History of the M.E. Church, Vol. IV - Media Sabda Org

for such as were possessed of evil spirits to be delivered, even if they were torn a little, than to
remain under the power of demons."
At last McCormick's appeal to the Conference was answered by the mission of Kobler, who, on
the second of August, 1798, "preached the first sermon delivered in the territory by a regularly
constituted Methodist missionary." "He administered the sacrament of the Lord's Supper at a
regularly appointed quarterly meeting at McCormick's, held on the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth
days of December, 1798. This was the first time the Methodists had partaken of the sacrament in the
territory," etc. [17]
[18]
We have from Kobler's own pen an allusion to his expedition. In passing through the country
he found it in its almost native, uncultivated state. The inhabitants were settled in small
neighborhoods, few and far between, with little or no improvement about them. No house of worship
had been yet erected. The site on which Cincinnati now stands was a dense forest. No improvement
was to be seen but Fort Washington, which was built on the brow of the hill, and extended down to
the margin of the river; around it were cabins, in which resided the first settlers of the place. This
fortress was then under the command of General Harrison, and was the great place of rendezvous
for the federal troops, which were sent by the government to guard the frontiers against the Indians.
Forty years later Kobler, in revisiting the country, landed at Cincinnati, and wrote that he came from
aboard the steamboat Bristol, and walked through a considerable part of the city; but had no language
to express his reflections while comparing the past with the present. He went from street to street,
and from square to square, for more than half a mile, wondering and admiring at the great change.
Having, he says, since arriving in Cincinnati, traveled over many parts of his old missionary ground,
he finds a most astonishing improvement has taken place. Where formerly there were indistinct
paths, sometimes only trees being blazed to direct his course from one house or settlement to
another, now there are highly improved roads and turnpikes, and every facility for public
conveyance. And where there stood unbroken forests, now there are numerous villages and large
towns, numbering their thousands. He spread the first table for the sacrament of the Lord's Supper
that was seen northwest of the Ohio. When the communicants were called to approach it, the number
did not exceed twenty-five or thirty; and this was the sum total of all that were in the country. Now
the Minutes of the Annual Conferences of Ohio returned one hundred thousand regular Church
members; so mightily had the word of God run and prevailed! "Where," he continues, "we once
preached in log-cabins, we now see stately churches, whose spires point toward heaven, and whose
solemn bells announce the Christian Sabbath, and call the attention of the multitude to the house of
God. This is indeed the Lord's doing! Your aged servant has been standing on the walls of our Zion
for fifty-five years; and while, with unwearied vigilance, he has been guarding and laboring for the
interests of the Church, he has been making strict observations on circumstances and things
connected with the Church; and from long observation he has been fully convinced, and of late more
so than ever, that it is the doctrine which we preach, the discipline which we have exercised, and the
system by which, as a Church, we are regulated, that have produced these happy results in the
conversion and sanctification of so many thousands."
When he crossed the Ohio in 1798 "at a little village called Columbia," he fell upon his knees
upon the shore, and prayed for the divine blessing upon his mission. "That evening," he writes, " I
reached the house of Francis McCormick. He lived ten or fifteen miles from Columbia, on the bank