Personal Recollections of Pardee ButlerButler, Pardee
Religion
Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler
Butler, Pardee
Kansas -- History -- 1854-1861
The only sermon that I can remember as containing any allusion to
politics, was one that he preached at Pardee that summer of 1858. It
was from the text, "Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!
for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the
weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought
ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." After speaking in
a general manner of Christian duties that are left undone by those who
are precise about certain theological points, he spoke plainly of the
injustice and unmercifulness of slavery, and besought Christians to be
careful how they upheld it in any manner, lest they be condemned by the
words of the text.
Another sermon that he preached at Pardee, August 1, 1858, was from I.
Kings xviii. 21: "If the Lord be God, follow him: but if Baal, then
follow him." After delineating very graphically the terrible drouth,
and the long contest of Elijah with Ahab and Jezebel, he told of the
final triumph of religion, and the merited defeat and punishment of
wickedness. He finished with an eloquent appeal from the text, "If the
Lord be God, then serve him." At the close two boys confessed their
Savior. One of them was an orphan boy, then making his home at my
father's house, and since known as Judge J. J. Locker, of Atchison,
who died last September.
But winter came, and the co-operation that had engaged father that
summer felt that they had paid all they could raise. It had not been
enough to pay a hired man, and meet our frugal expenses. Yet that was
the first money he had made for three and a half years, except by his
two trips to Illinois. He had appealed to the General Missionary
Society, and they had declined to support him, unless he would promise
not to say a word about slavery. But the people were calling to him
from every direction to come and organize churches. He decided to
appeal personally to the churches in the older States. From December,
1858, until May, 1859, he preached constantly in Illinois, Indiana,
Michigan and Ohio, collecting what money he could. He reported $365 as
the amount received, expenses $110, leaving a balance of $255. He
received enough more during the summer to make his salary #297.42.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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