The concept of true satisfaction in Christian service, arguing that it comes not from fruitful labor but from an intimate connection with Christ himself. The passage recounts personal experiences in Raleigh and Newport News, highlighting lessons learned about reliance on God, facing opposition, and the nature of genuine faith. Key takeaways include the understanding that service cannot replace Christ, joy is found in Him even amidst barren seasons, and trials serve to refine faith, producing spiritual gold that endures God's presence. The message concludes by emphasizing that enduring faith and faithfulness in trials lead to reward in God's presence.
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when he has tried me, I shall come forth as you. Now for the last four, twenty nights we've been speaking about how the Lord lived. In reference to our exercise for the ministry and our coming down south, and last week, if I remember correctly, we stopped at Raleigh, North Carolina, and how the Lord lived there and what the Lord did. How we had that one campaign in Clayton, how the Lord so remarkably led him to us, taking that campaign alone, and how he came in as wonderfully blessed, and then he was saved, and that was the beginning of my launch.
He had little hand, although I didn't have a couple of campaigns, as I mentioned. It was a little bit true that the training brother that I engaged on this for the President. But the desire of my heart was the young Christians, and especially after the Lord put the burden on our hearts for souls, for precious souls, that seemed to be the consuming passion of my heart until one night. And the Lord taught me a lesson that has stayed with me, frankly ever since. During that campaign in Clayton, I think it was the night seven had stayed back and confessed Christ and poured up the rain.
That was A lot for me to keep safe, just starting out with a fifty-one during these five weeks. The night of seven came back and spoke of them safe. Instead of rejoicing, as I thought I would, I didn't rejoice. I somehow went home heavy-hearted. The folks I was riding in couldn't ride in written. The car, the chapel, they couldn't understand why being so quiet. But somehow I just felt heavy-hearted and hollow-hearted. I couldn't understand myself. So I went immediately to my bedroom on getting home.
As I did, I drew myself across the bed, and it was right at the window. And I asked the Lord why it was that I wasn't happy over the blessing, you see. And I looked up I looked out the window and looking right down, it seemed on me, it was a full moon. The moon was full. As you know, sometimes they claim they can see a face in the moon. Well, it just seemed to me as though the Lord was looking right down. And this was the message that seemed to come to me right there. It's not certain.
even fruitful service that truly satisfies the heart of the Christian is totally a Christ. I learned that lesson that night, that if you saw a thousand saved, that would be fully satisfied. It makes you happy. But service cannot replace the master. No matter how you engage in service or how much you are blessed in your service, only the Lord Jesus Christ. Because if your service is not fruitful, and at times you have a bound period, if your joy depends upon your fruitful service, you're going to be unhappy.
Because if you're not seeing much done for the Lord, then you're not going to be very joyful. But if you're occupied with Christ, even though you don't see much being done in the way of fruit in your labors, Lord Jesus doesn't give, and therefore you have him and he only truly satisfied. I never will forget that night that I have taught you lessons, that I have taught this law months in this day. Some of the experience I have in Raleigh, as we told you, we stayed with the chapel at night, you know, some said drive Raleigh. And one morning while we were sitting there chatting, Mrs.
Chapel said, Wilson, you know it's strange things that he started building this home the same month that he got saved up in Canada, six years ago. And you know since that time, Jimmy and I have been praying for God to send us a preacher. We made that room that you're sleeping in. We made that room a prophet's chamber. We really didn't need an extra room. We had two other bedrooms, but we decided one night we were going to build an extra room onto the house. That was going to be the prophet's chamber.
And from that time till now, we have been praying that the Lord would send us a young creature to occupy that room and make this his headquarters. You know, we've had a lot of preachers come through, for she said most of them have been married men, and we didn't see if we could invite them. But they were. Then she said there were a couple of single preachers came through, but one of them was so shocked the people wouldn't understand. And the other one was Irish, and they didn't think that his type preaching was quite suit the people in North Carolina. So she said, Jimmy and I last night, His talk was all over, and he felt that you were the one the Lord had checked.
He walked it higher that room. Now, if you set it up for you, he said, before we get it. You may have that room, trade it as long as you like, and that is your room, and you can have your meal here. It won't cost you a penny. You want to make this short and important. I stayed there for three years. The chapel for a gift like parents to me, and as the Bible says, they do for the sake of father and mother, that same shall find father and mother. And I certainly found the father and mother in this, and this is Jason's Chapel of Galilee, North Carolina. But that was a very unusual thing, and another indication of the leading of the Lord.
