DONE WELL

I was on vacation in Chicago and had the opportunity of worshiping once again the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke on Belmont Avenue. Although that was not my home church, I had often worshiped there from the early 60s and 70s before I moved to Florida and then from time to time when I vacationed in Chicago. St. Luke was a marvelous parish with a flourishing Christian Day School and some of best liturgy anywhere.

The great attraction was the pastor, A. R. Kretzmann, of blessed memory. The church was the epitome of what Lutheranism could and should be. Dr. Kretzmann was an important figure in Chicago and in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. As I recall he designed the official seal of the LC-MS. But Dr. Kretzmann never hesitated to commune non-Missouri Lutherans. He would happily converse with seminarians from the LCA’s Lutheran School of Theology. During the unpleasantness at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis started, Dr. Kretzmann sided with the moderates. I was at the church the Sunday the pastors and teachers resigned their calls to St. Luke’s formerly LC-MS and then were called once again by St. Luke’s now AELC.

Dr. Kretzmann retired in 1982 after 52 years as pastor. I saw him a few times after that, and was saddened by his death in 1987. It was as if an institution had died.

St. Luke continues to be an exemplary church under the expert leadership of Pastor David G. Abrahamson. It has expanded it’s out reach with senior citizen’s housing.

I attended Morning Prayer at 8:30 since I was on my way to the Printer’s Row Literary Fest. Anyone entering the church is immediately overwhelmed by the soaring height of the modern structure. It’s now 50 years old, but still gives the impression of being absolutely contemporary. It is the silence which still impresses me. My church tends to be rather talkative before services, but not St. Luke’s. The liturgy was perfectly led by Dr. Ruth Hamilton, the pastoral assistant. Organist Michel Wolniakowski plays the hymns i liturgy in a way that makes it easy to sing, yet always with variety. Whether it was a German Chorale or a Marty Haugen contemporary piece his playing was absolutely appropriate. The sermon came at the end, where it makes sense after the office liturgy. Pastor Abrahamson preached a solid, Biblically grounded sermon with a proper relationship of Law and Gospel. And then to finish with a flourish, the postlude was Sigfrid Karg-Elert’s “Nun danket alle Gott.” Wonderful!

St. Luke remains an example of what is possible in the Lutheran Church. I say example rather than model because I don’t think you can duplicate one church in another location, with a different congregation, and a different pastor. I certainly don’t have Pr. Abrahamson’s leadership qualities nor could I preach with his gravitas. Nevertheless, we need examples of church done well. “Done well” is a key. We should never settle for less that our best in the worship and service of God.

May the Lord bless you on your journey and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne

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THE FORGOTTEN CHURCH AT MELROSE, FLORIDA

Now an addendum to my investigations of Lutheranism in Marion County. I mentioned that one of the early missionary pastors to Marion County was W. A. Julian. Local records show that he had performed a wedding in Marion County on February 21, 1865, of John W. Randall and Louise B. Todd.  (I am wondering if the bride was any relation to Pr. Bernheim’s wife, Jane Todd.)  That’s the only evidence about his presence other than the fact that he isn’t listed in the 1860 census. I have now discovered that from 1854-1863 he was serving Beck’s, Pilgrim, and St. Luke’s churches in Lexington, NC. (Pr. Bernheim served the same churches in 1874-1878.) Pr. Julian was back in North Carolina at Zion, Coble from 1865-1870 which leaves the years between 1863 and 1865 when he could be in Marion County.

We know he was back in Florida serving Bethlehem in Columbia County, 1893-1898.  There he had to contend with the great storm of 1896 which blew down the church. At that point I lost track of him until I found a reference to him living in Melrose, Florida in 1904.  Melrose is a town straight north of Ocala in Putnam County near the Alachua-Putnam County line. As far as I knew, there weren’t any Lutheran churches in Alachua County until the 1930s. I wondered if Pastor Julian had given up on the Lutheran Church. Not so. The GainesvilleThe Daily Sun has several references to the Lutheran church in Melrose.  There is certainly no mention of a Melrose church in the History of the Florida Synod and it wasn’t one of the preaching points for Missouri Synod Lutheran Pastors. Where did this one come from? The answer is the Pittsburgh Synod.

Why would a northern synod have a church in Florida? Perhaps there was a touch of “brand consciousness” involved. This Pittsburgh Synod belonged to the General Council. Three of the existing Lutheran Churches belonged to the Missouri Synod, and the other two to the United Synod, South.

Here’s most of the story taken directly from History of the Southern Conference of the Pittsburgh Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church by Wm. F. Ulery and Adolphus Le Roy Yount  Adolphus Le Roy Yount, 1903.

