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All Saints Day Revelation 7:9-17; Psalm 34:1-10, 22; I John 3:1-13; Matthew 5:1-12 November 2, 2008 [Heritage
Festival coincided with All Saints Day; great participation yesterday] Saints
of Grace Grace’s
saints were the keepers of brooms and keys. Rosa Brown, in the 1920’s, was the keeper of the church key. She lived back at the end of the road. Rosa would come when it was time for the occasional service at Grace Church, sweep the dust out of the church and the leaves off the porch and unlock the door for the people to come in and worship. In the years when Grace Church was, I guess you could say, dormant, the members of Calvary Church in Cornelia would come over to Clarkesville, unlock the door, sweep the place out and have enough services each year to keep the church consecrated and with an active status in the Diocese. Bess Hodkinson remembers as a child growing up across the lane from the church. She eventually married Pete Hodkinson and became a member of Grace Episcopal Church. But as a young girl she was Baptist. She remembers watching the activities of the little Episcopal church in the neighborhood. And when she would see someone over here sweeping off the porch, she knew that those Episcopalians were going to have one of their services. Just in the last week or so, I was walking up to the church on Sunday morning and saw Russell Johnson with a broom in his hand, sweeping the porch before services began. At one low point, a letter was written by the senior warden to the bishop indicating that he was returning the key to the bishop since the church did not have enough activity to keep its doors open. Now, this place is filled with people and the key is long gone. In the days when most of us lock our cars before we come in here, the church is never locked. If you come here sometime when it’s quiet and you want to step inside to think and pray, you’ll find the broom just behind the inside doors. If you put it in your hand and sweep off the steps, the porch, before you leave, you will get the feel of what it’s like to be among the many saints who have tended this little church and kept its doors open. The
saints of Grace are children. There may have been years when there were no children visible around Grace. But, their presence has been here from the beginning. In the earliest days, the first priest of Grace Church, The Rev. Ezra B. Kellogg, wrote in his first report to the bishop, ‘I commenced service in the place, o the 28th of October, 1838. There are but three families decidedly Episcopal, who remain throughout the year. Several others are in the habit of spending the summer in Clarkesville and returning again to their homes in the Autumn. On Easter Day, I administered the communion to five persons. My Sunday School numbers 42 scholars and 7 teachers. There being no other in the village, our school is an object of much interest to parents, and so far as I can learn, gives very general satisfaction. We have been furnished with a suitable library of 61 bound volumes for use of the children. In the 1930’s there was reported a total of 16 members of the parish, but that 44 children, white and black, were in Sunday School due to the dedication of someone who would pick them up and bring them on Sundays. Today, our numbers are growing again and like the garden they planted this past spring, our children are bringing joy and playful wonder into this place. The saints of Grace have come at times in the form of priests. This parish has had its share of priests! Many churches may boast of having 5 or 6 rectors. We can claim 33! The first priest, the Rev. Kellogg, forebear of Bishop Frank Kellogg Allen, started many missions in the wilderness of Ohio and came to Georgia for health reasons. He not only started Grace Church, but also started missions in Gainesville and the Nacoochee Valley. He, like many of the priests who would follow him to this ‘mission outpost’ or ‘seasonal chapel’, only stayed a short time, one, two, and maybe three years. The two priests sharing the name Eppes, great grandfather and uncle of our own John Moss, had longer tenures and were here from 1873 to 1889 and from 1931 to 1942. There are memories of stability: The Rev. Milton Murray served from 1958 to 1964. He came to town, courted a young widow named Jane who had children. They married and added a child of their own to the family. Milton is remembered as one who gathered the church together and offered a sense of continuity in which the past melded with the present. Our Heritage Committee produced a video this past year of Milton’s reflections of his time here. There are memories of change and growth: And the Rev. St. Julian Lachicotte, whose shadow still lingers. Julian came to a little mission outpost and taught its people to look out beyond the front porch; an introverted priest who extroverted the church. During Julian’s time here, Grace-Calvary connected with other area churches. Outreach ministries were started. Julian got Charlotte Reeves to go check out a Roman Catholic thrift store in Gainesville. Joining with St. Mark’s Roman Catholic church here, they began Sharing and Caring, that just celebrated its 25th anniversary. Julian’s initiative got several other ministries started in the area. Julian brought a depth and an honesty that blessed some and frustrated others. Some tell stories of his pastoral acuity and the difference he made in their lives. Others remember those eyes with their dark circles and the eccentricities that came with the man. And
then there were those saints who faithfully responded to God’s call for them right in the
place they found themselves. There was Uncle Willie, who, after a priest came in and ordered that the ‘high’ pulpit be taken out, quietly stored it in his barn. Willie knew that when that priest moved on, the pulpit would be restored to its rightful place. There was Mervyn who would vest, sit in his pew, and sing the Lord’s Prayer at the appropriate time. One Easter morning, it is remembered that the windows were opened and he never flinched or missed a note as wasps flew in and circled him while he sang. Alive Driver, in the 1970’s, was known as a strong, admirable person; a natural leader with a good sense of humor who knew how to talk to people, to lead by example; trustworthy and wise. John and Nancy Kollock remember her as someone who could encourage things to happen without a making a rucus…a true gift! I read this in regard to saints: A person is properly designated as a ‘saint’, not when that person succeeds in living a strenuously virtuous life, but whenever God commandeers that person’s life, whenever that person embodies, at least to some degree, what God really wants for that person’s life, here, now. One such saint is John Kollock, whose relative, George Jones Kollock was one of the founding members of the church. Four generations ago John’s family came to this area and with others established this church and their summer homes. God has entrusted the spirit, history, and mission of this place to John. You can see in his paintings that as a young boy and all through his life, John has absorbed the essence of this place, the everyday scenes and people he has known and loved. You might say he pondered these all things in his heart. For the ‘been heres’ John has captured parts of life in these foothills and in this place that keep memories and bestow identity. And for the ‘come heres’, his paintings give us an open window that draws us into the history and the qualities of the place and its people.
As we move our attention to the altar in a few minutes… as we join with the angels and archangels and all the company of heaven… if we pay attention, we will sense that the many saints who have passed through this building join us in our praise and thanksgiving. This wall that backs the historic pulpit and altar is so solid. And as people worship in this place, they can’t help but notice the light coming through the windows as it plays on this big wall. Depending on the time of year and time of day, the patterned light through the windows has shown itself to people and they have talked with wonder about the movement of the Spirit of God across this church so solidly placed in time. Brooms and keys, hearts for mission, the laughter of children, the faithful, named and unnamed, in large and small ways have made their mark and have received their mark as Christ’s own forever. Such are the saints of Grace.
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