05 ~ 1938
1938 was to be a momentous year in my life and ministry. It was the year I was to finish high school, enroll in college, and before the year was out, to be married and enter college again with my wife. It was the year that I would be ordained to the gospel ministry and be called to the first church I ever pastored. The year 1938 began with my speaking at a BTU (Baptist Training Union) rally at Pine Springs. I had the opportunity to preach at Ebenezer Baptist Church where one person was saved on a cold snowy Sunday. The month included my preaching in jail services. It also included January Senior Day when, because of my good grades in my last year at high school, I was exempted from having to take the exams. I was now ready for college.
~ But I must share my experience with the college before I ever finished high school. For you see, just after I started preaching we had a sweeping revival in our community. H. H. Springer, a cowboy preacher who preached colorful sermons. In the environment of a tent with great gospel music and strong preaching, I was greatly influenced. In fact he indicated to me that I needed to get my education and get it quickly because the Lord was coming back soon, and I needed to get my schooling behind me.
~At that time I was about to finish high school, but I heard the College of Marshall had an academy and I could enroll there. So I proceeded to go to Marshall to enroll in the College of Marshall academy before I ever finished high school.
~ Perhaps a letter I had written to Faye will express some of my frustrations and fear as a high school student in a college environment. I was assigned to what they called the “Vatican” on the campus. It was an old building that used to be a Catholic boys orphanage. The school had acquired it, and the football boys lived there. I was assigned to the football boys living quarters. This is what I wrote Faye, “As soon as you left yesterday, I came into my room, slipped on my coat, and a group of preachers and I started to church. We had hardly started–in fact we had walked about twenty yards–and we caught a ride and went to BTU. It was a very good program then to church.” But the part of the letter that has impressed me and shows my state of mind is when I said, “I met about fifty preachers it seemed to me after church. One of the preachers had his car or what I called his struggle buggy, and so we rode around a bit, [and] heard some hair raising tales about freshmen. Especially when they told me about the freshmen who they said last week was beaten up so badly that he had to stay in bed for three days.” And I said to Faye, “It’s a little wonder that I am off to myself this morning. Came back to our room after writing a bit and went to bed. I rolled and tumbled. I could see seniors on all sides of me. At last everything got quiet and peaceful, but then all of a sudden, of all things, I have never heard such banging and bumpity-bump. Something came falling all the way down the stairs. In my horror and excitement I could see a freshman rolling down that long flight of stairs. The boy I slept with jumped up and ran to the door. I couldn’t bear to look. He came back to bed a little bit later only to tell me that it was a couple of football players moving a dresser from upstairs, and the mirror had slipped out and tumbled down to the very bottom of the stairs. To top it all off, it didn’t even crack the mirror!”
~ From reading the letter one can realize that I was in a state of shock and fear for my life when I was around seniors. Imagine my surprise when the next day I lined up to sign up for my courses in the academy. I shall always be grateful to Dean J. Wesley Smith who was sitting at the table when I came to register. He looked at my registration and the fact that I hadn’t finished high school and he said to me, “Son you ought to go back to Tyler. They have a much better high school than we have here. Finish your high school there and then come back to the College of Marshall.” I could have hugged him. I was ready to go back to my familiar surroundings and escape my fearfulness of freshman hazing.
~ Now, after I had finally finished high school, because I had finished in the January term, I enrolled in what was then called the College of Marshall; later it was East Texas Baptist College. The excitement I experienced! I have never had such joy. There was only one tinge of disappointment, that Faye was not near and I could not share the experiences with her. The spring semester I engaged in all the activities I could on the campus and became saturated with the spirit of college. Previously I had a small part in a little theater in Tyler, a production of “Ceilings Zero.” Therefore I thought I would try my wings in the little theater in the college. I joined the group and became president. I enjoyed being in the play called “Applesauce.” Mrs. Bell was the director, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact I invited Fay to come to Marshall. She accepted the invitation and came up on the bus to see us on the night of our presentation.
