Friday, May 17, 2019


HOW LINCOLN BECAME A BELIEVER

By William J. Skinner

Most people have not given much thought to whether or not Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of the United States, was a believer in God or a member of a particular faith group.  On February 14, 2019, the Wall Street Journal newspaper printed an article about how Lincoln, when he was a circuit-riding railroad lawyer in Illinois in 1852, came across a vest pocket book of Scripture containing snippets for 366 days in the year.  The WSJ article by John J. Miller, director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale College speculates about how Lincoln obtained the “The Believer’s Daily Treasure” that was sold by the Religious Tract Society in London.  Lincoln was a believer and I think this can be established.
            Miller’s article quotes Carl Sandburg, an author and poet, who compiled Lincoln’s papers in an eight volume set with a separate 378 page index that was published in the 1950s by The Abraham Lincoln Society with the Rutgers University Press, as saying “How Abraham Lincoln acquired his copy is the devotional, we do not know.”  Miller suggested Mary Todd Lincoln may have bought it for him. Sandburg’s (1878-1967) comments, perhaps from his research papers for his Pulitzer award winning Lincoln biography, about the circumstances of Lincoln’s receipt of the booklet in an introduction in the front of the Lincoln’s Devotional that was recently reprinted in 1995.

             Miller also says a copy of the devotional book was found, with the “A. Lincoln” signature in the front, by a Lincoln memorabilia collector, Carl Haverlin. The signature was authenticated by experts at the Library of Congress and at the Chicago Abraham Lincoln Book Shop, whose manuscript expert found the booklet of interest and “a possible clue to the source of some of his references to religion.”  Miller further uncovered a reference to “John Jay, an antislavery activist who shared his name with his Founding-era grandfather who once recalled seeing Lincoln read a pocket edition of the New Testament.”  (Grandfather John Jay was the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who also helped write the treaty to settle the Revolutionary War.  Jay, a member of the Church of England, was also the first vice president (1816-1821) and later second president (1821-1827) of the American Bible Society founded by Elias Boudinot, a New Jersey lawyer and a local Presbyterian Church trustee.)

             Miller has more to say about Lincoln and the devotional booklet, but I will leave you to get the full article from the newspaper account or from Miller.  What I want to add to this quest about Lincoln’s religion are some details I began to learn a few years ago from reading the History of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. by Frank E. Edgington published in 1962. Library of Congress Card Catalog Number 61-11471. 369 pp.  I purchased a copy from a bookseller on Amazon and when it arrived, I noticed it was signed by Edgington.

             During the period from 1970 to 2003 I was an attorney in Washington, D.C. and Maryland.  I started practicing law in the D.C. area as General Counsel and Assistant Executive Director to the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy in late 1970. Three years later I joined Raymond McMurray and William Pendergast in their boutique Food and Drug law firm on 18th Street, where I practiced for three years. During this time, I continued to represent the AACP for another five years.  I was chosen by the U.S. Pharmacopeia Board as its outside counsel during my move to the five-member law firm. The USP was my client for about 25 years.  After three more years with McMurray & Pendergast, I established my own office in D.C at 515 15th Street, N.W. across the street from the VA offices and McPherson Park, just a block and a half from the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church.  Thus, I could from time to time stop in the church to see what was happening and as our young family of four children grew older, we visited the church with the Cub Scouts a few times on hiking trails in downtown D.C.

            You can learn more about the Church’s history from its current (2019) website at http://www.nyapc.org/history/, but this source will not be as complete as the Edgington book or other information I will share in this article. But first, let me set the stage by bringing you up to date on how this website connects Lincoln to this church in its brief discussion of the connections between President Lincoln, the church, and President Eisenhower, who was baptized as an adult, with the following section of the web NYAPC history:

             Lincoln and “Under God”

           To commemorate the 60th Anniversary of “Under God” sermon by Dr. George M.              Docherty on  February 7, 1954, the Presbyterian Historical Society will place the         article, “Lincoln and Under God,” on its blog and in their electronic newsletter.

“Under God” was first added by Lincoln to his Gettysburg Address while at Gettysburg. All of Lincoln’s preliminary drafts of the Gettysburg Address contained no mention of “under God,” while all newspaper reports and copies of the address thereafter included the words “under God.”

Why did Lincoln add “under God” at Gettysburg? Perhaps his reason might be best understood through the words of his minister, Dr. Phineas D. Gurley of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church. Dr. Gurley noted that “…in the latter days of his chastened and weary life, after the death of his son Willie and his visit to the battlefield at Gettysburg, he said to me with tears in his eyes, that he had lost confidence in everything but God….”

Years later, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address inspired the historic “Under God” sermon that was preached on Lincoln Sunday, February 7, 1954, by Dr. George M. Docherty at Lincoln’s Church, The New York Avenue Presbyterian Church. Dr. Docherty noted “there was something missing” in our Pledge of Allegiance, and that was “under G.” President Eisenhower was in attendance. The President immediately prompted Congress to pass legislation adding the wording “under God” to our Pledge of Allegiance.

So Lincoln’s need for God at Gettysburg led to the addition of “under God” to his Gettysburg Address and, later, to our Pledge.

            You may be aware in current times (2019) groups raise money for and against the attack of the “Under God” reference in the Pledge.  In this battle over the meaning of the First Amendment provisions of the Freedom of Religion other groups claim they are responsible for adding “Under God” to the Pledge.  I am not denying that many groups did work very hard to persuade the Congress to enact legislation to add “under God” to the Pledge.   No one worked with more powerful persuasion than President Dwight Eisenhower who heard about Lincoln’s reasons in a sermon at this church that he occasionally attended.

             Eisenhower was the only President who had also made a decision to become baptized as an adult. “On February 1, 1953, just 10 days after his inauguration, Eisenhower was baptized and welcomed into the National Presbyterian Church by the Rev. Edward Elson. Eisenhower remains the only president ever to have been baptized while in office, and his work to link faith and American identity has influenced political debate in the country for half a century since.” See https://www.history.com/news/eisenhower-billy-graham-religion-in-god-we-trust.

            I first learned about Lincoln’s faith journey from a recorded TV sermon by Rev. Dr. D. James Kennedy, Pastor of the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. This was not taught in my Sunday School, high school or college American history classes. Later my interest was roused again and I contacted the Coral Ridge Ministries, which was no longer directly a part of the Ft. Lauderdale church after Dr. Kennedy died for more information.  Among staff suggestions was to check the history of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church and the Lincoln Museum across from Ford’s Theatre in D.C.  Since then I have read several books about Lincoln, but none flat out state he became a Christian. 

             In 2000, Professor Allen C. Guelzo of Gettysburg College won the Lincoln prize for his book, Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President, 1999, William Erdmans publishing Co. I wrote to Guelzo in 2007 to ask if he had ever seen the Edgington book and whether he considered the possibility that Lincoln was about to join the NYAPC on Easter Sunday, but was assassinated three days before on Good Friday.  Guelzo replied that he did not mention the history of this church accept in passing and categorically denied that Lincoln had ever been baptized, took communion, made a verbal confession of faith, and had made no written record that he had ever done these things.  Guelzo said that Rev. Gurley’s diary has disappeared and there are no church records indicating Lincoln wanted to or had arranged to join the church.

             Since the early 2000s the Internet has added many more resources from libraries and museums and it has become much easier to research parts of the story.  Perhaps we will never know if Lincoln wanted to become a Presbyterian.  But let us take a closer look at Lincoln’s life in Washington, D.C. The facts seem to indicate Lincoln found his “Kingdom” again in the NYAPC.

             In the Edgington book there is a chapter titled, The Lincoln Family and the New York Avenue Church at pages 231 to 253.  The next chapter is titled, The Lincoln Pew, from 254 to 256, followed by a chapter, A Symbol of Freedom, from page 258 to 265, about the presentation of the original draft of the Emancipation Proclamation to the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church on December 20, 1951, by Barney Balaban, President of Paramount Pictures Corporation.  The next chapter is Dr. Sizoo and the Lincoln Family, from page 266 to 274. 

