Planted by God

It was a sight that caught the eye of many passers-by in the 1940s as they traveled through what was then on the outskirts of Clearwater. A seemingly endless sea of gladiola blossoms stretched for 20 blocks in a part of town that soon would become a neighborhood called Skycrest.

As the gladiola farm relocated and houses started sprouting up, Amy Davis, a member of Calvary Baptist Church wrote a check for $100 to help launch a new mission in the area.

In May 1952, Calvary bought a section of the former gladiola farm and additional land that included a small bungalow. Skycrest’s first Sunday School classes were held there two years later. Within a few short months, the cottage chapel was bursting at the seams.

After reorganizing as a church in Sept. 1954, Skycrest built a new worship building, dining facility and education complex. In response to continued growth, Skycrest exchanged its original property in the mid-1980s for a 7½-acre landscape nursery on the southeast corner of Belcher Road and Drew Street. On June 14, 1987, the first services were held on what is now our present church campus.

God rooted us where living plants were being nurtured and continues to grow us today.