The church in Loughor was known originally as “Jehovah Jireh”, the Lord will provide; this was true and very real in the lives and experiences of the believers there in the early days of the testimony. It came about in the following way.

In 1926, every Sunday a man by the name of Mr Banfield, an evangelist, along with Mr Hickory who was blind, used to walk from Manselton, Swansea to Loughor, a distance of six miles in order to meet with Christians at the English Congregational Church. After studying the Scriptures for some time, they became concerned that the Congregational church was not following the principles and practices laid down in the New Testament.

Mr Banfield and several of the other believers decided to leave the Congregational Church and meet together in a rented room above the old Town Hall (the lower part was a Police Station, complete with cell). They continued meeting there for two years. At the time many of the believers were from poor working class backgrounds. Coal miners, tin and steelworkers, labourers and many unemployed. It was 1926 the time of the general strike but God touched many men and womens’ hearts and their lives had been changed.

Later it came into their hearts to look for land in Loughor to build a hall. On the street where they were then meeting a man called Johnny Butler built two houses on a field that he owned. Jocelyn Davies bought a plot of land and built a bungalow, at the side of which was a wide entrance gate that led to a slaughterhouse at the bottom of the field. Mr Banfield negotiated for the remainder of that field.

However, they were not prepared to go into debt on any account, so everything had to be paid for beforehand. How were they going to do it? There were those amongst them who were employed and owned their own homes. They arranged with the bank to take possession of their homes so that the Church could obtain a loan. All the company of Jireh agreed to repay two shillings and sixpence (12 1/2p) a week, which at the time was a lot of money. The average weekly wage at this time was only 15 shillings (£2.40) a week.
They managed to maintain the payments only by cutting down on the amount of food they ate. Instead of having the normal joint of roast beef for Sunday dinner they had sausages, with chips, potatoes or anything they could grow in the garden. Many bowls of cawl (welsh broth) were made, many kept pigs for bacon, and rice and eggs were very cheap.

The land was thus bought and the Gospel Hall was built behind the houses. The building was made from wood, in the centre was a round coal stove for heating and seating was on long wooden benches.

Indeed the Lord did provide and the name of the fellowship therefore could only be “Jehovah Jireh”. It was with great regret in later years that the name Jehovah was dropped, remembering this the writer would like to see this restored again, for we are where we are today because of those who put the Saviour before their stomachs. “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us”(1 Sam 7:12) is surely the privilege of those who can look back over the years gone by and trace the good hand of God.

There were days of disappointment, despair, and departure from the gatherings but there were also days of great delight. Even with money being so hard to come by, people would not work on Sundays despite the pay being double the normal amount. Many would work on a Saturday right through until midnight and stop. They called Sundays the Lord’s Day, a day indeed for the Lord. They refused to work overtime on the prayer meeting nights, saying to their employers that they had very important business with the Lord. These faithful men and women experienced the blessings of the Lord in their time and the truth of 1 Sam 2:30 which says “Them that honour me I will honour”.

In 1986 the brethren realised that the sixty-year-old wooden building was deteriorating. A new building fund was initiated, and a team of volunteers led by Jeff Bowen and his father Eric with support from the believers from the assembly helped in the mammoth task of building a new brick hall around the old existing one.
On April 23rd 1988 the new building was opened. This is the building that is pictured on the front page of the Loughor website.