Phineas F. Bresee - A Prince In Israel - Media Sabda Org

washing. We modestly tried to tell them that we really believed in feet washing. We confessed and
denied not that we sometimes practiced it to the extent of washing our own. Our clothes seemed to
us to be themselves our defence along that line; and we averred that we highly prized the relation
which we have with our brethren and sisters in church fellowship. They attacked us on the score of
secret societies, and I had to confess that I was a member of two societies, one in some sense a secret
society it being somewhat exclusive, and composed of only my wife and myself; but that the other
was open to all good people it being the Church of the Nazarene. I learned that they call themselves
'The Olive Branch,' but they did not seen to me to be waving it conspicuously. I understand that they
regard themselves as saints; but I could not help advising them that henceforth, if they could find it
possible, it would seem to me to be well for them to attend more exclusively to their own business.
One of the elements of fanaticism seems often to be a feeling of necessity for those thus affected to
impose their own notions about social and economic things and methods upon everybody, and to
regard everybody as heathen who does not exactly think and do according to their shibboleth.
"We found here some true and heroic souls who are bearing aloft the banner of holiness, and they
would heartily welcome the advent of the Church of the Nazarene among them."
By the beginning of the new year, 1905, Dr. Bresee, after having spent a profitable Sabbath at
Berkeley and Oakland on his way south, found himself once more in the midst of his activities as
pastor of the First Church at Los Angeles.