             These 40 pages are the main pages of the book that I want interested readers to have an understanding about to make their own interpretations of what these chapters say or mean. Below is a summary the content of the 40 pages.  The remainder of the book contains much information about people and programs over the years. The 1962 book was copyrighted by Edgington and when he died a member of the church, he left money to the church in a trust fund to support poor people in D.C.
    
The Lincoln Family and the New York Avenue Church at pages 234 to 253.

            Abraham Lincoln and his oldest son, Robert, then a student at Harvard, left Springfield, Illinois, in February, 1861, on the Great Western Railroad and said farewell to friends and the town’s people.  Abraham would not return until his burial.  Lincoln said good bye to Rev. James Smith, D.D. of the First Presbyterian Church who had comforted him when young Eddie passed away.  The family reunited at the Willard Hotel in a short time

             After the Inauguration, Mrs. Mary Lincoln sent for the plan of seating arrangements at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church. The first Sunday after moving into the White House, the family was in their pew.  During their first year, Willie and Tad often attended the Fourth Presbyterian Church with their friends, the Taft boys.  There is a story about Lincoln taking the boys to task for attending there and the two replied it was more fun there.  Lincoln told them, “But I didn’t know that you went to church for fun.”  The boys replied, Oh, yes, papa!  You just ought to see those old rebels slam their pew doors and stamp out when the minister prays for the President of the United States.”
            Abraham and Dr. Gurley were friends and Gurley was frequently at the White House.  Dr. Gurley’s daughter was nice about greeting the Lincoln’s at church after the services.  Mr. Lincoln was   quick to notice a love affair beginning to flourish between Miss Fannie and William Anthony Elderkin, a West Point cadet.  Their war-time romance was later published in the New York Times, but the Times mistakenly printed that Fannie was the daughter of a different pastor who was claimed to be at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church (NYAPC). (This is what President Donald Trump would call “fake news” today.) 

            The Elderkin’s grandson, William Elderkin Huntington, presented the New York Times with a corrected story about the wedding at NYAPC that is four pages in the Edgington book.  This story is reproduced here for easy reference.

                                                      Lincoln’s Part In A Wartime Romance 

A Hitherto Unpublished Story of
A Young Soldier Who Obeyed
His Summons
           
            The following story of Abraham Lincoln has never, I think, appeared in print before.  It illustrates a side of his life with which we are least familiar – his intimate personal life with his friends.  It was told me by Mrs. Elderkin herself about four years ago, and at her request I wrote it out for publication.”

             “Abraham Lincoln’s life was a troubled one all the days of his Presidency.  It is perhaps not widely known whence he drew the source of his unfailing trust in the ultimate good which the war must bring about.  He sustained his courage and buoyed up his hopes with the simple remedy of prayer.  Whenever a great battle was about to be fought, whenever he received news of some terrible disaster, whatever the time, day or night, it was the President’s custom to send hos carriage for his pastor, Dr. Gurley, to come to the White House to pray.  Many a night have these devoted friends spent upon their knees in the capital, while the soldiers and the Union were matching their last sleep before battle.

            “This is the story of the marriage of Dr. Gurley’s daughter, a young girl in whom the President felt a deep interest, since her father was one of his closest friends, the man for whom he sent in time of doubt or trouble.

             “As soon as the news of the fall of Fort Sumter reached Lincoln, he sent for Dr. Gurley to come to the White House that they might pray together.  After a few hours spent in seeking comfort and advice from God, the devine started to leave for his home, when the President delayed him.

             “’What of your daughter?’” he asked.  ‘She is engaged to young Elderkin, is she not?  And he is a member of the graduating class at West Point, and must be called to the front at once.  It will be hard for that girl.’ He talked for some time with the father, and asked him to send his daughter to the White House. ‘I must talk with her,’ he said.  ‘If there is a war, Elderkin must take part in it.’  He has seen at once that if war must come, Elderkin be an even better soldier with a wife and home of his own to fight for.

            “The President had seen the young lady and talked with her **** his wonderful powers of persuasion, assisted in this case, beyond doubt, by the girls own heart.   Miss Gurley has but one doubt in her mind, and this she felt that even the wonderful President could not remove.  She had no clothes in which to be married.  There could be no wedding in Washington; her father’s daughter could not be married in any unsuitable garments.  The President smiled his happy, one-sided, and wholly beautiful smile. ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ he said.

             “Dr. Gurley was the pastor of a large church, his daughter was known and loved by the congregation, her engagement to the West Point Cadet and his summons to the front had awakened much sympathy for her.  They were ready to answer Abraham Lincoln’s call.

             “The President’s carriage went about the city bent upon a strange errand – he was borrowing a trousseau.  The quest was a very successful one.  Lincoln had seen Miss Gurley in the morning.  He has sent the dispatch to Elderkin immediately afterward.

                        “That evening the bride’s outfit was ready.  The wife of one of the President’s Secretaries lent a veil, a historic bit of lace that had been in the family many years; another lady sent a fan, a present of an honored Ambassador to the United States; a third friend produced white satin slippers that had adorned the feet that danced with Lafayette.  Seldom has one small bride worn so many historic and valuable things.

             “A leave of absence signed by the President of the United States could not be disregarded even in the face of war.  So, on the next morning after the eventful conversation between the President and Miss Gurley, young Elderkin arrived in Washington to attend his own wedding.

            “Dr. Gurley performed the ceremony, after which President Lincoln stood by the side of the bride and received with her.

             “That the Gurley family at the manse was held in affectionate remembrance by Mrs. Lincoln is evidenced by the gift of a Thanksgiving turkey from the Eastern Shore, accompanied by this note:

                                                                                     Executive Mansion

My Dear Mrs. Gurley:

                It affords me much pleasure to hear that your family are recovering.  We have had so serious a time with our little Taddy, but we can deeply sympathize with you in any such trouble.

                We have received from Baltimore a small supply of poultry, am I taking too great a liberty with you, to ask your acceptance of a turkey for Thanksgiving dinner?  Hoping to soon have the pleasure of seeing yourself and the Dr. remain.

                                                                                                Very truly,

                                                                                                Mary Lincoln

November 24, 1864

          
            The remaining pages of this chapter tell of stories of the Lincoln family interactions with events of the war in Washington.  At one point the church was told it would be transformed into a hospital and Dr. Gurley announced that services would be suspended.  Lincoln stood up in the service and told those present that this action was being taken without his consent and he countermanded the order saying, “The churches are needed as never before for devine services.”

            In early 1862 Willie Lincoln caught a cold that took a serious turn so that Willie died on February 20.  Dr. Gurley visited Willie while he was sick and Willie gave him his little bank containing some money Willie had collected for the Sunday School mission work.  This is recorded in the minutes of the annual meeting of the church in March 1862 as being announced by Dr. Gurley when the treasurer of the Sunday School gave his report.  Dr. Gurley gave the funeral sermon for Willie at the White House on February 24, 1862.

            Filling out this chapter there are several remembrances by church members who had connections with the Lincoln family members.  One of these is about when a shabbily dressed man, bewildered and ill at ease, wonder down the aisle without any usher assisting him, when Lincoln put out his long arm and hauled him into the Lincoln pew and made him welcome.

             Another instance of Lincoln’s feelings about the church was a statement given to the Chronicle of Arlington, Virginia, attributed to School Superintendent Dr. Newton D. Bateman that was quoted in its editorial as follows:

             “One Bateman who was Superintendent of Schools of the State of Illinois relates that Lincoln said to him – ‘I am not a Christian and I know that I am right.’ and again, ‘It is claimed that Lincoln worshipped there and as receding years make safe any sort of claim, it is now said that  Lincoln rented a pew there.’”

