BRINGING THE HOPE OF JESUS CHRIST TO THE GREATER SCHWENKSVILLE AREA AND BEYOND!
Phone: (267) 287-3964
Email: officeofnef@gmail.com
Church History
NEW EDEN FELLOWSHIP formerly Eden Mennonite Church
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The following church history was taken from the Eden Mennonite Church 175th Anniversary booklet as compiled by Anna Jane Waddington. Updates have been added where appropriate.
Much time has passed since the first building of worship was constructed for Mennonite worship in Schwenksville in 1818. In that year, the congregation created “Ziegler’s Meetinghouse”, named for the church family which deeded 1 acre and 7 perches of ground to the congregation for the sum of $1.
The historical background of the first members and founders of Eden dates back more than 300 years, when in 1683 Mennonite settlers, immigrating from Europe to this country, settled in Germantown, Pennsylvania. Most were weavers and artisans who came from Crefeld, Germany. Those who immigrated in the 1700’s were, for the most part, farmers. In the year 1702 a group of Dutch Mennonites moved from the Germantown area and settled in Skippack. In 1717 a deed was granted to residents for 100 acres of land in Bebber Township, Philadelphia County, now Skippack Township. The Mathias Van Better’s deeded this to residents for church and educational facilities. A small tract of this land was selected for a Mennonite Meetinghouse and its house of worship became the second Mennonite meetinghouse in Pennsylvania.
By the year 1725 many families spread out from the Skippack area and settled in Limerick and Frederick Townships near the site of a village which, by the year 1833, would become known as “Schwenks Store”. Among this group were the families of Gottschall, Ziegler, Kline, Stearly, Hunsberger, Shoemaker, Funk, Herstein, Pennepacker, Haldeman, Keelor and Bingeman.
Although one thinks of these early settlers as “followers of the plow”, we find that their occupations were varied. Some were cabinet makers, weavers, clockmakers, blacksmiths, merchants and farmers.
For a period of time the Mennonites met in small groups, worshipping in individual homes. But as the membership grew and homes became crowded, a larger area was needed. Members of the Lutheran and Reformed groups were meeting in a log schoolhouse which also served as a community “union church”. The Mennonites arranged to hold their worship meetings there also. (This Keeley’s Schoolhouse was built in 1762 on ground donated by Valentine Keeley to the Trappe Lutheran Church. The log schoolhouse was built by neighbors working together, providing both labor and materials. During the Revolutionary War, soldiers were encamped in this area following the Battle of Germantown. The log schoolhouse also served as a hospital for the wounded. Those who did not survive their injuries were buried in unmarked graves in the area that was the woods near the schoolhouse. After the war, the school was enlarged and divided into two acres, one part used as the school and the other as a place of worship.)
It is recorded that on one cold morning when Brother Henry Hunsicker came from Skippack to Schwenksville to preach, he found members of the congregation struggling to get heat from the stove. Investigation showed that the stove pipe had been stuffed full of tow. The stove would not draw. Smoke filled the room and the congregation was smoked out, unable to worship that day. The Mennonite body decided this was a hint to them that they were not welcomed in the log schoolhouse. Rather than raise controversy, the group voted to construct their own meetinghouse, the Ziegler’s Meetinghouse.
Ziegler’s Meetinghouse was later called the “Mine Hill Meetinghouse”, this name indicative of the copper mines on the hill, owned and operated by the Caledonia Copper Mine Company. Still later, the congregation called itself the Gottshall Meetinghouse after their first pastor, Moses Gottshall, who was chosen by the membership to serve the congregation from 1847 to 1888.
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The congregation flourished and by the year 1887 members of the congregation felt they were out-growing their second meetinghouse and wished to rebuild closer to town; “near to civilization”, where road conditions would make travel a bit easier. Rumors also circulated
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that black snakes and panthers were in the woods behind the meetinghouse on Mine Hill. Disapproval of proposed sites in Delphi and Schwenksville postponed the actual plans to build in a town. In the Spring of 1893, the deacons, led by Samuel Longaker, were authorized to make visits and determine from the membership exactly what they wanted to do. Two-thirds of the congregation wished to build in town. The location of a construction site was resolved when Mary Geiger, daughter of Jacob Schwenk, for whom Schwenksville is named, donated the ground whereon the present building stands. The old brick church which stood on Mine Hill was torn down and these bricks were used in the construction of the new church building. Additional brick was needed and purchased from the local Delphi brickyard.
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In 1893, dedication services were held for the basement and lower portions of the building. Church services were held there for one year until the upper portion was completed. The present church auditorium was completed, dedicated, and put into use in 1894. A two-day program with a special dedication service held on November 14, 1894, was later described as the highlight of Reverend William Gottshall’s ministry. Services on this day were held in German and English, a tradition of the time.
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It is not known why the new building was called Eden, but the Reverend Freeman Swartz, pastor from 1921-1957, wrote that regardless of the reason, “it remains Eden … and it is left to us, as to Adam, to dress it and keep it and here, in the cool of the day, to walk with God and fellowship with him.”
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Early church services of the congregation followed the tradition of women and young children being seated on the right and the men and older male children on the left side of the meetinghouse. When women entered the meetinghouse, they would change their “street bonnets” for handmade “church bonnets” or cap coverings. “Church bonnets” were kept on the “die cappe schank” (the cap shelf) from one service to the next. Aprons were usually worn over the long dresses of the ladies.
