed the Zion Hill Baptist Church, also in Piscataway. Both Churches still exist.

In 1933 a few members disagreed about the name of the "new" church and decided to leave Zion Hill. One Sunday morning this small disenchanted group walked out of the service, leading their children by the hand "down the hill to the bus stop."

Following this eventful day, the group, undaunted and without a minister, worshipped each Sunday under an apple tree in Mr. and Mrs. Alonzo Haigler's yard in Highland Park, or at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Elijah Anderson on Roosevelt Avenue in New Brunswick. Members of the group were composed of family and friends: Elijah and Georgia Anderson, John and Sarah Brunson, George and Emma Brunson, Ethel Brockington, Corrie Griffin, Ollie Middleton VanHorn, Robert and Mary Bussey, Alonzo and Susie Haigler, Stephen and Lula Middleton, Leola Middeton Willis Murray, Thomas and Hattie Lasure and Mrs. Lourie Brunson Ryan.

One Sunday, Mrs. Georgia Anderson came excitedly to the small congregation with a proposal. She had passed what seemed to be an abandoned gas station on Route 27. It was an old stucco building. The owner slept in what appeared to be a "hole" under the building. The building had promise. They rented it for $4.00 a week until they raised the money to buy it.

There was no doubt whom they wished to lead them in this venture. A committee of three approached Reverend Clifford Wooding, former Associate Minister of Zion Hill, to serve as their Pastor, and he with the advice of Reverend Smith, Pastor of the Second Baptist Church of Perth Amboy, formed the Lincoln Gardens Mission.