In German, the framed stained glass window reads, “To God be the glory”. Generations of Mary Stelzer’s family worshiped under this ornate piece of glass, 9 feet wide. Her great grandparents were charter members of Zion Lutheran Church when it opened at 2621 Swiss Ave., in 1879, and the congregation had the glass made for its sanctuary. Back then, the services were all in German. The church made the switch to English in 1940, and Mary Stelzer and her husband, Marvin, married there in 1943.
The church moved to Lovers and Skillman in 1954. The original church is long gone. The old piece of stained glass was stowed in the new church’s boiler room for years. And every time Mary Stelzer saw it, she noticed it falling farther into disrepair. So the Stelzers made a donation to the church to take the glass home and have it repaired. Their house on Marquita has a west-facing window that is just about 9 feet wide. Mary Stelzer believes God led them to buy that house so they would have a place for the glass. There it sat, the centerpiece of their living room, for decades. But now it’s time to give the glass back. The new church is undergoing renovations, and the design includes a place for the old piece of stained glass. So the Stelzers are having it restored once again, and in June, it’s going back permanently to Zion Lutheran.
“I will miss it,” Mary Stelzer says. “I’ve enjoyed seeing how the colors changed as the light changes in the west window.” A restorer told the Stelzers that gold was used to give the ruby red glass it vibrant color. And they think it could be the work of the same artist who designed stained glass for the St. Paul United Methodist Church, which was built on Routh Street in the 1870s. Even though the glass is out of their family life, the Stelzers are happy that the glass is going back to the church so that many more generations can enjoy it.