            However, the above statement was not taken down properly or was transmitted incomplete.  Edgington says the real statement Mr. Lincoln made was indicated as follows:

             “The statement Dr. Newton D. Bateman really made was quite contrary to the one given to the Chronicle.  Mr. Lincoln often went to Dr. Bateman’s office for a quiet talk. What he did say was, ‘Just before the election of 1860 a careful canvass of the City of Springfield had been taken and Mr. Lincoln was anxious to know how the ministers were going to vote.  The list was before Mr. Lincoln and with me he carefully examined it.  Nearly all of the ministers were against him.  Drawing from his pocket a small copy of the new Testament Mr. Lincoln said, ‘I am not a Christian.  God knows I would be one.  I have carefully read the Bible and I do not understand this Book.  I know there is a God and he hates injustice and slavery and I see the storm coming, and I know that He has – I think I am ready.  I am nothing but truth is everything and I know that I am right because I know that liberty is right for Christ teaches it and Christ is God.   I have told them that a house divided against itself cannot stand and Christ and reason say the same and they will find it so.  If I am elected with God’s help I shall not fail.  I may not see the end, but it will come and I shall be vindicated and these men will find they have not read their Bibles aright.’”

            Lincoln also frequently attended the mid-week prayer meeting by slipping into the side door of the church and by agreement with Dr. Gurley who would leave the paneled door leading to the lecture room left ajar so that he could share the inspiration of the meeting a pray with the members of the church for the things nearest to his heart without being a focus of attention.

             Another story angle on Lincoln’s participation in the NYAPC was found in a letter from Dr. William Henry Roberts, Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in 1907, commenting to a friend that when he attended services there in 1863 for about a year and a half while in Washington, D.C., he saw Lincoln stand up for prayer, and commented on the mid-week prayer meeting arrangement with the door ajar that was started to avoid the members of the church petitioning Lincoln about personal requests.

            Quotations from Dr. Gurley are included, but the printed source of this information is not mentioned.  The point made by these quotations was that Lincoln was trying to make up his mind whether to join the church and Dr. Gurley said that he thought it was Lincoln’s intention to make a profession of religion. 

            The chapter contains a reproduced affidavit-type document signed by a member of the church with a document in affidavit form, signed by an attorney attesting to the matters stated therein.  The document’s content speaks for itself below.  The whereabouts of the affidavit now is not described.  In the Edgington book, the document is at pp. 244-245.

            STATE OF NEW JERSEY,       }

                                                    }          SS:

COUNTY OFF ESSEX.            }

             Mrs. Sidney I. Lauck[1], of full age, being duly sworn upon her oath, according to law, deposes and says that: --

                I am a resident of East Orange, New Jersey, living at 16 South Walnut Street, in the said city.  I was born in Washington, D.C. on the 29th day of March, 1834, and resided in that city all my life, until a few years ago I moved to the City of East Orange and have lived in East Orange up until this time.

                During the period when Abraham Lincoln was President of the United States of America, I was a member of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C.  Abraham Lincoln was a regular attendant at the church, not only at Sunday services, also at Mid-week Prayer Meetings, for he was most unostentatious.  He would take his place in a room, adjoining the main room where the people were assembled and would leave the door ajar, so he might hear the services.  His reasons for wishing to remain in this adjoining room were that his modesty constrained him to avoid publicity, which could have come from his mingling with the small group at these Mid-week Prayer Meetings.  It was at his request that he sat in the adjoining room and with the door open about six inches.  He wanted to attend the Mid-week Prayer meetings, but he felt that he only wanted to attend them in the manner aforesaid.  It was common knowledge among the people of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church that Mr. Lincoln attended regularly these Mid-week Prayer Meetings.

                 I can see him still, as he would come up swinging up the aisle on Sunday morning, with his boys following him and then he would stand at his pew until they filed in; he would then take his seat at the end next to the aisle.

                 The pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church aforesaid, at the time Mr. Lincoln attended said Church, was the Reverend * Melville D. Gurley.  I was a friend of Frances Gurley, the daughter of the aforesaid pastor, * Melville D. Gurley.  I attended the home of the said * Melville D. Gurley so often, that I was considered almost one of the family.

                I knew Mr. Lincoln; I was introduced by * Melville D. Gurley aforesaid whom we knew as Dr. Gurley.  On numerous occasions Dr. Gurley and I talked particularly about Mr. Lincoln. 

                After Mr. Lincoln’s death, Dr. Gurley told me that Mr. Lincoln had made all of the necessary arrangements with him and the SESSION of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church to be received into the membership of said church, by confession of his faith in Christ, on the Easter Sunday following the Friday night when Mr. Lincoln was assassinated.

                 At the time of the experience herein stated, I was about 30 years of age and remember clearly and distinctly the facts herein stated.

Sworn and Subscribed to,
               before me this 15th ,
            day of February, 1928.

(Signed)                                                                                 (Signed)
              GEORGE W. PERRY                                                        SIDNEY I. LAUCK
                Atty. at law of New Jersey.

 * For Melville D. Gurley the name should read Phineas D. Gurley.  Mrs. Lauck subsequently made the correction at one of the Lincoln Day Dinners.  Melville D. Gurley was the son of Dr. Phineas D. Gurley.

                The asterisk was apparently used by Edgington to point out that Mrs. Lauck was remembering the name Melville, the son of Dr. Phineas Gurley, when she gave and signed her statement for Attorney Perry.  The Edgington book does not list any repository for the affidavit.  New Jersey case law would have to be researched for the time of the signing and changing to determine any legal effects the change made.  For this and Dr. Phineas D. Gurley’s diaries and sermons, one might look at the Peterson House where Lincoln was laid to wait on death.  There is a museum there that contains more than 3,000 items.

                From the Peterson House Museum website, the following paragraph explains what happened to many Lincoln papers from Springfield and Washington, D.C.:

                The May 2, 1926 Washington Post announced the purchase with a banner headline reading, “Gets Storehouse of Lincoln Relics: Government Action Assures Preservation of Oldroyd Collection Here.” The newspaper column reported, “Captain Oldroyd has been gathering the collection for 63 years, having started on this patriotic work of love for his chieftain soon after he was released from service in the internecine strife (Civil War). Mr. Oldroyd is now 80 years old. Having for years been a student of Lincoln, acting as guide for his collection all through its formation, Capt. Oldroyd has become a rich source of Lincoln traditions. Passage by Congress of the measure authorizing the purchase of the Oldroyd collection, 3,000 authentic Lincoln mementos now on display in the historic Petersen House where the martyred president died, will preserve for future generations making pilgrimages to Washington a great store house of materials identified with Lincoln tradition.”

                               
See http://weeklyview.net/2017/07/20/osborn-oldroyd-keeper-of-the-lincoln-flame-part-2/

            The NYAPC chapter in Edgington’s book continues with the text of a sermon by Rev. Dr. Phineas D. Gurley given in the East Room of the White House for Lincoln’s funeral service on April 19,1865.  The title of the sermon, which covers six and a half pages, single spaced, in type font between 4 and 5, was “Have Faith in God.”

             We include the verbatim version of the sermon to make this readily available and an effort to convey as much information as we can to spread the word about what may be available for future researchers with the interest to uncover more interesting facts about Lincoln. Here is the sermon.

               His sermon on that occasion directs our thoughts to Lincoln's deep-seated faith and is of             national significance.

It was as follows: 1

"HAVE FAITH IN GOD" - MARK 11:22


A Sermon1
                                    Delivered in the East Room of the Executive Mansion

Wednesday, April 19th, 1865
                                                                             At

The Funeral of Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States

By

Rev. P. D. Gurley, D. D.


Pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church

Washington, D. C.

AS WE STAND HERE TODAY, MOURNERS AROUND THIS COFFIN AND AROUND THE LIFELESS REMAINS OF OUR BELOVED CHIEF MAGISTRATE, WE RECOGNIZE AND WE ADORE THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD.

His throne is in the heavens, and His kingdom ruleth over all. He hath done, and He hath permitted to be done, whatsoever He pleased. "Clouds and darkness are round about Him; righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne." His way is in the sea, and His path in the great waters, and His footsteps are not known. "Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; whatcanst thou do? Deeper than hell; what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea. If He cut off and shut up, or gather together, then who can hinder Him? For He knoweth vain man; He seeth wickedness also; Will He not then consider it?" We bow before His infinite majesty.  We bow, we weep, we worship.

"Where reason fails, with all her powers, there faith prevails, and love adores."