In the autumn of 1890, Rev. A. H. Waters resigned his position as superintendent of the Soldiers' Orphans' School at Jumomille, Pa., and went, with his wife, to spend the winter in Florida. He settled in Melrose, where he found a few Lutherans, who, as well as himself, desired to have church service. At the request of these people he held services, and as the interest was awakened, they were continued, and on the l0th of February, 1894. a congregation was organized with eight members, under the title of "St. Luke's Evangelical Lutheran Church." A constitution was adopted in harmony with the doctrinal basis of the General Council and Mr. Francis Obenhoff and Mr. Wm. A. Vogelbach were elected as elder and deacon respectively. During the time when Rev. Waters has his residence in Melrose, he conducts regular services on every Lord's Day: during his absence in the summer months he provides for occasional supplies.

In 1894 a move was made to build a church. Plans and specificat1ons were secured and adopted, and the contract was let for the building. As soon as the foundation was completed the corner-stone was laid, the Services being conducted by Rev. Waters.

Early in 1895, the church was finished and was set apart to the worship of God. Rev. J. Bowman, D. D., was present on this occasion and preached the dedication sermon, and the pastor performed the act of consecration.

The church is a very neat frame building, 28x42 fact in size, gothic in its architecture, and is handsomely finished, and furnished in a corresponding manner. It has fine stained glass windows and beautiful chancel furniture. Two of the large windows are memorial; the one for the youngest son, and the other for the wife of the pastor. The one representing the Good Shepherd, and the other the Angel of Praise. Both are fine  specimens of art. The church is beautifully situated, overlooking Lake Santa Fe, and presents a very phasing appearance. The lot on which this lovely church stands, was donated to the congregation by Rev. A. H. Walters, and, with the exception of a few donations from friends and some gifts of the Ladies' Aid Society of the First Lutheran church, Pittsburg, he paid for the building of the church. The membership is still small, but there has been a gradual increase in the last few years. It was organized with eight members, its present communicant membership is 23.

The church is deservedly popular in the town, and is exerting a good influence on the people who are associated with it, and has proved a source of great comfort to the Lutheran people who have taken up their residence in Melrose. It has had only one pastor, Rev. A. H. Waters, who founded it, and has had charge of it from its organization till the present time.

The final chapter to the story was soon to be written. Pastor Waters died May 24, 1903. It appears for a time Pr. Julian served the church, but a notice appeared in The Daily Sun, March 16 1904. “Rev Julian has accepted a charge at a Lutheran Church in Fitzgerald.“ I haven’t located Fitzgerald yet, let alone a Lutheran church. I find no further references to St. Luke church after this date, so I suppose that the church closed. I have to check with friends in Gainesville to see if they know where the building is (or was).


I am away on vacation next week, so there won’t be another blog until June 25.


May the Lord bless you on your journey and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne


JUNE 22 UPDATE


I visited Melrose yesterday. St. Luke's Church was converted to a residence for John McLeod in 1925. 

Here's a picture ca. 1910-1920

Here's a picture of it today.

THE MYSTERY OF LUTHERANISM IN MARION COUNTY, FLORIDA, PART 2

Last week I was puzzling over the beginnings of the Lutheran Church Florida. Why did the first missionary pastor, Charles H. Bernheim, come to Marion County? The first clue lies in the way Lutherans developed missions: they looked for a place where there were Lutherans and then sent pastors. They didn’t go off into the middle of nowhere hoping to convert whoever they found. The first act was always to gather together Lutherans who were already present in an area.

Many of the early settlers in Marion county were from South Carolina, and one area of South Carolina in particular, Dutch Fork, was populated by Lutherans. So I needed to find people from that area in Ocala.

The break through I needed came from a recent article “Adam thought Pineapple would do well” in the Ocala Star-Banner, May 16, 2010, written by David Cook. Mr. Cook, a former editor of the Star-Banner, is an avid local historian who writes the most fascinating articles. The Adam mention in this article refers to  Adam Eichelberger (pictured below). A German name immediately caught my attention. Was he a Lutheran, perhaps? The article mentioned that he was born in Newberry, South Carolina. That was a center of the Lutheran Church.  When I later learned his full name was Adam Luther Eichelberger, I was convinced. 

Doing some genealogical research, I learned that Adam was the son of Col. John Eichelberger, Jr. John Eichelberger is remembered for having donated the land in Pomaria, South Carolina, for what would become Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary. Furthermore, Adam was not the only son who moved to Marion County. I found at least three of his brothers were here: Jacob Walter Franklin, John Bainbridge, and  Wade S. Eichelberger. There were several other Eichelbergers in Marion County as well.  Both Adam and Wade owned land near Long Swamp where the first Lutheran Church in Marion was organized in 1859 according to the report of Pastor Charles H. Bernheim.

