USA > Missouri > Presbyterianism in the Ozarks : a history of the work of the various branches of the Presbyterian Church in Southwest Missouri, 1834-1907 > Part 2
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In 1857 the New School Church reached the high water mark. That part of the Presbytery lying in this territory had nine churches, with 304 communicants. For three successive years the Presbytery of Osage was starred in the Assembly minutes, indicating that, in l'eu of a report, the report of the previous year was inserted. After 1860 even the name of the Presbytery was dropped from the Assembly roll, not to reappear until 1866. The causes of the disintegration of the Presbytery were the position of the church on the issue of the day and the with- drawal of the American Home Missionary Society from the work in Missouri. In June, 1857, Rev. William II. Smith wrote:
"I can not be sustained without aid from abroad, and unless that comes I must either leave the state or resort to some secular occupation. Now when the immigration to this region is immense, when the Eastern people as well as others are settling up our prairies, we are crippled by the want of proper support-must leave in a great measure the work of the min- istry to obtain a living! Our church is not going to do much in Western Missouri without preachers can be placed in circumstances to labor more' effectively. Brother Jones because of his age and affliction of the throat,
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is thinking about giving up his charge. Brother Bradshaw is almost super- annuated, Brother Requa is practicing medicines and is not going much in the ministry; and Brother Renshaw has recently deceased, so that you see we are weak in men and means, not so much in means perhaps as in dispo- sition to aid in supporting the gospel."*
But though the Presbytery disintegrated, the labors of such men as N. B. Dodge, Amasa Jones, Levi Morrison, G. A. M. Ren- shaw, Albert G. Taylor, Bedford Ryland and William H. Smith were not in vain .. They are recorded in the annals of the church triumphant, whose records are never lost. And streams of their influence are yet watering the waste places of the earth, if we could only trace them.
The Presbyterian Recorder contained this item that illus- trates the spirit and purposes of the work:
"A brother in the bounds of Osage Presbytery in a private business note under date of November 2, 1854, writes: 'At a previous meeting of our Presbytery we concluded to establish a school of high order to be under care of Osage Presbytery. At our last meeting a board of trustees was elected, with power to secure a title to forty acres of land lying in Greene County, including the Cave Spring, the present place of Brother Renshaw's church. This donation of land and $600.00 in subscription is given by Brother R.'s people. We have in all about $2,000.00 subscribed, and intend to contract for building this winter and have them erected by next fall. I have just returned from Brother Morrison's meeting. A precious time we have had. The Lord came down in power. About twenty souls are re- joicing in Christ as the result. Brother M. is greatly encouraged. At Brother Renshaw's a similar result has been witnessed. We have had some mercy drops even at Warsaw.' "'
In the Mid-Continent of May, 1890, Dr. James H. Brooks said :
"It is not true that there is anything in the Form of Government or doctrines of the Presbyterian Church to account for the slow growth during the three-quarters of a century. But apart from the fact that much of the time has been spent in fighting one another instead of fighting shoulder to shoulder she has not at all utilized her resources."
This statement was made a plea for some kind of a regula- tion similar to that provided for subsequently in the constitu- tional rule pertaining to local evangelists, and if the good Doctor looks down from the glory world on the church of today no doubt he realizes that his plea has found a completer answer in the Presbyterian Brotherhood. But who can measure the folly of "fighting one another instead of fighting shoulder to shoul- der?" Much of the weakness of Presbyterianism inheres in the dismembered front she has presented to the world.
Dr. Brooks said in another place that Judge Lucas remarked to Judge Gamble : "I wish my daughters to be Roman Catholics, *Hill's History of K. C. Presbytery.
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because that church teaches women to be obedient and submis- sive; but I hope that my sons will be Presbyterians, for then I am sure they will fight."
Well, the times that tried men's souls required men of con- viction. The iron heel of destiny may grind such men to pow- der like flint. Their organiations may be crushed out. But the world can never repay its debt of gratitude to them.
