May 12, 1862, is the date of the first District Meeting of northern Illinois, to be held in the Waddams Grove congregation, in the Louisa meetinghouse. It was not the first District Meeting of northern Illinois, for in 1860 there was a District Meeting held in the Yellow Creek congregation.

Nine churches of the district were represented. Twelve queries came before the meeting and were disposed of. As these minutes and also those of the District Meeting of 1871 were never printed, they are given here. It was not until 1877, if correctly informed, that the minutes of District Meetings of northern Illinois were printed. 1. Should we invite a brother to our love feast who holds sentiments contrary to the Gospel? Answer. No, rather forbid him. 2. Is it according to the Gospel to have pulpits in our meetinghouses? Answer. According to our profession we should all keep on a level, hence, dispense with pulpits. 3. Can a church tolerate hoops in any circumstance? Answer. No, neither any imitation thereof. 4. Have the sisters a right, according to the Gospel, to speak or vote in the church? Answer. They have if done in order. 5. Is it consistent with the Gospel for brethren to hold public offices? Answer. Referred to A. M. Minutes of 1859. Art. 30. 6. Why are some brethren authorized to preach without a legal election? Answer. Considered best to elect all (ministers) and be no respecter of persons. 7. Should not a public transgression be publicly acknowledged? Answer, if the transgressor feels so to do, but cannot compel him by the Gospel. 8. What is to be done with a brother that takes unlawful interest, and has been admonished again and again? Answer. Referred to A. M. Minutes of 1856, Art. 1. 9. Should a brother attend to other business on the day of council meeting? Answer. Only in cases of unavoidable necessity. 10. Is it right to communicate the transactions of one church to another, correct, or incorrectly? Answer. Members should be careful what they say about council, especially of what has been settled. 11. Why not get the pure juice of the grape for communion purposes? Answer. Considered preferable if it can be had. 12. Is it right to invite penitents to rise to their feet in the public congregation in order to show their willingness to be received into the church? Answer. Let them make their wants known by some means.

April 10, 1871, the District Meeting was again held in the Waddams GroveChurch. It was a very rainy time for the meeting. Eleven queries were before the meeting as follows:

(1) Why did not the committee to California and Oregon stay longer than they did. Answer. Referred to Annual Meeting for an answer.

(2) Is it right for the brethren in northern Indiana to call their school, the Brethren’s High School? Answer. No, not right. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(3) Is it right for brethren and sisters to teach instrumental music, or employ some one else to teach? Answer. No. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(4) Should not this District Meeting form a better system for visiting the brethren in Wisconsin? Answer. Yes, Brethren Martin Myers and Joseph Lehman for the first time (25th of June), David Price and David Miller for fall, and John Rowland, treasurer.

(5) Should there not be a limit to the time for disowned members to make application to Annual Meeting for a committee? Answer. We think that the time should be limited, and should not be longer than the second Annual Meeting. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(6) Can a church hold two members, say husband and wife, as members, where the one will not live with the other under any circumstances whatever? Answer. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(7) Is it right for the Church of Christ to tolerate or allow Brethren to print five or six periodicals, or newspapers, and the church to support them, and for brethren to assail the decision of Annual Meeting? Answer. This District thinks it not right to print so many, and also not right to support them, and also not right for the brethren to assail the decision of Annual Meetings, and that those brethren that did assail the decision of Annual Meeting, Art. 14, 1870, on the marriage contract, shall make a public satisfactory acknowledgment.

(8) Would it not be advisable to have a change made in query 1, 1866, and have it read that the Annual Council is to be formed by all the members present from the whole Brotherhood, instead of by all the ordained elders present, by which we understand all the rest are excluded from the council, and would we not better dispense with the delegate system to Annual Meeting separate from the Standing Committee? Answer. We think it would be advisable.

(9) If a church demands an humble acknowledgment of a member, and if that member refuses to make the required acknowledgment, we wish to have the advice of the Annual Meeting whether it is the housekeeper’s duty to let that member withdraw again, and take further council with said church, or is it his duty to al once read that member out of the church without further council with the church? Answer. It is his duty to read that member out of the church at once. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(10) Will the District Meeting allow a member to hold a policy in a Mutual Life Insurance Co.? Answer. No, it is not consistent with the Gospel. Referred to Annual Meeting.

(11) Can any brother or sister that has subscribed money for the use of the church purposes, year after year passes without paying and have ample means to pay; can such members have full membership with the church, or what can be done with such members? Answer. Such members are to be visited, and, if they fail to pay they fall under the council of the church.

Proceedings of District Meeting of northern Illinois, held at Waddams Grove, May 9, 1882.

Meeting opened by diving services. A resolution was offered and adopted, that the officers of the meeting be elected by ballot to be counted privately, and the names of the officers elected along be reported.

Officers elected: Moderator, D. E. Price; reading clerk, Edmund Forney; recording clerks, John J. Emmert and S. Z. Sharp.

1. Is it the duty of the congregation in which the county poorhouse is located to receive and take in charge any paupers that may apply for baptism, or do they properly belong to the church district from which they come to the poorhouse? Answer. The congregation from which the applicant was taken, shall be consulted before he is received. Then he is to belong to that congregation.

