South Union United Methodist Campmeeting
Memorial Day Observance
May 27, 2001
Speaker: Miss Erin Moss
P.O. Box 424
Ackerman, MS 39735
 "Wherefore,
seeing we are encompassed about with so great a cloud of
witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that so
easily does beset us, looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher
of our faith , who for the joy that was set before Him, endured
the cross, despising the shame and is set down on the right hand
on the throne of God." Hebrews 12:1-2.
Let us bow our heads for just a moment of
prayer. Our Father, we thank Thee for Thy goodness and praise
Thee for all the wonderful works that Thou hast done for us. We
thank Thee for all the people that are here this morning at
South Union, for all that have been here in the past who are now
with Thee, for all who wanted to be here but are physically
unable to be here. We ask Thee to be with us and may we all feel
Thy presence for we know that Thou are with us. May we feel Thy
presence and Thy love and Thy power. We ask Thee to lead us in
this time that we meet together and give to us Thy blessings. In
Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
 With
humility I stand here where so many great preachers, talented
singers, and gifted laymen have come to us with powerful
sermons, beautiful songs, and memorial addresses that touched
our hearts. I have so much love for South Union and for the
people who come here and I have so much love for all who have
been here in the past and have now crossed to the other side. I
have so much love for the ones who once came here and are still
living but are physically unable to ever be with us again. And I
have so much love for the Lord that it is to me a joy and a
privilege to stand in this sacred place and lead you in this,
our memorial time together. I thank you for inviting me to come
here this morning. I want to thank all of you for being here. We
look forward to seeing you and we hope all of you will be back
with us for camp meeting. It is my wish and my prayer, too, that
when all of God's children have been gathered home, that every
person under this arbor will be there in that gathering. I may
not know who all of you are. I'm almost blind and may not
recognize you, even when we meet face to face unless you tell me
who you are. But God knows you and He loves you and wants you to
be there with Him when all of His children get home. Now with
your love and your prayers and with the love of our Lord and
with His help, let us look to the past and remember, look to the
present and see the great heritage that is ours, and realize the
responsibility that has fallen on our shoulders, and look to the
future and rejoice for the best is yet to be.
I have been a member of this South Union church
for seventy-six years and have been coming here longer than that
because my parents, Jim Moss and Ella Snow Moss started bringing
me here when I was just a baby. There are so many things that I
would like to tell you about all those many years that I have
been coming here but time won't let me do that. But I remember
coming to memorial days and seeing crowds of people coming
across the campground with beautiful flowers in their hands,
carrying them to the cemetery to place on the graves of their
loved ones. Now so many of them have gone on and others are
bringing flowers to place on their graves. Entire families that
I have known have gone on. I remember coming to camp meetings
and seeing people come from their tents across to the arbor at
the blowing of the horn that called us to worship. Some of these
members are so far in the past that they seem like a dream, but
a beautiful dream. And then coming on closer up by, I can still
see very clearly Lillie Belle Liddell coming from her tent
behind the church with all of her family, her children, her
grandchildren, and her in-laws walking with her, coming even
before the blowing of the horn. She never was late to a service
and never missed a service. Now her children, her grandchildren,
her great-grandchildren, and in-laws are carrying on the way
that she did.
And then freshest on my mind, and it still
brings tears to my eyes when I think about it. I can just see
Calton Bruce, even before the blowing of the horn, leaving his
tent on the corner and coming across the campground, with a
walking stick in his hand and with Jimmy Dale Bruce, his nephew,
walking slowly by his side to see that Calton made it to the
arbor all right. And when Calton died a short time after
Christmas, a friend of his said to us, "Please don't let
South Union ever die, because Calton loved it so much." And
he did and talked so much about his love for the Lord and about
heaven where he now is.
 Now we
can't talk about everything that happened in the past, but let
us look back to the time when South Union first became a place
of worship. None of us, of course, knew personally our founding
fathers, but in that group was my great-grandfather, the
Reverend Archie Moss, a circuit rider, who with another circuit
rider, the Reverend Humphrey Buck, and a layman, Carl Pollard,
met, had prayer, and started South Union Camp Meeting, the first
of which was held in 1872. Before that time there was a South
Union Methodist Church. The three men that I just mentioned and
their wives were members of that first church, a log church
built about 1840. Now, of course all in that first generation
have passed on but they left to those coming after them South
Union, a place of worship. The second and third generations
added their touch to South Union history. They added their touch
for the lives that followed them. And in this second and third
generation, all those people kept and used South Union as a
place of worship and now they have passed it on to us who are
following them. My generation, the fourth, is the oldest
generation now living. We have moved to the front line and are
fast crossing over to the other side. But we have with us about
three generations of people who are younger than we are who also
love South Union and we are looking to them to keep coming here
after we are gone and to keep this a place of worship, never
turning it into anything else.
