Circuit riders

Into the wilderness: Circuit riders take religion to the people

BY N. FRED JORDAN JR.

Reprinted by permission from Tar Heel Junior Historian 37, no. 2 (Spring 1998) copyright North Carolina Museum of History

The cover of Harper’s Weekly magazine in 1867 portrayed the difficult life of the circuit preacher. About the illustration

John Wesley and his old friend George Whitefield were trying only to revive the Church of England (the Anglican Church) — to spread its message to the working classes and the outcasts of England. Neither really meant to start a new denomination, only to update an old one. They wanted to save souls, to gather followers, to "beat the devil."

Whitefield was an itinerant preacher whose powerful style and presentation attracted large crowds wherever he went. Between 1739 and 1765, he visited North Carolina seven times. He preached about the love of God, the reality of sin, and the wonders of heaven. And his messages were remembered: sources say his sermons made "hell so vivid that one could find it on an atlas."

Not enough ministers, not enough need

After Wesley organized his followers into Methodist societies within the Church of England, official missionaries were assigned to the colonies. In 1772, Joseph Pilmore, another itinerant preacher, became the first official missionary to serve the North Carolina area.

Pilmore preached at Curritick Court House and then journeyed through the eastern portion of the colony. He visited Edenton, New Bern, Wilmington, and other locations where he found an audience. The conditions he found must have been disappointing. He found only eleven Anglican ministers in the entire colony. And in his journal, Pilmore called Edenton "a poor damp dirty place, where they have only preaching once in three weeks." He compared the people to "sheep having no Shepherd."

Even by 1790, twenty-nine out of every thirty North Carolinians did not belong to any church. Obviously, the harvest of souls would be ripe if a method could be found to reach the people and make them see their need.

Methodists make a move

The Methodist societies of the Church of England already had part of that method—an existing collection of itinerant preachers. By assigning these preachers to specific circuits in the colony, instead of letting them wander, they could spread Christian (and Methodist) beliefs to all parts of the North Carolina frontier. These circuit riding preachers would become known as circuit riders.

The first Methodist circuit to reach into North Carolina actually stretched into the Albemarle and down the coast from Virginia. But because of rapid and strong growth, a separate Carolina circuit was created in May 1776. That circuit was totally within North Carolina and was assigned to three circuit riders: Edward Dromgoole, Francis Poythress, and Isham Tatum.

Unfortunately, America’s War for Independence (1776-1783) had begun, and some Methodist preachers (who were really members of the Church of England, remember) went into hiding. When the war ended, many ties with England were broken. The tie between Wesley’s Methodist Society in America and the Church of England was broken as well, and the Methodist Episcopal Church was born in 1784. Francis Asbury was elected one of its first two bishops. The responsibility for assigning preachers to the many circuits fell completely to him and to other bishops who came after him.

Who were the circuit riders?

Circuit riders had to be young, in good health, and single (since marriage and a family forced preachers to settle in one area and leave the traveling ministry). Unlike their counterparts in other denominations, Methodist circuit riders did not have to have a formal education. Leaders of the new church wanted educated, trained circuit riders, but they wanted even more to spread their ministry to people on the frontier who needed Christian guidance.

Life was not easy for a circuit rider, partly because living conditions on the frontier were harsh. Enoch George, who later became a bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church, said that serving the Pamlico Circuit in 1790 and 1791, he "was chilled by agues [malaria], burned by fevers, and, in sickness or health, beclouded by mosquitoes."

Circuit riders rarely served longer than one year in a circuit. Each year, they were appointed to a new area. This gave the preachers an opportunity to reuse their sermons and to perfect their delivery. It also kept them from growing too familiar with the local people and wanting to settle down.

The impact of circuit riders

Circuit riders had a simple plan of evangelism: They went where the people lived, and they ministered to their needs. Often, one of the first visitors to a family who had just arrived on the frontier was a Methodist circuit rider. During the day, he might help out with chores or assist with teaching the children. In the evening, after dinner, he would offer religious instruction to the family and to any neighbors who wished to join them.

If the preacher had found a warm welcome, he might spend the night with the family. Upon leaving the next day, he would usually promise to return the following month on a certain date to teach, preach, and hold services again.

These little pockets of people sometimes became the core of a new Methodist Episcopal congregation. As the community and population grew in size, church members often built a structure called a "brush arbor." Brush arbors were open shelters that had a flat top covered with brush for the roof.

These temporary shelters often served as a group’s first official place of worship. The host family for these new congregations (or sometimes the family that donated the land or materials for the brush arbor) frequently gave its name to the new place. Even today, many Methodist churches bear a family name such as Morris Chapel in Forsyth County or Cox’s Chapel in Randolph County.

On the first day of a camp meeting in North Carolina all roads leading to the grounds were clotted with people hurrying to the meeting, some on foot carrying their shoes in their hands; others on horseback with a child in front and a bundle of provisions behind; still others in wagons and carts, some drawn by horses, others by oxen, vehicles crowded with women and children and piled high with equipage. The camp ground was heavily wooded; near by was a creek and spring of water. Men and women were tethering horses, erecting tents, cooking meals for the day. Children were frolicking about, in and out among the wagons, frightfully near the horses’ heels.