Not far from Long Swamp lived another South Carolinian of Lutheran extraction, Colonel Adam G. Summer, a second cousin once removed of the Eichelbergers (if I have the relations worked out right). He was from Pomaria where the seminary had its first home.  (By the way Summerfield in Marion County was named for him.)

Now we turn to the Rev. Charles Bernheim. I found this biographical sketch of him in a genealogy.  

Charles Bernheim was born April 6, 1831 at Cologne, Germany. His parents were the Rev. John Herman and Lisette (Delmann) Bernbeim. His father of a distinguished Berlin Jewish family, was a convert from Judaism, and became a Lutheran minister. In the infancy of Charles Herman his family settled in western Pennsylvania. He was educated at the Theological Seminary. He was married to Jane Todd in 1855. They had several children. From 1868 to 1874 the Rev. Bernheim served Friedens, Guilford Co.; St. Paul, Alamance Co.; St. James, Concord and other churches in Davidson and Forsyth counties. Bernheim died January 20, 1901, and was buried near Conover.

Informative, but not very helpful in understanding his work in Florida. I know  that Bernheim was an 1855 graduate of Southern Seminary. When he was at the Seminary, the president was Lewis Frederick Eichelberger. I haven’t worked out his relationship to the Florida Eichelbergers.  What was Bernheim doing between his graduation in 1855 and his move to Florida in 1859? So far I have discovered only one clue.   

Dec. 24th, by Rev. Charles H. Bernheim, Dr. Wm. T. McFall, to Miss Mary Ann, daughter of Jacob Singley, all of Newberry, S. C. Marriages and Deaths, Lutheran Observer and Southern Lutheran, Issue of January 29, 1858, p.174  

So that puts his ordination not later than 1857 and places him in Newberry in December of that year. Of course, Newberry is where the Eichelbergers were from. I think the Eichelbergers and Summer could have provided the core for the Long Swamp Lutheran church.

One more deduction. In 1859 Bernheim reported to the South Carolina Synodical Missionary Society that “Three churches are about to be erected, and a school house large enough to answer as a temporary house of worship. Twenty-four white and twenty colored members have been received, and others are prepared for taking this step as soon as an opportunity is offered.” The South Carolina Synod minutes showed the reception of the Columbia County congregation with 23 members and the Long Swamp congregation with 18 members. Do the math and it is clear that both churches had African members–slaves. This is the unwritten chapter of Florida Lutheranism. The book Masters and Slaves in the House of the Lord reaches the inevitable conclusion that nearly half the first Lutherans in Florida were slaves.  This would fit with what we know about the Eichelbergs and Summer. They were all slave holders in Marion County.

One more surmise.  Bernheim had mentioned a school house being built that could serve as a place of worship. I’d venture that the school house was used for Freestone Springs Academy which he established at Camp Izard. A look at the map in last week’s blog shows that both Long Swamp and Camp Izard were in the Southern part of Marion County. Although there was no direct road between the two locations in the 1850s, there were roads that would have allowed people to travel from one location to the other without going all the way into Ocala. I find it interesting that the first source I discovered for the school came from an oral report by W. E. McGahagin, a prominent resident of Long Swamp.

What happened to the church in Long Swamp? It probably closed after the Civil War. With emancipation the former slaves would not have remained in their former master’s church. Adam Summer died in 1866. Jacob Eichelberger moved to Sumter County between 1868 and 1871.  Pastor Bernheim had moved to North Carolina by 1868. Bethlehem Church in Columbia County had no pastor between 1864 and 1869. When Pastor S. W. Bedenbaugh arrived there in 1872, his attentions were confined to expanding the work in Columbia County*. 

My guess at this point is that Lutheran work in Marion county ended with the departure of Pr. Bernheim, not to be revived until a Missouri Synod Pastor, F. J. W. Reinhardt began preaching in Martin, north of Ocala, around 1890. That work came to nothing. Information gleaned by E. P. Weber from Edgar  Brammer, Pastor in Gainesville 1938-1941, indicated that the church in Martin served a group of English-speaking Lutherans from Pennsylvania who eventually returned to the north. That's another chapter than needs investigating.

It intrigues me that a line drawn between Long Swamp and Camp Izard would pass very close to where my congregation, Our Saviour in Marion Oaks, is located. We don’t qualify as historic: the church was organized in 1979.    

May the Lord bless you on your journey and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne









*Note: In case anyone else reads this in working on Lutheran history, the mysterious reference in the Florida Synod history to an Ebenezer church served by the pastor of Bethlehem almost certainly refers to a Lutheran church in the community of Ebenezer, Columbia County. At the point of this writing I also know work was done at Ft. White (1885-1893) and Mt. Tabor, both in Columbia County.)






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