Two Centuries on Market Street
Salem, New Jersey is the oldest incorporated town in the state, and at 88 Market Street stands a congregation whose roots run back nearly to its founding. First Presbyterian Church of Salem has gathered for worship since 1821, when a colonel with Presbyterian sympathies and two physician brothers broke ground on what was then private property. Colonel Robert G. Johnson, an Episcopalian by birth who had attended a Presbyterian school in Pittsgrove Township, gave the land and absorbed roughly half the cost of the original building - $1,161.26 toward a total of $2,419.79. Dr. James Van Meter and Dr. Robert Hunter Van Meter together took on the second-largest share at $315.61. John Congleton and Matthias Lambson each contributed $100, and a long list of smaller donors gave anywhere from thirty-one cents to sixty-five dollars.
That first building went up on what would become Grant Street on the morning of Tuesday, March 6, 1821. There was a brief objection to the laying of the cornerstone over property lines and the routing of a new road, but the matter was settled and Grant Street itself became public as a result. By 1835, attendance had outgrown even the expanded building, and within twenty years a new cornerstone was laid on July 17, 1854. About three years of construction later, the present sanctuary opened on Market Street, and the bell of the old Grant Street church was carried over in October 1856. The bell served its new home for just over a year before being donated to the Fenwick Fire Company in December 1857.
Two memorial gifts have left lasting marks on the sanctuary. In 1902, Mr. and Mrs. Albert Sherron gave a Tiffany Glass window in memory of their daughter Eva Alberta, who had died two years earlier at the dawn of the new century. Seven years later, in 1909, Mrs. Harriet Van Meter Cone gave the baptismal font still in use today in memory of her father, Dr. Robert Hunter Van Meter. Music is carried on a Hook and Hastings pipe organ originally built in 1878. The two-manual, fifteen-rank instrument was installed in the balcony in 1879 and pumped by hand until the ladies of the Pastoral Aid purchased a water-driven motor in 1902. In 1908 the organ was moved from the balcony to a newly built choir loft at the front of the sanctuary. Electric blower power took over the work of the water motor four years later, in 1912, and the organ has sounded from its present position ever since.
Sola Scriptura, Sola Gratia, Sola Fide
First Presbyterian Church of Salem stands within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the largest Presbyterian body in the United States. The congregation describes itself as theologically conservative and firmly rooted in the historic Reformed tradition, summing up its commitments in five Latin watchwords: Scripture Alone, Grace Alone, Faith Alone, Christ Alone, and All to the Glory of God.
The church's confession runs through the historic Christian doctrines. The Old and New Testaments are the authoritative witness to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, and the church understands itself as "reformed and always reforming according to the Word of God" in the power of the Holy Spirit. God has revealed Himself in three persons - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - and His will cannot be ultimately frustrated. There is no area of human relationship, endeavor, or culture outside His domain.
Humanity, though created in God's image, is sinful in every aspect of its nature and being, "lost and without hope of eternal life, save in God's redeeming mercy and grace." God the Son, in the fullness of time, humbled Himself, was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and was born of the virgin Mary. In the one person of Jesus Christ are two natures: fully God and fully man, yet without sin. He proclaimed the arrival of God's kingdom, performed miracles attesting to His deity and power, and offered Himself as the final, complete sacrifice for sin by His death on a Roman cross. By His bodily resurrection from the grave He conquered sin and death, promising the same redemption of the body to all who believe and trust in Him on the Last Day.
The Holy Spirit indwells each and every believer and endows every one with spiritual gifts for the work of ministry. There is one holy catholic Church in heaven and on earth: visibly divided into many denominations, but one body united with Christ and with the Church in heaven, made up of every man, woman, and child through the generations who has looked to Jesus Christ in hope for salvation. That Church is commissioned to take the gospel of salvation to every race, tribe, and tongue and to make disciples of all nations. And at the end, Jesus shall come again physically and visibly, on a day appointed by the Father: "the trumpet shall sound, Jesus shall appear, the dead shall be raised," and He shall gather His Church to Himself forever, wiping away every tear, ending mourning and crying and pain, as the former things pass away.