O. S. PRESBYTERIES (MISSOURI, UPPER MISSOURI. LAFAYETTE.)
None of the controversies that have affected Presbyterianismi so disastrously in this State have originated in her borders. Lin- gering regrets have given place to reluctant separations only when independent positions seemed no longer tenable. Not until 1840 did the separation of the Old and New School churches take place in this State. Nominally, at least, four Old School Presbyteries sucessively embraced the territory of the subsequent Ozark Presbytery. They were Missouri, Upper Missouri, Lafayette and Southwest Missouri.
At its organization, October 2d, 1832, the original Synod of Missouri consisted of three Presbyteries. The Presbytery of St. Louis covered the eastern part of the State, the Presbytery of St. Charles the northeastern part and the Presbtery of Missouri the rest of the State. In 1843 the Presbytery of Upper Missouri was formed out of the western part of the Presbytery of Mis- souri, and in the fall of 1856 the Synod erected that portion of the Presbytery of Upper Missouri lying south of the Missouri River into the Presbytery of Lafayette.
As with the New School church so with the Old-the centers of effort and influence were to the north of our confines. Mount Zion Church at Cave Springs and Ebenezer at Greenfield were for decades the most influential churches in this territory-the former was New School and the latter Old School. Not till 1860. when Calvary Church was organized at Springfield did the old school church gain a permanent foothold in any of our now populous cities.
"The old school church began its operations in the South- west in 1842, in Dade County, where the Rev. W. B. Bell or- ganized the Ebenezer Church of sixteen members. The principal man in that organization was J. M. Rankin, who came from East Tennessee, two of whose sons are now ministers and two others prominent men in Kansas. This Ebenezer Church was the only one in that region until January, 1854, when the Mount Vernon Church (subsequently called Ozark Prairie) was organized. The
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pastor of the Ebenezer Church had a parish extending from Cedar County to the Arkansas River, a distance of 130 miles."*
Less than a generation ago it could be said of African map makers:
"Such dense ignorance abounds
They place elephants for want of towns."'
After the organization of the Ebenezer Church twelve years elapsed before another was organized. The statistics for Lafay- ette Presbytery indicate that before 1865 the following candi- dates and churches in Southwest Missouri had been on its roll at one time or another: Churches-Ebenezer and Mount Vernon received at organization; Little Osage and Marmiton enrolled September 16, 1859; Springfield Calvary enrolled September 26, 1860; North Spring River and Bolivar, April 13, 1861. Candi- dates-Received at time of organization, W. L. Mitchell, S. W. Mitchell and J. N. Rankin.
In 1857 the Presbytery met in Greenfield, and in 1859 it elected Rev. John McFarland a Commissioner to the General Assembly.
The men of national reputation confined their labors to other parts of the State. In lieu of the account of movements in this section, therefore, I shall here insert pen sketches of typical conditions in the other parts of the State. These sketches are taken from addresses delivered at the semi-centennial of the Synod of Missouri, held at St. Louis in October, 1882:
From a letter written for the Synod by Dr. Edwin F. Hat- field :
"The Synod of Missouri was born in the midst of a gracious outpour- ing of the Spirit, baptizing the churches from St. Louis to Apple Creek on the south, Columbia on the west and Palmyra on the north. * * *
"The members of the Synod (1832) with their wives, were enter- tained at the house of Mr. John Shackleford, after which at the publie meeting I preached again. The next day three public services were held and sermons were preached by Brothers Cochran, McAfee, and Hoxsey. Sermons were preached on Saturday by Brothers Durfee and Wood, and service preparatory to the Lord's Supper, full of interest, was held in the evening. Very little time was given to the details of ecclesiastical busi- ness. Two of the Presbyteries had just begun to be, and had but a brief record for review by the Synod. * * *
"As the churches were called upon to relate their story for the year it was plain to be seen that it had been, even in those 'ends of the earth' as it had been all over the land, a year of the right hand of the Most High God. First and foremost, the church with, whom they had assembled had been favored with a visitation of the Holy Spirit unexampled. not only in its own history, but in all the region west of the great river. A wonderful work of grace during the previous winter and spring had been wrought in St. Louis, putting new life into both ministers and people, and
*Quoted from Dr. Timothy Hill's History Outlines, etc., p. 25.
