CHAPTER 20 JOHN A. GRENADE

CHAPTER 20 JOHN A. GRENADE A short sketch of this wonderful man, written by our friend and brother, Dr. Baker, of the Cincinnati conference, containing some deeply thrilling and interesting incidents, will be found below. The Doctor’s sketch is prefaced by the following:

"Dear Brother, — I am much gratified to learn that you are engaged in rescuing from the shades of forgetfulness the names, the labors, and privations of those pious dead, who, in the early stages of the settlement of the vast region of this now cultivated and truly ’great west,’ went forth, bearing the precious seed of Gospel truth, and scattering it broadcast over the extensive field. They had, morally speaking, to fell the forest, to clear, break up, and reclaim a soil, wild and luxuriant, of a vitiated growth, and transform it into a fruitful field. How did those men toil and suffer privation! Surely their names, their labors, their sufferings, and their success should be stereotyped in the records of Methodism, and of the nation, in all coming generations. But, alas! even the names of some of them are almost forgotten. We hope you will gather up many of the fragments that yet remain. It is a work worthy of your pen; and the book will be hailed with joy by hundreds of the pioneers of Methodism who yet linger on earth, both in the north and in the south, and by thousands of their descendants.

"I send you herewith a few reminiscences of Rev. John A. Grenade, known, in the days of his itinerancy, as the ’wild man.’ Some points in his character and history I have learned from others, but the pastoral visit I give from memory.

"God, in his wisdom, for the accomplishment of his purposes, has, in every age of the world, chosen such instrumentalities as were adapted to the times, circumstances, and state of society. This is illustrated and confirmed, as in numerous other instances, in the character of the early Methodist preachers of this country. Moreover, times and circumstances tend to develop the character, mold the habits, and shape the courses of men. Hence, ’men for the times’ are the instruments God has provided to meet emergencies; and where they are obedient to their call, and with fidelity attend to the work to which they were destined, success ever has, and ever will honor and crown their efforts; and if some disobey, others will be called. Thus are the designs of God accomplished. Such men always leave their impress upon their age.

"Of several of the Methodist preachers who labored in the south-west in the days of my childhood, I have recollections more or less distinct. Samuel Douthet was hortatory and pathetic; Ralph Lotspeich, a weeping prophet; Thomas Wilkerson, a son of consolation, whose speech dropped like the gentle dew; John Crane, a warm, earnest, eloquent man. He, too, often wept in preaching. Crane was a slender man, apparently feeble, very zealous, and abundant in labors. He fell a martyr to his work in 1812, on Duck river, Tennessee, where he labored night and day, while God himself was warning the terrified inhabitants by ’terribly shaking the earth.’ James Axley, droll, witty argumentative, and often powerful. I heard him last at a campmeeting in Tennessee, in 1819. There are others of whom I could speak. Among them all, however, Grenade was the ’Son of Thunder.’ The visit to my father’s family, when he traveled the Holston circuit, impressed him upon my memory so as never to be forgotten.

"Of the parentage, nativity, or early life of Mr. Grenade I know nothing. When I saw him at my father’s, in 1803, he was, as I suppose, near thirty years of age. He was about medium height, but slender; of a quick and elastic step; formed for action. His voice was full and musical; his eye keen, piercing; and, when speaking, his gesticulations were violent. He was a man of respectable education, a physician, and a poet. His temperament was ardent, or, as Martin Luther said of himself, he was ’choleric by nature.’

"After his conversion, if my impressions are correct, he lost his evidence of justification and all his religious enjoyment, in consequence of refusing to preach. But the Spirit of God pursued him, and, though he tried to shake off his convictions of duty, he was brought to see and feel his perilous condition so sensibly as to excite the most fearful apprehensions and alarm. The enemy, taking advantage of his condition, suggested that his destiny was now sealed; that he had ’grieved the Spirit of God whereby he had been sealed;’ that he had ’sinned against the Holy Ghost;’ that his case was hopeless, and his doom unalterably sealed. He yielded to the temptation, and his spirit sank within him. Now it was he ’found trouble and sorrow;’ yea, ’the pains of hell got hold upon him,’ and now for a season the billows of the Divine wrath seemed to overwhelm him. He was brought to the verge of despair, and here he struggled long and hard. While thus drinking the ’cup of trembling,’ the wormwood and gall, he wandered in forests and mountains, by day and by night, scarcely taking sufficient rest or nourishment to sustain nature, bewailing his lost — as he believed — his hopeless condition and fearful destiny.