~ I joined the little theater and I joined the ministerial alliance. I enjoyed preaching at every opportunity, visiting every church I could possibly visit. I recall it was my privilege to go with a group of preachers to Longview to hear George W. Truett preach in a revival meeting. He took sick in this revival and was not able to finish it.
~ Of course I was interested in getting into full-time pastoring and therefore used every opportunity I could. In the spring of ’38 I met several young people from the old Mount Zion Baptist Church community. One of them was Lola Morrison who mentioned that the church at Mt. Zion was going to be looking for a pastor and told me about their coming revival meeting. She invited me to attend the meeting, which was to be held by the district missionary Morris A. Roberts, who at that time was a very good preacher. I blush when I think of my eager and aggressive spirit as a young preacher. I wrote a letter on July 12 inquiring about the church. On July 18, 1938, I accepted Lola Morrison’s invitation to attend the revival meeting and left for Mt. Zion, stopping in Longview and Marshall on my way. The revival meeting was July the 17th to the 24th.
~ I attended the first service on July 19 and was greatly moved by the preaching of Morris A. Roberts. One of the sermons brother Roberts preached was on tithing. I shall never forget that he had miniature bales of cotton that he used as an object lesson, separating nine bales of cotton for himself and one for God. He did the same thing with potatoes: nine potatoes for himself and one for God. He was an unusual and forceful preacher who made quite an impression on me at this particularly impressionable time of my life.
~ I stayed through the meeting to July 24th. On July 23, which was Election Day, W. Lee O’Daniel carried the country. He was to become our new governor, and despite the great number of votes he received it was difficult to find anyone who would admit that they had voted for him. He was a popular salesman of flour who had a popular radio program with the “Light Crust Dough Boys.” He pushed the sales of Light Crust Flour; because of his following as an entertainer he received a good vote and became governor of the State of Texas.
~ The following day, after W. Lee “Pappy” O’Daniel’s election, Brother Morris A. Roberts asked me to preach the closing sermon at the Mt. Zion revival. I was thrilled because of his confidence in me. My notes indicate that I preached a text from Jeremiah: “The summer has ended; the harvest is passed, and we are unsaved.” Another impressive thing I recall about that particular revival meeting was a baptismal service when Brother Roberts baptized several candidates in the open baptistry out under the trees.
~ On Monday July the 25th I left Mt. Zion community and drove out to Cave Springs where it was my joy to hear Brother W. D. Peterson preach. Brother Peterson was a classmate of mine and an unusually good pastor and preacher. On July the 26th I attended the College of Marshall summer school graduation exercise. August was to be an eventful month for me. I had held a revival in Navarro County at Angus Baptist Church. S. R. Goff, whom I had preached for when he was pastor at Springhill Baptist Church, was preaching a revival at Angus and drove all the way from Angus, near Corsicana, to Tyler to invite me to finish the meeting. He had a conflict in the community, was leaving, and wanted me to preach the rest of the revival. I did so. The Lord blessed my preaching with power, and apparently I made a good impression.
~ At the end of the revival meeting, having preached on a sermon, “Whatsoever He Saith Unto You, Do It,” the church invited me to come pastor or at least they talked to me about it. It was August 16 that I received word Angus had called me as pastor. That was to become my first church though Mt. Zion Baptist Church had been contacted before Angus. On September 11, 1938, I preached my first sermon at Mt. Zion in view of a call. By this time I had reached the point in my life when I felt that I wanted some companionship during my college days. So Faye and I (we had been going together for 4 years) set the wedding date. Many of our friends talked to us about our youthfulness; I was 18, and she was 19. They said it would not last, because we were so young. I guess they were right in a way. It lasted for 55 years until her death.
~ After I had preached at Mt. Zion in view of a call, I received a postal card from Brother Emmitt James asking us to spend the night with them on September 10. We made our way as husband and wife to the Mt. Zion community. It was a very eventful Saturday evening. We got stuck in a ditch near Brother James’s home. He had to assist us by getting us out with his horses. During our brief tenure Brother Emmitt James came to my aid on numerous occasions. He and his family were ever willing to offer us lodging and Christian hospitality.