Well, about that time, Mr. Nugent moved down, saying there was a Bible conference in Newport News, Virginia, over New Year's, and would I like to go along? I said, yes, I would like to go along with his conference, so he came too long and picked me up. We went on down to Newport News for the Bible conference, a very large conference. He was held in the Warwick Hotel. He used the big auditorium in the hotel, and of course all his assistants and poses. came from afar, stayed in the hotel, and occupied about all of the, while there were local Christians in Newport News, there were quite a number of them, and they did take some of their homes, visitors.
At that conference, there were a lot of men, I suppose I was the youngest preacher there, and there were about twenty-five or thirty of them. Most of them were old pioneers, men, if you wouldn't know if I mentioned their names, like Bradford, Michigan, and so on. men who had been preaching the gospel for thirty and forty and fifty years. One night, Mr. Nugent and myself were having suffered. It was just before the Sunday night service. And one of the men in charge at the conference came over and said, be enlightened, be man, to preach the night. And I said, yeah, pray it.
No, he said we want either of these Jews. I said, no, I don't want to preach. That said, well, just trust the Lord. Let's just trust the Lord. So that was it. Well, I had just started my supper. I think I'd taken about four bites. I didn't take another one. I thought I was about to lose before I'd already taken. So I had to get up from the table and go up to my room's hotel. And I'll assure you, I was scared to death. I knew the audience would be there that night, especially all these veteran preachers, and here I was, the youngest one in the crowd. So I spent my time in my room, and finally Greg came up to my room and tried to encourage the people ahead.
When I walked up on that platform, I looked out on that audience and saw two front rows, just lines with these gray-haired vestments of the word. I kind of like saying, well, now I appreciate very much that I could clap my wings a whole lot better if you let them slip off and have a prayer in me when you don't want to be booed. But nevertheless, the Lord, in His grace, came in and gave help on that occasion. So after that experience in the Newport News. They asked us, emerged us, to stay for a series of meetings, which we did. We agreed for six weeks in the Chaplain Newport News.
Then I went back to Raleigh, and they were involved there, especially among those local places where we had been treated. The summertime went on, and another thing had happened back in Canada, as I told you, Mark, parents more or less depended on thee when I left them, and I came south, depending upon the Lord only, with no salary of any kind, with no promise from anyone for a penny, just the living God in heaven, with me quietly. Well, I left in July, and in December my father fell and broke his head, riding the bicycle to work on the icy road. His bicycle went out from under, and he broke his head, and his working days were over.
When I got news of that, it was just that the man who was up to me to shoulder that responsibility financially, which I thought to do, thought to do from that very home. So then the time came when I thought it was to go home. In fact, Fred was wanting to go up to Canada, and we went on to Canada to see our folks, and from there we went over to Chicago. Mr. Kennedy, who was here last Sunday morning, Jim Kennedy. He was one of the first men I met there, that big chapel, Robert Memorial, one of the largest in Chicago, and met with Kennedy at that time, and I've known him ever since.
I mean, they're a real companion, a real prayer partner. So we have this seven-week campaign in Rick Roberts Memorial Church in Chicago, and then they came back down to Raleigh. Well, after the blessing being seen in Newport News, the president there wanted Mr. Newton and I to come back and operate the tent in the summer, so we did go back and had eight weeks of meeting right in Newport News in the very tent. Well, that was the last campaign that Fred and I were together. The Lord came in and lots of people were saved. Proud came every night.
A couple of times, Carlos came down from Raleigh, down to Newport News, just within a couple hundred miles. Ted said to me one night, a semester, why are they coming down from Raleigh? Well, the reason they were coming down from Raleigh was they wanted me to come back to Raleigh. They thought, possibly, I was going to shave down Newport News. Well, let's tell you the truth. I was caught between two curts. I thought a lot of Fred's missions, and we've seen a lot of lessons together, and yet I felt that God had taught me a lesson, as I mentioned last week, that my place of labor was in North Carolina.
So I told Fred, I said, Fred, they want me back in North Carolina, and I think I'll go. Well, he didn't seem to like it very well, but Anyway, he decided to return a couple of days later. I was to leave on the boat. They went across from Newport, New York, New York, and Norfolk. He got the train all back to Raleigh, and Fred and I stood on the dock there. This is where my text from there. Fred said, Lester, when are you coming back? Gloria, I said, I don't have to stay. Well, he said, I believe.
If I know anything, I believe the Lord's kingdom is up together. I believe we brought it together, labor together in the Lord's word. These I think possibly the existence of wrongly are leading you up to the Lord's path. O Fed, I said, the word says this, he knows the way that I take, and that's the text of it. He said, do you know the rest of that text? I said, no, I don't. I don't hand. Well, he said, listen to the letter. When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as well.
