MACON - The question for Macon United Methodist Church was a no-brainer: Why build a stairway to heaven when you can put in an elevator?

The Methodists actually tore out an old staircase and replaced it with the gleaming $70,000 elevator, which gives the righteous instant admission to either the sanctuary or the comfortable basement meeting rooms.

And it also means the church can now give an instant lift to 310 years of living history at the touch of a button, which is a great relief to the history whose ability to ascend stairs in the pursuit of faith isn't what it used to be.

"I just think this new elevator is great," says 106-year-old Elsie Nicholls. "I rode that other thing up more than anybody, and this is just, well, great."

The "other thing" is an open air mini-elevator contraption that used to lift those in need of help up the front steps, while the heavens rained down whatever they could. Nicholls sure didn't like it much, and neither did the rest of the history: Ruth Sanner, 103, or 101-year-old Trenna Carroll.

All three centenarian congregation members were on hand recently for the dedication of the elevator, and all pronounced that this was an improvement of which they were well pleased.

"It's very nice," adds Sanner.

"I like it," Carroll said.

The 200-strong church family certainly likes having the three women around, two of whom are actually older than the circa 1906 church building, and realized that more youthful church members in their 70s and 80s also might appreciate power-assisted ascension.

"It was just time; putting in the elevator needed to be done," explains Pastor David Hutton, a mere baby at 64. "Because while these ladies are the only three we have in wheelchairs, we do have a lot of elderly, and the outside lift was getting impractical, and it gave them no access to the basement."

Asked how unusual it was to have three church members whose collective age is 78 years older than the nation they live in, Hutton believes it's got to be some kind of record. "As far as I know, we're the only church around here who can say that," he adds.

"And I don't know why; maybe it's something in the water."

Don't ask the women what longevity's magic formula is, either, because they all arrived at the other end of a century along very different paths. Carroll worked jobs ranging from bookkeeping to nursing in her long life and still lives in her own home. "I've always believed in God, and I believe in prayer," she announces with a smile. "Prayer helps you a lot."

Sanner, who lives in the Moweaqua Nursing and Retirement Center, ran a lumber yard in Macon for 50 years, likes to chill out with a dose of television and plays a wicked hand of pinochle. "I just think it's fun being 103," she says. "And you've got to make your own fun wherever you go."

Nicholls was a farmer who drove a tractor and rode a stationary bicycle six miles every morning while reading the morning paper. She only gave up doing that when she was 97 and quit driving when she was 98. "It's not my fault I'm 106," says Nicholls, who still lives two blocks from the church in her own home. "It's the Lord's fault; I didn't have anything to do with it."

Whatever the secret to their remaining among us, however, there is no doubt their spritely nature tends to elevate the spirits of everyone they meet. "You visit with them and you think you are giving them a little lift," says Peggy Gorden, 77, a niece to both Sanner and Carroll.

"But when you leave, you feel like you have received the gift of lift. All three of them are just nice to be with."

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