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Old Time Religion,
Country Style
A very unique thing happened in our family
that started the wheels turning for a new song. We had moved
to a small community where
Dona had attended church and church-school when she was a kid.
It was a little white country church that sat in the corner of
a cornfield. Two farm roads made an intersection there, and an
irrigation ditch ran along one side between the road and the
parking lot, a real attraction to little boys, but a real source
of irritation to mothers. Dona had a lot of happy memories of
her childhood there, and now Carla, our daughter was going to
start school there.
After church services one day, we had friends over for dinner.
The conversation was centered on the uplifting sermon and how
much “just plain fun” it was to go to church there
because everybody was so friendly and warm. I commented on how
I loved the way everyone joined in on the hymns and literally
made the rafters ring.
The conversation went on, but I was caught up in quiet memories
of my own as I thought back to when I was a kid. We had attended
a small country church, too. It wasn’t in a field. It was
on the corner of a very small street in a very small town. Most
of the members were from farms nearby. It seems that most of
us were extremely poor and came to church in various forms of
Model A Fords. I remember I thought my grandpa was rich because
he drove a Studebaker with “overdrive.” Those were
happy days, and we’d get together after church with friends,
and we’d all go to the river below our place where we’d
have a picnic dinner of the riverbank, then we’d wade along
the edge of the water. Usually we would end up around a campfire
listening to the grown-ups tell stories until time to go home.
I can still remember riding on my dad’s shoulders, looking
up at the stars and asking how they got there. He’d tell
me about God and creation, and heaven, and how someday we would
all be there together.
Suddenly, the topic of conversation at
hand brought me back to reality. Plans were being made to build
a new church and sell
the old one. I decided to write a song that would keep that “old
church” and all its precious memories in our hearts.
Lyrics:
It was in a country church where we heard the angels sing,
Though we didn’t have a choir, we made the rafters ring.
Folks would walk a country mile just to hear the spoken Word,
And lift their happy voices, singing praises to the Lord.
Chorus:
Give me that old time religion, done in country style.
Give me that old time religion and I’ll linger a while.
Just to hear hosannas ring, singing praises to the King,
Give me that old time religion, done in country style.
I remember my mama and daddy kneeling there in prayer.
No matter how heavy the burden, they always left it there.
And we felt a little closer as we heard the spoken Word.
Then we’d lift our happy voices, singing praises to the
Lord.
© 1974 Chuck Fulmore |
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