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resulting in the accession of 128 members to the church, doubling their num- ber quadrupling their energy and zeal for the Master; resulting also in the organization of the Des Peres Church, about fourteen miles west of the city, and in plans for the speedy organization of a second church in St. Louis. * * *
"The showers of divine grace had extended their benign and life- giving influence to St. Charles, where Brother Wood had been laboring about two years, with about seventy conversions, and had lately welcomed some fifty new converts into the church. Far down the river, in Perry County, Brother Cowan's people at Apple Creek had caught something of the heavenly shower and counted some thirty or forty converts among their widely scattered habitations. Brother Ladd, of Farmington, in St. Francis County, * *
* told how his heart had been stirred by what he had heard at the meeting of the Presbytery in April of the Lord's doings, and he had gone home resolved to labor and pray for a revival; and the whole region about Farmington had been aroused to call upon God, and many had been converted from the error of their ways. Brother Donnell, too, brought good news from the lead mines in Washington County, below Potosi, and told of a score or more converted among his people. Away up the country in Calloway County, among the prairies and groves, in the region of Fulton, Brother Hoxsey had to tell of a blessed visitation of grace that had given the Aux Vasse Church a blessed accession of more than forty new members. Columbia, too in Boone County, had not been passed by, *
* * and far up the Mississippi, where Dr. Nelson had so faithfully testified of Christ and his cross, in and about Palmyra, : *
* similar miracles of divine grace had been wrought "
Dr. Hatfield then gives an account of the second and third meetings of Synod-the one at Columbia in 1833, the other at St. Charles in 1834.
At Columbia the Synod could only adjourn from day to day by reason of the fact that a quorum could not be obtained. It was regarded as an unhappy occurrence that the county horse races were to commence the opening day of Synod. But the members of Synod began a revival-the races were given up in despair and "more than fourscore souls were hopefully con- verted."
Of the third meeting he writes :
"On Thursday, October 16, 1834, early in the morning, Brothers Don- nell, Potts, Allen and myself mounted our horses at St. Louis and rode very pleasantly to the bank opposite St. Charles, on the Missouri River reach- ing the ferry about 11:30 a. m., within four hours. There we had to wait six hours for the crazy old ferryboat, the wind having been too high for the miscrable old craft to attempt to steer the fierce eurrent until theu. Ten hours were thus consumed in reaching St. Charles from St. Louis. We found that the brethren, wearied with waiting for the St. Louis brethren, had undertaken to organize the Synod with only two Presbyteries. The next morning we organized anew. *
"As at St. Louis and Columbia, so at St. Charles, the one business of the Synod was the preaching of the gospel, with direct reference to the conversion of souls. Twice or thrice daily the word of God was pro- claimed, and at least every evening the anxious were called out of whom there were at least a score, several of whom were hopefully converted."
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The evangelistic character of pioneer Presbyterianism in Missouri is abundantly attested by others.
Dr. Timothy Hill :
"The most marked agency, especially in Northeast Missouri, under the leadership of Dr. Nelson, Cochran and others, was the camp meeting. The work was carried on systematically, camps consisting of tents or more permanent structures in the form of sheds, in which the preaching services were held, and around which tents were pitched, constituted the external appearance of the work. The places selected were generally in a grove, near a large spring, for 'much water' was needed for the accommodation of both man and beast. When the selection was made the ground was usually entered, in order to become the fixed property of some one, and thus remained from year to year. To these meetings people came from a great distance and remained oftentimes for days together, listening to most earnest, pungent preaching, and great numbers were gathered into the church."
