Fred Bach: A Common Man Who Did It God's Way
I write these lines on the 100th anniversary of the birth of Fred Bach in the Ukraine, Russia, on December 20, 1895. Fred's parents were of hard-working German stock who had the dream of following friends to the promised land of the United States. They arrived around the turn of the century and settled in a little German community in Cooper County, Pennsylvania. It was there in 1905 that Fred and his parents received their naturalization papers and US citizenship. The coal mines provided work for the German settlers, but the lure of the West soon beckoned and the Bach family moved to Montana to homestead. By this time, there were seven Bach children, and Fred, being the oldest boy, needed to drop out of elementary school and go to work to help support the family. He learned the meatcutting trade and then carpentry. With his strong work ethic, he always seemed to get a job.
Fred's interest in learning allowed him to maintain a passion for reading, mathematics, and music. Although he never graduated from high school, he did pass an entrance examination at the University of Montana and studied there while he continued to work full time. The influence of his mother helped him become a believer, one who yielded his life to the Lord in his youth and felt the urge to pursue a life of Christian service. He transferred to Seattle Pacific College (University now) and graduated in 1928. While in college he became President of the Student Ministerial Association and am ember of the academic club, Sigma Pi Kappa He majored in English and was a member of the Glee Club and Orchestra. His love was the flute — his old, wooden black flute still sits on my shelf!
From Seattle Pacific, Fred ventured east to Moody Bible Institute in Chicago where he studied the Scriptures fervently. He also continued his meat cutting trade, and in Chicago, the "Hog Butcher of the world," he always had work. In 1930, he received his Biblical Studies Degree from Moody and came back West. For the next several years he cut meat, preached, sold books, pounded nails, and served people from Spokane, Washington to Santa Rosa, California.
Somehow, possibly from a newsletter called The Rural Missionary News, Fred found out about the need for a preacher in a struggling little church in San Andreas. In 1938, he met Joseph Kirk, a lay minister and carpenter. Together they built a new church which still sits connected to the sanctuary of the present Community Covenant church. It wasn't long before Fred met a quiet Swedish lady named Anna Peterson who had come to teach at Calaveras High School. She grew up on a grape farm in Fresno, and was not only a popular home economics teacher, but also a talented musician and the pianist at the little church in San Andreas. A curious courtship developed and on a lonely road near Bear Mountain after Anna's '39 Chevie ran out of gas, he asked her to marry him. She said "Yes" and they were married in 1940. After a little reception at Pete's Cafe in Valley Springs, they went on a quick honeymoon to the Coast, and returned to San Andreas and began a ministry that would last more than four decades.
I need not recite the details of my entrance into Fred's life in 1946 when I was adopted into the Bach home. Needless to say, it was a life-changing experience for me as I was thrust from a vagabond world into the well-ordered discipline of Fred's house. My new life with them was not always easy as I adjusted to a quite and gentle Swedish lady and am ugh and disciplined German man. Fred was definitely set in his ways. I remember him challenging me to shave with an electric razor though he himself shaved with a blade. He always finished first! He also challenged me to cut a section of grass with a weed-eater though he used a scythe — again finishing first, at least according to his standards.
His commitment to the Lord could not be challenged. He spent hours in his study; and I often heard his passionate prayers and saw him on his knees. Fred did his preaching and the preparation for it, in a very carefully planned, organized, thorough way. He was not much for spur-of-the-moment, extemporaneous preaching.
I have several boxes full of Fred's carefully filed sermon notes. They are typed on an old Royal typewriter that I often heard tapping away late into the night. I have one in front of me as I write, dated August 29, 1948. The text is Romans 12:1. "I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." In Fred's notes, he comments that the mercies of God require gratitude and gratitude requires expression or it dies. Gratitude requires sacrifice, not just of means or gifts, but of oneself.
Those of you who knew Fred can confirm that he gave of himself. He faithfully conducted church services, invited evangelists to San Andreas, visited people in their homes, in hospitals and convalescent homes. He came whether invited or not. I remember him working long hours as a laborer or carpenter, coming home, and then leaving again to visit people. His rough carpenter hands became gentle as he helped the elderly and widows buy groceries or make repairs on their homes.
In 1950, Fred was able to work out the details to get the little church in San Andreas affiliated with the Evangelical Covenant Church, relinquishing the pulpit to James Grosso, a Covenant Pastor. Fred then traveled to White Pines, and organized a church which today is Chapel in The Pines, a Covenant church. He was a faithful warrior at that little church, and for nearly a decade he never missed a Sunday. If only two people showed up, he still held Sunday School and a service. Anna played an old pump organ; special music was usually a song sung by George Beverly Shea on a 78 rpm record spinning on a portable player. Fred's sermons were delivered from a homemade pulpit. I remember asking him, "Why do you still go up there?" He replied, "What would happen to Floyd Butterfield and Carl Fields?" These were tough mountain men who became believers because of Fred, and I believe are both now in Heaven!
Though he was never sick and believed that quinine was the only cure for ailments, Fred suffered his first stroke in the Spring of 1980. He was transferred from Mark Twain Hospital to San Joaquin General in Stockton where he underwent rehabilitation for a couple of months. He was a terrible patient because he was impatient. When he returned home, a new sense of settledness came over him. The rough edges were being sanded off. The next years were spent with a new freshness and tenderness. I would often come to the house and find him holding hands with Anna and reading the Bible. She had a look of serenity on her face that I will never forget. In 1982, however, Fred suffered a second and fatal stroke. He died quietly on a bright spring morning. I remember standing with Anna over his body and hearing her deep sigh and soft whisper, "I guess he's gone." It was over on the earth for him, but not for all of us who knew him. In his memorial service, held on May 19, 1982, the Community Covenant Church Choir sang one of his favorite songs, "The Longer I Serve Him, The Sweeter He Grows." What more can be said!
Fred left no earthly treasures, No buildings are named for him; no monuments recall his presence. But to those of us fortunate enough to be touched by him there will always be an everlasting remembrance. He did intimidate some, may have offended others, but his tenacious love of the Lord tempered all of that with his commitment. Charles H. Spurgeon has written some lines that seem to describe Fred in a straightforward way. "Others may break the bread to more people, but they cannot break better bread than the Gospel which you (the common man) teach, for that is bread from our saviour's own hand." Shall we ever forget him? I think not.
In his play, Julius Caesar, Shakespeare writes, "The evil that men do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones," That may be true of some people, but in Fred's life, the good lives after him! In Psalms 21, we read, "You have given him his heart's desire and gave him the blessing of goodness: you set a crown of gold on his head. He asked life of thee and you gave it to him, even the length of his days for ever and ever."
"Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord; that they may rest from their labors and their works do follow them" (Revelation 14:13). Peace to His memory.