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Services were often several hours long because there was usually only one service a month, the pastor of Eden also serving the congregations of Bertolet, Deep Run, Boyertown and Bowmansville. We can imagine the joy of the church members when wooden planks were added to the backless benches, giving church members a place to rest against.
The minister did not preach from behind the sort of raised, narrow pulpit we know today. The “predigt-schtuhle” (preacher’s pew) was a long pulpit, raised a little above the floor, behind which was a bench, allowing for the seating of not just the preacher, but any visiting bishops, church deacons or assistants.
Special services for baptism were held in two ways at Eden: “im haus” (in the meetinghouse), or “im wasser” (in the water). Baptisms in the church were conducted with the boys kneeling at the long rail at the front of the meetinghouse as the preacher baptized them with water from the hand-hammered pewter baptismal bowl, which has been used continuously for baptism throughout the church history. Girls were baptized in like manner after the boys were baptized.
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“Im wasser” baptisms were conducted by the preacher or bishop, who would walk into the water of the Perkiomen Creek. The one to be baptized would kneel in the water. The preacher would dip his hand into the creek and would place the water on the head of the one being baptized.
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Mennonite preachers and deacons were considered to be some of the best wine makers in the area during the 18th century. Communion wine was prepared from fermented fruit and served in the common pewter cup, still in the possession of the church, along with the flagon, from which the wine was poured.
Moses H. Gottshall, first preacher, was known as a fine wine-maker, and one interested in “modern” innovations, such as including musical instruments in the church service when such was not allowed in other “plain” congregations. A beloved pastor and friend of the wider community, his funeral services, in the year 1888, were attended by more than 1,500 persons, including 27 clergymen from various denominations. Horses and buggies blocked the roads in the Schwenksville community as they made their way to the services and to the cemetery on Mine Hill.
October 24, 1915, was a Banner Day at Eden. 1915, as we recall, was the early day for the automobile. On the date mentioned, a big car, top down, chauffeur driven and equipped with a footman in full attire, drove to Eden. From the car alighted Governor Martin Brumbaugh. Governor Brumbaugh was driven to Skippack for the dedication services of the Christopher Dock Memorial, and was invited to come to Eden to preach the morning message. Governor Brumbaugh was ordained a minister in the Church of the Brethren before becoming Governor of Pennsylvania. Thus, preaching was nothing new to him. Also in the Eden congregation that day was former Governor Samuel Pennepacker and Senator Shantz, a brother of Reverend Shantz.
Mrs. Grace Livingstone Hill, a famous author, came to Eden to present a book review on April 2, 1933. The occasion was the fifth anniversary celebration of the Christian Endeavor. For this occasion, an amplifying system had to be borrowed and set up to carry the program to the over-flowing group who had to sit in the basement. Approximately 650 crowded into the Eden building for this event.
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A strong emphasis was placed on music at Eden. Traditionally, musical instruments were not found in early Mennonite meetinghouses. The Reverend Moses Gottshall, first pastor of this body (1847-1888), felt there was no harm in having a musical instrument in the
meetinghouse. He would carry his melodeon to the meetinghouse on the hill on Sabbath mornings where it was used to accompany some of the German hymn singing. This Gottshall Melodeon was graciously presented to the Eden congregation on the occasion of the 150th anniversary celebration in 1969, by Mrs. Newton Gottshall, widow of the late Newton Gottshall, who was grandson of Moses.
The melodeon was eventually donated to the Mennonite Historians of Eastern Pennsylvania and is housed at the Mennonite Heritage Center, Harleysville.
In 1867, a pump organ was purchased by the congregation for the church. Later on a pipe organ was purchased and used for church services. An Allen digital computer organ was purchased in July 1975 for the sum of $13,236.30. In 2022 the Allen organ was removed and replaced with a Korg Kronos Music Workstation
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There had been some renovations, but no additions to the church from 1894 until 1973, at which time Peter Hunsberger of Harleysville was engaged to construct an addition to the north wall of the church building for a cost of $110,000. A total of 16 new classrooms, a choir room and a pastor’s study were added in the three floor area and dedication of the new addition was held on July 28, 1974. (A proposal for an addition had been presented to the congregation in the year 1961, but the congregation voted down the proposal to add a church education wing at that time.) Major renovations were made to the kitchen and the downstairs was painted in preparation for the Eastern District Conference’s Annual Meeting which was hosted at Eden in April 1976.
The 150th anniversary of Eden Mennonite was observed with a week-long series of special events, September 1968. A flower show, with arrangements based on scriptural and historic categories, along with a display of articles used in the early church opened the sesquicentennial week of celebration. A vesper service, with 150 people attending, was held at the site of the first church, the present site of the Eden Mennonite Cemetery. A Family Night program including slides and movies from past activities was held following a congregational dinner. 189 attended this evening. “The Eden Story”, a pageant depicting the history of Eden and folk life of the early days, was presented on two evenings with an attendance of 153 for the first performance and 223 at the second. A Homecoming Day Service was also observed. An anniversary booklet, with a detailed church history and photographs, was printed at that time. Material used here is abbreviated from that history, and has been updated.
In 2001 Eden Mennonite Church reorganized and became New Eden Fellowship. The first service as New Eden Fellowship was held April 8, 2001. In 2018 New Eden Fellowship withdrew from the Mennonite conference and since that time has been operating as an independent Anabaptist church.