Not far off women were already beginning to find their places on the rude plank seats in front of the "stage." They were leaving vacant a few seats in front. Those were the "anxious benches." Here the "convicted" [those whom God had chosen for conversion] would come to be prayed for when the preacher issued the invitation for "mourners." The only covering over the arbor sheltered the pulpit. On the stage was a knot of men solemnly shaking hands and conversing. On all sides of the arbor, row after row of vehicles crowded one another. Men were standing everywhere. The music struck up, quavering; mostly female voices singing two lines at a time as the deacon read them off. After another hymn, a preacher arose and the men came filing in, taking their seats on the opposite side of the arbor if the women had not filled them all; or crowding into the aisles and back of the seats occupied by their women folk. The minister, an ordinary looking man, dragged out an ordinary address while whispered conversations hummed louder and louder. Infants wailed fretfully. A dog fight started somewhere among the wagons.

This sketch by Benjamin Latrobe shows the layout of a camp meeting in Fairfax, Virginia, in 1809. Latrobe also noted, to the right of the main camp, "a boarded enclosure filled with straw, into which the converted were thrown that they might kick about without injuring themselves." Note also that seating was to be segregated. (Click the image to see the full version.) About the illustration

At length the evangelist arose. At once the congregation was electrified. "And what come ye out into the wilderness for to see?" he asked, fixing his eyes upon the congregation. His voice rose powerfully, "Ayr! ye are come as to a holiday pageant, bedecked in tinsel and costly raiment. I see before me the pride of beauty and youth; the middle-aged,… the hoary hairs and decrepit limbs of age; — all trampling — hustling each other in your haste — on one beaten road — the way to death and judgment! Oh! fools and blind! slow-worms, battening upon the damps and filth of this vile earth! hugging your muck rakes while the Glorious One proffers you the Crown of Life!" Women were in tears. "That’s preaching!" shouted a gray-haired man. "Lord, have mercy!" another besought.

With words of doom yet upon his lips, the preacher suddenly stopped. A female voice began a spiritual:

This is the field, the world below,—

Where wheat and tares together grow;

Jesus, ere long, will weed the crop,

And pluck the tares in anger up.

With a mighty roar the congregation burst into the chorus:

For soon the reaping time will come,

And angels shout the harvest home!

The preachers had come down from the stage. "Sinners come home!" they shouted above the surge of the song. They went through the congregation shaking hands, singing as they went:

For soon the reaping time will come,

And angels shout the harvest home!

Nerves were taut. The tumult rose. Shouts of thanksgiving and wails of despair joined with the ever recurring pulse of the song. Now a minister was praying; now he was shouting, "Washed in the blood of the Lamb!" One after another, weeping mourners arose and flung themselves in front of the anxious seats.

It was now two o’clock. After a brief intermission, while the ministers and their helpers continued to labor with the seekers, there would be prayer and exhortation. At candle-light pine torches would be lighted and there would be preaching again. So far, no one had "come through." The ministers had hardly expected it. That would not come until the third or fourth day of the meeting.

　

Almost all the religion in the world has been produced by revivals. God has found it necessary to take advantage of the excitability there is in mankind, to produce powerful excitements among them, before he can lead them to obey. Men are so sluggish, there are so many things to lead their minds off from religion, and to oppose the influence of the gospel, that it is necessary to raise an excitement among them, till the tide rises so high as to sweep away the opposing obstacles. They must be so excited that they will break over these counteracting influences, before they will obey God.…

[A revival] presupposes that the church is sunk down in a backslidden state, and a revival consists in the return of the church from, her backslidings, and in the conversion of sinners.

A revival always includes conviction of sin on the part of the church. Backslidden professors cannot wake up and begin right away in the service of God, without deep searchings of heart. The fountains of sin need to be broken up. In a true revival, Christians are always brought under such convictions ; they see their sins in such a light, that often they find it impossible to maintain a hope of their acceptance with God. It does not always go to that extent; but there are always, in a genuine revival, deep convictions of sin, and often cases of abandoning all hope.

Backslidden Christians will be brought to repentance. A revival is nothing else than a new beginning of obedience to God. Just as in the case of a converted sinner, the first step is a deep repentance, a breaking down of heart, a getting down into the dust before God, with deep humility, and forsaking of sin.

Christians will have their faith renewed. While they are in their backslidden state they are blind to the state of sinners. Their hearts are as hard as marble. The truths of the Bible only appear like a dream. They admit it to be all true; their conscience and their judgment assent to it; but their faith does not see it standing out in bold relief, in all the burning realities of eternity. But when they enter into a revival, they no longer see men as trees walking, but they see things in that strong light which will renew the love of God in their hearts. This will lead them to labor zealously to bring others to him. They will feel grieved that others do not love God, when they love him so much. And they will set themselves feelingly to persuade; their neighbors to give him their hearts. So their love to men will be renewed. They will be filled with a tender and burning love for souls. They will have a longing desire for the salvation of the whole world. They will be in an agony for individuals whom they want to have saved; their friends, relations, enemies. They will not only be urging them to give their hearts to God, but they will carry them to God in the arms of faith, and with strong crying and tears beseech God to have mercy on them, and save their souls from endless burnings.

A revival breaks the power of the world and of sin over Christians. It brings them to such vantage ground that they get a fresh impulse towards heaven. They have a new foretaste of heaven, and new desires after union to God; and the charm of the world is broken, and the power of sin overcome.

When the churches are thus awakened and reformed, the reformation and salvation of sinners will follow, going through the same stages of conviction, repentance, and reformation. Their hearts will be broken down and changed. Very often the most abandoned profligates are among the subjects. Harlots, and drunkards, and infidels, and all sorts of abandoned characters, are awakened and converted. The worst part of human society are softened, and reclaimed, and made to appear as lovely specimens of the beauty of holiness.