He said, if you're in the Lord's will, it's true he knows the way that he thinks that you're going to be taught. He said, I am sorry you're going to leave me because I enjoyed being with you. I was happy times together. I'm sorry you're going, but I think you're making mistakes. Once again, I suppressed egoist the way that I did. So at this time, I went on to revolt and let you stand there on the ground. We fought a lot of each other through Jib and July. Last year, as you know, three or four years ago, went to Canada and took the illusion of Jib.
But... After that, the Lord's soul blessed was back in North Carolina, the threatened that it was such a godly man, a man who feared God, that he could see that I had chosen the right path. And afterwards, he met many times, chatted his home, he moved back to Canada, and realized that I was in the Lord's village going back to Rome, the way the Lord had left. So then we went back to The chapels place I referred to a little while ago, but there was an experience that happened in Newport News. It'll do well to be pursued to strengthen your faith, because in those days the Lord was strengthening mine, putting me into experiences that increased my faith.
And I remember this experience. Lord, they came. And I was saying with Mr. and Mrs. Newton at that time, I used to pay them Four, seven and a half dollars a week was fifteen dollars for two weeks. So I could pay every two weeks. Well, four days came, and I got up that morning, I had three dollars in my pocket. So I did some praise. Oh, the Lord, I needed fifteen dollars that day. And the mailman came, and he left, and he didn't leave ever, except a car. But on that card it was that a parcel was down at the postal office for me.
And it says carrying charges gave the price of the parcel two dollars and seventy-two cents, postal charges or carrying charges extra. I said to Fred, what does that mean? He said it means if it's been there after so many days, you pay so much for days. For a day, for a change out, I was, oh my. I didn't tell him he didn't know what I was a millionaire. I had three dollars in my pocket and bored it. And I thought, of all days for this thing to come along. So we went on down to the postal officer. He said, I said, no, he failed that car.
I didn't know what to do. It was more than three dollars. I didn't want him to see that I had had three dollars. that's a lesson there. I said, no, I said, you stay in the car. I don't want to see you in that ministry. No, he could argue. So he came in. I had the clerk to pick the hog and look at it with that drop of pocket. And one of the books I had my mother sent down. I said, how much do we owe you? He said, two, seventy-two. I said, no, carrying charges. No, he said, hasn't been here five days. Oh, I thought that's smart. I had twenty-eight cents now. Still bored there.
So then something else, George told me a minute or two later, that I said, you know, great children's night. He used to have children's night on the Friday night, I think it was. He'd have about a hundred children from out. One of them would speak to the children. The other would be as all drafted. We used to treat them. Every Friday night, we'd give this youngster something to eat. And it used to cost us about a dollar a piece, about a few dollars. Oh, I thought, I got twenty-three cents. And children's not. So he said, well, you get the kids that I... And I said, I don't know, but let's go over the finest end of it.
Well, the first things are in my mind. So we were over the five and ten cents store, and just we walked in the, and right in, take the face of the candy counter, and all I saw there was a great big, big foam of these chips wrapped up in paper. And I saw them ten cents a pound, and my mind began working pretty quick. I got ten cents a pound, five pounds, that fifty cents, twenty-five cents to him, twenty-five cents to me. And I said to the girl, I said, how much, how many of those in a pound? So she raised them up to you. They're about forty in a pound. That's two hundred. That's two fifty-three kids. I said, sir, that's all right. He thought, then he said, well, I guess you'll be all right.
I'm just sure that's plenty. That's plenty. Well, he said, all right. Well, I hand over my quarter. I drink that one. Well, he had the meeting that night, and I was still thinking about four days. three pennies, what I thought. After the meeting at the front of the name of John Lloyd, he came up to me and said, well, look at me. He said, here's a letter. He said, I forgot to give you last night. He said, I should have given you last night. He said, I brought it tonight. Well, he knew what I thought of him. Because I got the letter, and as soon as I got an opportunity, I had opened it.
There were fifteen dollars. So that was about nine certain that night, and I had taken my board on board day. Not until the Lord had reduced me to three pennies. So they were one of the experiences I had in Newport when the Lord was teaching to me to strengthen our faith. I see our time to go up half past, and I'm not going to go over this time. So the next three to... continue of the Lord's leading. We get back to Raleigh and see what he did there, and then after that we'll swallow Winston's Pharaoh and end up, I suppose, for a fifth, fifth, and now down here in Alder.