It was a cruel, cruel hand, that dark hand of the assassin, which smote our honored, wise, and noble President, and filled the land with sorrow. But above and beyond that hand there is another which we must see and acknowledge. It is the chastening hand of a wise and a faithful Father. He gives us this bitter cup. And the cup that our Father hath given us, shall we not drink it?

"God of the just, Thou gives! us the cup: We yield to thy behest, and drink it up.''

"Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth." 0 how these blessed words have cheered and strengthened and sustained us through all these long and weary years of civil strife, while our friends and brothers on so many ensanguined fields were falling and dying for the cause of Liberty and Union! Let them cheer, and strengthen, and sustain us today.  True, this new sorrow and chastening has come in such an hour and in such a way as we thought not, and it bears the impress of a rod that is very heavy, and of a mystery that is very deep. That such a life should be sacrificed, at such a  time,  by  such  a  foul  and  diabolical  agency;  that the man at the head of the nation, whom the people had learned to trust with a confiding and loving confidence, and upon whom more than upon any other were centered, under God, our best hopes for the  true  and speedy pacification of  the  country,  the  restoration  of  the  Union,  and the return of harmony and love; that he should  be taken  from  us, and taken just as the prospect of peace was  brightly  opening  upon  our  torn and bleeding country, and just as he was beginning to be animated and gladdened with the hope of ere long enjoying with the people the blessed fruit and reward of his and their toil, and care, and patience, and self ­ sacrificing  devotion  to  the interests  of  Liberty  and  the Union. O it is a mysterious and a most afflicting visitation! But it is our Father in heaven, the God of our fathers, and our God, who permits us to be so suddenly ""and sorely smitten; and we know that His judgments are right, and that in faithfulness He has afflicted us.  In the midst of our rejoicings we needed this stroke, this dealing, this discipline; and there­fore He sent it. Let us remember, our  affliction  has not  come  forth  out of the dust, and our trouble has not sprung out  of the ground.  Through and beyond all second causes let us look; and see the sovereign permissive agency of the great First Cause. It is His prerogative to bring light out of darkness and good out of evil. Surely the wrath of man shall praise Him, and the remainder of wrath He will restrain. In  the  light  of  a clearer day we may yet see that the wrath which planned and perpetrated the death of the President, was overruled by Him whose judgments are unsearchable, and His  ways past  finding out, for the highest  welfare  of all those interests which are so dear to the Christian patriot and philanthropist, and for which a loyal people have made such an unexampled sacrifice of  treasure  and of  blood.  Let us not be  faithless but  believing.

     "Blind unbelief is prone to err, And scan His work in vain;
                                         God is His own interpreter,
                                                And He will make it plain.''

We will wait for His interpretation, and we will wait in faith, nothing doubting. He who has led us so well, and defended and prospered us so wonderfully, during the last four years of· toil, and struggle, and sorrow, will not forsake us now. He may chasten, but He will not destroy.

         He may purify us more and more in the furnace of trial, but He will not consume us. No, no! He has chosen us as He did his people of old in the furnace of affliction, and He has said of us as He said of them, "This people have I formed for myself; they shall show forth My praise." Let our principal anxiety now  be that this new sorrow may be sanctified sorrow; that it may lead us to a deeper repentance, to a more humbling sense of our dependence upon God, and to the more unreserved consecration of ourselves and all that we have to the cause of truth and justice, of law and order, of Liberty and good government, of pure and undefiled religion. Then, though weeping may endure for a night, joy will come in the morning. Blessed be God! despite of this great and sudden and temporary darkness, the morning has begun to dawn-the morning of a bright and glorious day, such as our country has never seen. That day will come and not tarry, and the death of an hundred Presidents and their Cabinets can never, never prevent it. While we are thus hopeful, however, let us also be humble. The occasion calls us to prayerful and tearful humiliation. It demands of us that we lie low, very low, before Him who has smitten us for our sins. 0 that all our rulers and all our people may bow in the dust today beneath the chastening hand of God! and may their voices go up to Him as one voice, and their hearts go up to Him as one heart, pleading with Him for mercy, for grace to sanctify our great and sore bereavement, and for wisdom to guide us in this our time of need. Such a united cry and pleading will not be in vain. It will enter into the ear and heart  of Him who sits upon the throne, and  He will say to us, as to His ancient Israel, "In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment: but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy upon thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer."

  have said that the people confided in the late lamented President with a full and loving confidence. Probably no man since the days of Washington was ever so deeply and firmly embedded and enshrined in the very hearts of the people as Abraham Lincoln. Nor was it a mistaken confidence and love. He deserved it - deserved it well - deserved it all. He merited it by his character, by his acts, and by the whole tenor, and tone, and spirit of his life. He was simple and sincere, plain and honest, truthful and just, benevolent and kind. His perceptions were quick and clear, his judgments were calm and accurate, and his purposes were good and pure beyond question. Always and everywhere he aimed and endeavored to be right and to do right. His integrity was thorough, all­ pervading, all-controlling, and incorruptible. It was the same in every place and relation, in the consideration and the control of matters great and small, the same firm and steady principle of power and beauty that shed a clear and crowning lustre upon all his other excellencies of mind and heart, and recommended him to his fellow citizens as the man who, in a time of unexampled peril, when the very life of the nation was at stake, should be chosen to occupy, in the country and for the country, its highest post of power and responsibility. How wisely and well, how purely and faithfully, how firmly and steadily, how justly and successfully he did occupy that post and meet its grave demands in circumstances of surpassing trial and difficulty, is known to you all, known to the country and the world. He comprehended from the first the perils to which treason had exposed the freest and best Government on earth, the vast interests of Liberty and humanity that were to be saved or lost forever in the  urgent  impending  conflict;  he  rose  to  the  dignity  and momentousness of the occasion, saw his duty as the Chief Magistrate of a great and imperilled people, and he determined to do his duty, and his whole duty, seeking the guidance and leaning upon the arm of Him of whom it is written, "He giveth power to the faint,  and  to  them  that have no might He increaseth strength." Yes, he leaned upon His arm. He recognized and received the truth that the "kingdom is the Lord's, and He is the governor among the nations.'' He remembered that "God is in history," and he felt that nowhere had His hand and His mercy been so marvelously conspicuous as in the history of this nation.  He hoped and he prayed that that same hand would continue to guide us, and that same mercy continue to abound to us in the time of our greatest need. I speak what I know, and testify what I have often heard him say, when I affirm that that guidance and mercy were the props on which he humbly and habitually leaned; they were the best hope he had for him­ self and for his country. Hence, when he was leaving his  home  in Illinois, and coming to this city to take his seat in the executive chair of a disturbed and troubled nation, he said to the old and tried friends who gathered tearfully around him and bade him farewell, "I leave you with this request: pray for me." They did pray for him; and millions of other people prayed for him; nor did they pray in vain.  Their prayer was heard, and the answer appears in all his subsequent history; it shines forth with a heavenly radiance in the whole course and tenor of his administration, from its commencement to its close. God raised him up for a great and glorious mission, furnished him for his work, and aided him in its accomplishment. Nor was it merely by strength of mind, and honesty of heart, and purity and pertinacity of purpose, that He furnished him; in addition to these things, He gave him a calm and abiding confidence in the overruling providence of God and in the ultimate triumph of truth and righteousness through the power and the blessing of God. This confidence strengthened him in all his hours of anxiety and toil, and inspired him with calm and cheering hope when others were inclining to despondency and gloom. Never shall I forget the emphasis and the deep emotion with which he said in this very room, to a company of clergymen and others, who called to pay him their respects in the darkest days of our civil conflict: "Gentlemen,  my hope of  success  in this great and terrible struggle rests on that immutable foundation, the justice and goodness of God. And when events are threatening, and prospects very dark, I still hope that in some way w·hich man cannot see all will be well in the end, because our cause is just, and God is on our side." Such was his sublime and holy faith, and it was an anchor to his soul, both sure and steadfast. It made him firm and strong. It emboldened him in the pathway of duty, however rugged and perilous it might be. It made him valiant for the right; for the cause of God and humanity, and it held him in a steady, patient, and unswerving adherence to a policy of ad­ ministration which he thought, and which we all now think, both God and humanity required him to adopt. We admired and loved him on many accounts - for strong and various reasons; we admired his childlike simplicity, his freedom from guile and deceit, his  staunch and sterling integrity, his kind and forgiving temper, his industry and patience, his persistent, self-sacrificing devotion to all the duties of his eminent position, from the least to the greatest; his readiness to hear and consider the cause of the poor and humble, the suffering and the oppressed; his charity toward those who questioned the correctness of his opinions and the wisdom of his policy; his wonderful skill in reconciling differences among the friends of the Union, leading them  away  from  abstractions,  and  inducing them to work together  and  harmoniously  for  the  common  weal;  his  true and enlarged philanthropy, that knew no distinction of  color or race, but regarded all men as brethren, and endowed  alike  by  their  Creator  "with certain  inalienable  rights,  among  which  are  life,  Liberty,  and  the  pursuit of happiness;" his inflexible purpose that what freedom had gained in  our terrible civil strife should never  be lost,  and  that  the  end  of  the  war should be the end of slavery, and as a  consequence,  of  rebellion;  his readiness to spend and be spent for the attainment of such a triumph -- a triumph, the blessed fruits of which  shall be  as wide spreading  as  the earth and as enduring as the sun:-all these things commanded and fixed our admiration, and  the  admiration  of  the  world,  and  stamped  upon  his character and life the unmistakable  impress  of  greatness.  But  more  sub­ lime than any  or  all  of  these,  more  holy  and  influential,  more  beautiful and strong, and sustaining, was his abiding confidence in God and in the final triumph of truth and righteousness through Him and for His sake. This was his noblest virtue, his grandest principle, the secret alike of his strength, his patience, and his success.  And this, it seems to me, after being near him steadily, and with him of ten, for more than four years, is the principle by which, more than any other, he, being dead, yet speaketh." Yes; by his steady enduring confidence in God, and in the complete ultimate success of the cause of God, which is the cause of humanity, more than by any other way, does he now speak to us and the nation he loved and served so well. By this he speaks to his successor in office, and charges him to "have faith in God." By this he speaks to the members of his. cabinet, the men with whom he counselled so often and was associated so long, and he charges them to have faith in God."  By this he speaks to the officers and men of our noble army and navy, and, as they stand at their posts of duty and peril, he charges them to have faith in God." By this he speaks to all who occupy positions of influence and authority in these sad and troublous times, and he charges them all to "have faith in God."  By this he speaks to this great people as they sit in sackcloth today, and weep for him with a bitter wailing, and refuse to be comforted, and he charges them to "have faith in God."  And by this he will speak through the ages and to all rulers and peoples in every land, and his message to them will be Cling to Liberty and right; battle for them; bleed for them; die for them, if need be; and have confidence in God."   O that the voice of this  testimony  may  sink  down  into  our  hearts today and every day, and into the heart of the  nation,  and   exert  its appropriate influence upon our feelings, our faith, our patience, and  our devotion  to  the  cause  of  freedom  and  humanity-a  cause  dearer  to  us now than ever before, because consecrated by the blood of its most conspicuous  defender,  its  wisest   and  most   fondly-trusted   friend.