Now over the years we have loved and lost so
many people and we will continue to miss them until we are with
them again. But in the last year, I don't think I have ever
known a year when we have lost more. And once again let me
mention to you the people that we have lost for they mean so
much to me and to all of you. Now I have already mentioned
Calton Bruce, a member of our church. And also another member of
our church, a faithful member that we have lost is N.H.Gatlin.
And others, though not members of South Union church but very
much a part of South Union, people very dear to us are Lyndell
Chambers who is a descendent of an old camp meeting family, the
Neely Henderson family, and then Marietta Love and her brother
Kendall Worrell, the last of the Mac Worrell family. And then
Carmen Blaine who we have seen so many times at camp meeting,
and Joyce Bruce though we have now seen her here quite so much.
She used to come to camp meeting too. And then from an old camp
meeting family, Hayes Smith who in his eighties still would come
down, drive from his home in Normal, Illinois, making the trip
in a day's time to be with us for camp meeting. And then Mildred
McWhorter Ray, Doris Terry's sister would come from her home in
South Carolina and stay with Doris to attend camp meeting. And
two other very dear people that we have seen at South Union so
many times are Mrs. James Black and Mrs. Houston King. And then
this morning we received word that Hester Blaine had died. Now
the dear ones are gathering home. We know that we love all
these. We miss them greatly but we as Christians sorrow not as
others who have no hope, for we know that we will see them
again, that we will know them, that we will be reunited with
them, and that nothing will ever again take them away from us.
Another thing that we can think about those who
have gone before us is that it is better to be absent from the
body and be present with the Lord. So now they are with the Lord
in heaven and are so happy. And as good as life was to them here
on earth, and as much as they loved the ones that they left
behind, they are so happy and are there waiting for us to
welcome us home. So when we are here on this earth, we know that
we are hurt many times, sometimes very deeply, but not everybody
in the world is a Christian, as we well know, but when we get in
this atmosphere here at South Union, with Christian people who
have so much love, life is a lot easier. But then in this world
too, we see all around us things of great value being destroyed.
The book of Isaiah in more than one place tells us that in all
of heaven there will never be anything that will hurt, that
there will never be anything that will destroy. So, as the old
song goes, these who have gone on are beyond the reach of
trouble and care. So, knowing that they are happy and that we
will see them again and be with them forever, we can now look to
the great heritage that they have left to us.
We can look first of all at the trees that
surround this campground, the beautiful trees all around the
campground. Across the road, South Union owns land, the South
Union spring, the hills above it, and trees on that and the
trees along the side of the road. When we look at these trees,
we are reminded of the goodness and greatness of God, the
creator and sustainer of the universe, who gave us all things
richly to enjoy. Then they stand as a memorial to those who went
before us, who appreciated and enjoyed God's creation and left
them for us to enjoy. Now we want to keep these trees around the
campground. Never is a tree cut on South Union land unless it
dies and has to be cut to keep it from falling on somebody. Then
we look at the land and the buildings here. They stand as a
memorial to those who went before us. And it takes a lot of work
to keep up South Union, not only just cleaning up and mowing and
getting ready for memorial day and camp meeting, but throughout
the entire year a lot of work is required. And as long as we
keep the ones that we now have, the job will be done and will be
done well.
And now to the tents. Two of these tents were
built by people who are still living and still coming here every
year to tent. They built them in keeping with the rest of the
tents to preserve the rustic beauty of the place. Now, these
other tents, each has a history to tell, a story to tell. The
older people built them, and tented in them, came here to
worship, and then left them to us. And as they did in the days
of old, we still want to move over here two or three days before
the meetings start, not only to enjoy being here and being
together, but so that we will have quiet time to think and pray
and get ready for the meetings.
