VALDOSTA — Macedonia First Baptist Church’s congregation was first called in the days near the Civil War’s end. Only months, really, following Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. It formed when Valdosta was about six years old.

Through Reconstruction, segregation, civil rights and raised equality, Macedonia First Baptist Church has continued meeting and worshiping from the middle of the 19th century into these early years of the 21st century.

On Sunday, Macedonia kicks off its 150th anniversary celebration at the church. It is the oldest African-American church in Valdosta, according to the church history.

• At 3 p.m. Sunday, a pre-anniversary celebration features Pastor Bernard Robinson, Greater Pleasant Temple Baptist Church.

•  At 7 p.m., Feb. 16, a pre-anniversary night service features the Rev. Dr. Joe Troope, River Hill Baptist Church.

• At 7 p.m., Feb. 17, a pre-anniversary night service features the Rev. Jimmy Jay Williams, Shady Grove Baptist Church.

• At 6:30 p.m., Feb. 19, an anniversary banquet features guest speaker the Rev. Dr. Gregory Homer, a Valdosta native, at Mathis City Auditorium, 2300 N. Ashley St. Ticket: $25; purchase deadline: Thursday. More information: Call (229) 247-2858.

• At 3 p.m., Feb. 22, Anniversary Celebration Culmination, with guest speaker the Rev. Dr. Perry Simmons Jr., Abyssinian Baptist Church, Newark, N.J.

Several years ago, Ruth Chastang shared a detailed history of the church’s early years with the Lowndes County Historical, Society.

This history was compiled by the Rev. J.L. Lomax and Stella Gilmore, probably in the 1960s.

Following Valdosta’s creation in 1859-60, the Rev. Charles Anderson held religious services for a group of the city’s black residents in several locations.

Anderson had been born a slave in 1813, owned by a Savannah judge. He grew up on the farm but later worked the railroad as tracks extended into Georgia.

Between the ages of 25-30, he moved from the fields to his master’s paint shop, where he became a skilled carriage painter. During part of the Civil War, his master forced Anderson to pack provisions for the Confederate Army.

By war’s end, Anderson was a free man, a godly man who had moved to Valdosta.

He led worship services. In 1865, he founded Macedonia First African Baptist Church. In 1867, the church’s name changed to its current Macedonia First Baptist Church.

For the first several months, the church was represented wholly by the idea that the congregation, not the structure, is the church. Meetings were held at the McKey Place on St. Augustine Road.

By early 1868, Anderson formed a group of members who became the fledgling church council, which adopted the Articles of Faith of the Orthodox Baptist Church.

Joe Goldwire, a white man and member of the old Troupville Baptist Church and clerk of the then-new Valdosta Baptist Church, assisted Anderson and his congregation in forming Macedonia. Goldwire also opened the first free black school.

Macedonia’s first church building is described as “little more than a shanty, made of pine slabs, with rough planks for seats and pine straw for the flooring,” according to the church history. In short time, the congregation found it unacceptable and unusable.

They sought a new location or a new church building.

The old Troupville Baptist Church had been dismantled and the materials placed in storage. To acquire this lumber, the church would need $130, “an enormous amount of money for a recent slave (the Rev. Anderson) to even think about,” according to the history.

Anderson sacrificed his talents, his energies, his income and in some measure his newfound freedom to make the new church building a reality. Anderson hired himself to various local white families with instructions that his pay be directly sent to the owners of the second-hand lumber.

It took him a few years at this routine, but a large-framed church house was built with the materials.

Anderson lived to the age of 94, dying in 1907. In 1909, Pastor A.W. Bryan supervised the construction of the current sanctuary location at 715 J.L. Lomax Drive.

On June 3, 1913, fire destroyed the old wooden church. But the faith of Anderson and the original congregation lives on at Macedonia First Baptist Church.