The Church, the Falling Away, and the Restoration

by J. W. Shepherd

For several days he accompanied Mr. Campbell from place to place, an enraptured listener to every discourse, and earnestly engaged him in conversation as they traveled along the way or sat under some hospitable roof. At last his mind cast off its fetters. The way hitherto so clouded became plain, and he left the company of Mr. Campbell, resolved henceforth to devote his life to preaching the simple Gospel as exhibited in the New Testament.

The step was, as he had anticipated, attended with great sacrifices. Old friends forsook him. He had always stood high among his preaching brethren, but now he was regarded with undisguised suspicion. Soon the storm gathered furiously about him. At the annual meeting of the association in which he held his membership charges were preferred against him, among the most serious of which was that, instead of the King James translation of the Scriptures, “he had on two or three occasions in public, and often in his family, read from Alexander Campbell’s translation.” Without being given an opportunity to defend himself, he was placed under censure, and given a year in which to correct his views and change his ways.

Returning to his home, the way for a time seemed to close before him. The little farm was covered with a heavy mortgage. The churches that had obligated themselves to pay his debt in compensation of his services, now refused to make further payment. Nothing apparently remained but for him to cultivate his farm with his own hands, and for a time to abandon the work of the ministry. Taking his ax he went into the forest with the heroic purpose, first to free himself from debt, and then to return to the defense of the faith which he now felt to be the teaching of the Word of God. But one day as he was bending to his labors he thought of the cause that he loved, and remembered that there was no one in all the land to advocate it but himself. He also thought of the construction that would be put on his silence by his enemies. He dropped the ax, went to the house, and threw down his coarse apron at the feet of his wife, exclaiming:

Nancy, I shall work no more! Get whom you please to carry on the farm, but do not call on me! In all the land there is not one soul to open his mouth in defense of the best cause under the sun! I am determined, from this time forth, to preach the Gospel, and leave the consequences to God.

With the courage of his convictions, he immediately began to preach the truth as he now felt it and saw it. No personal consideration was allowed to interfere with the course he had marked out for himself. His heroic wife readily caught his spirit and as cheerfully accepted the responsibilities of her new position—agreeing to take the oversight of the farm, care for the family, and to relieve him of every temporal care, while he should give himself wholly to the ministry of the Word.

But from a course so radical and perilous his friends earnestly sought to dissuade him. They argued: “Your more influential brethren will abandon you; you will get nothing for your preaching; your debts will press you to the earth, and your farm and house eventually given up.” “Conscience,” said he, “is an article that I have never yet brought into the market; but should I offer it for sale, Montgomery County, with all its lands and houses, would not be enough to buy it, much less that farm of one hundred acres.”

As he now went from house to house, and neighborhood, to plant the cause of Christ, his zeal knew no bounds. His heart was all aglow with his new-born knowledge of the truth, and with tireless effort he sought to win men to respect and obey the simple claims of the Gospel. So intense was his desire that he scarcely allowed himself time to eat and sleep. After a busy day he would often spend a greater part of the night answering questions or meeting objections which his public discourses had aroused, or in helping some half-persuaded inquirer to a full acceptance of the Gospel; often going the same hour of the night to some near-by stream to administer baptism, when a surrender had been made. Or, if at home, the burden that was upon his heart, and his thirst for the knowledge of the Word of God, would often interfere with his sleep, and he would arise and light his candle at midnight “to examine some word or text not yet understood, and which, perhaps, had confused him in his dreams.”

The preaching of John Smith, so different from that of the times, so far removed from the conventional forms, and so new and strange in doctrine, at once awakened new interest in languishing churches. Calls now came to him from so many quarters that he seldom had an opportunity to enjoy the fellowship of his family, to which he was warmly attached. He endeavored, if possible, to visit his home once a week; but this purpose he was not always able to accomplish. “He would tarry at some distant place, preaching and baptizing till the week was nearly gone, and then, dismissing the people at a late hour, ride hurriedly through the darkness, sometimes through mud and cold and tempest, in order to keep his promise with his wife. At other times, when going from one part of the district to another, he would pass along by his own house, but, too much hurried to stop and rest, would linger a while at the gate, and, gathering strength from her words of cheer, press on to his distant appointment.” On one occasion, as he thus hurried from one appointment to another, he stopped at home just long enough to change his soiled linen for clean. As he was about to leave his wife remarked with a touch of sadness in her tone, “Is it not time that you were having your washing done somewhere else? We have attended to it for you a long time.” “No, Nancy, I am pleased with your way of doing things, and I do not wish to make any change.” After a kind good-bye to her and a few playful words to the little ones, he passed on to meet the congregation that would wait for him that day in some young convert’s house, or perhaps, in some hospitable grove.

The patient heroism of faith finds few better illustrations than in the wife of this tireless pioneer. Upon Nancy Smith rested the burden of the family and the farm. When help could not be secured, she would go forth herself into the busy field to tend the growing crop, or to superintend the gathering of the harvest, that her faithful husband might devote all his energies to the cause to which they were both so much devoted. His preaching brought no material recompense to relieve their pinching poverty. Though he labored incessantly for the salvation of his fellow men, no one ever thought of contributing to his support, or if they felt inclined to minister to him in temporal things were probably too poor. During the years 1825-1830, in which he laid the foundation of primitive Christianity in Kentucky, he never received a dollar for his services, or compensation of any kind, save the remittance to a friendly merchant in a neighboring town for a small bill of goods.

The result of such zeal, such labor, such sacrifice, brought its reward to this devoted messenger of truth in a richer blessing than any that material prosperity had to offer. His message was gladly received. Multitudes gathered to hear him, and many received with joy the glorious Gospel of the Son of God which he now felt himself commissioned to preach. A revival of religious interest began to follow the track of his ministry, and he had the satisfaction of seeing hundreds, who had held aloof from the religious systems of the day, now turn to the Lord. So fruitful were his labors that within a short period of six months he was able to report seven hundred conversions and five new churches organized. But greater still, he had established a great cause in the hearts of the people.