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Saturday Evening, August 20

Kreider Meetinghouse

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For the second part of Saturday evening, we moved from White Oak Meetinghouse on Penryn Road to Kreider’s – our historical meetinghouse – for the remainder of the evening.

The greeters were LaWanda and Kim from our committee. LaWanda was making sure everyone received a program and Kim offered everyone a fan which doubled as air conditioning and a memento from the weekend.

To open the evening, there were four stations where you could observe an old Love Feast meal setup, the attic, the basement and the cemetery.

John Diffenderfer (from our committee) explained how four people shared a bowl of rice soup for the meal and how three benches could be changed from three benches facing the pulpit to only one facing forward, the second created a table, and the third faced the back of the church.

The second station was upstairs in the attic. Since it was full of people, I used pictures that I had taken earlier this summer.

This is where beds and baby cradles were provided with feather tick mattresses and pillows . One side for the men and the other side for the women.

It looks like heat could also be provided with this fireplace.

A kettle that was left behind – maybe for a quick bath in the morning.

This was used when horse and buggy was the mode of travel over rough dirt roads and some people came from a distance for the two-day Love Feast event.

The basement was set up with tables for meals – especially lunch on the second day.

The stove where food was cooked.

A storage room for kettles, utensils and dishes.

Steps to the outside where outhouses and the cemetery are located.

Outside, people were gathering after visiting the stations and waiting for the 7:00 PM service to begin.

Worship in the early days of this meetinghouse meant women sat on one side and men on the other.

Singing in an old wooden church is an experience like nothing else. The sound almost raised the roof.

Singing with the men and women separated creates a beautiful four-part a capella harmony.

Dave Wenger our moderating minister opened the service.

Jim Myer one of our oldest ministers was the evening speaker and began by wearing his dad’s black hat and illustrating the importance of the black hat in the early days of The Brethren. They were worn almost everywhere except in buildings – especially church.

He shared several amusing stories about the past, some involved a black hat, others came from his time of traveling around the country speaking in other Brethren churches.

When it was over, many gathered outside. It was a beautiful, warm summer evening.

You may remember seeing three busses in our church parking lot in yesterday’s post. This was the reason we originally thought one would be enough. These people traveled from our church on Penryn Road to here via bus to save parking space. The parking lot here is not very large. You will find out why we needed four in a future post. We only used one for this event.

Parking was tight, so you planned to not leave until the car in front of you left. 🙂 We were a car in front, so left very quickly after the service.

It was a delightful and information-filled day.