The congregation's own mission statement is more compact. "We believe in Christ-centered ministry." Jesus of Nazareth is the Word of God made flesh, the preaching of that Word holds first place in the church's life, and the teaching of the Bible is necessary for a growing relationship with God in Christ. "Jesus Christ is front and center in our ministry," the statement reads, quoting Colossians 1:17-18, "in him all things hold together... that in everything he might be preeminent."
Sunday Mornings on Market Street
Worship takes place at 11:00 a.m. on Sunday mornings. After June 11 each year, the service shifts to 10:00 a.m. for the summer schedule, and a fellowship hour follows the service each week, giving members and visitors a chance to greet one another over coffee and conversation.
The church has no dress code; visitors come as they are. There is no nursery care offered at present, and children are welcome to remain with their families in the pews. The sanctuary is reached through the double doors facing Market Street, which open into a vestibule. From there, a spiral staircase on either side leads up to three entryways into the nave.
Street parking is available along Market Street in front of the church, with a second lot behind the building on Grant Street. Driving directions the church publishes cover five common approaches: from the Delaware Memorial Bridge via Route 49 south and a left onto Griffith Street; from I-295 south via 551 (Hook Road) east and Route 49 south; from Woodstown by way of Route 45, which becomes Market Street as it enters Salem City; from Bridgeton, Shiloh, and Quinton via Route 49 westbound; and from Alloway along Route 657, which becomes Grant Street. Each route ends at 88 Market Street, on the left or right depending on the direction of travel.
Lighthouse and the Olive Street Garden
Outreach takes concrete shape through Lighthouse Ministry Inc., a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization that members of First Presbyterian Church initiated, incorporated, and continue to help fund, alongside donations from other churches, individuals, and local groups. Lighthouse describes itself as a faith-based Christian outreach to the children and youth of Salem City and greater Salem County, with the goal of presenting the claims of Jesus Christ and His gospel to young people and to their families.
At its center sits the Lighthouse Learning Center, a volunteer-based tutoring program for elementary students that has been running since 2007. More than ninety tutors drawn from at least twelve different churches have volunteered at least one day a week over the years. They come from many backgrounds - retired teachers, mothers of young children, junior and high school students, recent college graduates, retired adults, and pastors - and share a love for children and a desire to make a difference. Each session focuses on reading and math, with nutritious after-school snacks, a steady daily routine, and time for both group and one-on-one work. Adult volunteers apply with references and pass a background check before being oriented to the program and trained in the reading materials at hand.
Beyond tutoring, Lighthouse runs youth mentoring, a youth home repair program, and youth leadership training that includes paid positions for motivated high school students interested in building job-related skills. Free summer day camps round out the calendar. A community garden first started by the ministry has grown into the Olive Street Community Garden Project, established in one of the most distressed neighborhoods in the city. Since 2021, the Ann C. Campbell Garden House has extended Lighthouse's reach, providing a warm, welcoming space for building relationships, reaching people for Christ, and meeting practical needs in the surrounding community.
The congregation's stated vision is to strengthen outreach by forming partnerships with other local churches, with the public schools, and with the wider community. The Olive Street garden and the Garden House are the visible expression of that vision in one neighborhood of Salem.
Two Hundred Years and Counting
First Presbyterian Church of Salem now sits at the center of an extended family of ministries: a 200-year-old sanctuary on Market Street, a Reformed confession that runs from the Five Solas to the resurrection of the body, a Sunday gathering followed by coffee and fellowship, and a community garden in the same small city where Colonel Johnson once sketched out plans for the first cornerstone. Whether a visitor comes for the Tiffany window, the Hook and Hastings organ, the tutoring down the street, or simply a Sunday morning pew, the church on the corner of Market and Grant Street has been opening its doors since 1821.