To the Glory of God and My Neighbor's Good: Study of the Historical Development of a Community Identity: Marilla

Abstract

The sign out front reads, "The Marilla Church of the Brethren - ’To the glory of God and my neighbor's good.'" The small white "Church on the Hill" very seriously has lived and continues to live its church life with its "neighbor's good" an integral part of its practicing religion. This relationship between the Marilla Church of the Brethren and Marilla Township is one so tightly woven into the character of this community that the "doing" for each other has became a "given". Marilla history is one of a pioneering community integrated into the northern Michigan booming lumber industry; Michigan led the nation in lumber production from 1870 to 1900. The Church of the Brethren history is a part of that pietistic upheaval of 17th century Europe, which played so large a part in the resultant plethora of Protestant denominations who emigrated to the United States. These two, the township and the church, are so closely tied in so many ways that the history of each would be virtually impossible to understand without the history of the other. Thus, the historical development of the resulting community identity is a blend of both histories. Their unique, close relationship, though it began with the inception of the church, requires not only an understanding of the social and theological beginnings of this very comunity-minded church. It is equally important to understand the social, political and economic forces that brought together those who pioneered this northwestern Michigan community. How these forces combined with geographic factors to continue to significantly affect the development of a Marilla identity with such an astonishingly close community tie with the Marilla Church of the Brethren is a curious and amazing story in many ways. On a surface level, it does not seem logical that such a close relationship could occur without an insistence on religious inclusion. Yet, this was not the case, nor is there any evidence of any strong attempts to make Marilla primarily a Brethren religious community. Understanding this closely tied relationship requires a more thorough knowledge of the historical and social development of those forces both within the church and the community as they acted on the major Marilla personages. How a religious group with a strong religious communal background could transfer these community ideas to include a secular social community without insisting on conversion, or losing their own peculiar Brethren identity, needs the understanding of the religious struggles within the Brethren church and hew these struggles profoundly affected the leaders who settled in Marilla. Nor can these factors alone account for the rich growth that such a strong identity required. One needs, also, a thorough knowledge of how geographic location, soil content, the lumber industry and other social and cultural factors could provide the environment that this "rich growth" required. This paper will attempt to illuminate and clarify the significance of Marilla Township history, the Church of the Brethren creation and the resultant blend of the Marilla identity that has existed and is, today.