Skip to main content

Touchdown Jesus gets torched by lightning

Charred remnants remained this morning, June 15, of the large Jesus statue iconic to Interstate 75 that was destroyed following an apparent lightning strike during a thunderstorm late Monday night.

The Lawrence Bishop Music Theater at Solid Rock Church on Union Road endured smoke damage, according to officials. Damages to the King of Kings statue and the theater were estimated to be around $700,000, said Monroe Fire Chief Mark Neu.

No one was injured in the blaze.

The smell of smoke surrounded the area of the statue’s charred frame, and the pond in front of it appeared murky, witnesses said.

Keith Lewis of Middletown showed up at the church just after 7 a.m. with a camera in hand to take some shots of the remains. His wife, Stephanie, sent him.

“It has been a landmark in this area for a long time,” Lewis said. “She said she wanted picture of what was left.”

A guitarist, Lewis said he has learned to play comedian Heywood Banks’ song about the statue, “Big Butter Jesus,” and has also had his picture taking in front with his hands in the air.

Was the statue an oddity or inspiration to Lewis?

“Really a little of both,” he said, noting he doesn’t believe the nicknames were meant with any disrespect. “Kind of do hope they rebuild it.”

Neu has called a news conference for 10 a.m. today at the church. He and Police Lt. Brian Curlis said officials have been swamped with calls from media across the Tri-State this morning about the blaze.

Neu said indications are lightning struck the right hand of the statue. 911 calls received by Monroe and Warren County dispatchers confirm witnesses saw the hand on fire first.

“It was fully involved when our guys got there,” Neu said. Firefighters were dispatched at 11:16 p.m. and were on the scene at 11:22 p.m.

The church was not damaged, but audio equipment housed in the music theater was damaged, Neu said.

The touchdown jesus in Monroe, OhioImage via Wikipedia
“They had a lot of expensive audio equipment that was lost,” he said.

Earlier this morning and late Monday night, motorists were stopped along the highway and along Union Road in Monroe to watch the 62-foot King of Kings statue burn. The fire was reported at 11:15 p.m. Monday, June 14. Within minutes, all that was left was the steel frame of the statue at the church.

Church member Cassie Browning, 27, of Dayton, said she was driving north on I-75 on her way back from Tennessee when she and her family saw smoke and noticed the statue missing. “It meant so much to so many people,” Browning said. “The statue can be destroyed and gone, but Jesus can’t be.”

The fire spread to the attic area of the church’s adjacent amphitheater. There were no injuries, said Neu, who spoke just before 2:30 a.m. to media at the scene. It was a “hot fire,” he said, which made it more difficult to battle, but it was extinguished within about an hour.

In the late evening and early morning hours, social media sites such as Facebook fueled interest and onlookers: the curious, the incredulous and still others who just wanted to poke a little fun at the situation.

“God struck God, I like the irony. Jesus struck Jesus,” said Dawn Smith, 25, of Hamilton, who was among those standing outside the vehicles along Union Road. “I had to see it. What else are you going to do on a Monday night?”

Since its completion in 2004, the statue, which appeared to come out of a pond in front of the nondenominational megachurch, was known by multiple nicknames, including “Touchdown Jesus” because the arms and hands were raised upward. It also was known as “Big Butter Jesus” after comedian Heywood Banks referred to it as such and created a song about the statue, which he performed on radio’s popular “The Bob and Tom Show.”

The statue was constructed of wood and styrofoam over a steel framework that was anchored in concrete and covered with a fiberglass mat and resin exterior, according to the church. It was slated to undergo renovations this summer.

Also gathered along Union Road were Franklin twins and storm chasers Levi and Seth Walsh, who said they were out in the thunderstorm when they heard about the fire through a Facebook update.

“It sent goosebumps through my whole body because I am a believer,” said Levi Walsh, 29. “Of all the things that could have been struck, I just think that that would be protected. ... It’s something that’s not supposed to happen, Jesus burning,” he said. “I had to see it with my own eyes.”

“I can’t believe Jesus was struck,” said his brother, who noted the giant Hustler Hollywood sign for the adult store across the street was untouched. “It’s the last thing I expected to happen.”

Whether jostled by the incident, or ready to call out zingers, all agreed the statue is what makes that stretch of I-75 in front of the church special.

“It’s a landmark, so it’s going to make the drive different,” said Josh Bartram, 18, of Middletown.

Because the fire was sparked by lightning, Neu said there will be no further investigation.

Also lost in the fire was audio equipment stored in the attic that Neu said was to be used for a Fourth of July event at the church. No damage estimate will be available until 10 a.m. today, said Neu, who added that church leaders indicated to him they planned to replace and rebuild all that was lost in the fire.

Crews responded from Monroe, Middletown, Liberty Twp., Deerfield Twp. and Trenton, according to dispatchers.

STORY LINK



King of Kings (Also known as "Touchdown Jesus" or "Big Butter Jesus"), is a 62-foot-tall sculpture of Jesus just outside of Cincinnati. Jesus appears to be rising from the waters behind the amphitheater at Monroe's Solid Rock Church.

