The Society built its first church, a blue stucco barn called the Wesley Chapel, on this site in 1768; its design was attributed to Barbara Heck.[3][5] Timber from the Chapel was later used in building the Bowery Village Methodist Church and the Park Avenue United Methodist Church.[5] The second church on this site was built in 1817-18, and the extravagance of the building provoked a secession from the congregation by Rev. William Stillwell. The third church, the current one, was necessitated by the widening of John Street.[5]
Hymnist Fanny Crosby was a member of the church congregation for many years.
Museum
Below the sanctuary, the Wesley Chapel Museum displays many artifacts from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American Methodist history. These include church record books, the Wesley Clock (a gift of John Wesley, 1769), love feast cups, class meeting circular benches, the original 1785 altar rail, the original 1767 pulpit made by Philip Embury, and Embury's signed Bible.[6]