I first saw the light of day at a Marine Corps base in Camp Lejeune. My mother was a Marine brought up Pentecostal and my father was a Naval medic brought up Catholic. As a boy I use to enjoy the times my parents would drop me off at my grandmothers and I would take in all the beauty of their small Virginian farm. The people on mom’s side of the family were very poor, but lived very well, almost like a visit to the old Walton’s home. We as a family moved from place to place until we settled down in the Ann Arbor Michigan area in the 1970’s. My parents bought me a Yamaha dirt bike and I would have tons of fun riding both winter and summer.
One Sunday, while riding my bike in the early AM a church bus stopped and the driver yelled at me that I needed to be in church. The man’s name was Rod Moxely and the church was called the Fellowship Baptist church in Whitmore Lake, Michigan. To make a long story short the whole family ended up getting saved, the church expands, and attendance skyrockets from 80 to over 400. During this time as a teenager I would go on youth trips where the Holy Spirit would touch my heart. I went up for salvation many times as it always produced a spiritual sensation joyful and clean. We did have a revival at that time in which an evangelist really convicted the hearts and people would pray earnestly in the prayer rooms after church. I must say the Baptist had a whole lot going on for the children, lots of fun events that left me with a spiritually clean feeling every time and very challenged. All of the events were decent and well organized.
All I knew growing up was the Baptist church. I was convinced very young that the Baptist doctrine was the most superior. I am afraid I was rude to fellow Catholics and honestly believed that speaking of tongues was of the devil. The only thing I knew of Methodism was that they did not believe in drinking or playing cards, so I was not interested.
It came to pass that Rod Moxely passed away, the church experienced political trouble and the deacons would end up getting a guy nobody liked. So, the attendance plummeted, the congregation fell into natural things, and I would spend the rest of my teenage years working at a restaurant. On referring to the lost generation, I basically fell in with them. I then began to experience a growing lost feeling and instability of Spirit. Which is not a plus in this ‘lost generation,’ especially when folk are unstable as Christians! As Christ is our rock we should have a spiritually strong spirit as well as mind!
After graduating high school I decided to stay the summer with my Grandmother here in Virginia. I would get a job washing dishes in the morning and would put up hay in the evening/afternoon. There I began to get a taste of a totally different lifestyle. The people would work hard Monday-Friday, go to town on Saturday morning, some kind of constructive activity Saturday afternoon, and we had Saturday night prayer time at the church during the nights. Sundays were a day that the people would go to church, they would not work on Sundays, and return to church Sunday night There were also blue laws keeping places of businesses closed on Sunday. You could set your watch on their righteous routines, which I would later discover were Methodist ways handed down from the mid-1700’s. The area seemed to fit the old Tina Turner song “Nutbush City Limits:”
That summer I would put up hay with a QC analyst who kept the joy of the Lord alive in his heart all his years. He would shout in church, shout at home, and shout out in the hay field. I have never seen such joy in all my life. Not only was there a joy, but there was a richness in love as well. The people would really let you know that they loved you. In the old TV show the Waltons the family would talk to one another before going to bed. I have since learned that this was because the houses were so small. But despite the houses being small the people lived decently and in great love, joy, and peace.
So I fell in with them. I would go to the revivals and prayer meetings and live among the people. The services at the Pentecostal Holiness church were at this time very lively. People would shout, run the aisles, fall out in the Spirit, speak in tongues, and then wait for an interpretation. They would have prolonged alter services and would crowd the petitioners and encourage them to tarry and wait upon the Lord. There were times that the old guys would sit back in the pews weeping, and if they made eye contact with you they would declare, as souls around the alter fell out in the Spirit… “The Holy Ghost! The Holy Ghost!” There were souls who would fall out in the Spirit and would have to be carried out of church.