He is dead; but the God in whom he trusted lives, and He can guide and strengthen his successor, as He guided and strengthened him. He is dead; but the memory of his virtues, and of his wise and patriotic counsels and labors, of his calm and steady faith in God lives, is precious, and will be a power for good in the country quite down to the end of time. He is dead; but the cause he so ardently loved, so ably, patiently, faith­ fully represented and defended-- not for himself only, not for us only, but for all people in all their coming generations, till time shall be no more-that cause survives his fall, and will survive it. The light of its rightening prospects flashes cheeringly today athwart the gloom occasioned by his death, and the language of God's united providences is telling us that, though the friends of Liberty die, Liberty itself is immortal. There is no assassin strong enough and no weapon deadly enough to quench its inextinguishable life, or arrest its onward march to the con­quest and empire of the  world. This is our confidence, and this is our consolation, as we weep and mourn today. Though our beloved  President is slain, our beloved country is saved. And so we sing of mercy  as well as of judgment. Tears of gratitude mingle with those  of  sorrow.  While there is darkness, there is also the dawning of a brighter,  happier  day upon our stricken and weary land. God be praised that our fallen  Chief lived long enough to see the day dawn and the daystar of joy and peace arise upon the nation. He saw it, and he was glad.  Alas!  alas!  He only saw the dawn. When the sun has risen, full-orbed and glorious, and  a happy reunited people are rejoicing in its light,  alas!  alas!  it will shine upon his grave. But that grave will be a precious and a consecrated spot. The friends of Liberty and of the Union  will  repair  to  it  in  years  and ages to come, to pronounce the memory of its occupant blessed, and, gathering from his very ashes, and from ,the  rehearsal of his deeds and virtues, fresh incentives  to  patriotism,  they  will  there  renew  their  vows of fidelity to their country and their God. And now I know not that I can more appropriately conclude this discourse, which is but a sincere and simple utterance of  the heart,  than by addressing to our departed  President,  with  some  slight  modification, the language which Tacitus, in his life of Agricola,  addresses to his venerable and departed father-in-law: "With you we may now congratulate, you are blessed, not only because your life was a career of glory, but because you were released,  when, your country safe, it was happiness to die. We have lost a parent, and, in our distress, it is now an addition to our heart­ felt sorrow that we had it  not  in  our  power  to  commune  with  you  on the bed of languishing, and receive your last embrace. Your dying words would have been ever dear to us; your command we should have treasured up, and graved them on our hearts.  This  sad comfort  we  have  lost, and the wound, for that reason, pierces deeper. From the world  of  spirits behold your disconsolate family and people; exalt our minds from  fond regret and unavailing grief to contemplation of your  virtues.  These we must not lament; it were impiety to sully  them  with  a  tear.  To cherish their memory, to embalm them  with  our praises,  and, so far  as  we  can, to emulate your bright example, will be the truest mark of our respect, the best tribute we can offer. Your wife will thus preserve the memory of the best of husbands, and thus your children will prove their filial piety. By dwelling constantly on your words and actions, they will have an  illustrious character  before  their  eyes,  and, not  content  with  the  bare  image of your mortal frame, they  will  have  what  is  more  valuable-the  form and features of your mind. Busts and statues, like their original, are frail and perishable. The soul is formed of finer elements, and its inward form is not to be expressed  by  the hand of  an  artist  with  unconscious  matter  - our manners and our morals may in some degree trace the resemblance. All of you that gained our  love  and  raised  our  admiration  still subsists, and will ever subsist, preserved in the minds of men, the register of ages, and the records of fame.  Others,  who  had ,figured  on  the  stage of  life and were the worthies of a former day, will sink, for want of a faithful historian, into the common lot of  oblivion, inglorious and unremembered; but you, our lamented friend and head, delineated with truth, and fairly consigned to posterity, will survive yourself , and triumph over the injuries of time.


            Edgington’s book continues describing that on the funeral train which bore Lincoln's body home to Springfield, along with the casket of Willie Lincoln which was to rest finally beside that of his father, Dr. Gurley composed the following hymn to be sung at the service at the grave in Springfield:


Rest, noble Martyr! rest in peace; Rest with the true and brave,

     Who, like thee, fell in Freedom's cause, The nation's life to save.

Thy name shall live while time endures, And men shall say of thee,

"He saved his country from its foes, And bade the slave be free."

These deeds shall be thy monument, Better than brass or stone;
                                                They leave thy fame in glory's light, Unrival'd and alone.

                                            .  This consecrated spot shall be To Freedom ever dear;
                                               And Freedom's son of every race
                                                Shall weep and worship here.

 0 God! before whom we, in tears, Our fallen Chief deplore
Grant that the cause, for which he died, May live forever more

Doxology.

To Father, Son and Holy Ghost, The God whom we adore,

Be glory as it was, is now, And shall be evermore.

