Mount Zion is the oldest Methodist Church in Johnston County, North Carolina. It was founded in 1809. The following information was written in the 1977 Smithfield Bicentennial Record on the Johnston County churches, and was reported in the "Smithfield Herald" by Editor Tom J. Lassiter on April 26, 1977.  

John and Susan Leach gave the land and built Mount Zion. Susan was from Virginia and was a member of the Methodist Society there. She was unhappy here where there were no Methodist churches; so her husband set aside a two-acre plot of his plantation known as Leachburg, built the church, and dedicated it to her comfort and to the glory of God.

The first meeting house was small and made of logs. After a few years, as the congregation increased in number, a more elaborate building was built. This was a frame building constructed of hand-hewn planks. Before 1840, this church burned and was replaced by a larger building. This new church was 50x30 feet, the walls were plastered, and the windows were treated with some substance that resembled stained glass. For more than a hundred years this house of the Lord was in His continuous service, and it was the old Mount Zion Church which was attended and loved by the people until 1948.

The earliest roll of church membership found up to this time is dated in the late 1830s. The first name listed is Elizabeth Sanders Leach, wife of Dr. James Leach. She and Dr. Leach were married in 1833, and it is assumed she moved her membership from Elizabeth Church.

During the reconstruction years after the Civil War and in the early 1900s, the church became very dilapidated. In 1914, the members pooled their resources, and with the leadership of Neil B. Johnson, who later became a Methodist minister, made the necessary renovations.

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