Porters Chapel United Methodist Church will celebrate the 50th anniversary of its sanctuary with a weekend of homecoming events.

The slate of events begins at 4 p.m. Saturday at the church, 200 Porters Chapel Road, said Lundy Marshall, chairwoman of the Family Life Committee, which is sponsoring homecoming.

“We’re going to have our fellowship and finger foods,” she said.

Following the snacking and visiting, Mike Robison will perform a concert, she said.

Sunday morning, the church will hold its regular services at 11 a.m. followed by a covered dish lunch.

“After the services will have a covered dish dinner and more visiting and hopefully get to see a lot of our friends from the past,” longtime church member Pearl Carter said. “You can’t beat the food at Porters Chapel. We guarantee it will be good,”

Sunday’s speaker will be former Porters Chapel pastor Willis Britt. Of course current pastor Donald Williams also has his connection to Porters Chapel’s past.

“He was the pastor when we built the new sanctuary. It’s hard to believe that he is the pastor now. He came back a year ago. We think that is really a great thing,” Marshall said.

The church typically has 50 members in its pews every weekend, but for homecoming activities, attendance is expected to swell to twice that size.

“We’re certainly hoping to have a large crowd,” Carter said. “We want to extend an invitation to everyone in the community to join us on Sunday and Saturday too for that matter.”

Porters Chapel’s congregation has been in existence since 1830. Its original building was constructed in the mid 1800s, and a second was added in 1910. The first services in the current sanctuary building were held in 1965 and the original sanctuary was used in 1985 when a family life center was built.