From an address by Rev. John Leighton:
"Let us take a glance at our places of worship generally, at that early day. We may consider them as of three classes. First and best were the small buildings, frequently wooden, put up without any thought of archi- tectural symmetry, unsightly in shape, without finish and devoid of com- fort. *
* * A second class comprised the log or board buildings, fre- quently with but one or at the most three openings called windows but as likely as not without glass, and supplied with a piece of sacking to keep out the rain. They had puncheon floors, and split logs mounted on pegs for seats. They were built without workmen and withont the outlay of $20 in cash. But when one of them was completed by the ax and fro of elder and brethren there was as real a jubilation as whwen Bezaleel finished the work of the tabernacle. * * * The third class of church buildings con- sisted of mere sheds, capable of covering 800 or 1,000 persons. These shelters were built for the accommodation of what were then everywhere known as Presbyterian camp meetings-an institution growing out of nec- essary and blessed evangelization among a destitute and sparse population. * * * The floor was our mother earth, with here and there a stump from which a post had been cut. The pulpit was an unplaned board made fast to a tree at each end, and the preacher's seat was another rough board supported in the same substantial way. As the sides and front and rear were all open. Nothing circumscribed the limits of the congregation. *
* * And I have seen as many as fifty men standing or sitting behind the preacher, these generally not members of the church. *
''While there was far more spirit and devotion in the singing than we now witness, it was loud and discharged from all scientific exactness. * * * Dr. David Nelson, Rev. James Gallaher and some others had the voice of a silver trumpet-strong and mellow-and the first named espe- cially would occasionally come in where no hymn was expected with a solo that would move the heart and start the tears. As for musical instru- ments, I cannot say that there was the least prejudice against them, but for the reason there was no occasion for prejudice instruments being uni- versally unknown and undesired. Accompanying the singing, on the greater occasions, there was the exercise of handshaking, though this was not common. The custom seems to have been brought in by good brethren from Tennessee, who had a number of ways peculiar to them and not laid
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down in the book. These brethren formed quite an element in our churches in Missouri. * * *
"On one occasion (a meeting of Synod in Henry County) *
* there came up a storm which drove us to what was called 'the church' (Synod was meeting in a basilica or shed), a log house such as I have de- scribed, having one opening for a window, but no glass. The pious com- pany were standing up and singing, when suddenly a movement was made which was novel to me. Across the floor from where I stood and near the open door was 'Father' Bradshaw, the pastor of the church. While sing- ing with much spirit he advanced and took the hand of a brother and shook it with vigor. Thought I 'This is a brother the pastor has not chanced to see during the meeting, and be takes the liberty of greeting , him in the midst of the devotions.' Presently he advances and shakes the hand of a second stranger. 'And here is another,' I said to myself, 'he has not met before.' And not till he had reached the third and fourth did the truth burst on my mind. When I saw the good pastor advancing to my part of the room I stiffly turned my face to the log wall. expecting that he would pass me by. In this I was disappointed. He laid hold upon my shoulder and gave me a violent pull around, and then he took me vig- orously by the hand, a Christian honor which I neither understood nor deserved.
"At that same meeting an incident occurred which illustrates the un- pleasant necessities of those primitive days. It was the Sabbath afternoon, and the Lord's Supper had been celebrated with real fervor and profit, and there were many wet eyes. About ten of us ministers were in 'the stand' and the benediction was being pronounced. Just as the final word was uttered a countrymen thrust himself in among the ministers. He cried out, 'I want to speak to the people.' Raising his voice yet higher, he gave notice of 'a stray mare,' which he went on to describe with more par- ticularity than elegance .* While some of us were considerably taken aback, that fastidious youth, Henry M. Field, who had been called to the new church on Sixth street, near Morgan, and was only a few months from his cultured associations in the East could not repress his amaze- ment. This was his first venture out from St. Louis. He goes instantly to Father Bradshaw and demands what this kind of a thing meant. 'Oh,' said the pastor, 'we are here for the present constrained to allow such im- proprieties.' Yet some of these improprieties were rebuked in a character- istic way. * * I was aiding in a protracted meeting in Lewis County. During the delivery of the sermon one day a young man engaged in carving on the back of the bench before him. A minister who was sitting beside the preacher observed the irreverent use of the pocket knife, and, stepping down, he took up a billet of wood from beside the stove. Going with it to the young man, he presented it to him, saying, 'Whittle on that.' * * *
"But as for the preaching of those days, let it be said that while great improvement and advance has been made in every other respect-in our places of worship, in the singing, in the gentility of the audiences, and in the salaries of ministers-there has been no advance in the quality of the sermons. The sermonizing of the great evangelists I have named was not so much the development of the texts they cited as it was the unfolding
*Since the author has been pastor in Springfield he was conducting a funeral in a rural district. A rural minister asked the privilege of making an announcement. He first expatiated on the solemnity of the occasion commended the "young brother" for his feeling address, sang in a sepul- chral tone three or four stanzas of a death-bed song, then announced: "Not to detract from the solemnity of this occasion, I have lost a sorrel horse, white mane and tail, a horn saddle," etc.