It was in this state of mind he composed some of his mournful and penitential poems, as he doubtless thought and feared, the funeral dirges of all his hopes. But though bordering on despair, he continued to pour out his soul in prayer, still cherishing a faint hope that mercy might possibly yet be extended to him, and the vials of Divine wrath be turned aside. Often did he wrestle as in an agony, pleading with God for mercy. It was in consequence of his thus wandering alone, bewailing his condition, and refusing to be comforted, that he first obtained the appellation of the ’wild man,’ which cognomen consorted equally well with his subsequent zeal and the character of his efforts as a minister.

"When he obtained deliverance it was sudden — instantaneous as the lightning’s flash. As he lay alone upon the ground, looking up toward heaven with mingled hope and despair, a light from heaven shone round about him, dispelling his gloomy forebodings, and filling his soul with unutterable peace and joy. It was a complete triumph. The transition was so sudden, so great, that the morning of rapturous joy was now as overwhelming as had been the long, dark night of his sorrow. In the poem commemorative of this event, and which I heard him sing with the deepest emotions, are the following stanzas:

’One evening, pensive as I lay Alone upon the ground, As I to God began to pray, A light shone all around.

Glory to God! I loudly cried, My sins are all forgiven; For me, for me the Savior died: My peace is made with heav’n.’

"Having been thus severely schooled by experience in the evils of sin, and having tasted the joys of salvation, he became exceedingly zealous for the honor of that God whose mercy had so marvelously saved him, and, deeply concerned for the salvation of his perishing fellow-men, he immediately engaged in calling sinners to repentance.

"Mr. Grenade entered the traveling connection in 1802, in the Western conference, and was appointed that year to Green circuit, with Moses Floyd in charge. In 1803 he was appointed to Holston circuit, with Thomas Milligan in charge; but Milligan was afterward sent to Clinch, and Grenade was left in charge. The Holston circuit then embraced a large extent of country in East Tennessee, in the bounds of which my father then lived. Whether Grenade was left with or without a colleague, I know not; one thing is certain, however, he was abundant in labors, insomuch that his career as an itinerant was brief. His circuits were large, his rides long, and much of the time he labored both day and night; for where he had not regular appointments, his zeal and extraordinary labors rendered him so notorious that the people would throng him. Though often coy, shy, and fearful of approaching too near, yet they flocked to see and hear him; and he was ever ready to speak for his Master; ever ready to warn, to instruct, to comfort, to pray, or to sing, as opportunity offered or occasion required. He obeyed the injunction, ’Work while it is called today.’ Such was his zeal for God, and his concern for the souls of men, that he seemed to have forgotten himself or to disregard the effects of his excessive labors upon his own frail constitution; and his success may be learned from the official reports from the fields of his toil.

