John Chambers, Servant of Christ and Master of Hearts, and His Ministry in Philadelphia

by William Elliot Griffis

To-day, with its large eldership, boards of trustees and deacons, its doormen and tithemen, its leaders of Christian bands, its college established in 1881—the first of its kind in Philadelphia, and of which for many years its vice-president, Rudolph S. Walton, was chief friend and benefactor, Bethany is a center of blessing to thousands. Of the Deaconesses' Home, the Men's Friendly Inn, and other details of the great work we have not space to speak. At his decease in November, 1900, Mr. Walton left about $200,000 for the erection of a new college building.

No sooner was Bethany Church grown to adult life than it began to send forth colonies. The Bethany Mission was its first namesake. By this time, in the twentieth century, the boy that I once knew as no richer or poorer than the average, had become one of Philadelphia's princely merchants, with hand ever open for gifts and help. A lot at the northeast corner of Twenty-eighth and Morris streets, measuring 114 by 136 feet, was secured. It was far away from any human dwelling, but it was in the direction of growth. The skilled fishers of men let down the net just where they knew the fishes would be in shoals—a method and policy following out that of their great teacher, Jesus Christ, and of their earthly exemplar, John Chambers. On this lot Mr. John Wanamaker and Mrs. Wanamaker (at whose wedding I remember being present, as a boy), in gratitude to God for the wonderful preservation from fire of the great Wanamaker store, have erected, since the streets were opened, a superb edifice with all modern equipments and furnishing. This, at the present time, serves as a church and Sunday School and for social gatherings. The main church edifice is to be erected later on the southern portion of the still unoccupied lot.

How gratifying this was to the Presbytery of Philadelphia is seen in the records given below. From the minutes of October 30, 1901, we make extracts of the

PROCEEDINGS OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE PRESBYTERY OF PHILADELPHIA.

Mr. Robert H. Hinckley presented the following preamble and resolution:

"As a member of the special committee who reported June 1, 1899 (see folio 228) on the proposed location of a church at 28th and Morris Streets, I desire to report that in accordance with the permission therein granted, Mr. John Wanamaker has erected and dedicated to the memory of the late Rev. John Chambers a church building on the North East corner of 28th and Morris Sts., which affords ample space for a congregation of fifteen hundred worshippers, also for a large Sabbath school and several large rooms suitable for reading rooms and for the general purposes of an institutional church. The ground and building cost Mr. Wanamaker over eighty thousand dollars, all of which has been paid and the building was dedicated during the third week of October, free of debt, as The John Chambers Memorial Church. I suggest, therefore, that we recommend to Presbytery the following Resolution:

Resolved, That a special Committee of three members of this Presbytery be appointed to wait on Mr. John Wanamaker and extend to him the thanks and appreciation of the Presbytery for his princely liberality and his magnificent recognition of the work and services of one of our most devoted ministers who has long since been called to his reward".

This was unanimously agreed to and the Committee appointed.

In the above record, the name of Robert H. Hinckley is that of the surviving elder of the Chambers Presbyterian Church and still an indefatigable worker in Christ's name. On Saturday afternoon early in May, 1901, in the presence of a large gathering of Bethany Church people and about five hundred children, ground was broken at Twenty-eighth and Morris streets. Besides addresses from John Wanamaker, Rev. Messrs. Wm. Patterson, John Thompson, George Van Deurs, and the laymen Edwin Adams, Robert Boyd, and R. M. Coyle, there were prayer and singing.

I visited this as yet unbuilt portion of the city on Friday, Jan. 23rd, 1903, which, besides being the 324th anniversary of the Union of Utrecht, our great national precedent for federal government and the date of the dinner of the Holland Society of Philadelphia, was for me a veritable John Chambers day.