     Mrs. Lincoln in her deep gratitude for the friendship and sympathy of her pastor wanted him to have some personal belonging of her husband's as a keepsake. She sent the following letter with her gif t:


 


                                                                                    Executive Mansion

                                                                                    May 22nd, 1865

 Rev.  Dr.  Gurley

My  Dear  Sir:

             Please accept as a memento, of the very kind regard entertained for you by my beloved Husband, the hat worn by him, for the first and only time, at his Second Inauguration.  While its intrinsic value is trifling. You will prize it, for the associations that cluster around it. If anything can cast a ray of light across my dreary and blighted pathway, the recollection of your Christian kindness, extended to myself and family in our heavy bereavements will ever be most gratefully cherish.  With love to Mrs. Gurley, I remain.

                                                 Your heart broken friend

                                                                                    Mary Lincoln[2]

                                                                       
The Lincoln Pew, at pages 254 to 256

             In this chapter it is mentioned that during renovations in 1886 the Lincoln Pew was discovered and saved by John D. McChesney, who as a boy with a friend had tracked Lincoln to the White House from church one night in the snow. The story was that Lincoln did not let the boys know that he had discovered them until he arrived at the White House and turned around the thank the boys for the escort. McChesney and the sexton sat on the pew until they were assured the pew would be saved.

            Mrs. Lincoln had chosen pew no. 14 when they first arrived in Washington, D.C.  It now occupies the relatively same position in the church which it did then.  The minutes of the Session for March 8, 1893 state, “Decided to submit to the Congregational meeting tomorrow evening the propriety of restoring to its former place the pew occupied by President Lincoln, which was removed when new pews were put into the church.”

            People have come to see the pew and paused to hear the story about the man who prayed in the pew, who said he came there because he got not partisan politics but something to feed his soul at the church.  When told how Lincoln carried a small Bible he called “The Rock,” visitors would accept similar Testaments offered to them.  Visitors were told how Dr. Gurley would pray with Lincoln for the troops kneeling beside him in prayer for the Army.

            On the 100th Anniversary of the NYAPC, President Theodore Roosevelt occupied the pew with the Secretary of State, Honorable John Hay.  Roosevelt’s remarks on that day are partially quoted in the book.  Secretary Hay also spoke.  The chapter mentions other Presidents and notables who have visited the pew at NYAPC. It ends with a poem about Lincoln’s pew by Lyman Whitney Allen who was inspired by pastor Dr. Radcliff’s comments about Lincoln.

 A Symbol of Freedom, at pages 258 to 265

             This 7-page chapter discusses the presentation of the original draft of the Emancipation proclamation to the NYAPC during the dedication of the new church building on December 20, 1951.  The NYAPC had a long relationship with the Washington Hebrew Congregation whose Rabbi Norman Gersenstein suggested that the NYAPC should be where the documents should be given by the then owner, Barney Balaban.

             Balaban was present and there were several speakers.  Rev. George M. Docherty, D.D., had been the pastor of the church for about two years, is quoted in his remarks about the documents and their donor.  Balaban’s response to the comments are quoted, including his intentions about setting up a Trust Fund to support events concerning the Emancipation Proclamation to be sponsored by the NYAPC on the occasion of Lincoln’s birthday. There were comments and prayers completing the event.

Dr. Sizoo and the Lincoln Family, at pages 266 to 274. 

             Joseph Richard Sizoo was born in Antwerp, Belgium in 1884 and served as pastor of NYAPC from 1924 – 1936.  It happened that William Jennings Bryan, a three-time Democratic candidate for President, unexpectedly died in 1925 and the NYAPC offered the use of the church for his funeral.  Sizoo became important to the life in Washington, D.C. and the church facilities did too.  There is more about this in the early chapters of this book about NYAPC.

            Dr. Sizoo came to know the Robert Lincoln family at NYAPC.  But Sizoo had heard of the Lincoln family from his own father who was greeted by Robert during an inspection tour of the factory where Sizoo’s father worked some years earlier.  Sizoo’s father was quoted as saying, “What a wonderful country this is that the son of a President will stop to talk to a working man.”

             Dr. Sizoo later thanked Mrs. Robert Lincoln for the kindness Robert had done for his father by speaking to him.  This Mrs. Lincoln was instrumental in restoring the steeple that had been blown down by a storm, and the daughter of this Lincoln family, then named Mrs. Mamie Isham, contributed to restoring the clock and chimes. 

            The incident of burying Robert Lincoln is reported in this chapter.   When Robert Todd Lincoln died in 1926, his wife, Mary Eunice Harlan, had not decided where to bury him and placed him in a vault.  The daughter of Robert and Mary, Mamie, was the wife of Charles Isham, a historian.  One day Mamie came to Dr. Sizoo to tell him she and her mother were sending a car for him at a certain time and day to pick him up.  When he was delivered to the home in Georgetown, a little old lady came to greet him, saying, “Today I am your mother and you are my son.  We shall go out and bury father.”  With that they got into the car and were delivered to Arlington and the car stopped at a little knoll which the Congress had set aside for the Lincoln family.  Mrs. Lincoln did not even permit her daughters to attend the funeral.  Sizoo cited the 23rd Psalm, said a prayer, and benediction and the casket was lowered into the ground.


            This chapter ends with three pages about the Dedication Service of the Lincoln Memorial Tower at the NYAPC, including statements about what the memorial meant to the people in the church and community.

             I would encourage those interested to find the Edgington book and read the other interesting stories that are told.

 Another Book – Capital Witness

            In 2019 I discovered another book has been written about the history of this church by a group of people in 2011.  Capital Witness: A History of The New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., Plumbline Media, LLC, 2011, ISBN: 978-1-937824-00-6, 436 pp.  I was able to purchase a very good copy from an Internet book seller with a price tag inside the front cover marked “8—", way below the price it was originally.  This copy was dedicated in a book plate to thank Cynthia J. Bolbach.

            This book is a heavy coffee table book made of slick glossy paper, hard covers, lots of photos and art, plus three editors, namely Dewey D. Wallace, Jr., Wilson Golden, and Edith Holmes Snyder are  listed on the cover.  There are fourteen chapters by the editors and other authors.  Chapter 5 is in two parts, the first by Robert C. White, Jr. is titled, Abraham Lincoln’s Minister at pages 112 to 126, and part II by Frank van der Linden, is titled, Stories of a President and His Pastor at pages 127 to 132.  What follows are a few facts and quotes from this chapter.

             The remainder of the book covers more interesting church history including the pastorate of Dr. Peter Marshall and others, the civil rights movement, and Washington, D.C. activities of the church. This could be a model for other churches looking to preserve the history of their organizational efforts.

             Abraham Lincoln’s Minister

             Phineas Densmore Gurley graduated at the top of his class at the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1840.  He served churches in Indianapolis and Dayton before being called to the F Street Church in 1844.  Gurley was an Old School Presbyterian preacher, not a New School preacher.  Gurley was asked by Princeton Theological Seminary to take over the “preaching and pastoral” department in May of 1860.  The Republican Party met in Chicago the same month to nominate Lincoln to run for President.  Gurley’s answer to the Seminary is not known, but he started preaching to President Lincoln from March 1861 to April 1865.

            “Gurley stood squarely in the American Presbyterian understanding of Reformed theology.  The basic themes of Reformed or Calvinist theology were shaped by John Calvin in Geneva and handed down through Calvinists in England, Scotland, and Holland.  God was understood not as the first principle in philosophy, but as the primary actor in history.  Persecuted in old Europe and old England, in the New World American Calvinists (as Pilgrims, Puritans, and Presbyterians) sought to live under the kingly rule of God.  They wanted to balance their high view of God with a low or realistic view of humanity.  The Presbyterian paradox was that belief in the sinfulness of human beings did not lead to passivity; rather, Presbyterians were confident that in God’s sovereignty, human beings were called to be instruments of devine purpose.” Capital Witness, 113-114

             The Old School and New School division was made in 1837 over a number of theological and organizational issues.  Both traditions were grounded in the Bible, but the Old School remained rooted in a doctrinal tradition and the New School was expressed in revivalism of the Second Great Awakening.  The New Schoolers believed in anti-slavery advocacy whereas the Old Schoolers believed that the church, as a spiritual institution, should not involve itself in political questions. Gurley graduated in 1840, so he must have heard the discussions about the Old School and New School situation.