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of a Bible theme. Dr. Nelson, I suspect, generally selected his subject before he settled upon his text, yet his texts contained his sermons. He seldom took up any but a most weighty subject *- the sovereignty of God (those men were strict Calvinists); the fallen condition of man; the nature and need of regeneration; free grace; justification by faith; the terror of the Lord.
.. * * * Beginning just about fifty years ago (i. e., fifty years be- fore 1882) and continuing for fifteen or twenty years, there were almost annual revivals in quite a number of our churches. These ingatherings were counted on when the brethren came together, three or four in number. to preach and pray, and also to sing, for four or five days continuously. * * *
"Some of the earlier of these refreshings should be especially singled out because of the character of the subjects of them. Throughout a con- siderable part of Missouri there was, at the time when Dr. Nelson began his labors, a widespread infidelity of the old-fashioned, Jeffersonian type. And it came through Kentucky from Virginia. It was intelligent and proud, and bold, and very supercilious toward Christians, and toward preachers particularly, and most particularly toward Presbyterian preach- ers. This skepticism included lawyers and doctors and political bosses. The fame and popularity of the camp meetings drew those men near. Dr. Nelson gave to them his special attention. Having himself in early life been one of them, he was familiar with all the rat-holes in which they burrowed. In short, therefore, at one and another of these revival meet- ings, four or five of these Anakim would fall at once. And sometimes the number of them would be great enough to characterize the revival as an ingathering of converted infidels. A few old men yet surviving in the churches could give us names by the dozen. It was the privilege of the writer of this paper to have in the church which he served for seventeen years three or four of these very men, two of them being ruling elders. Another of those converts entered the ministry and went as a missionary to the Sandwich Islands."
Mr. Leighton thus describes another condition of the times:
"School houses and court houses were the common resort, and even there our brethren had to alternate with preachers of other denomina- tions, two, three, or even four, taking the place on successive Sabbaths. This arrangement gave rise to an evil which in those days was rife and almost coextensive with the State, with the exception of St. Louis and two or three other places-an evil whwich through increasing courtesy and kind feeling has happily passed nearly away. This was the prevalence of con- troversy and strife over points of doctrine. What the Presbyterians preached in the school houses on the previous Sabbath was taken up on the next by the Reformer and fiercely mutilated. The creed of the Re- former in turn was torn to shreds by the Methodist when his day came around. All this was heard to a large extent by the same people of all the denominations. In this way the controverted points, to say nothing of misrepresentations and slander, became the theme of bitter talk through the week and the whole community would thus be kept in hot water. And it was wonderful how sharp and knowing men, and even women became in those disputed themes-baptism, water regeneration, the gift of the Spirit, etc. They also 'reasoned high of fate, free will, and foreknowl- edge absolute.' We suspect our modern city Christians would not know what to make of that 'strong meat' which was devoured, I do not say
*I have somewhere heard Webster's great oratory attributed in part to the fact that he was silent save on weighty themes.
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digested, the whole year round. That bitter controversial spirit which filled the air too often crowded out living piety, and was even made a sub- stitute for it."
Even so it gave to the godly a loyalty to church my eager eyes have longed to see. The Mount Zion Church had loyal members as far away as Springfield. And before the Mount Vernon Church was organized "Uncle Billy" and Aunt Jenny Orr trudged on horseback from their home three miles rorthwest of Mount Vernon through "the wilderness" to Greenfield, where their pious souls feasted on the "strong meat" provided.
Though the scenes of the foregoing incidents were laid for the most part in other portions of the State and the actors were largely new school men, they are not out of place here by reason of the facts that they are truly typical, and in part at least relate to events that transpired before the unhappy dismemberment of our church in the State.
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