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This is the Baptist Church that the Spurlings left to start the COG. I visited the church out of curiosity and was amazed how much like an old fashion COG it was. It is off the road to the right from Tellico Plains going toward Turtletown. A short ride up the mountain.
Visit this church! It is Holly Springs Baptist Church.
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 4:36 PM]
one log room with a prayer altar – all that’s needed for God to rekindle the ole revival fire Alan N Carla Smith
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 4:44 PM]
Google street view gives a 3d image https://www.google.com/maps/@35.274358,-84.379829,3a,75y,116.05h,71.92t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sUEC7TMaLyEH9rp-T1-mLuw!2e0!7i3328!8i1664!6m1!1e1
Charles Page [07/22/2015 4:44 PM]
They have a cloth banner of their declaration of faith and sing from the Red Back Hymnals! Does anyone know what a Redback Hymnal is?
Charles Page [07/22/2015 4:46 PM]
an out house in back
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 4:47 PM]
heat gas tank next to the out house 🙂 afraid everyone here knows what a Redback Hymnal is
Charles Page [07/22/2015 4:48 PM]
no 120?
Charles Page [07/22/2015 4:49 PM]
they have heat but I am not sure the building has running water.
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 4:50 PM]
for the younger ones in the discussions Red Back Hymnals is like a smart phone (just ask me why Rick Wadholm Jr Alan N Carla Smith)
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 4:51 PM]
Your pilgrimage might have been back in the 70s since the out house is now replaced by a modern bathroom seemingly behind the altar. There’s metal roofing, fellowship building and water running just outside of it in the creek where Google map shows a couple seemingly digging for gold or sth.
Charles Page [07/22/2015 5:00 PM]
I visited a couple years ago. I know there is an out house, I had to use it!!! 😉 They have a building next door for fellowship and water may be there. I didn’t do a building inspection. All was needed was a room and an alter. They did have a choir and pulpit.
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 5:00 PM]
M. S. Lemons served at Steer Creek while R. G. Spurling at Camp Creek
Charles Page [07/22/2015 5:39 PM]
Joel Roman [07/22/2015 5:41 PM]
What was #120 ??Count Your Blessings???
Joel Roman [07/22/2015 5:42 PM]
They had these in spanish for all COG so #120 is probably different
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 5:43 PM]
Charles Page is mistakenly persuaded there were 120 in the upper room, where all #Voorhis students here are well aware there were but 12+ Alan N Carla Smith Bill Coble Eric Muckel
Charles Page [07/22/2015 5:44 PM]
Victory in Jesus what about #92?
Charles Page [07/22/2015 5:46 PM]
The largest car is recorded in the Bible and it was Japanese made, what was it?
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 5:46 PM]
Accord Acts 2 – “Just A Little Talk With Jesus” (page 92)
John Kissinger [07/22/2015 5:47 PM]
Noah went out of the Ark-n-so. Leah lit off the Camel. Come on!
Varnel Watson
by our own Charles Page who went there to visit
Varnel Watson
Charles Page INFACT This was not the Liberty Baptist Church as often wrongly attested though there is a Liberty Baptist in Murphy and yet another one close by in out of town The Spurlings (sic) left the one and only Holly Springs located on Steer Creek Rd.
Varnel Watson
Charles Page R. G. Spurling was a licensed minister with the nearby Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Cherokee County, North Carolina. His father was an ordained elder and member of the Holly Springs Baptist Church near Tellico Plains, Tennessee. They also built and operated grist and lumber mills.
R. G. Spurling experienced growing discord with the Landmark Baptist movement that dominated congregations in their area, however. He increasingly desired fellowship with Christians outside the Baptist tradition. Believing that human creeds were fallible and too often led to unnecessary divisions among Christians, he emphasized the New Testament over creedal statements and Baptist traditions.
Charles Page
“When he refused to limit his ministry to Landmark Baptist congregations, Spurling faced opposition” this is a historians statement and not Spurling’s.
