'The heart' of small Kentucky town destroyed by fire

A devastating fire struck at “the heart” of a small Kentucky town when a historic building was destroyed in a blaze.

The Old Annville Institute, erected in 1922 and home to Grace Coventry Ministries, burned to the ground late Wednesday night and into Thursday morning. Twelve fire departments battled the fire.

Despite the effort, the “building’s walls collapsed as fire within the main unit continued to spread,” according to a report by WKYT.com.

Annville is a town of approximately 1,000 residents in Jackson County.

Pond Creek Fire Chief Jay Gabbard told WKYT.com that the building was “the heart of Annville.”

The cause of the fire is currently unknown. The Jackson County Sheriff’s Office and ATF are leading the investigation.

Grace Coventry Ministries posted the following statement on the fire on its Facebook page at 8:00 Thursday morning:

I am not sure how to even start a post like this…a lot of emotions this morning. Last night a building with an amazing legacy and history burned beyond repair. God tells us to give thanks in all things, so today we choose to give God thanks. We don’t thank Him for the fire but we thank Him for the memories, we thank Him for the countless lives that were touched in and around this building. We thank Him for all of the fire fighters who did their best last night and even now continue to monitor flames and have been at the site for over 7 hours now. We thank God that nobody was hurt and that the firefighters kept Sexton Hall and Annville Community Church from starting on fire.

Finally, we thank God for His sovereignty. We believe with all our hearts that God is in control and that He “works all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.” -Romans 8:28. Knowing all of that, we rest in His will and ask you to pray for wisdom for us as we also seek God’s will for us moving forward. To many of you and to us this was more than just a building-it represented a vision of Reverend Worthington from 1909. You can rest assured that that vision is alive and well today and we will do our best to honor God and the vision of reaching out to our community with the redeeming love of Christ. We had big plans for Lincoln Hall. We may only see the ugliness of a fire, but God sees the big picture and He has a plan, so we “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus.” May God be glorified, even in this.