As we go through chapter by chapter of he, leader, me, showing that God is ashamed of day as he was two thousand years ago or four thousand years ago. He still leads the street, still meets their needs. He tests them, he prides them. God requires a simple childlike faith. And we find out, although it's true, he knows the way that I take it. When he has tried me, I shall embark his road. The trials are to that end. We might, of course, disclose that which speaks of that which abides and spans the fire.
You know, you read in Corinthians, here's a Christian's life brought in to review, and one man has wood, hay, and stubble, and all that's up in smoke. There may be plenty of wood, plenty of hay, plenty of stubble. It looks taken to catch the four men. When it's put in the fire, nothing but ash is there. That's the life of some Christians. But what is it that abides the fire? Wood, hay, and stubble is what burns, is burned up in the fire. Gold, silver, precious stone. These are the things that abide the fire.
The fire in that fire. capes is the presence of God, for our God is a consuming fire. He will consume everything that is not done according to his will and for his glory. That which is done according to his will and for his glory will will abide his presence and be rewarded at the judgment seat of Christ. And so the gold is found hitting the lips of that which abides the presence of God and the gave it on his while he was forever. For when he hath cried me, I shall come forth this goal, for only goal to keep us to this truth.
Let us be faithful in our trials and comfort. Today's day, and that will suit the goal that will abide this presence and be rewarded by him in that new coming day of reward. I'll make an announcement. We won't have that on me. Psalm thirty-two and verse eight. Psalm thirty-two and eight.
I will have and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go, I will guide thee with mine eye. And another text in first Corinthians sixteen. First Corinthians sixteen. And verse nine. First Corinthians, sixteen and nine. For a great door and effectual is open unto me, and there are many adversaries. Now in the last five or six weeks, we've been speaking on the Lord's leading.
That is, in my own personal life, and I've tried to bring out the way the Lord leads, and trusting it will be a stimulant to all our faith. And as each week I sat down for a little while in the morning, To recall some of the things that happened twenty-five, thirty years ago, I've been amazed how freshly they seem to float back out of the past and happy thoughts. And as I reminisce over those days gone by, how God led so definitely, we're going to continue these messages until we end up right here in all ways. The Lord's leading and the release.
One he may lead another. And if you're reading of my case and of some encouragement to you, that's wonderful. So tonight we want to get back into Raleigh. Last week you remember we went down to Newport News and got back to Raleigh where it seems the Lord had signally pointed out that we were to decide. On the way back from Newport News to Raleigh, North Carolina, I didn't have a car at that time. I told you how the Lord sold the one I had before I left Canada. So, on the way back by bus from Newport News for Raleigh, I was driving down, looking out, watching the signs as we approached Raleigh, and I saw a big sign, C-Ralls for used cars.
Well, as I say, I didn't have a car, and I realized I needed one. So when arriving back in Raleigh, I began praying about one, and the next day as I was uptown, I saw a car go by, and it was a nineteen-thirty-one Chevrolet, Merle, Merle, and Black. Now, that may go back beyond some of you, but many of you remember that year, and the car did go over that time. But anyway, as I saw that car pass, I thought that's the kind of car I want, and I just somehow fell for it. So the next day I was in my room, or not in my room, in the front room of the chapel residence in Raleigh.
Mrs. Chapel had gone out, but the chapel was working, was a pharmacist, so I was in the front room on my knees, praying that the Lord would make it possible for me to have an automobile, for I knew I needed one. Well, I had seventy-five dollars in my pocket, and I knew that was a long way from buying an automobile, and furthermore, I needed a suit. So while I was on my knees, there was a knock at the door. I got off the knees to answer the door. And Mrs. Herbert Riddle, she's still alive in Raleigh. She was at the door, and as I answered, she said, Mr. Wilson, the Lord has made something on my heart, and I thought I'd come around and give it to you.
She says, here's fifty dollars for you to buy a car. Help to buy one. Well, now this is around... Twenty-nine years ago, and you know what fifty dollars was like then and what it was worth. Why was it worth equal to one hundred and fifty to two hundred a day? Well, I said, Mrs. Little, do you know I was just on my knees praying that the Lord would enable me to get an automobile? And I certainly thank you for that. She says, well, I hope you'll be able to, and she left. So the next afternoon, after some more prayer, I thought, well, I'm going uptown. See what I can do. I've got a hundred and twenty-five dollars.
I went to the post office to mail some letters, and as I came out on the other side of the post office, I looked up, and here I saw on the top of this big building walls used car. I thought, that's the sign I saw coming in on the bus the other day. So I went over there and one of the salesmen walked up to me and he said, can we help you? I said, well, what kind of used cars have you got? At least that you've got some good used cars. I said, have you got any Chevrolet? Yesterday we got a nineteen thirty-one Chevrolet, two doors.
