Rufus P. Bucher

Rufus P. Bucher was a Brethren minister, evangelist, and farmer. He served for 55 years as a free minister, elder, and pastor of the Mechanic Grove congregation in Pennsylvania. In addition he was the presiding elder of six other congregations, moderator of district meeting ten times and Annual Conference in 1946. He served on the district mission board for forty years. The extent of his evangelistic work was impressive - more than 200 series of meetings resulting in almost three thousand accessions to the church.

On his return from one such meeting he encountered a young stranger in a railway depot who handed him a tract entitled "Brother, Are You Saved?" When the young man put the same question to Bucher, he replied, "That is a good question and deserves an answer. I think, however, that I might be prejudiced in my own behalf. You'd better go down to Quarryville and ask George Hensel, the hardware merchant, what he thinks about it. Or you might go to the Machanic Grove grocer or to one of my neighbors in Unicorn. While there you might ask my wife and children. I'll be ready to let their answers stand as my own."

Source: The Brethren Encyclopedia