Like any other minister he was disappointed and wanted to go independent. ala Wallace in Chattanooga
Varnel Watson
when Spurling felt emphatically the need to “set a church in order,” as he put it — a phrase reflecting his strong Baptist background — the result being the Holiness Church at Camp Creek in May 1902. Spurling, Bryant, and Frank Porter were the first three ministers of the Church of God, Bryant receiving his ordination from the hands of Spurling and Porter. M. S. Lemons, a schoolteacher from Bradley County, Tennessee http://www.pentecostaltheology.com/is-the-church-of-god-a-landmark-or-a-restoration-movement/
Varnel Watson
Charles Page I visited Tellico yesterday for the 200 anniversary of the Cherokee Nation removal as part of my heritage. I spoke with the museum director and various other speakers and will continue to talk with them Did you know
– the actual barney creek stones were donated by cog worldwide and are still in the tellico museum? I took pictures Most early cogs were established down the train line which was basically set upon the trail of tears meaning early cogs were set on the actual trail of tears
Spurlings were kicked out of Holy Spring baptist on steer creek rd NOT liberty baptist as often asserted Did you know that – they have very early pictures of the church 2 paintings of the mill house – the original records of Holy Spring baptist submitted just recently but not yet displayed anywhere or known to any church officials except the museum https://www.google.com/maps/@35.2743706,-84.3798436,3a,75y,116.05h,71.92t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sUEC7TMaLyEH9rp-T1-mLuw!2e0!7i3328!8i1664
Charles Page
I also visited that museum and was told the same story of the millstone. The one at the PTS is a replica. Did you get a chance to attend the Holly Springs Sunday service? I did and was amazed at the old fashioned COG similarities…even the hymnals
Varnel Watson
Charles Page they did not have one no a saturday but I spoke with MANY older baptists in the area who hold the old conservative holiness sanctification + still wash feet on Sunday
I am set to meet the lady who submitted their old records still unseen except by the museum folk There was too much crowd to bother them with showing them to me However, did you know if the actual kicking out of the Spurlings would be in these records? Its been often asserted to Liberty Baptist which is all the way in Murphy NC not Holy Springs in Tellico
Many years ago I had the privileged of meeting the grandson of Kilpatrick at a TN yard sale just He has helped Wade H. Phillips write his books and is writing a book about his own family. Still attends Liberty Baptist and is well acquainted with Church of God (+OP) history. The Kilpatricks rented the house when the first Church of God Assembly happened there. Later on AJ Timlinson purchased the house with one acre of land that it sat on. And then again later he purchased additional one acre to go with it but the 160 acre farm that it sat on is still intact and in the Kilpatrick which I was surprised to learn. They still attend Liberty Baptist where 40 were expelled before establishing the Christian Union and Holiness Church at Camp Creek. They knew little about speaking in tongues back then – the argument of expelling was sanctification. The baptist people believed in eternal security while the new fraction embraced the teaching of Wesleyan entire sanctification and holiness renewal insisting there was much work to be done in the life of the believer after salvation and that salvation could be indeed lost. He concluded that had it not been for entire sanctification and holiness renewal, there would have never been an argument, no one would have been expelled and the Church of God would have never been started. It was sanctification and holiness that caused the Church of God to come into existence. My, GOD have we arrived today just to find out we have lost the very reason for which we began as a movement until Holiness prevails again in the House of God… Link Hudson you ever did foot washing when you grew up cog? I know Alan Smith has done it too
Varnel Watson
Charles Page Richard was living in his parents’ home in Fentress Co. when the 1830 Census was taken. In 1840 – Rev. Richard Sprnlin received Entry 840 – on the waters of Clear Fork in Fentress County.On March 8,1841, he purchased from Arthur Edwards, for the sum of $160 some over 640 acres on the north side of Clear Fork of the Cumberland River. Richard and Nancy lived on these proper-ties, near his parents and his brother Daniel until around 1847, when they moved their young family to Morgan County, and took his aged parents to live with them.
During this time their family had grown considerably. They had James J., Ann Emmaline, Nathaniel Anderson, Daniel Eli Love, William A., and baby Elizabeth. While living in Morgan County, they became the parents of Hiram, Nancy and Richard Greene, Jr. By 1860, Richard and Nancy had moved to Monroe County, TN.
Richard, Nancy, James, James J. and Frances Spurlin and Annie “Pittman (Richard’s dau.) were “charter” members of the Clear Creek United Baptist Church of Christ of Morgan Co. which was constituted the 29th of Aug., 1852. Richard, after preaching for over 40 years, was greatly dissatisfied with his church. After two years of study and prayer. a meeting was called at the Barney Meetinghouse in Monroe County, TN.
When Spurling felt emphatically the need to “set a church in order,” as he put it — a phrase reflecting his strong Baptist background — the result being the Holiness Church at Camp Creek in May 1902. Spurling, Bryant, and Frank Porter were the first three ministers of the Church of God, Bryant receiving his ordination from the hands of Spurling and Porter. M. S. Lemons, a schoolteacher from Bradley County, Tennessee
Charles Page
are you making a clear distinction btw father and son Spurling?
It was the elder Spurling who “set a church in order” correct the son was one of the three ministers, right
Varnel Watson
YES Charles Page you are 100% correct Sir – The “Clinton (TN) Gazette” – 1891: Died – Richard Spurlin, a minister of the gospel from Monroe County, died last Friday. He was 81 years old.” He is buried in the Eleazer Cemetery in Madisonville, TN. Also member of Holly Springs Church. Richard and Nancy’s children & spouses: James J. married Jerusha Pittman – Morgan Co.; Ann Emmaline married Reason Pittman, Mor-gan Co.; Nathaniel Anderson married 1) Mary Wallace – Monroe Co.; 2) Sarah C. Scott -Morgan Co.; 3) Rebecca Childress – Knox Co.; Daniel Eli Love married Mary DeHart; William A. mar. 1) Nancy Black (Monroe Co TN – 9/14/1861), 2) Nancy Scott (a sister to Sarah C. Scott); Elizabeth married ?; Hiram C. married 1) Mary Waldrop, 2) Jane Guffey; Nancy mar. ? Walls; and Richard Greene, Jr. married Barbara Hamby.
Now I’ve heard a NC scholar speaking who said they were ordained Methodists but I dont know about that any I’ve come to many factual documents saying they were ordained baptists Now what is the role of Liberty Baptist in Murphy NC in all that?
Steve Maxwell
This is what a denomination in decline looks like.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2019/may/southern-baptists-acp-membership-baptism-decline-2018.html
Varnel Watson
irrelevant – none of these churches were Southern baptist