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Remember therefore ... and do the first works (Revelation 2:5).

Thus saith the LORD
… ask for the old
paths, where is the
good way, and walk
therein, and ye shall
find rest for your souls.

Jeremiah 6:16
O ver 100 years ago when
my grandfather Andrew
Crutchfield loaded up his
l 0 children for church on the old
wagon, it was serious business.

The children must learn about
God, and Sunday was a holy day.

The old dirt and dusty road in
front of his house remains today
as it was 100 years ago―Georgia
red clay adorned with pebbles and
ruts. The old church, still standing
after all that time, is located about
three miles away from the old
homeplace. The journey with horse
and wagon would have taken An-
drew Crutchfield forty minutes to
an hour each way. In church with
the children, Andrew would have
heard hymns clear and simple and
yet profound. To the children the
old pews were hard and the ser-
mon might have seemed eternal.

Yet my mother (one of those chil-
dren) remembered those days with
great joy.

Those days in the old church
were foundational for her. She
would pass on the values instilled
in her to her own children and they
to their children. Years later my
mother would retrace those old
paths. Whenever I would return home
to visit her, she always wanted me
4 • NATIONS
Andy and Minnie
Crutchfield before
her untimely
death on
Easter Sunday



to take her back to Round Oak to the
area of her childhood, located in Jones
County above Macon, Georgia. I can
still hear her voice, “Jim, take me up
home.” he place was forsaken and the
old house falling down. The front
yard was filled with weeds waist high.

We would walk around the yard. She
would tell me, “I used to play there.

There was a tree here; all of us loved
to climb up that tree.” She would point
up to a room on the second floor and
tell me, “I was born in that room.”
Then we would go to the graves of
her mother and father nearby. Eventu-
ally, we would make our way down the
old dirt road to the church. She would
tell me the story again: “My mother
died on Easter Sunday. I was only 12.

That Saturday before Easter she had
my Easter clothes pressed and laid out.

I awoke on that Easter Sunday morn-
ing with the sounds of crying and sobs
of grief.”
For a few hours my mother RE-
LIVED HER CHILDHOOD. She
would try to hide her tears. Now all of
these things were just memories, but
T for a few moments―it all became real
again. The great days of the Old Paths
need to become real again to us.

God told the church at Ephesus
to return to the place of beginning.

Remember . . . and do the first works
(Revelation 2:5).

od was telling the believers at
Ephesus to RETURN TO THE
PLACE OF BEGINNINGS. A lot has
changed in those 100 hundred years.

The world has become noisy and busy.

Sunday as a holy day has vanished.

Activities, shopping, television,
G cell phones, and many other things
have taken preeminence over worship.

The god of sports rules the minds of the
population and occupies their thoughts
with games, players, and events.

Although sports and activities might
have a place, God, it seems, has taken
last place―if at all any place. How-
ever, it will not be recreation that will
bring peace in trouble or in the day of
dying. It is time to put God back on
the throne. It is time to revisit the old
paths described by Jeremiah as
― the good way to find
rest for our SOULS.

1 Photo courtesy of Sunshine Church,
Round Oak, Georgia
NATIONS • 5