Music by Heywood Banks, the version originally broadcast on the syndicated Bob & Tom radio show.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Are You an Atheist Success Story?

By Avangelism Project ~ F acts don’t spread. Stories do. It’s how (good) marketing works, it’s how elections (unfortunately) are won and lost, and it’s how (all) religion spreads. Proselytization isn’t accomplished with better arguments. It’s accomplished with better stories and it’s time we atheists catch up. It’s not like atheists don’t love a good story. Head over to the atheist reddit and take a look if you don’t believe me. We’re all over stories painting religion in a bad light. Nothing wrong with that, but we ignore the value of a story or a testimonial when we’re dealing with Christians. We can’t be so proud to argue the semantics of whether atheism is a belief or deconversion is actually proselytization. When we become more interested in defining our terms than in affecting people, we’ve relegated ourselves to irrelevance preferring to be smug in our minority, but semantically correct, nonbelief. Results Determine Reality The thing is when we opt to bury our

So Just How Dumb Were Jesus’ Disciples? The Resurrection, Part VII.

By Robert Conner ~ T he first mention of Jesus’ resurrection comes from a letter written by Paul of Tarsus. Paul appears to have had no interest whatsoever in the “historical” Jesus: “even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, we know him so no longer.” ( 2 Corinthians 5:16 ) Paul’s surviving letters never once mention any of Jesus’ many exorcisms and healings, the raising of Lazarus, or Jesus’ virgin birth, and barely allude to Jesus’ teaching. For Paul, Jesus only gets interesting after he’s dead, but even here Paul’s attention to detail is sketchy at best. For instance, Paul says Jesus “was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” ( 1 Corinthians 15:4 ), but there are no scriptures that foretell the Jewish Messiah would at long last appear only to die at the hands of Gentiles, much less that the Messiah would then be raised from the dead after three days. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus—an event Paul never mentions in his lette

Christian TV presenter reads out Star Wars plot as story of salvation

An email prankster tricked the host of a Christian TV show into reading out the plots of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Star Wars in the belief they were stories of personal salvation. The unsuspecting host read out most of the opening rap to The Fresh Prince, a 1990s US sitcom starring Will Smith , apparently unaware that it was not a genuine testimony of faith. The prankster had slightly adapted the lyrics but the references to a misspent youth playing basketball in West Philadelphia would have been instantly familiar to most viewers. The lines read out by the DJ included: "One day a couple of guys who were up to no good starting making trouble in my living area. I ended up getting into a fight, which terrified my mother." The presenter on Genesis TV , a British Christian channel, eventually realised that he was being pranked and cut the story short – only to move on to another spoof email based on the plot of the Star Wars films. It began: &quo

ACTS OF GOD

By David Andrew Dugle ~   S ettle down now children, here's the story from the Book of David called The Parable of the Bent Cross. In the land Southeast of Eden –  Eden, Minnesota that is – between two rivers called the Big Miami and the Little Miami, in the name of Saint Gertrude there was once built a church. Here next to it was also built a fine parochial school. The congregation thrived and after a multitude of years, a new, bigger church was erected, well made with clean straight lines and a high steeple topped with a tall, thin cross of gold. The faithful felt proud, but now very low was their money. Their Sunday offerings and school fees did not suffice. Anon, they decided to raise money in an unclean way. One fine summer day the faithful erected tents in the chariot lot between the two buildings. In the tents they set up all manner of games – ring toss, bingo, little mechanical racing horses and roulette wheels – then all who lived in the land between the two rivers we

Why I left the Canadian Reformed Church

By Chuck Eelhart ~ I was born into a believing family. The denomination is called Canadian Reformed Church . It is a Dutch Calvinistic Christian Church. My parents were Dutch immigrants to Canada in 1951. They had come from two slightly differing factions of the same Reformed faith in the Netherlands . Arriving unmarried in Canada they joined the slightly more conservative of the factions. It was a small group at first. Being far from Holland and strangers in a new country these young families found a strong bonding point in their church. Deutsch: Heidelberger Katechismus, Druck 1563 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) I was born in 1955 the third of eventually 9 children. We lived in a small southern Ontario farming community of Fergus. Being young conservative and industrious the community of immigrants prospered. While they did mix and work in the community almost all of the social bonding was within the church group. Being of the first generation born here we had a foot in two

Morality is not a Good Argument for Christianity

By austinrohm ~ I wrote this article as I was deconverting in my own head: I never talked with anyone about it, but it was a letter I wrote as if I was writing to all the Christians in my life who constantly brought up how morality was the best argument for Christianity. No Christian has read this so far, but it is written from the point of view of a frustrated closeted atheist whose only outlet was organizing his thoughts on the keyboard. A common phrase used with non-Christians is: “Well without God, there isn’t a foundation of morality. If God is not real, then you could go around killing and raping.” There are a few things which must be addressed. 1. Show me objective morality. Define it and show me an example. Different Christians have different moral standards depending on how they interpret the Bible. Often times, they will just find what they believe, then go back into scripture and find a way to validate it. Conversely, many feel a particular action is not