CHAPTER 42 INDIAN CAMPMEETING

CHAPTER 42 INDIAN CAMPMEETING In the year 1828, a short the after we left the Indian nation, we held a campmeeting at Messick’s campground, not far from Bellefontaine. To this meeting we invited the Indian brethren at the Wyandott mission. This invitation was generally acceded to, and the Indians came with their camping apparatus, to the number of one hundred and fifty. A place was assigned them for pitching their tents, so that they might all be as near together as possible. We have called this the "Indian campmeeting," because, as the sequel will show, the exercises were mostly confined to the Indian department of the camp, and the Lord seemed to have selected our red brethren as the instrumentality, through which all the glorious results that attended it were achieved. The Indians being more expert in pitching tents than the whites, they, of course, were ready at an earlier hour to engage in religious exercises. It is characteristic of the Indian to devote exclusive attention, for the time being, to whatever pursuit or employment he may take in hand. If it be fishing, or hunting, or sugar making, or corn planting, nothing else is allowed to interfere in the time allotted to these things. So in regard to religion. The time devoted to God was the most sacred, and no people could unite with greater sincerity than they in singing those appropriate lines:

"Far from my thoughts vain world begone, Let my religious hours alone."

Soon the Christian chiefs, and queens, and all, were formed into a circle, and the voice of praise and prayer made the forest arches ring. After singing one of their Christian songs, only as Indians can sing, they fell simultaneously upon their knees and lifted up their faces toward heaven, as if they expected to see the Great Spirit descend in blessings from the parted skies. One of their number would lend in prayer, and when the Indian words, ’tamentare’, and ’Homendezue’ would escape the suppliant’s lips, a deep amen would be uttered in concert by all the circle. The Indian has strong faith, and when he makes preparation for a sacrifice to the Great Spirit, he expects with the utmost confidence that it will be accepted. So was it in this instance; for while they were praying the Spirit came down upon them, and the power of God was manifested in the awakening and conversion of souls. As the shaking of the leaves in the tops of the mulberry trees was an indication to the prophet of the presence of God, so the excitement of the multitude engaged in prayer, as indicated by the tears, and groans, and shouts, was a sign that the Great Spirit was at work upon the hearts of these sons and daughters of the forest, and presently the tents of the whites were forsaken, and many might have been seen mingling with their red brethren and sisters in the exercises of the hour. From this hour though so early in the meeting, the work of the Lord began, and the interest continued to increase and spread as the meeting progressed, till Saturday night, when the whole encampment was in a flame of religious excitement. There seemed to be no need of preaching or exhortation, the Lord having taken his own work into his own hands. All that the preachers and people had to do was to follow the leadings of the Spirit, and the hours passed away in singing and prayer, interrupted only — if indeed, it may be called an interruption — by the loud cries for mercy, which rose from the burdened hearts of the kneeling penitents, or the louder shouts of praise to God for delivering grace, which rose up on the night air and reechoed among the trees from the converted. The holy scenes and hallowed associations of that night of prayer among the Indians, will never be erased from our memory; and though many of our precious red brethren and sisters, who made that grove resound with their voices, have long since gone to join the innumerable company before the throne of God and the Lamb, yet we shall cherish the recollection of that hour till we too shall be summoned to the marriage feast above.

