From an Open-Air Service to a Church and an Education Centre: A St Elizabeth Pastor’s 36 Years in Elim

• Pastor Everton Charlton held Elim’s first open-air service on May 24, 1987
• The Elim Shiloh Apostolic Church grew out of it and now has its own building
• An education centre was built on church grounds for literacy, computer and baking classes
• His congregation honoured him for 36 years of community service

In May 1987 a young youth leader walked into Elim, a community in north-eastern St Elizabeth, and preached in the open air. Thirty-six years later, the congregation that grew from that service has honoured Pastor Everton Charlton for building both a church and a place of learning, the Jamaica Observer reported.

Charlton grew up with his father, Elder R Charlton, as a leader in the Shiloh Apostolic Church. According to a church statement, in 1987, when he became youth president at the Goshen Assembly, he received his father’s blessing for a new work. A trio from the Goshen Shiloh Apostolic Church went to survey Elim, and on May 24, 1987 he held the first open-air service there. The Elim Shiloh Apostolic Church was formed after it.

The church statement said one of his goals as leader had been “to ensure a facility to house his members”, and that this had been “realised”. Under his leadership an education centre was also built on the church grounds. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, students there got help with literacy, numeracy, computer technology and baking. He has also led scholarships for secondary and tertiary students.

His congregation recently held a service in his honour. The statement described him as an active believer in “taking the gospel to the people” through open-air services, and said his interest in community development leads him to organise meals every Christmas Day for elderly and shut-in residents. He also leads the Grosmond Shiloh Apostolic Church in the parish.

Elim’s story follows a common pattern for rural Jamaican churches: services in the open first, then land, then a church building, and then a second building that serves the whole district. An education centre on church grounds turns a place used mostly on Sundays into a community facility used all week. For small congregations and diaspora supporters thinking about what to fund next, this is a model worth copying. A modest multi-purpose building on land the church already owns can deliver skills training and after-school help for years, and the land does not have to be bought.

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