That's just the car I wanted. So we went downstairs, because they all used cars downstairs, and ported that car up to me, and it was a maroon and black, just exactly what I want. I said, that's the car I want. Well, he said that's a year old, that car, and he said it was seven hundred and fifty dollars. Now, I think it's just a car new for seven hundred and fifty dollars. That's what a nineteen thirty-one Chevrolet cost in nineteen thirty-one. This was a year later, so I said, how much do you want for now? Well, he said, let's go for a ride first. Then he did. He drove around the block. I said, what do you want for it? He said, do you have a car to trade in?
I said, no, I don't have a car. Well, he said, no, we barely have two prices. Of course, anyone dealing in cars knows that. If you've got cash, you get a little cheaper stuff on the trade-in journey. Another price. So he said, well, we'll sell it for three hundred and twenty-five dollars. Well, I thought that was pretty good. It had twenty-one thousand miles on it. So I said, well, I'll tell you about it. So he went upstairs, and I went out on the street in Raleigh and passed over, and I met Mr. Allen. Now, Mr. David Allen was the one, as you know, that made us alone on the other building. I said, David, I've been over to Raleigh, and I mentioned a car over there.
They got a good used car. He said, well, what kind of a car is it? I told him. He said, you know, I do all my car buying at Rawls. I get a new car there every second year. I also buy trucks for my visit. He said, I'll go over and see Mr. Rawls. So he went over and saw Mr. Rawls. When I came back a couple hours later, Mr. Rawls said to Mr. Wilson. He said, you may have that car for two hundred and seventy five dollars including the license well that was fifty dollars off of the salesman's holding three twenty five well I said I'll take it and he said down sat down figured out he set the down payment including the license is a hundred and four dollars I said that's fine so I had my car when I went down to drive it away why I told the salesman what I was given it for, and he was mad.
He said, I could have got three hundred and some dollars and three hundred and ten without this warning, he said. Mr. Rawls wouldn't come down from the price this morning, three twenty-five. He said, that was the price. He wouldn't come down. I could have got more than that for this morning. Well, anyway, I got it for three seventy-five, including the strike And then, as I say, it cost a hundred and four dollars. So I had twenty-one dollars to buy a suit with. I went uptown and I met one of the Christians there, Mr. Horace Martin. He still is alive and crawling. And I said, Horace, if I was practically new around there, I said, where's a good place to buy a suit?
Come on over. I'll show you where I buy mine. He took me over and it was the door operated by a Jew. So finally, I'm looking around and I saw the suit I wanted and a few pair of trousers and I said, how much is this suit? So Horace slipped this fella aside, whispered short and to him. And I didn't tell Horace how much money I had. I didn't say it's aimed to anyone. No wonder I just had this twenty-one dollars in my pocket. So finally, They had a little conversation. I just want to know.
I don't know. But he came over, and I believe Morris was kind of sitting in the arm a little because he wasn't too happy. Well, he said, I'll tell you the suit for eighteen fifty, two pairs of trousers. I said, thank you. I'll take it. Well, I got home with a car in the suit and two dollars and fifty cents. So I thought I did pretty good. So that was the way I got my car in Raleigh, and that was just one of those many incidents that happened back in those early days. Then we began to get exercised about another place for some meetings. Mr.
Chappell already referred to, he was a pharmacist, one of the chief pharmacists in the chief sting wholesale drug company in Raleigh. He used to wait on a lot of doctors and so on that came in there. And a doctor, O.L. Ray, who was head of the Board of Education out there, came into the paramedics one day, and Mr. Chappell said, Dr. Ray, do you know of any vacant buildings out in the country? He said, like school buildings or community buildings that are available for a campaign. Ray said, what kind of a campaign?
What he said is an evangelistic country. Why, he said, who do you want to preach? Well, he said that the young Canadian is staying with me, with me now for about a year. And he's going to locate around here. And I was just wondering if there might be a place out in the country, because he wants to get out into the out-of-the-way places, and if we just start only about a half a mile from my home. It used to be a Christian church, but it hasn't been used for two years, and the windows are all knocked out. He said, and the dirt and all were just taken over. The doors were opened, and he said, the kids have been in there doing a lot of damage.
He said, as far as I know, there's only one elder left of the board of deacons, of the board of deacons, that church, and that's Mr. Lynn. He used to be sure of the many years ago. And he said, Martha, I know he's the only one who has any say so about that building, but he said it's in a mess. How long does this fellow want to preach in it? Mr. Chappell says, oh, maybe six weeks. And he just roared laughing. He said, why, they couldn't get anybody to go there once a month. How are you going to get anybody there for six weeks? And he'll do well to get people to come in for a week around our place.
