My dad was born in 1931 and like my mom lived in West Virginia's post depression. He went to school with a boy who was older than he and came from money. This boy was very kind to my dad...he always had big juicy apples and would share with my dad. When my dad speaks of this I can see his eye shine from the held back tears.
My dad told me about the time that he and his brothers pushed over the outhouse with granny in it...and then he told me of the tanned hide he received afterwards.
Behind the house he grew up in was a train (coal) track. The kids would follow the train and collect coal and sell it for a little bit of cash.
It was there on those same train tracks that my Uncle Ronnie got born again. They were walking along the track whose knows where and uncle Ronnie and this boy were talking about the Lord...it wasn't long and they both knelt down where they were and Uncle Ronnie asked Jesus into his heart to save him. They ran up and told my dad what he had done. He understood what Ronnie was doing when he did it but wasn't saved himself...It would be many years later and many more chances before he would trust the Lord.
He was making a run out of state for this guy he worked for delivering something or another. They had a flat on the highway...up the hill from the highway was a house. My dad hiked up and asked if they had a jack that he could borrow. The lady of the house said sure but he would have to wait for her husband to get home because he had it with him. In the mean time she got to talking to him about the Lord and asked him about his soul...just then her husband got home...they were headed out to his brothers funeral and told him just to leave the jack on the porch when he was done. The lady told my dad don't wait to take care of getting saved.
Later when my dad was in the Air Force stationed in Alaska...there was a plane crash: Anchorage, Alaska (AP) -- An Air Force C47 crash-landed during a freezing rain in bitter cold weather 75 miles northeast of here yesterday and some of its 16 passengers are known to have survived. 2-6-1953. My dad wasn't on that plane but Huey Montgomery was. After his near death experience Huey came back talking about getting saved and trusting Jesus. Still my dad did not get saved.
Later while working at the Ford motor company in Vermillion OH. a fellow worker who was studying to be a preacher kept witnessing to him but still he would not get saved and he told my dad don't wait too long. The guy had told him to start reading the Bible and he said he didn't have a Bible, so this guy brought him one to work.
It wasn't until 1972 after spending his life in a bar...he started praying for God to show him where to go. His sister-in-law knew he was searching and asked her pastor to go visit him and in October 1972 pastor Ross came to see him with one of his deacons. He asked my dad if he died where would he go? Dad said "hell" he said well what you gonna do about it my dad got down on his knees and asked Jesus to save him.
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