Who is 1st G?
We are 1st G Strong!
Nurtured. Pressed. Purposed.
Our Identity as a Gethsemane People
Where God Transforms Lives
VISION
First Gethsemane is a thriving multigenerational church unified in demonstrating love and grace to Louisville and beyond.
Scripture Foundation: John 21:15-17
MISSION
Transforming lives by helping every person discover their value, their voice, and their purpose through Jesus Christ.
Scripture Foundation: Ephesians 2:10
OUR MINISTRY PHILOSOPHY
From Sunday to Saturday. From the sanctuary to the street. God is present in every season of your life, and so are we.
The Three Pillars of Our Mission
Value
Every person carries worth that no one can take away. We awaken what God already placed inside them.
Voice
Every person has something to say and contribute. We draw out what is already there.
Purpose
Every person was made for something specific. We move people from attending to activating.
The Gethsemane Perspective
Gethsemane means ‘oil press.’ For centuries, the press has been misread as an instrument of destruction. It is not. It is an instrument of release, designed to draw out what was always there. This is the theology that shapes us: God does not press God’s people to break them. God presses them to reveal what God has already placed within them.
Nurtured
God is a gardener. We are cared for, cultivated, and tended before any pressing begins.
Pressed
We do not run from hard seasons. The pressing is not punishment. It is the process through which God’s purpose is released.
Purposed
The pressing was never random. We emerge with direction, identity, and a holy assignment.
The oil was always inside the olive.
The pressing simply revealed what was already there.
First Gethsemane exists to be the place where God's people are nurtured into their worth, pressed into their calling, and released into the world.
What We Believe
WE BELIEVE in a Triune God (Father, Son [Jesus Christ], and Holy Spirit) as the one and only true God.
WE BELIEVE
that Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, is the only way to salvation.
WE BELIEVE
in and stand on The Holy Bible as the revealed and inspired Word of God; The Lord’s perfect
revelation to humankind.
WE BELIEVE
that all believers are called and spiritually gifted for ministry service for the present age. The
local church is a body of baptized believers in Jesus Christ who work in covenant relationship under the headship of Jesus and led by a Senior Pastor as overseer and under shepherd.
Our History: Oil From the Press
In 1910, a railroad switchman named Rev. Henry Jones walked through a forgotten Louisville neighborhood called The Bottoms and could not shake a single thought: these people deserve a church. He rented a rundown building, set out his own benches, and invited a young preacher to come and hold revival. Four weeks later, fourteen souls were saved. Nine charter members made a covenant. And on May 3, 1910, First Gethsemane Baptist Church was born with a thirty-five cent offering and a faith that has never stopped growing.
What God started in The Bottoms, He has refused to leave there. Through depression and flood, fire and pandemic, seven pastors have carried this congregation from a mission building on South Floyd Street to a thriving campus on Algonquin Parkway and into the life of a city that has never been the same since. Leaders developed here have served on four continents. History was made here when the first women were ordained in 1995. And through every pressing, this church has done what the garden it is named for has always done: produced oil. One hundred and sixteen years later, First Gethsemane is still at it. Still pressing. Still producing. Still the place Where God Transforms Lives.
Affiliations
First Gethsemane Baptist Church is a proud member of the following organizations:
Central Baptist Association
General Association of Kentucky Baptists
Lott Carey Baptist Foreign Missions Convention
Youth for Christ Louisville
