CHURCH, Celesta 1868 - 1915

CHURCH, HARSHBARGER FRAZER NEWBERG ROOSESVELT

Posted By: A.M.W. (email)
Date: 3/25/2009 at 16:21:06

Celeste Harshbarger Church, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James H. Harshbarger, was born on the farm now owned by M.W. Harsharger, six miles southwest of Mr. Pleasant November 15, 1868, and died at her home just about one/quarter of a mile west of where she was born on her 47th birthday, November 15, 1915.

At about the age of 20 in a Friends meeting held in the Oak Ridge Church, she gave her life to Christ and has been in His service ever since, doing little kindnesses here and there all along the way, brightening the lives of all those with whom she came in contact. Though she was always frail and the mother of seven children (the first two preceding her to the Great Beyond in infancy), yet with all the home duties, which were attended to perfectly, she was never too weary to be thoughtful of others and by her kind pleasant ways was ever "brightening the corner where she was".

The funeral services were in charge of Rev. Geo. J. McClellan pastor of the Cedar Friends Church and Rev. Viola Smith, pastor of the Friends Church at Salem, and were held at the Cedar Church at 11 o'clock Wednesday morning. The Cedar choir sang "Nearer My God to Thee" as the friends entered the church and after the reading of the Scripture by Viola Smith, they sang "He Knows" and "There Will Be No Dark Valley" and at the grave at the Oakland Cemetery, there in the quiet and hush of the wood and the silence of the city of the dead, as the loved form, surrounded by a multitude of friends and relatives was gently lowered to its final resting place, the beautiful Scripture reading and prayer was given by the pastor Mr. McLellan and the choir sang very impressively "We Are Going Down the Valley One by One".

The sermon which was a pleading and a warning to all to enter the "resurrected life" was given by the past Geo. J. McLellan and was an uplift to all who were privileged to hear it. The thought carried all the way through the sermon was "For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead".

On November 1, 1891 she was married to A.E Church who, with four daughters and one son, together with three brothers, John F., Martin A., and Mahlon W., and three sisters, Mrs. E. H. Frazer, Mrs. C. A. Newberg all of this community and Mrs. A. G. Frazer of Roosevelt, Minnesota, are left to mourn the loss of a devoted wife, mother, and sister.