T.C. Schilling, New Zion Pastor, St. Helena Parish, La.
File submitted by Bonnie Bridges McMillan
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Copyright.  All rights reserved.
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Many thanks goes to Bonnie Bridges McMillan, author of "New
Zion Baptist Church, 1869-1994" from which this file was taken.

T.C. SCHILLING
1896 - 1898

     T.C. Schilling was born in Washington Parish, La., January 
23, 1853.  He professed religion at seventeen years of age, be-
ing baptized into the fellowship of Mt. Hermon church of Louisiana.
He received his early education in the neighborhood schools.  Pro-
minent among his instructors was Prof. W.H. Dixon, an Englishman,
and a man of scholarly attainments and fine teaching ability.
Later he enjoyed a course of instruction under the lamented M.S.
Shirk, of Osyka, one of the ripest scholars of all that section.
Some years after his marriage and his ordination to the ministry,
he was induced to undertake a course of study in Mississippi
College.  Accordingly, in the fall of 1880 he moved to Clinton
and entered the college, but was forced after a short time, by
serious and continued illness in his family, to give up his cher-
ished undertaking and return home, to take up whatever work the
Lord might open to him.

     Though frustrated in his plans for a college education, he
had already learned one of the main lessons intended for the col-
lege student - that of continuous application to his studies.  He
has never ceased to be a student, especially of "the Book", and 
has been able to hold his own with many men of better advantages
as a master of clear, consise and forceful expression, and as an
exponent of Bible doctrines.  Service in his early life as book-
keeper and school teacher proved very helpful as a factor in his
preparation for his life work.

     He was married February 3, 1876, to Miss Angie D. James, who
has proved herself a faithful and devoted wife.  Blessings on 
these faithful and self-sacrificing preachers' wives, who "stay
by the stuff", rear the children and bear the burdens, through
winter's storms and summer's suns, while their husbands are giv-
ing their lives to make the world better and to lift souls to
heaven.  Truly theirs is the harder lot and theirs ought to be
the greater glory, though they are the faithful ones whose toils
and tears and sacrifices are unknown to the world.

     Bro. Schilling was licensed to preach in 873, and ordained 
in 1876, the presbytery being conmposed of Elders W.J. Fortin-
berry, C.F. Crawford, W.H. and E.M. Schilling.  His minister-
ial labors have been mainly in Amite and Pike counties, Miss.,
he having also served a number of churches in Louisiana.  In an
unexpected and providential way his life became linked with the
little village of Gillsburg, Amite county, and eternity alone
will reveal the value of his contribution to the religious and
educational interests of that community.  This inland village
came to be known far and near through the Gillsburg Collegiate
Institute, founded in 1882 by Mr. W.A. Gill, whose generous giv-
ing and unselfish devotion to the public good entitle him to rank 
him among the world's benefactors.

     In the fall of 1882 Bro. Schilling was unexpectedly called to 
the pastorate of Jerusalem Baptist church, two miles distant from
Gillsburg.  During the following year, while serving this church,
he was invited by Mr. Gill to preach on Sunday afternoons of the
same year at Gillsburg, for which service Mr. Gill himself paid.
So satisfactory was the service rendered that at the beginning
of the next year, January 3, 1884, Bro. Schilling found himself a
resident of Gillsburg as pastor of the Gillsburg Baptist church,
largely through the influence of Mr. Gill.  The best twenty years
of his life he gave to this place, nineteen of them as pastor of
the church.  For seventeen years he was Secretary of the Board of
Trustees of the Gillsburg Institute, and in this position was usu-
ally foremost in procuring new teachers.  He rendered valuable ser-
vice in writing for the papers and in soliciting pupils for the 
institute.  For this latter work he had fine opportunities, as he 
went among the surrounding churches in evangelistic labors and as
pastor (for Gillsburg was not a full-time church).  Among others,
he served such strong churches as Ebenezer, Liberty and East Fork.
His work has been greatly blessed, but especially so at Gillsburg,
where he labored for so many years.  Here he touched many lives for
good and baptized many happy converts into the membership of the
church.  As student of the Gillsburg Institute it was the writer's
privilege to sit under his ministry for two years, and it gives him
pleasure to testify that he was "a good minister of Jesus Christ",
as he faithfully, earnestly and conscientiously broke the bread
of life to perishing men and women.  For twenty-six consecutive
years he has ministered to churches in Amite County.

     December 16, 1903, Bro. Schilling moved to Magnolia, Miss.,
from which place he continues to serve surrounding churches.
For twenty-four years his time has been fully occupied, and, al-
though past the age when many preachers are said to pass the dead
line, he continues in demand with the churches.  For a number of
years he was a member of the Convention Board.  His painstaking
and systematic methods are manifest in his habit of keeping a re-
cord of all his work from the first, such as days of service,
miles traveled, sermons preached, baptisms administered, marriage
ceremonies performed, funerals conducted, etc.  He has gathered
a fairly good collection of books, which he knows how to use to
the best advantage, and his continued usefulness is accounted for
by the fact that he continues to study.  As long as a minister of
the Word can bring out of God's storehouse treasures new and old,
there will be a place for him among the churches.  Too many pas-
tors with churches widely separated allow their habits of study
to become completely demoralized.

     During his busy ministry he has found time to read a number
of denominational papers and to contribute valuable articles to
some of them.  He seem still in the vigor of a useful life, with
the prospects before him of filling his remaining years with some
of the best work of his life.

     God be praised for the "old guard" of faithful country pas-
tors, the worth of whose services will never be known till the
books are opened up yonder.

W.F. Yarborough

"Abstract History of the Mississippi Baptist Association"
Author: T.C. Schilling