HOME FREE CLASSIFIEDS OBITUARIES EVENTS ANNOUNCEMENTS OPINIONS WEATHER OUTDOORS TEXAS LOUISIANA NATIONAL Toledo Bend Lake Information
|
Hot News Tip? Call Phil Yocom's Cell Phone at 936/275-6206 |
My Year at Liberty Hill By Doug Fincher
In 1956 I was released from the Army, got enrolled again in college and was invited to become the Pastor of Liberty Hill Baptist Church in San Augustine, Texas. The church made an appointment for me to meet with John Henry and Meta Bland to discuss the church. Mrs. Bland said, “Bro. Doug, you are our Joshua who will lead us across the Jordan.” When we got in a discussion about how long preachers stay at churches I told her that “A rolling stone don’t gather no moss” to which she replied, “Yes, but a settin’ hen don’t grow no feathers, either”. Tribune editor Webster Hays said he didn’t pray in public, “but I promise to pray for you and your ministry here every day”. I remember his new green and white Dodge car, his special hat and his kind, measured voice…and I know he kept his promise.
Music Director Howard Bailey owned a small grocery store at Bland Lake and lead us in singing “Shall we Gather at the ‘River” every time we baptized in the Lake. Gordon Peavy was a member of the Antioch church of Christ and his wife Emma was a member at Liberty Hill. They attended his church one Sunday and hers the next. I had many meals in their home and Gordon gave me my College Graduation Watch. Hollis Peavy and I enjoyed squirrel hunts together and fished often on Bayou Seipe Creek near Huxley, Texas. Toledo had not yet been built and the creeks in that area were paradises for fishermen willing to crawl up and down their slippery banks. Houston Ponder told me that his name was Houston, “but I’m so short that most folk just call me Tebo”. (I later learned that Tebo was a small ranch east of San Augustine. Ben and Ruth Tartt invited me to fish at their Pond one Saturday afternoon. I planned to fry the fish at Houston and Mary Ponder’s that evening but when I showed my catch to Ben he said, “A good string, preacher …now go turn them back.” “Let’s give them a chance to multiply”. After I had preached about the Three Wise Men one morning, Mrs. Josie Whitton (age 95) asked me how many wise men did I say there were. When I told her “three” she asked where I found it. When I opened the Bible to show her, I discovered her point. The Bible says the wise men brought three gifts but doesn’t say how many men brought them. Mrs. Lula Fisher always told me that my tie was pretty after church services and offered to give me a free burial plot in her cemetery. At 28 years of age I didn’t treat her offer seriously. At times I spent the weekend in her son Joe Fisher’s apartment behind her house. Betty Jean Cartwright (of Magnolia Life Insurance) parked often under the shade of our hickory trees at the church to read. We became good friends and are till this day. There were many others that became a part of my life that year: Cecil Murphy, Willie and Maude Bucklew, the Longs, Albert Green, Bill and Pearl Stringer, Ed Bucklew, the Tormeys.. ..and many others. Most of these have now crossed the Jordan and the present members of the church likely never heard of Doug Fincher. But I’ll always remember Liberty Hill Baptist Church, and the many kindnesses they showed to their fledgling pastor. I made many lifetime friends that year. …and it was a good year…a good one indeed. |
|
|