2. Seven churches having sent in queries of similar import in regard to representation at Annual Meeting, it was decided to place these queries into the hands of a sub-committee to formulate a query, embracing the essential features of all those submitted. The committee reported as follows: To the District Meeting: Your committee, to whom were referred the papers relating to the proposed change of holding Annual Meeting, beg leave to offer the following report:

3. Whereas by the present plan of holding our Annual Meeting, it partakes more or less of the spirit of the district in which it is held, and on account of the unequal representation, and the great concourse of people that assemble, it is unsatisfactory and difficult to transact business.

Therefore we offer the following amendment to the plan of 1866:

1. Each State District shall send its quota of delegates on the Standing Committee, as formerly, omitting the representative delegates.

2. Each congregation shall have the privilege of sending one or two delegates, chosen from the officials or lay members, two or more congregations may unite if they desire and send one or two delegates.

3. The Standing Committee shall have charge of the general arrangement of the business of the Annual Meeting, but shall select sub-committees from the delegates sent from the congregations and submit such business into their hands as it may deem proper.

4. All members present shall have the right to participate in the discussion of all questions before the meeting, and in case any query or queries cannot pass by unanimous consent, the delegates and Standing Committee shall decide them by a two-thirds majority vote.

5. All decisions shall be considered mandatory until repealed or reconsidered and changed by subsequent Annual Meeting. All previous decisions conflicting with the provisions of the above are hereby repealed.

6. This query was also the result of the deliberations of a committee into whose care three queries were presented, with the following result:

We your committee recommend that at our district meetings the votes cast for officers to serve at District or Annual Meeting, be counted privately by Brethren appointed for that purpose, and the result be made known by said Brethren to the meeting. We also recommend that all the churches in northern Illinois adopt the same method of voting, that there may be a similar practice.

Resolved, by this District Meeting, that in the future the delegates shall meet one hour before the regular time of opening the meeting for business and elect the officers of the meeting.

Resolved, that in all cases where questions cannot be decided by unanimous consent, then two-thirds of the delegates shall decide the question.

7. Inasmuch as it is not in accordance with the principles of the Gospel, and decisions of Annual Meeting for members to have their likenesses taken, will not this District Meeting decide that all churches of northern Illinois respect and carry out the decision of Annual Meeting? Answer. Resolved that the elders of northern Illinois try to carry out more fully the decision of Annual Meeting with reference to likenesses.

8. If it is right to take chattel mortgages, is it not equally right, in order to hold said mortgage good, to replevy said goods, to try the rights of property when taken by a third party? Answer. No.

9. Tabled.

10. Tabled.

11. We petition Annual Meeting through District Meeting that no Sabbath school convention shall be held or organized by the Brethren. Granted and sent to Annual Meeting.

12. We also petition that the many papers now published by the Brethren be discontinued, and a church paper be established and controlled by the church at large. Granted and sent to Annual Meeting.

13. We petition Annual Meeting through District Meeting of northern Illinois to pass a decision that all offenders who write or speak against the decisions of Annual Meeting, in a reproachful manner, shall be brought to account by Annual Meeting, Granted and sent to Annual Meeting.

14. We petition Annual Meeting to appoint a suitable committee to revise the Minutes of Annual Meeting to make them harmonize with the present condition of the church and with the resolution passed in 1880 (Art. 18) by Annual Meeting, in regard to those minutes. Granted and sent to Annual Meeting.

This District Meeting decided that the Missionary Board select an elder to go with D. M. Miller to visit the churches in Wisconsin at least one week before their love feast.

On motion C. P. Rowland was appointed on the Missionary Board, in place of Bro. Wales who moved out of the district.

The churches in Pierce and Dunn Counties, Wisconsin, were represented by letter, with greetings. Elder D. E. Price was elected on Standing Committee, and E. Forney as delegate.

On motion, decided that the money remaining in J. H. Moore’s hands be paid to Treasurer of Missionary Board.

Report of Treasurer of Mission Board, on motion accepted. On motion decided to raise $250 for missionary purposes.

Agreed to hold District Meeting in Yellow Creek church, on Tuesday, three weeks before Whitsuntide, at 9:00 A. M.

Decided to have a suitable number of copies of the minutes printed for the use of the several churches. J. S. Emmert, S. Z. Sharp, Clerks

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter One
Its Beginning

Chapter Two
Waddams Grove Church

Chapter Three
Ministers and Deacons

Chapter Four
A List of the Members of the Church

Chapter Five
The Annual Meeting of 1856

Chapter Six
Enoch Eby and Daniel Fry  s Mission to Denmark in 1877

Chapter Seven
District Meeting Preceedings for 1862, 1871 and 1882

Chapter Eight
Every Name List

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Chapter One
The Yellow Creek Meeting house in 1910

Chapter Two
Waddams Grove Meeting house in 1910
Chelsea Meeting house in 1910

Chapter Five
Where the Annual Meeting of 1856 Was Held

Chapter Six
Brother Enoch Eby's Photograph

Copyright © Carrol Parrish, Church of the Brethren, Christine Walters & Genealogy Trails