Under the Prayer Tree

Rancher Joe Evans got his religion in an American frontier home where a Bible and a rifle were the two indispensable items of furniture. His rancher father and his mother were devout Baptists, and father fought his share of Indians. In 1890, when Joe was nine, his parents helped found a series of outdoor camp meetings which are still held in West Texas. Joe watched hell-raising Jeff Davis County become law-abiding to the point where the grand jury, eleven years running, could find nobody to indict.

When Joe Evans expanded his holdings westward, he noticed that New Mexico had the same religious problems as West Texas--the range country was too sparsely settled to support regular churches--and that there were no camp meetings to fill the void. In 1939, he took the problems to the Rev. Everett King, then secretary of the Northern Presbyterian's National Missions board. King was fascinated. "This is perfect," he said. "You know the ranchers and have the camp-meeting experience, but you have no equipment. We have the equipment, but don't know much about organizing camp-meetings."

Rain on the Mesa. Baptist Evans worked out his plan with King and two Presbyterian missionaries from New Mexico, the Rev. Ralph Hall and the Rev. Roger Sherman. Says Evans of their first planning session: "We spent half that morning on our knees, praying to God for the wisdom we needed. When we got up off our knees, we knew where we were going."

A few months later, 128 ranch folk went up to the top of Nogal Mesa, a high (7,000 ft.) tableland in Lincoln National Forest, for their first camp meeting. A violent rain storm, which came up soon after the services started, almost swept the meeting away. But the ranchers liked the camp-meeting idea. Joe Evans and his Presbyterian friends decided to hold a meeting every year at Nogal Mesa--and to spread to other states. Since then they have set up similar meetings in Arizona, Texas, Colorado, Wyoming and South Dakota. Each summer, in two trucks containing tents, hymnbooks and other equipment, they travel a sweeping circuit of 7,000 miles.

All meetings are rigorously nonsectarian. To avoid any hint of denominationalism, preaching ministers are introduced simply as "Brother." Says Co-Founder Hall: "Our purpose is not to glorify any particular individual, or any denomination, but to glorify God and Jesus Christ."

Fresh Pasture. Last week, 1,000-odd people in dust-covered cars drove up a dirt road in Lincoln Forest for the annual meeting at Nogal Mesa. Four times a day they filled the rough pine tabernacle (which ranchers built themselves two years ago) to pray and listen to Brother Hoyt Boles, a hefty, plain-spoken Presbyterian from Denton, Texas, and Brother Bob Goodrich, a Methodist from Dallas. There was no shouting or breast-beating. Even conversions came quietly, with only the exchange of a firm handclasp between minister and convert.

Every afternoon after services, groups of cowhands and ranchmen sat around whittling under the "Prayer Tree," a stately juniper that towers over Nogal Mesa's stunted pinnon and cactus. There, with no clerical coaching allowed, they talked out their ideas on practical religion.

Said one ranch owner: "I'm afraid that my children have learned to cuss from their daddy. I'm as bad as the cow that leads her calves a crooked path through the bush. From now on that path's going to be straight." "You know," another grinned, "all of us coming out here reminds me of a bunch of hungry cattle being turned out into fresh pasture."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.