Around Old Bethany: A Story of the Adventures of Robert and Mary Davis

The Project Gutenberg eBook, Around Old Bethany, by Robert Lee Berry
E-text prepared by Joel Erickson, Christine Gehring, Leah Moser, and the Project Gutenbert Online Distributed Proofreading Team
A Story of the Adventures of Robert and Mary Davis
By
R.L. BERRY
This small volume was first published in the year of 1925, but it has been out of print for many years. The present reprint edition is in response to requests for it to be in print again.
The main characters in this true-to-life narrative are led to Bible salvation, and then step by step into the various Bible doctrines, and finally to establish a congregation of the Church of God after the New Testament pattern. In the meantime, the snares of false doctrines which surrounded them were exposed and they were guided unerringly in the truth of God's Word.
May the Scriptural truths set forth in this narrative enlighten every reader, and arm him with the Sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, to meet and refute the false teachings now abroad in our land.
—Lawrence Pruitt Guthrie, Oklahoma May, 1968
BEGINNING THE SEARCH
It was in the year of 1885 that the railroad was put through the particular corner of Missouri that marks the scene where the events of this narrative took place. With the coming of the railroad, there came an influx of new settlers, who were of various nationalities and conditions in life. There were Swedes from Malmo, Germans from Dresden, and Irishmen from Tyrone, all bent on founding a new home in the new country. Besides these, there were Americans of many kinds and inclinations. All of these settlers brought with them the particular brands of religion in which they had been brought up. The Swedes and Germans were Lutherans, but each nationality was of a different synod and had little agreement or fellowship. The Irishmen were Roman Catholics, while the Americans were divided up among the different denominations. No sooner had these settlers built themselves homes than they started to build chapels and churches; it was a chapel if its builders rebelled at calling a building a church, and it was a church if its builders had no such scruples. No survey was made as an effort to find out how many churches were needed; indeed, each denomination erected a place of worship even if there was only a handful represented in its membership. Those were the days of unleavened bread and bitter herbs, when every denomination was full of sectarian rivalry, and each of them claimed more or less of a monopoly upon the love and power of God. Revival-meetings were held frequently, sometimes contemporaneously, and the doors of the church were swung open every Sunday for the admission of new members.