I am lingering still with the old camp meeting, because of the deep interest our fathers felt in it. It was deemed a kind of pillar in the religious world—there many a new life began, the return of the backslider and the confirmation of the faithful. I remember when a small boy, Mrs. O.L. Erwin on her way home from one of these gatherings joyously telling my mother of the conversion of her brother, Lu (L.S. Gash). Such messages of conversion, reclamation and wonderful individual or general rapturous demonstrations went out in every direction from every meeting. It could not have been otherwise, the meetings were exclusively devotional and the participants were of one mind and in accord.
In the old form, the camp meetings are gone, but the influences they put in motion are still floating down the current of time. During the war and the immediate years following, the institution was dormant, not dead. Like the Lost Cause is yielded to outside reverses but smoldering under mental depressions and social restraint. From the days of the Hebrew Passover and the Grecian Olympics men have desired periodic reunions. There still remained in the southern heart a yearning for the used to be. Now and then as the readjustment of southern conditions began to take root, accounts were seen in the newspapers of informal conferences being held with the view of reconstructing or resuscitating the old regime. But one effort to renew Davidson River camp meeting was made. The ranks of the old supporters were so depleted, and the surroundings so changed as to discourage further efforts. In fact, the invasion of the decreasing ranks of the old workers by a constantly increasing new element “that knew not Joseph” as to make the old methods unworkable. Isolation is unpleasant and indicates restlessness and looks around for ways of escape. Small improvised conferences looking to this end ensued. The joy of fellowship and co-working gave momentum to the original scheme as to expand into the present day assemblies.
There is nothing more tangible in southern reconstruction than the transformation of the old camp meeting into the summer meetings of today—the camp meeting amplified and modernized. Thus, Davidson River unpretentious with circumscribed support and influence is embraced in Junaluska with boundless resources, Boiling Springs in Ridgecrest and Weaverville in Montreat. Instead of rough canopies we have imposing auditoriums, elegant bungalows take the place of pole-tents and commodious hosteries in the place of brush awning mess-halls.
The photograph of the old camp meeting compared with its picture of present day development reminds one of the picture of a boy compared with that of is manhood—the boyish lineaments are faintly discernable in his enlarged self. So it is with the dear old camp meeting; it can scarcely recognize itself in its manhood attainments of today.
In its first picture are the outlines of a simple folk, attentive to a simple gospel presented in a simple way. Nothing is thought of in these summer meetings but devotion and evangelism. Nothing is done that does not contribute to this end. The object is soul-saving only. Service is regarded as a spontaneous outcome of saving grace. Success is presenting the truth varies according to the personal and individuality of the ministry, other things being equal. Church organization was also simple, conforming to respective denominational usage only; yet without legal or ecclesial form, without State, county or church funds, charity is dispensed in kind needed. Orphans are placed in homes that they may feel the warmth of family ties. The sick man’s crop is planted, plowed, hoes or harvested as the season may require. The sick are tenderly watched, stimulated with herb teas or soothed with bark poultices. Hospitality is unalloyed; to charge a stranger of a night’s lodging borders on niggardness. In a word, service is not considered mandatory nor rendered from a sense of duty. It is an outflow of renewed grace within.
The enlarged picture of christian effort as it has developed through the last eight or ten decades is before us in its actuality. It is seen as it is today. The copy from which it came has faded out of view. Only the eyes of an octogenarian can see both. Many of the prominent liniments of the former are dimly traceable in the latter, he things, and that the sole reliance on the power of the spirit and word to save and control is waning. In the material world the word is, forward; but in the religious it seems the time is come to stop, look, listen, back to the word. The task to be done and done by this generation is immeasurable. When the eye of our faith scans the field and takes in its stupendousness the mind is overawed and cowers with the feeling: Impossible, And so it is. Nothing short of the sword of Jehovah and of Gideon will produce a flight. Take the sword of the spirit which is the word of God and all things become possible, easy.
From the front page of the Brevard News, Transylvania County, N.C., Friday, November 11, 1921
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