While our church family seeks to meet the contemporary needs of
people, we also want to honor our history.
The Origins of Clifton Park Center Baptist
Church
In 1793 Abijah Peck was licensed to preach by
the Second Baptist Church of Galway. The next year he moved to
Clifton Park (then part of Halfmoon) and began holding services in
his home. In September 1794 the First Baptist Church of Halfmoon
was organized. In 1796 the church joined the Shaftsbury Baptist
Association, and remained a member until 1935 when it joined the
Saratoga Association, an offshoot of Shaftsbury. The first
delegates to an Association meeting took a church offering of $15
for missions. Without a pastor, the new church grew slowly.
In 1801 Abijah Peck was ordained and became
pastor of the church. A meeting house was erected and opened in
October. Over the next 40 years the church grew and took over the
membership of the failing Newton Baptist Church, which remained open
for worship. In addition to holding services in two churches,
members were dismissed to restart or found other area churches in
Burnt Hills and Schenectady. In 1835 the groups meeting at the two
locations voted to become separate churches, and the Peck church
became First Baptist Clifton Park after the name of the new town
created from western Halfmoon. A brick Meeting House was built.
Elder Abijah Peck died in 1848, two months after a grandson was
ordained. In his over 54 years of ministry, he had baptized 740 and
brought another 263 into the church through letter or statement.
In response to a new law of 1876, the church
reorganized as Clifton Park Baptist Church. In 1891 an adjacent
shop was purchased for a prayer room. Sunday School started in 1894
using the district school house for many years. In 1913, a
parsonage was built across the road. In 1944, the horse sheds were
torn down and the materials used to build a Fellowship Hall onto the
prayer room. In 1957, the church incorporated as Clifton Park
Center Baptist Church in order to obtain a loan to build a new
education building. The new building was dedicated in 1957
and provided space for a Nursery School, now CPCBC Preschool,
starting in 1968. A major addition including class rooms, modern
rest rooms, a large meeting room, and offices was completed in 1990.
In
2004, the Old Meeting House was placed on the National and State
Registers in recognition of its historic role in our local community
heritage.
Clifton Park Center Baptist Church remains
committed to missions and local outreach. Its members still seek to
be a “lighthouse on the hill” in sharing the good news of the Gospel
with our neighbors in Clifton Park and the Capital District.
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05/01/04
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