Page 44 - Pictorial History of EUB Church by Glovier
P. 44
44 HISTORY OF THE VA CONFERENCE, E.U.B. CHURCH—D.F. GLOVIER
Having lived among United Brethren people and knowing their religious
life, and feeling the pressing claims of our work among his own people and
preferring the polities of the United Brethren church he cast his lot with the
Freedmen’s Mission and remained with it faithfully and unswervingly until the
day of his death. He became a member of the Virginia Conference in 1887.
Brother Clifford was a man above the average of his race. He was free-born,
but he understood thoroughly the conditions resulting from slavery and
sympathized in helpful ways with all of his people. He so deported himself as to
win the respect and esteem of the best people of both races, and those who
knew him best esteemed him most. He was a man of sterling integrity and his
upright life was never questioned. Among the colored people of
Rockingham, Augusta and other counties of Virginia and West Virginia, he
was known as a good preacher, but his life spoke louder than his words. He
was at one time called in as the spiritual adviser of an old acquaintance who
was tried, convicted and executed for murder; another crime to be laid at the
door of the open saloon. His spiritual help for the condemned man made
him friends among all the officers of the court, and many other citizens who
held him ever afterwards in the highest esteem.
He always attended sessions of the Annual Conference, and was closely
interested in all proceedings, but never took part in these public discussions unless
he was called upon. He appreciated genuine kindness and manifested his
appreciation in every proper way. He was a good preacher himself and enjoyed
a gospel sermon and believed in experimental religion. He was a good singer
and often led the soul-stirring singing of his people.
His work required consecration, patience and endurance. He could have
had better places and better salaries in other churches; his people were poor
and backward, even among a backward race, and his work required long drives
over mountains to sparsely settled communities. He served rural communities in
the main and he must have known he was leading a forlorn hope. As the
children grow up they go to centers of population and are lost to the church,
but not to the cause. Here he could find his reward.
Upon his death-bed, he asked his son, James, to come home from
Philadelphia and take up his work. We have never been fortunate in raising
colored ministers, and it is a touching scene, when the dying father puts his
hand on the head of a loved son and consecrates him to the work he lays
down. Somebody must come for these helpless people.
His funeral was conducted in the colored United Brethren church in
Harrisonburg by Rev. G. A. Newman, principal of the Harrisonburg
Having lived among United Brethren people and knowing their religious
life, and feeling the pressing claims of our work among his own people and
preferring the polities of the United Brethren church he cast his lot with the
Freedmen’s Mission and remained with it faithfully and unswervingly until the
day of his death. He became a member of the Virginia Conference in 1887.
Brother Clifford was a man above the average of his race. He was free-born,
but he understood thoroughly the conditions resulting from slavery and
sympathized in helpful ways with all of his people. He so deported himself as to
win the respect and esteem of the best people of both races, and those who
knew him best esteemed him most. He was a man of sterling integrity and his
upright life was never questioned. Among the colored people of
Rockingham, Augusta and other counties of Virginia and West Virginia, he
was known as a good preacher, but his life spoke louder than his words. He
was at one time called in as the spiritual adviser of an old acquaintance who
was tried, convicted and executed for murder; another crime to be laid at the
door of the open saloon. His spiritual help for the condemned man made
him friends among all the officers of the court, and many other citizens who
held him ever afterwards in the highest esteem.
He always attended sessions of the Annual Conference, and was closely
interested in all proceedings, but never took part in these public discussions unless
he was called upon. He appreciated genuine kindness and manifested his
appreciation in every proper way. He was a good preacher himself and enjoyed
a gospel sermon and believed in experimental religion. He was a good singer
and often led the soul-stirring singing of his people.
His work required consecration, patience and endurance. He could have
had better places and better salaries in other churches; his people were poor
and backward, even among a backward race, and his work required long drives
over mountains to sparsely settled communities. He served rural communities in
the main and he must have known he was leading a forlorn hope. As the
children grow up they go to centers of population and are lost to the church,
but not to the cause. Here he could find his reward.
Upon his death-bed, he asked his son, James, to come home from
Philadelphia and take up his work. We have never been fortunate in raising
colored ministers, and it is a touching scene, when the dying father puts his
hand on the head of a loved son and consecrates him to the work he lays
down. Somebody must come for these helpless people.
His funeral was conducted in the colored United Brethren church in
Harrisonburg by Rev. G. A. Newman, principal of the Harrisonburg
