History

A Short His­tory of Wood­mont Hills

The back­ground of the Fam­ily of God at Wood­mont Hills is filled with inter­est­ing peo­ple and events. We believe God’s hand has been on those peo­ple and has guided those events. Recall­ing them helps us real­ize our debt to Chris­t­ian men and women who have gone before us.

Waverly-​Belmont Church of Christ

In 1921, A.M. Bur­ton was instru­men­tal in pur­chas­ing the prop­erty at the cor­ner of 12^th Avenue South and Beech­wood Avenue for $2,500. Con­structed in 1906, the build­ing had served as the home of Bel­mont Bap­tist Church. The stained glass win­dow with the pre­vi­ous owner’s name was painted over, and Waverly-​Belmont Church of Christ was born.

Uni­ver­sity Church of Christ

Thirty-​three years after the open­ing of the Waverly-​Belmont church, a group of Chris­tians desir­ing to serve the Vanderbilt-​Peabody area began meet­ing. The year was 1954 when L.E. Cran­ford, a youth min­is­ter from the Hills­boro Church of Christ, saw the need for a min­istry among the stu­dents at Peabody Col­lege, Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­sity, and the nurs­ing stu­dents at Van­der­bilt Hos­pi­tal. From that sense of call, the Uni­ver­sity Church began with 36 members.

Ash­wood Church of Christ

In the fall of 1974, Waverly-​Belmont had out­grown its build­ing and began to explore pos­si­bil­i­ties for its future. Uni­ver­sity, with about 300 mem­bers, was open to dis­cus­sions about merg­ing to form a new con­gre­ga­tion. After much prayer, on Novem­ber 10, 1974, the Uni­ver­sity and Waverly-​Belmont con­gre­ga­tions merged to form the Ash­wood Church of Christ. Joe Gray served as min­is­ter dur­ing the merger and remained for two years. Approx­i­mately 800 peo­ple attended the first ser­vice of the Ash­wood Church of Christ.

Green Hills Church of Christ

A group of 48 adults from Waverly-​Belmont formed the Green Hills con­gre­ga­tion in 1948. The church met for the first time on April 4, 1948, in the home of W.E. Bright­well. Land at the cor­ner of Hills­boro Road and Castle­man Drive was bought for the site of a new church build­ing. Built in stages from Feb­ru­ary 1950 to April 1951, wor­ship ser­vices began there in April 1951. The Green Hills Church merged with the Ash­wood Church in April 1988 to form the Wood­mont Hills Church of Christ.

Wood­mont Hills Church of Christ

Fol­low­ing the merger that cre­ated the Wood­mont Hills Church, God’s bless­ings on the life of the church caused num­bers to con­tinue increas­ing. In 1987 – 1988, the lead­ers began to see the need for a larger and more ade­quate facil­ity. On August 7, 1994, the Wood­mont Hills Church moved all of its class­room fur­ni­ture, sup­plies, and teach­ing mate­ri­als into the upper class­room floor of the facil­i­ties at First Chris­t­ian Church at 4800 Franklin Road. On the after­noon of Sun­day, August 14, the church began two wor­ship ser­vices and a Bible study at that tem­po­rary location.

After much prayer, options were nar­rowed and the church pur­chased a house and par­cel of land at 3710 Franklin Road. This 14.4-acre prop­erty was deemed enough to build a facil­ity large enough to serve the needs of the Wood­mont Hills Church — with con­fi­dence that the Lord would sup­ply addi­tional space and options as the church grows. After sev­eral months of review before the City of Oak Hill, Metro Nashville, and the State of Ten­nessee, all obsta­cles to the con­struc­tion of a new build­ing at 3710 Franklin were over­come. The prop­erty pur­chase was final­ized on Decem­ber 5, 1994.

The church fam­ily com­mit­ted to fund­ing the con­struc­tion of a new facil­ity on the property. Construction was com­pleted in the spring of 1997. On Sun­day, March 16, 1997, the church met for the first time in the new facil­ity at 3710 Franklin Road. A sec­ond edu­ca­tional wing was con­structed and occu­pied in Octo­ber 1999. 

Hon­or­ing Our Past

The body of believ­ers that is the Fam­ily of God at Wood­mont Hills began in 1921. Through the years, the church has made con­scious deci­sions to glo­rify the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; to encour­age a rela­tion­ship with the Father; to inspire a sense of belong­ing; to share Jesus through exam­ple and deed, and to reach out to peo­ple in need. The val­ues and behav­ior of a faith­ful begin­ning helped shape our rela­tion­ship with the Father. We owe much to those men and women who have pre­ceded us in this church.

Chal­leng­ing the Present

The Wood­mont Hills Church of Christ con­tin­ues to seek the will of the Father, step­ping out of human tra­di­tion to more clearly wit­ness to the present work of Jesus Christ among his peo­ple. The Holy Spirit con­tin­ues to open doors of oppor­tu­nity as we grow and become the peo­ple that he wants us to be.

Pro­claim­ing the Future

As we con­tinue to ded­i­cate the build­ing at 3710 Franklin Road to the Lord, we make a covenant with heaven and earth. Regard­less of what the future holds, this body of Chris­tians will bear faith­ful wit­ness to God.

“We will serve the Lord.”