Sabbath morning came. It was one of those beautiful Sabbaths of an Indian summer, which, by its soft and balmy nature, reminds one of the rest and blessedness of heaven. Not many miles from the camp-ground there lived an ungodly man, whose wife, though not a professor of religion, having heard of the meeting, was desirous to attend. She had never been to a campmeeting before, and her desire to attend, like that which actuates too many others, was simply to gratify her curiosity. It was with some considerable difficulty that she could get her husband’s consent, for even backwoods wives in that day were accustomed to look up to their husbands for advice. She finally succeeded, however, as women generally do when they take the right course, in overcoming her husband’s opposition. He agreed to stay home and mind the children while she would be absent, but commanded her to come home by the middle of the afternoon, on pain of getting a whipping. The poor woman, with the brutal threat resting over her head, arrived upon the ground at an early hour. Scarcely had she got within the circle of tents and taken her seat in the congregation, till she began to feel sad at heart. A wonderful power had taken hold of her mind. Her thoughts were carried back to the days of her youth; her early religious thoughts were awakened; tears began to flow, as her children and husband passed rapidly but vividly before her; her sins rose up in frightful, hideous forms to her excited imagination and conscience; and tears and sobs gave place to groans and cries for mercy. She soon became an object of attention, and prayers from many a sympathizing heart went up to God in her behalf. She had already remained beyond the time allotted her by her husband, but her heart was too much burdened to think of returning. She could bear reproach, and scorn, and scourging, but a wounded conscience was insupportable. Through the entire day she continued to plead for mercy, and when the shades of night were gathering around, and forest and tent were lighted up with the watch-fires, and the voices of praise and prayer were swelling out in anthems and supplications to the God of heaven, she embraced the cross with all the fervor of her soul, and her burden, like that of Christian’s in Bunyan’s Pilgrim, rolled away from her and was lost in the tomb of forgetfulness. It was then that she passed from darkness to light, and from the bondage of Satan to the liberty of the children of God. That night was spent in rejoicing, and when the morning came, with a glad heart and free, she started home to meet her enraged and cruel husband. She was always amiable, but she met him that morning with a smile and a sweetness that only grace can spread over the features. With meekness and humility she told him the cause of her detention, and concluded by a simple narration of what God had done for her soul. This, however, as is usually the case, only enraged him the more, and taking his wagon whip he beat her most severely. This she could have borne without religion, for it was nothing when compared with the lashes of a guilty conscience; but now that her soul was full of the love of God, with a martyr spirit she could have borne the torture or the stake, in the name and for the sake of Jesus. From that hour the iron entered his soul only to be extracted by an omnipotent Hand. He raged like a maniac, and swore that he would take vengeance in firing the encampment that night.

Night came, and this inhuman fiend started out under its cover to execute his fearful threat. When he arrived upon the ground the Indian brethren were engaged in a most glorious work. The groans of the penitent, and the shouts of praise of the converted, were mingled together, and the sound of the many voices was like the roar of the distant sea. While this sound waked the songs of heaven, it was a "dreadful sound" to that ungodly man, and carried, like the sound in the Assyrian camp, terror to his heart. He drew near. There was terror in his face and wildness in his eye as the watch-fire gleamed upon him, but his heart had lost its courage, and his arm its nerve. As he gazed upon the scene, like Belshazzar, in the court of Babylon, in sight of the mysterious characters of fire, which blazed out upon him, his knees trembled, his heart quaked, and he fell prostrate upon the ground, crying for mercy. He was picked up by an athletic Indian, who fully understood the nature of his condition, and carried him into the circle. No sooner was the sturdy Saul prostrate before the Indians, than a volley of prayer went up in his behalf that almost rent the heavens. He was a prisoner, captured by one of the scouts of Immanuel’s army, but he was wounded and dying. His captor bent down closely with his ear, to listen to his dying groans, and would say to him in Indian, "by and by."

There lay the prostrate sinner pleading for mercy. The Indians stood by him, and sang and prayed till long past the noon of night. It was a desperate struggle, and seemed doubtful whether there was mercy for such a bold blasphemer and cruel persecutor. But just before day, when the stars began to fade in the light of the gray streaks of morning, God’s mercy came, the long agony was over, and the blasphemer and persecutor was changed into a child of God; the heir of hell was made an heir of heaven. To the astonishment of all, after his first bursts of praise were over, he related his cruel conduct to his wife, and his intention, as a matter of revenge, of setting the encampment on fire. Some one present interpreted his confession and experience to the Indians. When he was through, the noble hearted Mononcue stepped up to him, and taking him by the hand said, "Now, my white brother, God converted your wife, and you whipped her for it, and God has converted you. Go home and tell her what God has done for y our soul, and let her take the same whip, if she desires so to do, and whip you in return. It is good that God has converted you both. Go in peace, and sin no more." This couple will never forget the Indian campmeeting. But these are not all the incidents connected with this campmeeting; there were others still more interesting and thrilling, the relation of which, however, would occupy too much space for this chapter, and we shall reserve them for the next.