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religious life, and which gave tone to all his subsequent service in the gospel, was connected with his ministry at Lancaster. It was during the earlier part of his residence here when he preached one Sabbath morning with more than his usual fervor, his subject being the necessity of thorough repentance for sin, and faith in the Lord Jesus. Christ as a personal and conscious Saviour. After the service, a hearer who had been deeply moved by the potency of his appeal came to him with anxious heart, asking for spiritual counsel. Mr. Otterbein, whose fervent discourse had been largely the outcrying of his own unsatisfied spirit, replied: "My friend, advice is scarce with me to-day." He retired from the pulpit to his closet to . wrestle in prolonged struggle for a fuller experience of the regenerating power of the gospel, and a more satisfying witness of the Spirit to his personal salvation. That this struggle continued until he found in fullest measure the light he sought, and that he himself regarded it as a crisis of profound importance in his spiritual life, is evident from one of his replies to a series of questions propounded to him late in his life by Bishop Asbury, of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The question referred to was: "By what means were you brought to the gospel of God and our Saviour?" Mr. Otterbein's answer was: "By degrees was I brought to the knowledge of the truth while in Lancaster." From the earlier earnestness and zeal of Mr. Otterbein in his pulpit ministrations, the constant emphasis which he laid on the necessity for a deeper spirituality among professing Christians, and the devoutness and purity of his own personal life, we are hardly permitted to interpret this answer as meaning that he here found his first experience of conversion. We are rather to infer that he now experienced in a more satisfying degree the grace which he preached to others, and which he theoretically

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saw in the gospel of Christ. This grace he now realized in a most precious sense, and this experience became the key to the manner and spirit of all his subsequent ministerial life. It was the proclamation of the necessity for this deeper inward spiritual experience, and his insistence. upon it as a duty of every adherent of the church, that brought him afterward into painful conflict with brethren whom he greatly esteemed and loved, and which also led the way for the ultimate organization of the church of which he became the founder.

The subsequent pastorates were in Tulpehocken, an early German settlement embracing portions of Lebanon and Berks counties in Pennsylvania, a commodious church building being situated in Lebanon County; in Frederick City, Md.; in York, Pa.; and in Baltimore city, where he remained up to the end of his life. Before his going to Baltimore various other congregations extended to him earnest calls, the church in Philadelphia, then the most influential of the Reformed congregations in America, being especially urgent in pressing its wishes.

Early in this period, but notably during his ministry at York, Mr. Otterbein began to make those visits to other places adjacent to, or even distant from, the places of his residence which afterward became so prominent a feature of his life-work. These visits were largely of a character such as would now be called evangelistic, and were especially intended to awaken an interest in deeper personal piety and a more fervent spiritual life. Of this feature of his work more is to be said hereafter. Its importance will be perceived when it is understood how great a bearing it had in bringing about those conditions which resulted in the organization of a new denomination in the family of Protestant churches in America, the Church of the United Brethren in Christ.

It was during Mr. Otterbein's pastorate at York that an incident occurred which acquired a special historic interest in the annals of that early period. The first settlers of Lancaster County, of whom more is to be said in these pages, were a colony of Mennonites, immigrants from Germany who sought in America a refuge from religious persecution. The earliest arrival of Mennonites in this country was in the year 1683, a considerable number coming in response to an invitation from William Penn to join. his colony in Pennsylvania. The first company seeking homes in Lancaster County arrived in 1709. They were soon joined by others, and in 1735 the number embraced. over five hundred families. Among these people was born, in the year 1725, Martin Boehm, a man who, coming up from humble life, was to become in time one of the most conspicuous figures in early United Brethren history. Mr. Boehm, having found the forgiveness of sin and the quickening power of the Holy Spirit, became a zealous preacher of a true spiritual experience, and, like Mr. Otterbein, felt himself impelled to go beyond the bounds of his own immediate field of service. It was upon the occasion of his holding a "great meeting" in a Mennonite neighborhood, in Lancaster County, that Mr. Otterbein first met this zealous apostle of Jesus. The meeting was held in a large barn belonging to Mr. Isaac Long, a member of the Mennonite Church, some six miles to the northeast of the city of Lancaster. The building was over a hundred feet in length and of corresponding width, and was so constructed as to accommodate a large number of people; yet so great was the attendance that an overflow meeting was held in an orchard near by. Whether Mr. Otterbein had been invited to be present at this meeting, or whether, hearing of the meeting, he came of his own accord to see and hear Mr. Boehm, is not known. But however that

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may have been, their meeting together at this time had a marked bearing upon the future of each of the two men. The services were conducted in the German language, Mr. Boehm preaching the sermon, while Mr. Otterbein sat by his side, a profoundly interested listener. As Mr. Boehm proceeded with his discourse, his heart glowing with spiritual fervor, Mr. Otterbein's soul kindled with responsive feeling. The great, burning truths which he proclaimed were the same as those which Mr. Otterbein preached, and Mr. Otterbein felt that there stood before him a true preacher of the gospel of Christ, a real brother in the faith and in the ministry of the Word. And so strongly was his heart moved toward the plain and earnest preacher, that when he ceased, and before he had time to sit down, Mr. Otterbein arose, and casting his arms about him with a warm embrace, exclaimed, "Wir sind Brueder "—"We are brethren." The scene presented was dramatic and deeply impressive. Boehm was short in stature, attired in the plain garb of his people, and simple in speech and manner, while Mr. Otterbein was tall, of noble and commanding presence, and bearing the marks of elegant culture. The utterance of Mr. Otterbein became presently a tradition among the followers of these men, and the words are thought to have had influence in determining the choice of name for the church when the time came for assuming organized form.

As a considerable number of the early adherents of the United Brethren Church were drawn from the ranks of the Mennonites, further reference to these people, and especially to Mr. Boehm as their earnest and influential spiritual leader, will follow in succeeding pages.

CHAPTER II.

SECOND PERIOD, 1774-1789.

1. Otterbein in Baltimore.

THE year 1774 marked an important era in the history of Mr. Otterbein's work in America. Assuming charge in the city of Baltimore of an independent congregation, he was in a position to hold fraternal relations with, and, in time, to exercise a general spiritual oversight over, congregations which on account of their advanced evangelical position had become either in part or wholly separated from their parent denominations. Step by step, and without any purpose on his part to form a new and separate religious denomination, Mr. Otterbein was led onward in a course which, under the shaping hand of Providence, ultimately led to this result. It should be distinctly noted that he did not at this time, and indeed not for many years afterward, entertain any thought of such separate organization. Like Mr. Wesley, the leader of the movement which gave Methodism to the world, he was disposed to cling to his own mother-church, and, in fact, he never did formally separate himself, nor was he by any formal action of the cœtus ever separated from the German Reformed Church. His practical coöperation with the Reformed Church toward the close of his life ceased, but his friendly feeling toward that church never changed, and his name remained on the records of the cœtus up to the end of his life. But his work, for which God seems to have espe

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