In The Days

• Source: Detroit News
• News Date: 6/15/10
• Submitted By: Jim Remington

Monroe, Ohio — A six-story-tall statue of Jesus Christ with his arms raised along a highway was struck by lightning in a thunderstorm Monday night and burned to the ground, police said.

Idols

“Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.”
—1 John 5:21

The “King of Kings” statue, one of southwest Ohio’s most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati.
The lightning strike set the statue ablaze around 11:15 p.m., Monroe police dispatchers said.

The sculpture, 62 feet tall and 40 feet wide at the base, showed Jesus from the torso up and was nicknamed Touchdown Jesus because of the way his arms were raised, as though signaling a touchdown. It was made of plastic foam and fiberglass over a steel frame, which is all that remained early today.
The fire spread from the statue to an adjacent amphitheater but was confined to the attic area, and no one was injured, Police Chief Mark Neu said. The Fire Department would release a monetary damage estimate today, he said.
The huge statue by the roadside often startled travelers on Interstate 75, but many said America needs more symbols like it. So many people stopped at the church campus that church officials had to build a walkway to accommodate them.
The 4,000-member, nondenominational church was founded by former horse trader Lawrence Bishop and his wife. Bishop said in 2004 he was trying to help people, not impress them, with the statue. He said his wife proposed the Jesus figure as a beacon of hope and salvation and they spent about $250,000 to finance it.