They just don't go to church because it was a rural section. Well, Mr. Jaffa came home and told me about it, and we were not as immediately in contact with this Mr. Lynn, and he said, I don't see any reason why you can't have it. No church has been held there for two years, but the building will need a lot of fixing up. So the next Saturday afternoon, a number of the men at Raleigh in the chapel there in the south, we went to work cleaning up that building. And some were putting in the glass panes, others were getting all the dirt out of it, other scraps and saving up the sheets and washing them.
Why were we doing that? I was going to a cabinet that was up at the front of the platform. I came across a card with some other papers and Sunday school papers that had been left there for two years. As I looked at it, I said, fellas, look at this. And this was the text I read it to you here a while ago. A great door and effectual is open unto me, and there are many adversaries. And just then a man stepped into the doorway. And he smiled and said at the time of day, come to find out that the sister nomination that owned this building had sent him down there to try and get that thing going again.
I thought, well, sure enough, we've got an adversary right here. After we'd got permission to use the building, we were cleaning it all up, getting ready to start a campaign. It was a way out from Raleigh, about nine miles. And here's a man sent along by the denomination that had practically abandoned the property. And now he wanted to get something going and try and revive the old testimony, the old membership. Well, anyway, we had a little talk and seemed a little bit disturbed, but he couldn't do much about it. Seemed it already got the old cave from the only living deep. We went ahead and started meetings, and for six weeks, we preached in that church building, the place was packed night after night.
And Mr. Dr. O'Lray said to me, he had me over to his house for a meal one evening, and I think Mrs. Ray got saved in those meetings. He said, Wilson, you know, he said, I was very apprehentious about you having meetings here. I didn't think that people would come out. He said, you know, I only missed one night myself in six weeks. He didn't think anybody would come for one week, let alone six, but he admitted that he enjoyed the word of God. And there were quite a number of slaves during that time. I think over twenty-three, if I remember correctly, found Christ during those meetings.
I was thinking just before I sat down of one unusual case, the same with Mr. Stevens. They said that whenever Mr. Stevens, he was a farmer living about a half a mile from the old church building, and when you hear him out prowling, you could hear him cursing all over the place. He had a very loud voice in his own mule, get kind of stubborn at times, and he had cussed that mule out. and the other farmers said he could hear him almost a mile away, shouting and crushing that news. Well, Mr. Stevens came along to those meetings, and he got saved, and he was a happy soul. After that, we used to hear him singing hymns all over the countryside.
This was quite a change, and folks used to say, well, I'll tell you. Any man got changed around here during those campaign meetings, Mr. Stevens did. So I remember the day we were going to have the baptismal service that night. We had to have it in Raleigh because it didn't have a baptismal service out there. I went around that morning visiting the young converts and Mr. Stevens was out in the field. And he was singing his going on down the field with the flower and the mule. I said, Mr. Stevens? Are you still going to be baptized tonight? He said, Amen, brother. He said, If I could get near some water, I'd baptize them you.
He said, I'm going to be the Lord. He was just that happy. And he found baptism was in the Bible, and he was going to be baptized. So they were some of the happy times we had at Sixth Walk. Then we went over to Wendell, a place, twenty-four miles east of Raleigh. This was quite a place. It was a community building near a little town called Corinth. The amazing thing to me is there are so many little villages around there. The Bible name, for instance, is a place called Zebulun, and a place called Corinth, and so on. We heard about this community. It was a very wicked community.
A lot of bootleggers lived there, and they said they didn't go to church, and a lot of fights went on in that community. So we saw this big community building and it pulled about seven hundred people. It was a service held there once a month, and the preacher came from quite a distance to hold his service. They had twelve men on the board of deacons, and the only pay that preacher got was his car loaded down with collared greens and potatoes and sedges and vegetables like that. He got no money. All he got was vegetable, but he went back home happy. A couple of chickens swapping in the backseat along with it.
That was his salary. So he got the use of this building. In fact, the preacher and the congregation couldn't say much about it because it was a community building and anyone could preach in it but a Roman Catholic or a communist or an a Jehovah's Witness. That was his referral. So we got the use of the building and started these meetings. And this preacher used to come for his afternoon service once a month, though there was no conflict of the time. We went right on through Christmas and New Year's. I think out of those seven weeks, it rained five weeks out of the seven. There were four miles of dirt road from Wendell over to the church building.
