I don’t understand ghosts.  Some folks are certain ghosts exist—others think the notion is ridiculous. I just listen and ponder.  In the King James Bible, we read of the “Holy Ghost.”  But if we decide to go on the “Ghost, Voodoo, and Vampire” tour down in New Orleans, we’re not going to hear much about the Holy Ghost. 

The King James Bible also has a handful of references to people who “gave up the ghost,” a euphemism for “kicking the bucket,” “buying the farm,” “pushing up daisies,” or “crossing the river.”  

There were also a few instances in the gospels when Jesus’ disciples thought he was a ghost—as he had the habit of appearing when it would seem impossible.  Furthermore, demons and angels come very close to providing a ghost-like experience.   

One of the reasons I majored in Psychology back in college was so I could better understand how our own minds play tricks on us—making us believe in make-believe. So, while I don’t totally dismiss the notion of paranormal realities, I tilt toward being skeptical—by my nature.

But the older I get, the more I feel a powerful, living residue of the past in some places—inexplicable to me. For example, I can walk into a place like the Martin Van Buren House in Kinderhook and feel his presence—160 years after he “popped his clogs.”  What’s going on?

Setting aside the Holy Ghost—which I do with trepidation, my being a theologian and all—I would like to confine this week’s rambling to the kind of ghosts that seem to linger around after the demise of a person, animal, community, or habitat.  For instance, when I am canoeing in the Everglades, I sense the presence of ghosts millions of years old.  When I drive by Grace/Quest Church, just down the road from where I live now, I sense the ghosts of people (some still alive) who were a part of the congregation while I was pastor there for 15 years.  

Out west, tourists sometimes visit “ghost towns.”  One website suggests that there are 3,800 ghost towns throughout the U.S.  Illinois supposedly has 82 of them.  They include two “Half Ways,” a “Henpeck” and a “Jugtown.”  Other interesting ghost town names include:  Total Wreck, Arizona; Frog Level, Arkansas; Fudge, Kentucky; Lucky Jim Camp, Nevada; and Cute, Tennessee.

The term “ghost town” covers a range of places.  It might be a place where nothing but empty buildings still stand, or it might be completely empty—with nothing remaining except archaeological digs and written records. Or it might be a place that has been largely abandoned—even though a few residents still remain.    

Last month I read a book by a good friend of mine, Jeff Partenheimer, who included information about Sidell, Illinois—where Jie was pastor for three years.  The town reached its peak in 1920, when it had 800 residents.  In the 30s and 40s, they had grocery stores, funeral parlors, banks, gas stations, restaurants, barber and beauty shops, a drug store, a creamery, a department store, an auto dealer, a lumberyard, and a watch repair shop.  

In the last census, however, the town reported 489 people.  But none of the businesses that I listed survived.  When you talk to the residents these days, the first thing they let you know is what the town has lost.  It still has three churches, but it is in “ghost-town” territory.

I lived in Rock Grove, Illinois when I was in Jr. High. Rock Grove isn’t the kind of place you discover accidently.  You have to take the Dakota Road six miles north until it dead ends there.  Once you enter Rock Grove, you have your choice of three streets:  1) you can go east or west on the Rock Grove Road, 2) you can slip over and go south on North Fisher Street—an 800-foot gravel road, or 3) you can turn around and go back to Dakota.  There is also an East Fisher Lane on Google Maps, but it is only a driveway. There are no stores, no parks, no schools or post offices, no churches.  Not anymore.  About forty houses are scattered about the hamlet—but many are now abandoned.

If most of my readers ever get to Rock Grove, there will be little for you to do but ponder matters—such as, why is the neighboring town called “Orangeville?”  Why is a street that only goes into the south part of town called North Fisher?  And how did Rock Grove even get there?

But when I go to Rock Grove, I have much more to ponder.  It seemed to me to be a thriving village when I lived there.  The population then was about seventy.  It’s social life was centered in the Odd Fellows Hall—and its two churches.  I remember buying candy at the small grocery store, even though it closed the month after we moved to town. Kids made up half the population, and there were enough of us to organize sandlot baseball with nine players on each team.  We rode the bus to Dakota to go to school, drove to Freeport to shop and visit the doctor, and got free samples at the Colby cheese factory which was about five miles out in the country.  If we headed west out of town, we could ride our bikes up the gravel road to the Wisconsin border.  I became a Boy Scout in Rock Grove.  Our scoutmaster was Joe Scofield, a man in his 50s who was totally blind. I can still remember his perfectly cultivated garden (the opposite of ours) in his backyard.

My dad was pastor of the Evangelical United Brethren Church there.  We had a youth group of about 15 kids, and nearly 50-60 people of all ages attended Sunday morning worship.  Our church had Sunday School classes, a woman’s group called the “Dorcas Circle,” a youth choir, and regular fried chicken dinners. Folks occasionally had the preacher and his family over for Sunday dinner—but since my parents had four boys—hosting us could be a challenge—and it didn’t happen all that often.  The church building was regularly the site of funerals, weddings, and baptisms. The congregation had a slate of committees and officers—magnets for the usual amount of conflict and pettiness.  

My dad was sent to another church in 1968, we moved away, and I didn’t return to Rock Grove for 30 years.

On a trip to Wisconsin in the late 90s, I decided to wander off the beaten path and make a nostalgic pilgrimage to Rock Grove.

But something had befallen the town during the decades of my absence—some sort of death. I saw the ghostly remains with my own eyes.   The houses of people I once knew were abandoned and falling apart.  The Odd Fellows Hall was boarded up.  No children or youth ambled its streets. The adjectives that came to mind were impoverished, depressed, decayed.  

I parked in front of our church.  But it was no longer a church.  I peeked inside the windows and saw that it had become an unruly warehouse for a disorganized handyman—scraps of lumber and assorted junk—on the slim chance parts might be useful someday.  There was also garbage.  But no Bibles, no altar, no pews, no cross.  And no one inside with any faith--no one inside at all.  

If you had never been to Rock Grove before, you might have just shrugged:  another loser-church in a loser-town.  

But I could feel the ghosts that day.  They stimulated my sense of sight and smell and sound.  I relived songs we sang in that building, recalled Bible stories I’d learned, saw old men and women who treated me kindly—even though I couldn’t remember their names.  I re-smelled the aroma of potluck dinners and visualized the fresh cut Christmas tree in front of the altar rail.  I became aware of ghosts of grooms and brides standing on the outside steps under showers of rice—and men in tight funeral suits toting caskets out the front doors.  There were ghosts of weeping parishioners being comforted by my dad.  Organ cords, long sermons, and yearned-for-benedictions stirred to life that day.  I looked at the parking lot and felt the shadowy presence of cars arriving for church meetings or worship—and familiar folks disembarking.  All four seasons suddenly stirred in my brain—all at once, and I saw icicles hanging from the church gutters, smelled the Easter lilies in the sanctuary, felt welcome summer breezes coming through open windows, and heard the strains of Thanksgiving hymns on the electric organ.

By my count, there are far more ghost towns in Illinois than 82.  Probably over a thousand—where people still live, where stories still hibernate, where God’s grace strains to break free and revive.  Their revival will not be with new auto dealers and barber shops and department stores, of course. It will be something I’m still trying to understand—to name.

Not every ghost we encounter is the HOLY GHOST.  But I suspect there are plenty of localities and congregations that have been ghosted—but not by the Holy Ghost.  Something still stirs in those places if we could but be present for a while—quiet, curious, and attentive. If we could ask some questions, scout around, and let imaginations reach both for what has been—and what could be.