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Publisher's Comments
Turn over to the church page in today's paper and I bet you will find several revivals planned or under way at area churches. And you can't tell a distinction between denominations, none between black churches and white churches. The Baptists, Methodists, A.M.E.'s, A.O.H.'s and others are all prone to be holding revivals this month. Why is this? It ties back to our agriculturalbased heritage. Our ancestors were farmers and the biggest crop for generations of southern farmers was cotton. Cotton was the mainstay of life. What little cash money people had came from the sale of cotton. Entire lives were built around the preparing of fields for cotton in the spring, its planting and cultivating, and finally its harvesting and ginning in the fall and early winter. Cotton consumed a farmer's waking life from early spring to nearly Christmas. And I dare say that those few winter months when they weren't actually working with the plant, farmers fretted about how much they had lost the previous year or about their prospects for the next season. The one break from the hard work of cotton farming came in late July and August. By then, if everything was going right, the cotton was growing in the fields. There would be a final plowing to try to keep the coffee weeds and cockleburs from taking over and the farmer would "lay the cotton by" for it to develop its flowers and then the bolls of white marshmallow-looking fibers. Those few weeks between "laying by" and the beginning of frantic picking gave the farmer a little time to catch his breath. The local preachers figured out early, I expect, that this was a good time to work on the spiritual needs of their flocks. In the early days, such revivals were more often called camp meetings or protracted meetings because they weren't held just in the evenings but for a full week-day and night. Camp meetings were termed that because people did literally come to a location and camped out for the duration of the services. Some would sleep in their wagons or in tents. In some instances, hastily constructed cabins would be erected, especially in areas where the camp meetings were known to be an every-year event. Protracted meetings were just what the name implies too-long term events. Sometimes the meetings were held in existing churches but frequently such gatherings were outdoors or under makeshift brush arbors. Some were held under big pavilions called tabernacles that were more permanent and substantial structures. These extended services benefited not only people's spiritual well-being but their need for social contact with their fellow man too. Often, farms were miles apart and one family might not see their nearest neighbor for weeks. Trips to town were usually limited to a few times a year (such as when cotton was carried in to be ginned and baled). Big planks of wood would be nailed between trees for dinners and suppers. While the socializing and eating was popular, it wasn't the mainstay of the events. The preachers made the best of having a large congregation on hand for more than a few hours at the time and conducted emotional evangelistic services, prodding people to make confessions of faith and to accept Jesus Christ and His salvation. Music and old-time hymns played a big part too. "Amazing Grace" and "Standing on the Promises" would be sung to fluttering handheld fans, timed to the songs' tempo. The strength of this "old time religion" washed over many folks who would be prone to cry, laugh and sometimes shout their testimonies. A nearby stream-it could be a river, creek or just a mudhole of a pond-would be utilized for a ritualistic baptizing, the "washing away" of sins. Over the years, cotton has pretty much played out. Still, August is a month for revivals even though they don't too much resemble the camp meetings and protracted meetings of old. The day-and-night events were culled to evening events over time and in recent years the weeklong revivals have been cut down to just two or three evenings a week. The evangelistic fervor of the old meetings is present in some churches but in too many others the atmosphere more closely resembles some dull corporate stockholders meeting.
Perhaps we need to go back to planting cotton.
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