And I'm going to tell you those roads were simply a little different. Mr. Allen pulled the battery right off the bottom of his car one night, and it stuck in the mud. And that was there in the mud. We used to see people walking, and several nights we left Raleigh to go out there, and about twenty-four miles to stay out there. Actually, I thought it was useless to go. The weather was so bad and the rain was coming down. It had been raining all day. And I could say to Jimmy Chapel and Mrs. Chapel and some of the other fellows going up. He's going to go tonight, Mr. Wilson. I said, I don't see the need of it, but we'll go. If even one person comes, if they're coming out in weather like this, they deserve to be treated to.
If you know, we'd get there and see sometimes as high as two hundred. And at times we'd meet mothers. Within two miles of that church, rubber boots off, the raincoat off, and a bit of an umbrella, one little child in her arms, or if it was able to walk, it was trudging close to her, and another one trudging behind through the mud, and they had another pair of shoes under the raincoat, and when they got to the big building, they'd take off the rubber boots and put on the other shoes and go on into the building. And that happened time and time again, walking two and two and a half miles just to hear the gospel, way out in the open country.
I thought, well, if people are willing to do this, to hear the word of God, I'm going to go every night. We had some tragic things happening there one night. Mr. Chappell came in and the fumes were quite long. I suppose there were anywhere about sixteen feet to eighteen feet in length. and the people used to fill them right up near the front, and Mrs. Chapel came in, and so they moved over to make room for her. And as she sat down, evidently that end of the pew was sitting right on one board that had become detached from the adjoining board, and when she sat down, it all stood up to move over.
She made room for her, and as all she had sat down, sat down put together, That board broke, and as they sat down, the girl next to Mrs. Chapel happened to have her leg back up under, and her leg was broken badly. So we had to have that taken care of. She was carried out of the meeting. Eventually came back before the campaign was over and found the law. He just stopped her murder right across the street from that building. One afternoon I went out visiting. One of those young ladies had found Christ in the farm right across the street, and I thought there was something wrong when I pulled up.
I heard some screaming in the house. I heard two of these girls calling, go, go, go. Finally, I went around the house, and here I saw a man seen with blood. He had two big walks in his hands. He was troubled with blood. I said, what's going on around here? And then he recognized him. When he did, why, the door open and there stood the other man, the brother of these two girls. And he had an axe handle in his hand. The axe wasn't on the handle. It was a brand new handle. And it was stained with blood. These two men had gone at it.
And were both just stained with blood. And it hadn't have been that those two girls proceeded in pulling their brother and slamming the door on Dudley. There was been a murder. So we finally got the two of them together, and they decided to call it off. And this one left that community. It went out west. They hadn't heard him for months after I checked out. He hadn't come back. But that was the situation. Then the Lord began to work, and this creature began getting a little jealous. And I found out he was spreading it around the community that I was a Catholic.
And he had attended one or two of the meetings. So I found out the meeting the day he was going to have his service, and I went out. I sat and listened to him, and when the meeting was over, I went up and his eagons were gathered around him, and he seemed a little surprised that I was there, but I walked up to him, and I said, Mr. Wally said, how are you? Well, I said, I'm all right. I said, I just want to say this, that I hear that I'm being accused of being a Catholic. I said, any man who has heard me preach one sermon that says I'm a Catholic, he doesn't know any more about God's salvation than the Houghton talk. Of course, the preacher was the one who spread it around.
He dropped his head. Well, I didn't say it, but it's quite evident he did. The other didn't call his hand on it. Anyway, the opposition continued. As you said a while ago, there are many adversaries. One night I received a letter to the effect that if I came out that night and preached, it would cost me my life. As I say, it was a very tricky community, a lot of bootlegging going on, fights and so on. So the chapels were quite perturbed, and they said, don't you go? I said, yes, I'm going. So finally, some of the other men came around the course.
Mark and I referred to a while ago, and Ed Smith, and Mr. Chapel, decided he would go along, and there were five others rather than myself, and we were done. There weren't many cars in those days. They used those old Hoover carts. Most of the people walked. When we got there, there wasn't anybody in the building. There were crowds milling all around the outside, so we pulled up in the yard, and I said, well, if you just stay out here, I'm going in myself to see what happens. We went in and walked in the building, and nothing happened. I walked right up to the front, took my foot off, went down on the view, sat down with my Bible, get ready for the meeting, and nothing happened. After a while, some of the others began coming in.