Then we look at the church. It was built by
people who have now gone from us. We want to keep that going and
so far we are doing that. The membership is small but we still
meet every Sunday morning for Sunday School and then on second,
fourth, and fifth Sundays we have preaching and Communion on the
fifth Sundays. Later an annex was built to the church by people
who have now gone on and that annex bears to the name of the
Lloyd Reed Annex. It was named after one of our faithful South
Union members, Lloyd Reed who married into the Buell Adams
family, one of the old time camp meeting families. And then this
Lloyd Reed Memorial Annex stands as a memorial to those who went
before us. And also, near the entrance to the campground is a
beautiful cedar tree that was put out in memory of Lloyd Reed.
And then we come…..let me mention this too,
because this is something that I use every Sunday morning going
up and down the steps, the rails that have been put on the sides
of those steps, put there by Meek Blaine who has been gone for a
long time. At the time he built them, I was much younger and
could see and I didn't need them then, but I certainly need them
now every Sunday morning. I would like to thank Meek, if I
could, just for putting them there.
Then we come to this arbor. And I become almost
speechless when I come to the arbor because it means so much to
me. It is the third arbor that we have had here. The first was
destroyed by a tornado in 1883, the second accidentally
destroyed by fire in July of 1914. But the very next day, a
group of men came over and started building on this present
arbor. Under the supervision of Jim Stewart with Jim Blackwood's
help as a foreman, and with the work of a lot of men, and I wish
I knew the names of all of them, but I expect to meet them when
I get to heaven. Because these men came over here and worked
hard and within two weeks they had finished this building and
had camp meeting that year in August. Now to me, this arbor is a
masterpiece of workmanship, a work of love for these men who
worked on it, worked on it without pay, just giving their time.
And it is really a treasure that cannot be replaced. Under this
arbor, and this of course is the center of it all, under this
arbor we have heard powerful messages by great preachers. We
have heard the singing of old camp meeting hymns, such as
Amazing Grace that Billy Bruce used to sing for us up here every
camp meeting until he had gone home. And then also On Jordan's
Stormy Banks and The Old Rugged Cross, The Unclouded Day. We
still hear those songs being sung and we want to keep on singing
them for they lift our hearts and lift us closer to God. Then we
would see people come forward. I have seen people come up here
and surrender their lives to Christ, accepting Him by faith as
their Saviour. Then I have seen people come up here and join the
church. This is where I joined the church many years ago. And
then people, we see people, and we still see this, coming
forward to dedicate or re-dedicate their lives to the Lord and
when I see Grace Smith come up to re-dedicate her life, as good
as Grace Smith was and as close as she lived to the Lord, I
thought it was time for everybody else to be coming up. And then
so many times we gathered around the alter for a time of prayer
and we still do that. In the old days we would get down on our
knees in the saw dust and the shavings on the dirt floor and
pray. And now we keep and want to continue to keep the four
worship services a day and these were started earlier. And then
we want to keep our Thursday night prayer service for the
tent-holders and others who want to come in preparation for the
meetings that start on Friday night before the fourth Sunday of
July every year. So always remember four. That's the number here
at South Union. At one time they had preaching on the fourth
Sunday only. And then on the fourth Sunday in May we the
memorial, on the fourth Sunday in July the camp meeting. So,
four, remember the number four.
And then we are still keeping so many of these
things. We still have people who stay around and talk for a long
time after the services are over, just enjoying being together
and greeting old friends and meeting new ones. And the love that
we have here continues. That is the greatest thing in the world,
the love that we feel here at South Union. And we still have the
old horn that calls us to worship. This horn was sent to us from
Texas by Edward Buck who came from an old camp meeting family.
Edward died as a young man.
And then we have a few things that have been
replaced, nothing that changed the rustic beauty of this place,
nothing that changed its appearance, nothing that changed the
worship services here, and we don't want that ever to be. But
we, of course have had electric lights that came in to replace
the Aladdin lamps and lanterns under the arbor and the kerosene
lamps and lanterns at the tents. We had electric fans put all
around to replace the Palmetto fans, the funeral home fans, and
the little folding fans. And then we have had water put in to
the tents to replace buckets full of water that we would go to
spring for and come back up that steep hill and rocky pathway.
It was interesting and pretty but it was an exhausting climb up
that hill. And then our old organ that was so beautifully played
by Louise Smith and Effie Smith Gilliam has been replaced by a
piano and keyboard. Now these changes have just helped us. But
the only change that has been made is seeing so many empty
benches to take the place of the crowded benches that once were
here.
