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Source: Betty Colmery, History Committee Chair, GVPC 300th Committee
Date: 2010
From the 1710 Presbytery minutes we know that two separate groups of Welsh Presbyterians had formed a united congregation, one body living in the Welsh Tract in Pennsylvania and the other in Delaware at Pencader. These churches are among the twelve organized prior to 1770.
David Evans was an elder, probably having been ordained in Wales. He preached to both of these congregations but the Presbytery refused to ordain him until he had received further theological training. In 1713 he graduated from Yale College in a class of three. Soon after his graduation, Rev. Evans received a call from the church in Delaware, which he accepted, and was ordained in 1714. He has the distinction of being the first candidate for the ministry taken under the care of any presbytery in our land. He was also the first man ordained to the Christian ministry in this country according to the brief history of the church published by Dr. Arthur Willis Spooner, who was a minister at Great Valley a hundred years later.
The people at Great Valley did not unite with the Delaware Church in that call. They were therefore authorized by the Presbytery to form themselves into a separate and distinct body.
Apparently discouraged by the long wait for Mr. Evans the Great Valley congregation was by then enjoying the ministering of Rev. Malachi Jones who preached to them “as occasional supply in private homes and in the woods.” It was “by his labors” and under the authorization from the Presbytery that “they were induced to assume the form of a congregation, constituted to worship God according to His Word, and for this purpose bound themselves by a written compact dated the 10th day of October, 1714.”
During the six years following the formal organization of the Church it was without a pastor and was dependent upon the Presbytery for supplies, of whom Rev. Malachi Jones was the most frequent. Then in 1720 trouble arose in the Delaware congregation which led to the dissolving of the pastoral relation. Rev. David Evans was then called to Great Valley and under his ministry it grew considerably.
It is interesting to note that the Upper Octorara Church was at first connected with Great Valley Church, for in 1721 Rev. Evans was directed to spend one-fourth of his time there, the distance between the two being about twenty-two miles. In 1738 he was appointed to supply also once a month the Norriton Church in Montgomery County, which was about ten miles in the other direction.
Rev. Evans remained as the resident pastor at Great Valley for twenty years. He was a talented speaker of fiery eloquence, but grew to be eccentric, vacillating and volatile, and he created friction within the church. When he announced that he would preach his final sermon, it was delivered to a packed house. It may well have been the briefest sermon on record, consisting of only ten words. According to tradition, his parting shot was “It’s goats I found ye and goats I leave ye,” which was not well received by the members of the church and he had to jump out the window to escape. That was in 1740.
However, he soon forgave and forgot, and two years later he addressed the “goats” as a “church of Christians.” He died in 1751.
It is interesting to note that following a short interim of another pastor Rev. Samuel Evans, a son of Rev. David Evans, was installed at Great Valley in 1742 and served for five years.
References: The Great Valley Presbyterian Church by Ruth Moore Styer, TEQ 8-1 (November 1953); Early Memories and an Historical Sketch of Great Valley Presbyterian Church by Emily Wilson Nassau, TEQ 14-4 (October 1967); The Wilsons and Great Valley Presbyterian Church by Eleanor D. Chworowsky, TEQ 22-4 (October 1984); Great Valley Presbyterian Church by Mary Robertson Ives, TEQ 22-4 (October 1984); Great Valley Presbyterian Church by Mary Robertson Ives, TEQ 32-1 (January 1994)
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