             Lincoln may have looked for a pastor who did not dwell on politics and he found Gurley.  Once Lincoln was asked about Gurley and Lincoln replied, “I like Gurley.  He doesn’t preach politics.  I get enough of that through the week.” id. p 114. There is more about these hard to understand theological differences in this chapter.

             Lincoln’s faith journey began growing up Baptist with his father in Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois, but Lincoln reacted against this tradition which left little toleration for questions and doubt.  Between 1831 and 1837 Lincoln is reported to have written an essay on the Bible and revealed religion.  He moved to Springfield in 1837 and began to speak on a “doctrine of necessity” which he incorporated into a handbill in 1846 when he ran for Congress.  His opponent was a Methodist minister, Peter Cartwright, who accused him of being a “scoffer of Christianity.”

             Lincoln offered this definition of the Doctrine of Necessity: “The human mind is compelled to action, or held in rest by some power, over which the mind has no control.”  Lincoln told the voters, “That I am not a member of any Christian Church, is true, but I have never denied the truth of the Scriptures, and I have never spoken with intentional disrespect of religion in general, or any denomination in particular.”  Id. at 115.

             In 1850 when their second son, Eddie, died the Lincolns were drawn to the Rev. James Smith, the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Springfield. Mary was worshipping at the St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, where Rev. Charles Dresser was pastor, and he had married Abe and Mary in 1842.  In 1852, Mary joined the First Presbyterian Church and the Lincolns rented pew no. 20 in the fifth row.  Tad, their fourth son, was baptized there in 1856.

             Lincoln attended First Presbyterian Church infrequently.  John Todd Stuart, a law partner of Lincoln’s, and a member of First Presbyterian, remembered Lincoln began to attend more regularly in the late 1850s when the new railroad made it easier to travel to the 8th Circuit Courts for law business and Lincoln was able to spend more weekends in Springfield.  The First Presbyterian Church used Lincoln as one of three lawyers in a case against the Sangamon Presbytery, which chapter author Robert C. Wright, Jr. cites as an entry in the First Presbyterian Church’s Trustee records now held by the Illinois State Historical Library. Wright says, “Since it is contrary to Presbyterian order to allow outside counsel in such suits, it would have been understood that Lincoln was related to First Presbyterian.”  Id. at 116.

               Rev. Smith gained a reputation for learned preaching, but as a young man, like Lincoln, Smith was a skeptic who was intrigued with ideas of Constantin Volney (French philosopher) and Thomas Paine. But Smith later turned to rest more comfortably with the Old School in the 1840s.  In 1842, Smith wrote a 650-page book, The Christian’s Defense, that grew out of the debates in 1841 with a popular “free thinker,” Charles G. Olmstead, for 18 successive evenings at Columbus, Mississippi.  Lincoln may have read this book while staying with Mary’s family in Lexington, Kentucky, after the death of Eddie.

             Wright makes reasonable assumptions about what Lincoln gained from being acquainted with Rev. Smith.  Readers will need to read this if you want to inquire about how Rev. Smith and Abraham Lincoln may both have benefited from knowing each other.

            Wright says when Lincoln heard Rev. Gurley in Washington, he liked him for the same reasons he liked Rev. Smith in Springfield.  Gurley was different in that he punctuated his sermons with questions.  Leonard Swett, a friend of Lincoln in Illinois, said, “The whole world to him was a question of cause and effect.”  Wright says Lincoln’s participation in the NYAPC “coincided with his deepening effort to understand the meaning of God’s activity, the cause and effect, in the war.

            Lincoln was present for worship at NYAPC on April 15, 1861.  The Thursday before, April 21, Confederate troops opened fire on Fort Sumter and after 33 hours of fighting, the American flag was  lowered on April 14. Some say Lincoln and Gurley were on their knees together praying for the troops.

            In February 1862, Rev. Gurley presided at Willie’s funeral in the White House.  Gurley told the Lincolns that the meaning of devine providence was that “His kingdom ruleth overall.”  Gurley’s words would later be used by Lincoln.   Wright explains several other of Rev. Gurley’s sermons during these times that would have made impressions on Lincoln.  Gurley called attention to the logical contradiction of free agency and God’s governance.  “Man devises; the Lord directs.” Or “man proposes; God disposes.”  “Gurley chose this theme of human agency and God’s sovereignty, he said, as the best way to understand ‘the probable fruits and consequences of the terrible struggle’ in which the nation had been engaged.”

            Wright points out that Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address of 701 words mentions God fourteen times, quoted the Bible four times, and invoked prayer three times.  And it is the second shortest inaugural ever offered. Wright says that Lincoln’s “religious words are actually technical theological language that reflects directly on the influence of Gurley and Old School Presbyterian theology.” Id. at 121.

             Wright ends this chapter with some discussion of the theological basis of Lincoln’s address as being based on hearing Old School sermons from Reverends Smith and Gurley for about twenty years.  The Second Inaugural Address was delivered 41 days before Lincoln’s death is a “most compelling public declaration of politics and religion in American history,” Wright says.  Lincoln was teaching what Gurley had been sermonizing for the previous four years.

             Robert C. White, Jr. earned a Ph.D. at Princeton University and is the author of Abraham Lincoln: A Biography (2009) and other Lincoln books.  He formerly served as dean and professor of American religious history at San Francisco Theological Seminary.

             Stories of a President and His Pastor
 
            This Part II is only five pages including a couple pages of pictures.  Pastor Phineas D. Gurley was the Lincoln’s family pastor from their arrival to the White House.  Although Lincoln never became a formal member of NYAPC or any other church, “Lincoln often expressed his belief in the power of an Almighty God, and he sought devine guidance as carried the increasing burden of responsibility for the Civil War with its terrible toll of blood and suffering.”

            Gurley was called by the F Street Presbyterian Church in the District of Columbia when Rev. James Lurie died after fifty years of service to the church.  Gurley played a major role in the union of F Street Church and Second Presbyterian Church in 1859, the new church being named the NYAPC.  The F Street Church building was sold to the Willard Hotel and became the Willard’s Hall as part of the hotel and a political nerve center of wartime Washington.

             Rev. Gurley became a licensed preacher in 1840 and married Emma E. Brooks of Parishville, New York.  Their eldest daughter, Frances Mary, or “Fannie,” married William Anthony Elderkin in 1861.  The bridegroom wrote his parents in Potsdam, New York, “We had neither bridesmaids or groomsmen, nor did we make the matter public, yet, it became known by some unaccountable means and to our surprise more than 1,100 persons witnessed our marriage. We were heartily congratulated by many.  President Lincoln shook us both by the hands and wished us much happiness.” Id.  at 127.  He and Fannie had six children.

             Van der Linden recounts that a White House nurse, Mrs. Rebecca Pomeroy of Chelsea, Massachusetts, for Willie and his brother Tad, assured Lincoln that many Christians were praying for him. “With tears in his eyes, Lincoln replied, ‘I need their prayers.’ As they were going out to the burial, the president told Mrs. Pomeroy, ‘I will try not to go to God with my sorrows… I wish I had that childlike faith you speak of and I trust He will give it to me.  I had a good Christian mother, and her prayers have followed me thus far through life.”  Carl Sandburg, Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1940, vol. 5, 378.

             Sandburg also references a story of portrait painter Francis B. Carpenter who described in his memoirs a visit by Rev. Francis Vinton, rector of Trinity Church in New York, to the White House while Carpenter was painting Lincoln’s portrait.  Vinton warned Lincoln not to surrender to his grief. “Your son is alive in paradise,” Vinton said.  Lincoln cried, “Alive, alive!” and threw his arms around Vinton and sobbed, “Alive, alive!” Carpenter said Lincoln’s views about spiritual matters seemed to change from that hour.  Lincoln began to see new hope of reuniting with his two deceased sons. Id. at 379.

             Lincoln was aided by Rev. Gurley to invoke the help of God more to understand why the war dragged on and on.  On October 24, 1863, Gurley presented to Lincoln at the White House leaders of the Baltimore Presbyterian Synod (Old School).  Gurley introduced Rev. Septimus Tustin who declared to Lincoln that every member of the Synod “belongs to the Kingdom of God and is loyal to the government.”  Lincoln responded, “I have often wished that I was a more devout man than I am.  Nevertheless, amid the greatest difficulties in my administration, when I could not see any other resort, I would place my whole reliance upon God, know that all would go well, and that He would decide for the right.” (Emphasis added.) Id. at Vol 3, 370.