"At this time my father resided on Roseberry creek, a small tributary of the Holston river, in Knox county, Tennessee. About two miles distant was a preaching place, where the family were in the habit of attending preaching, and where my two eldest sisters, about this time, joined the little society. It was during this year, I think, in the month of June, and about two months before my father’s death, that Mr. Grenade made one of his primitive pastoral visits to our family. Though I was then but a child, I have a vivid recollection of this visit. Some of the family had been to hear him preach, and he came home with them. Soon after they returned from meeting word was sent to my uncle’s family, who lived on an adjoining farm, and I think to some other near neighbors, that Mr. Grenade was there, and would be glad to see and converse with as many as could conveniently collect. Soon after dinner the family were collected. My uncle’s family, with others, came in. All being seated in the largest room of the farm-house — we had no parlors in the country in those days — the table was set out a little distance from the wall, and the books placed upon it. The preacher then came from his room, was introduced to the company, and then took his station by the table, my father sitting by his side. He first read a portion of Scripture, sung a hymn, and prayed. Well do I remember the earnestness, fervor, and unction of his prayer. He then gave an exhortation, in which he waxed quite warm, frequently moving the table forward before him, till at the close of his exhortation it stood near the center of the room. His hearers, except my father and elder sisters, being unaccustomed to such stentorian addresses, kept as respectful and non-committal a distance as the dimensions of the domestic chapel would permit. And as to my little self, being among the youngest of his auditors, and extremely timid by nature, I was partly hid in the bushes in the fireplace. It was customary in those days, in the warm season-of the year, to clean out this recess, paint the hearth, and adorn it with green bushes from the woods and flowers from the garden. The exhortation over, he sang again, and then proceeded to speak personally to each individual present. Well do I remember what a chill ran over me when, in passing round the room in his earnest manner, rubbing his hands, he came opposite to where I sat, reaching forth his hand, and laying it upon my head, implored the blessing of ’Him that dwelt in the bush’ to rest upon the child. At that moment my heart seemed to sink within me; but ’coupled with fear’ was a reverence for the man. I wept, I loved him; for I really believed he wished us all to be saved. After conversing with, and earnestly exhorting all in the room, he came again to the place of beginning; and never shall I forget the attitude in which he stood before my father. Rubbing his hands briskly, lifting his feet alternately, and setting them down with no very slow or light tread, breathing deep inspirations drawn through his teeth, he almost literally danced, like David before the ark. After indulging for some moments in this ebullition of feeling, in which not a word was spoken, his full soul found vent in an outburst of blessing and thanksgiving to God that, though the harvest was large, and the laborers so few in that region, he had found one who was laboring faithfully in the wilderness to prepare the way of the Lord. He then walked the room for some time, singing hymns and spiritual songs, mostly of his own composing. His earnest manner, the shrill and musical tones of his voice, his speaking eye, now beaming with joy, and now suffused with tears, alternating with the varied emotions of his ardent soul, which seemed to be full of the mighty thoughts that were struggling within and seeking an utterance, made such an impression upon my heart at the time, that the lapse of half a century, with all its vicissitudes, has not erased. I even yet recollect some of the stanzas he there sung, especially those relating to his own experience, in which he so vividly portrays his condition, as when, in the anguish of his soul, he poured forth his wild and bitter wail of despair:

’O, that I were some bird or beast; Some wolf, or stork, or owl Some lofty tree should bear my nest Or through the desert prowl.’ And then his joyful deliverance, as given above. This stanza is, I think, nearly verbatim from his experience, as originally versified by himself.

"At the close of these services, which, to the best of my recollection, lasted not less than two hours, the company retired with his blessing. This interview, I presume, was never forgotten by any who were then present. Such pastoral visits were seldom in those days, and such a one I have not witnessed since. The evening was spent by Mr. Grenade and my father in conversation on the all-important subject of their work — the work of saving souls. These were times that demanded and called into requisition all the wisdom, the fortitude, and the patient perseverance of the few and widely-scattered laborers then in the field.

"The next morning, after family worship and an early breakfast, these servants of God, with renewed vows of fidelity in their work, parted for the last time. In a few weeks from this the my father died suddenly of apoplexy. Though he fell unexpectedly, in high health, and in the strength of manhood, he fell with the trumpet at his mouth. It was on the Sabbath. He had an appointment to preach at eleven o’clock that day, but his work was done. About two o’clock in the morning he was heard breathing in an unusual and laborious manner. In a few moments a light was procured, and his family gathered around his bed. But he spoke not; death was doing its work in a summary manner; and he—

’Ceased at once to work and live.’

"I have said Grenade was a poet. His poetry was characteristic of the man, and his style as a preacher bold, towering, often tinctured with the ’awfully sublime,’ yet flowing with ease and naturalness, and sometimes extremely tender and pathetic. In my childhood I memorized many of his ’spiritual songs;’ but have forgotten most of them. I have not seen any of them in their original dress for many years, and fear they are ’out of print.’ Some vestiges of them, occasionally found in compilations, are so mangled and distorted that the author, if living, would hardly recognize them.

"Mr. Grenade labored but three years as an itinerant. His zeal carried him beyond his strength, and under his indefatigable labors and exposures in the new settlements his health failed, and he located. My last information of him was, that he was practicing medicine somewhere in south-western Tennessee."