Now we want to keep not only South Union as a
place of worship, never turning it into anything else, but we
want to keep it a quiet, peaceful place of worship where people
can just get away from the stress and strain and anxiety, and
the rush and the loud noises of everyday life, and come out over
here where it is peaceful, quiet, where we can be close to
nature and close to God, where we can just be still and know
that God is God, that He is our God and where we can feel His
presence, His love and His power, and can receive His blessings.
It is my opinion, some may disagree with this point, but it is
my opinion that when Christ comes back to call out His church,
that South Union will still be here as a quiet, peaceful place
of worship. It is because that the people who come here love it
so. God knows how much we love it. God loves us so much and God
has all power. And He can touch the hearts of people and send
them to us, the ones that will be a help to us, as He has done
in the past.
And now another memorial that I would like to
mention that stands as a memorial to those that went before us,
we who are still living are a living memorial to those who went
before us. Now the ones who brought us over to South Union, that
came over here to worship with us, and who left us this great
heritage, the ones that gave us Christian homes filled with love
to grow up in, who provided for us, trained us, taught us to
live by the teachings of the Bible, sacrificed for us, giving us
things that they needed themselves but that we might have more,
who walked in the ways of the Lord giving us examples to follow,
and who left us with precious memories to carry with us
throughout life. We are living memorials to them, and as so much
we need to live such lives that our lives will honor them and
glorify God and to be an example for others to follow.
Now those who have gone on, fought a good fight,
they kept the faith, they finished the course, and they have
gone home. And now, one of these days our Lord will call to us
and tell us it is our time to go home. But now all of us know
that in order to be ready to go to meet our Lord and to be with
those who have gone before us that we have to have Jesus Christ
as our Saviour. And the Bible tells us in First John, the fifth
chapter, the twelfth verse, "He that hath the Sun hath
life and he that hath not the Sun of God hath not life."
So we have Christ.
And then in Ephesians 2:8-9, we are told, "For
by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should
boast." But the very next verse, Ephesians 2:10 tells
us, "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ
Jesus, unto good works, whereby God hath before ordained that we
should walk in them." So we do these good works and
there are people who carry very heavy loads but they don't want
to be a burden to someone else so they go on and struggle on
with them. But the Bible tells us that "Bear ye one
another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ."
And along with these good works we have love and we know that
the first and greatest commandment as Jesus told us is to love
the Lord our God with all our hearts, soul, mind, and strength,
and the second is like unto it, to love thy neighbor as thyself.
And the second one is referred to in scripture as the loyal law.
So with Christ as our Saviour, with love in our hearts, we go
about doing good works as long as we are here. And I believe in
handing out the roses to people while they are still living, but
since this is a memorial service I'li just save my roses and
give them to you from time to time because so many people have
done so much for me. And I do appreciate it and I have not
forgotten one little thing, and I never will.
And now we begin to look forward to going on
home. And we look to what it is like in heaven. And we have in
Revelation 21:4, "And God shall wipe away all tears from
their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor
crying. Neither shall there be any more pain for the former
things are passed away." And then in First Corinthians
2:9, "As it is written, eye hath not seen nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man the things that God
hath prepared for them that love Him." And then we
think about, well what about the body. I have heard this many
times. What about the body. How do we know that our loved ones
have gone to be with the Lord? But now, God takes care of
everything for us. He is so good to us and He takes care of
everything if we will just let Him. And so the Bible tells us
that there will come a time when all the graves will be opened
and we shall be resurrected for life everlasting and the Bible
tells us that the same great, mighty power that raised Christ
from the dead shall raise us up also. At Easter we heard so much
about the empty tomb and the risen Christ and we hear the words
of Jesus as recorded in Revelation 1:18, "I am He that
liveth and was dead and behold I am alive forevermore. Amen, and
have the keys of hell and of death."
And now if I could sing as some of you can, I
would sing When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time
shall be no more, and the morning breaks eternal bright and
fair, when the saved of earth shall gather to their home beyond
the sky, and the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there.
And then with this I close. From the fourth
chapter of First Thessalonians, "For the Lord Himself
shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
arch angel and with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ
shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in
the air. And so shall we ever be with the Lord, wherefore
comfort ye one another with these words."
Transcriber: Mrs. Beverly Dodd |
