On July 4, as we celebrate our nation’s 250th Anniversary, bells from all around the country will ring at 2:50 p.m. eastern time. For the most part, they will ring 13 times for the 13 original colonies.

Ebenezer Evangelical Congregational Church at 441 Center Ave. in the Heights of Jim Thorpe is one of the many churches and organizations who will be ringing their bell.

Not only are members celebrating the nation’s birthday; they are celebrating the fact that they are able to ring their bell at all.

“We call it the ‘Miracle on Center Avenue’,” explained Connie Hoffman, a volunteer with the church.

The congregation begin meeting in 1855 in a nearby building. The church building on Center Avenue was built 130 years ago in 1896. It’s one of the historic buildings in the area. But the church was showing its age.

In 2017, the church’s board approached the congregation with a huge renovation need. The bell tower, chimney, and roof all needed to be repaired and/or replaced. It was pointed out that there were numerous holes in the roof, causing leaks into the sanctuary, which damaged the church. And the bell tower was crumbling and in danger of collapsing. Also, the stained glass windows needed to be reglazed.

The initial cost was expected to be around $75,000. After complete estimates were done, it was determined the project would actually cost around $345,000.

The renovation began in May 2020, and took about four months, being completed in September 2020. Speedwell Construction of Manheim did the work

“We had a lot of fundraisers to help pay for the project,” Hoffman explained. “We had food sales, soup sales, bake sales, yard sales and auctions. We collected Jim Thorpe Market and Redner’s sales receipts for donation reimbursements.”

The fundraising committee raised about $110,000, and the rest was set up with a loan from Myerstown.

“The miracle is that with such an expensive project, we managed to pay off the entire loan this past September,” Hoffman stated.