So we got started in the meeting. About two hundred and fifty people were out that night, and at the end of the service, I said, well, evidently, there's some opposition to our having meetings here. Maybe we could find out the cause of that. I said, I've just been preaching the gospel. I'd like to know who are opposing the preaching of the gospel. Why was my life threatened? I said, for those who are responsible and opposing what I'm preaching stand up, no one stood up. So then there was a fellow, and he just got off the Tariro in five years.
in jail five years in the county road and he's been guilty of facing the murder very hard attitude he's been attending the meeting and he jumped right up on the street when no one got up he got up on this street and he said folks he said i gave this piece of property for the building of this structure and he said to my knowledge it was to be used for the preaching of the bible Also, he said, for other purposes, community purposes, but no one who is a Catholic or a Jehovah's Witness or a communist could preach here. Now, he said, I've been coming to these meetings. I'm no Christian, no professor today, but I'm a whole lot better than some of you folks who say you are.
Now, he said, I want some of you men who are opposing Mr. Wilson to stand up here. Let's take a look at it. No one dared stand up, and I'm glad they didn't because the way he was talking and liked it in a fight. Anyway, we found out after the meeting, before that service was over, I asked all to which these meetings to continue, and everybody stood up. There wasn't one at their seat. So we continued those meetings. We found out afterwards the reason, and they really meant business, those who wrote that letter, a group of young men about my own age. had gotten together when they heard about the threat of a maid, made known to these men, they said, You lay your hands on preacher Wilson, and we'll take care of you.
And there were about fifty men, young monks, who got together and dutched. The Lord used them to prevent any harm or any. There were a couple of interesting things. These men, when we'd get there, showing how they didn't seem to respect the place. We'd get there at night, and they'd all be standing around like sometimes I suppose you see these cowboys, and they're standing there with a hat cock on one side, two in the back, and smoking, sitting on the stove and everything else. Cool weather. And some of them were dressed up. They were just in the harm pose. They were hard men. Some of them looked for it. She had a razor in three weeks. They'd come in there and walk around and jabber and swear and spit and all the rest of the...
until we were ready to start the meeting. One night before the meeting I got up I said, Tell us, I'm surprised at you then. I said, you come in here like a herd of cattle. You have no respect for this place at all. We're preaching the gospel and I think the gospel deserves reverence. And you come in here and you stand around the stove, you smoke and you tell stories and you sit all over the stove and over the ashes. Now I said, this is a church building. Where is he going to have meetings here? And you should respect him. I suppose he took quite a chance at saying that, but you know it was the most amusing thing. And I think to this day, if you told me to travel this, you just about break his side last.
The next night, none of those men came in the building until we got up to Jesus to open him. And then they start in, let's not look it up in a few... Soon as they get inside the door, they take the hats off. And they hang on tiptoe and not a word on them, and they all sit right up front above the first two or three rows. Those fellas came night after night. I never saw one of them saved, but I saw many of them standing and eating. Now, whether any of them have gotten saved since, only God knows. But I'm going to carry one more instance of this connection, and then our time's almost broke down. In fact, it is. When we went there, one of those twelve deacons, an old fellow, couldn't read and write.
And he came up to me two or three nights after the campaign got started. He said, Mr. Rosen, he says, you know, I know what you're talking about. Forty years ago, he said, I was saved in the corn field. I could take you to the very spot, he says, where I got saved, where I trust the Lord, and I know I was saved, and I've known it for forty years, that I can't read the Bible. And I know he says when it's being preached. And I think he was the only one of those twelve teachings of New Christ. So he said to me one night, he said, this is what I don't have any money, but he said, I'd like to do something for these things. I'd love to hear the word from him.
He said, who put the curse seen in these lights? Well, there were about twelve curse seen lamps lit up that building. Well, I said... And from now I couldn't tell you. One had been born on about three nights, and I didn't know who had been put to church in. Jesus, can I do it? Well, I said, you'd be happy for me to do that. If you want to do it, it's unto the Lord. He said, yeah, I'll be glad to do that unto the Lord. I want to do my part. So there was a little kind of a community store, about two miles down the crossroads, his old gas, groceries. This old fellow broke it with his name. Man, I suppose, about sixty-five at that time. And he used to go down and get a gallon of gas and a five-gallon tank.
And about every Peterborough night, she'd go down and get a gallon of gas. Well, they had never known her revival to go longer than one week out there. So he had gone on, and he'd get his gallon of gas and come back, and he went on three weeks, and I announced the fourth week. And so he went on down after I announced it. I was going on the fifth week. went down on the Monday night and said, I want some more gas, more courtesy. The man says, how much longer is that fellow going to preach up there? And he says, and how much courtesy do you want this time? He says, fill up the can.
He's going to preach till Jesus comes. So anyway, the old fellow was quite enthusiastic, and since then he's gone both and remote. So there are just some of the experiences we've had in our early days. in Raleigh, North Carolina, and around there. Now, next week, we'll continue on our work around Raleigh, and then we'll move on to University of St.