             Various letters between Gurley and Lincoln supported the idea to van der Linden there was a “hot line” between the two men.  Lincoln intervened at the request of several Presbyterian clergy to request that the arrest of clergy and others be suspended for various reasons.  Gurley once got Lincoln to suspend the execution of a son of a member of the NYAPC.  For the latter story, see Albert Ebenezer Gurley, Charles Rogers, and Henry Porter Andrews, The History and Genealogy of the Gurley Family, Press of the Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co., 1897, 124)

             Van der Linden tells of an NBC radio program on February 14, 1943. wherein Robert St. John welcomed Emma Gurley Adams, then 84 years old, a small, hard-of-hearing lady who remembered Lincoln spent a lot of time in her father’s church ‘‘listening to the plain, unvarnished Gospel truth.”  She recalled one night when her father and Lincoln were out walking in the city and came home late, carrying the President’s walking stick. Lincoln had given him the stick saying he would probably need it to protect himself. 

             Emma was only six years old when Lincoln was shot.  The Gurleys were all in bed when the White House carriage came to their door on Friday night.  “Tom Cross, the president’s body servant jumped out of the carriage and shouted, ‘Mrs. Lincoln says for Doctor Gurley to come quick.  The President has been shot!’” (NBC Radio Interview by Robert St. John of Emma Gurley Adams, February 14, 2943.)

             Sandburg detailed the scene that Gurley found at the William Petersen’s brick house on 10th Street, where Lincoln had been carried from the theatre across the street.  Lincoln was still breathing when Gurley arrived and the President died at 7:22 AM when his heart stopped. Gurley led the group in prayer on his knees asking that the President’s family and the country be comforted.

             On April 19,1865, Gurley led the funeral service at the White House East Room.  Van der Linden quoted the scene that was recorded in Illustrated Life, Services, Martyrdom of Abraham President, Sixteenth President of the United States by David Brainerd Williamson, ed., T. B. Peterson & Brothers, 224.

             Six weeks later in the NYAPC, Rev. Gurley looked down at Pew No. 14 and revealed an emotion shared by many Christians, but repressed immediately after the assassination that he regretted that John Wilkes Booth had found the beloved president at the theatre.  This was not the place his friends would have wanted him to die. “For my own part, I have always regarded the theatre as in the main a school of vice and corruption – the illumined and decorated gateway through which thousands are constantly passing into the embrace of gaiety and folly, intemperance and lewdness, infamy and ruin… I lift my voice against it, and exhort you to number it among the polluting, perilous and prohibited places where you and your children must never be found.”  (Sandburg, vol. 6, 359).

             Frank van der Linden was a Civil War historian after nearing a half century as a Washington newspaper correspondent covering the Congress and the White House. He first interviewed Harry S. Truman at a poker party for congressional Democrats in 1945 and closed his career with an interview of George H.W. Bush.  He wrote a nationally syndicated column and appeared frequently on NBC’s Meet the Press.  He was one of Ronald Reagan’s favorite correspondents and profiled Reagan in his book: Ronald Reagan: What He Believes, What He has Accomplished, What We Can Expect from Him (1981).  He authored several other books, including Lincoln: The Road to War (1998)

 Lincoln’s Faith

             For those like Professor C. Guelzo who want to find an engraved membership card or something similar to prove Lincoln was a Christian, I would recommend they lighten up and recognize that God may not have such a requirement in place.  The Old Testament goes back thousands of years and the New Testament starts around 50 years after the crucifixion which marks our calendars today.  These Old and New groups of writings are not the same as the Old School and New School definitions used by the Presbyterians who came to the New World from Europe.   

             John Calvin came along about the time of Martin Luther about five hundred years ago and wrote a multi-volume set of books titled, The Institutes of the Christian Religion.  In this treatise, he covers things like what “faith” means in some detail.  From these writings other theologians have defined and split concepts and tried to make it all understandable to the common man and woman, almost never succeeding in making it 100 percent understandable to all, including Lincoln and this writer.

             Calvin describes multiple definitions of “faith” in Section 3.2.13-16 of the Institutes.  Presbyterians today are several groups, each with slightly separate understandings of what it means to be a member or Christian.   If one reads the New Testament, you will see that Jesus recognized when individuals accepted the truth about their faith in God.   Jesus did not issue membership certificates or ask people to make an oath.  In Jesus time there were no Presbyterians of any kind.  Nor were their Popes or other church-wide leaders.

             The Old and New Schools of Presbyterian attracted different kinds of people and some clergy have accepted one or the other part of the time or changed during their careers from one to the other.  Even today, change is occurring in the Presbyterian Church as it is in other churches around the world.

         Lincoln learned about the Bible first from his mother, and over his lifetime he joined the Kingdom in Springfield, Illinois, and again in Washington, D.C., even if he was not a card-carrying member of a denomination.  Sandburg quotes Lincoln who says he placed his trust in God.  Why do I say “Kingdom?” 

            After being baptized by John, Jesus became filled with the Holy Spirit and went to Galilee to begin preaching.    Archeologists have uncovered exactly where some of the Bible events like John’s baptism of Jesus happened.  A short time later, when Jesus was asked how to pray, he gave an answer quoted in Luke’s (Luke 11: 1-4) and in Matthew's (Matthew 6:9-13) versions.  The King James version of this prayer from Matthew is:

Our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come. 
Thy will be done in earth, 
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them that trespass against us. 
And lead us not into temptation, 
But deliver us from evil. 
For thine is the kingdom, 
The power, and the glory, 
For ever and ever. 
Amen.

Read more: https://www.lords-prayer-words.com/lord_traditional_king_james.html#ixzz5o0VqhSIe

             When Jesus says, "Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven," he is saying there are two Kingdoms.  Luke's version is communicating the same thing just in a shorter form.  In other words, Jesus was saying there are two Kingdoms – one in heaven and one in your heart.  Matthew 6:9-13

            My contention is that Lincoln and Mary joined their hearts with the Kingdom in Springfield after their son, Eddie, died at a young age, and Lincoln and Mary joined the Kingdom in D.C. especially after Willie died, and when the Civil War started their hearts were filled with needs that God provide because their relied on God to do so. In both cities this family had a place in their heart for the Kingdom where they lived.

             In the introduction to the Devotional book, Carl Sandburg describes Lincoln’s relationship with his pastor in Springfield.  Edgington’s book describes the various rolls Lincoln played at the church, how he participated in prayer at the White House with Rev. Dr. Gurley, how Lincoln helped Gurley’s daughter get married to a West Point soldier by going out one day in his one horse shay borrowing a wedding dress and other parts of the outfit for the wedding, and many other evidences of the D.C. Kingdom.   In the 2011 book, you learn more about the place that the Lincolns participated in for over four years.

             You need to first get the Devotional reproduction to see what Lincoln carried on horseback, stage coaches, and railroad cars for years riding between Illinois county courthouses.   You will begin to see Lincoln was a believer.  You will better understand the Gettysburg Address, the Second Inaugural Speech, and the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag.  Reading a daily Bible verse is one way to start building your faith.

             Living the life Jesus talked about is getting you closer to the Kingdom in your heart.

             If you pause long enough on the Friday before Easter, remember that it was that Friday that Lincoln was assassinated.  Lincoln’s Devotional would be good to have in times like these.

Lincoln’s Devotional, Henry Holt and Co., LLC, 1856, New York, NY, originally published in London: The Believer’s Daily Treasure, Text of Scripture Arranged for Every Day in the Year, Religious Tract Society, 1852, ISBN:0-8050-5832-5.





[1] Miss Sidney I. McCleary united with The F Street Church May 3, 1814.  Later she married Henry Lauck.
F Street Church was a predecessor to the NYAPC.
[2] Mrs. Lincoln died July 16, 1882 at the home of her sister, Mrs. Edwards, in Springfield, Illinois.

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