An Old Time Camp Meeting.
To Kentucky belongs the honor of originating the modern camp meeting.
This is no small distinction, when we consider how these institutions
have spread over the land and the great good they have done. Camp
meetings grew out of the needs of the times. When they providentially
sprang up in Kentucky, the frontier was sparsely settled, most people
living miles away from any church. Such churches as were built were
small and could accommodate only a few persons, and preaching services
were often weeks apart.
The revivals of genuine religion which usually attended these
gatherings were much needed in the backwoods. Most of the settlers were
honest, law-abiding persons, who had sought to improve their means by
emigrating to this western country; but many of the vicious
off-scouring of the older settlements also went west to hide their
crimes or to commit new ones. Rogues' Harbor was only an extreme type
of many law-defying places. Murderers, thieves, gamblers, defaulters
and their kind put life in peril, and threatened the moral and social
order of the state. These camp meetings strengthened and encouraged
good people, reformed many bad men and women, and thus became a saving
leaven of righteousness.
And what a place for a camp meeting was the Kentucky forest. What
nature poet can do justice to such sylvan loveliness as we find in the
"Blue Grass Region?" The pen must be dipped in the juices of that
Edenic vegetation and tinted with the blue of that arching sky to
record such beauty. What stately trees! They seemed like pillars in
God's own temple. The rich, warm limestone soil gave birth to trees in
form and variety scarce equaled in the world. Here grew in friendly
fellowship and rivalry the elm, ash, hickory, walnut, wild cherry,
white, black and read oak, black and honey locust, and many others.
Their lofty branches interlocking formed a verdant roof which did not
entirely shut out the sun's rays but caused a light subdued and
impressive as the light in a Saint Paul's Cathedral.
In such a forest was pitched the camp to which Jasper Very returned.
Let me describe this old-fashioned camp ground. A large, rough shed was
erected, capable of protecting five thousand persons from wind and
rain. It was covered with clapboards and furnished with puncheon seats.
At one end a large stand was built, from which sermons were preached. A
few feet in front of this stand a plain altar rail was set, extending
the full length of the preachers' stand. This altar was called the
"mourners' bench." All around the altar a liberal supply of fresh straw
was placed upon which the worshippers knelt. On three sides of the
large shed camps or cabins of logs were built for the use of the
attendants. In the rear of the preachers' stand was a large room which
accommodated all the ministers who labored in the meeting. The effect
at the camp at night was very striking. At intervals of several rods
log fires were kept burning and the bright light they threw was
contrasted with the deep darkness beyond.
It is astonishing to read how great an attraction these camps became to
the hardy pioneers of the Kentucky wilderness. People gathered from all
quarters in all kinds of vehicles, some traveling thirty or forty
miles. Many came in covered wagons in which they slept at night.
History records, that at Cane Ridge, Kentucky, a camp meeting was held
attended by twenty thousand people.
It is ten o'clock Sunday morning at Oak Grove Camp Meeting, where our
hero Jasper Very is laboring. Thousands are in the great wooden
structure, filling every seat and standing many deep beyond the edges
of the building. The preachers' stand contains twenty-five or thirty
ministers gathered from many parts of the State. The crowd has even
overflowed this stand, and all available room is occupied.
The Christians present have been prepared for this service by the cabin
meetings held at six o'clock in the morning and a prayer and testimony
meeting in the tabernacle at eight. And now the service begins. A
stalwart son of the prophets arises and announces the hymn:
"Come, sinners, to the gospel feast,
Let every soul be Jesus' guest:
There need not one be left behind,
For God hath bidden all mankind."
He starts the first note, and thousands take up the inspiring strain,
and the glorious music rolls through the forest like the sound of many
waters. A passage of Scripture is read and a fervent prayer offered. A
second hymn is sung: "There is a fountain filled with blood," and far
away the cadence is heard rising and falling, thrilling waves of sound.
The song is ended. A rustling noise is heard as the people settle
themselves in their places, and then a deep quiet ensues as they look
expectantly toward the preachers' stand. One whispers to another: "Who
is to be the preacher this morning?" They are not left long in doubt.
Slowly the minister arises. It is Jasper Very, the star preacher of the
camp meeting. He comes before his audience with a humble
self-possession which is reflected in the composure of his face. How
did he obtain this self-possession? Reader, we must lift the veil
somewhat and let you see.
In the morning he had gone into the deep woods to study and pray, as
was the wont of the forest preachers. Here he had prayerfully and
carefully completed the outline of his sermon. Then a great burden of
unfitness and helplessness came upon him. Like his Master he threw
himself prone upon the ground and poured out his soul to the Father. "O
God," he cried, "who am I, that I should be thy ambassador to beseech
sinners to be reconciled to thee? Who am I that I should stand between
the living and the dead and offer life and immortality to men? Thou, O
God, only art my sufficiency, my hope, my expectation. Stand by my side
and help me in this hour, for my need is great. This I ask in the name
of thy Son Jesus Christ. Amen."
Coming thus from the hidings of divine power, with the Spirit of God
like dew resting upon him, he announces his text: "Seek ye the Lord
while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: let the
wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let
him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our
God, for he will abundantly pardon."
He began by describing the way of the wicked. He unmasked sin, showing
its hideous deformity, how it pollutes the soul, and makes man unfit
for fellowship with a holy God. Then he passed on to show the guilt of
sin, the awful misery coming to a man when he is face to face with his
iniquities. With great skill he pointed out condemnation arising from
particular transgressions,--the defaulter fleeing from his country, the
murderer with his victim's bloody form ever before his mind's eye, the
lustful man tortured and consumed with the rewards of his own folly.
Continuing, he proceeded to tell the final punishment of these sinners.
In those days ministers at camp meetings preached a literal hell; and
as the speaker uncovered the pit of destruction and compelled his
hearers to look into it many felt that they were "hair hung and breeze
shaken" over the mouth of perdition.
Now his manner changed. His voice, instead of being loud and startling
like thunder, producing awe and terror, became sweet, tender, and
appealing, like a shepherd calling his sheep to the fold.
Having opened the wounds of sin, he poured into them the cordial of
gospel grace. He dwelt upon the words, "abundantly pardon," showing how
God had planned to put away sin by the gift of his Son and had promised
forgiveness to all guilty mortals who with hearty repentance and true
faith looked to Christ for salvation.
As he exalted the world's Redeemer from one plane to another his soul
was lifted up with indescribable joy and exultation. His voice and form
were in attune with his soul. We have read that this man's voice could
be heard a mile, and on this occasion it surely reached to the utmost
bounds of that great assembly. Extending his arms, as though he would
enfold the multitude and present them to the Savior, he besought
sinners to flee from impending wrath, to come to the altar and be saved
from sin so that they might "read their titles clear to mansions in the
skies."
The effect was tremendous. At once a rush was made for the mourners'
bench and it was soon filled. Many were stricken where they sat in the
congregation and fell on their knees imploring mercy. Around the
mourners gathered the saints of God, counseling, advising, quoting
suitable passages of Scripture, praying with the penitents. When the
meeting finally closed long after the dinner hour, scores professed
conversion, and a great victory for morality and religion in Kentucky
had been won.