At the end of that summer we had a good revival in which the Lord seemed there in a mighty way. On reading the book, “Run Baby Run,” by Nikki Cruise, I felt a voice telling me to put the book down. I paused, and then continued again to read. The voice said again… “Put the book down.” I slept in my Grandmothers living room on an old fold away cot by the open living room door. The Katydids seemed to be singing very loud that night. There in my Grandmothers clean linens I heard the Spirit speak again, “Where is all the stress, worry and hatred?” In which, upon examining my heart, there was nothing there but pure beauty. I thought to myself. “Oh my! I got exactly what those people got!” I would spend the rest of the summer rejoicing with the people and in revival until I went back to Michigan later that September.
So this Pentecostal thing is not real just because of a doctrine... But because of a personal experience.
One Sunday, while riding my bike in the early AM a church bus stopped and the driver yelled at me that I needed to be in church. The man’s name was Rod Moxely and the church was called the Fellowship Baptist church in Whitmore Lake, Michigan. To make a long story short the whole family ended up getting saved, the church expands, and attendance skyrockets from 80 to over 400. During this time as a teenager I would go on youth trips where the Holy Spirit would touch my heart. I went up for salvation many times as it always produced a spiritual sensation joyful and clean. We did have a revival at that time in which an evangelist really convicted the hearts and people would pray earnestly in the prayer rooms after church. I must say the Baptist had a whole lot going on for the children, lots of fun events that left me with a spiritually clean feeling every time and very challenged. All of the events were decent and well organized.
All I knew growing up was the Baptist church. I was convinced very young that the Baptist doctrine was the most superior. I am afraid I was rude to fellow Catholics and honestly believed that speaking of tongues was of the devil. The only thing I knew of Methodism was that they did not believe in drinking or playing cards, so I was not interested.
It came to pass that Rod Moxely passed away, the church experienced political trouble and the deacons would end up getting a guy nobody liked. So, the attendance plummeted, the congregation fell into natural things, and I would spend the rest of my teenage years working at a restaurant. On referring to the lost generation, I basically fell in with them. I then began to experience a growing lost feeling and instability of Spirit. Which is not a plus in this ‘lost generation,’ especially when folk are unstable as Christians! As Christ is our rock we should have a spiritually strong spirit as well as mind!
After graduating high school I decided to stay the summer with my Grandmother here in Virginia. I would get a job washing dishes in the morning and would put up hay in the evening/afternoon. There I began to get a taste of a totally different lifestyle. The people would work hard Monday-Friday, go to town on Saturday morning, some kind of constructive activity Saturday afternoon, and we had Saturday night prayer time at the church during the nights. Sundays were a day that the people would go to church, they would not work on Sundays, and return to church Sunday night There were also blue laws keeping places of businesses closed on Sunday. You could set your watch on their righteous routines, which I would later discover were Methodist ways handed down from the mid-1700’s. The area seemed to fit the old Tina Turner song “Nutbush City Limits:”
That summer I would put up hay with a QC analyst who kept the joy of the Lord alive in his heart all his years. He would shout in church, shout at home, and shout out in the hay field. I have never seen such joy in all my life. Not only was there a joy, but there was a richness in love as well. The people would really let you know that they loved you. In the old TV show the Waltons the family would talk to one another before going to bed. I have since learned that this was because the houses were so small. But despite the houses being small the people lived decently and in great love, joy, and peace.
So I fell in with them. I would go to the revivals and prayer meetings and live among the people. The services at the Pentecostal Holiness church were at this time very lively. People would shout, run the aisles, fall out in the Spirit, speak in tongues, and then wait for an interpretation. They would have prolonged alter services and would crowd the petitioners and encourage them to tarry and wait upon the Lord. There were times that the old guys would sit back in the pews weeping, and if they made eye contact with you they would declare, as souls around the alter fell out in the Spirit… “The Holy Ghost! The Holy Ghost!” There were souls who would fall out in the Spirit and would have to be carried out of church.
At the end of that summer we had a good revival in which the Lord seemed there in a mighty way. On reading the book, “Run Baby Run,” by Nikki Cruise, I felt a voice telling me to put the book down. I paused, and then continued again to read. The voice said again… “Put the book down.” I slept in my Grandmothers living room on an old fold away cot by the open living room door. The Katydids seemed to be singing very loud that night. There in my Grandmothers clean linens I heard the Spirit speak again, “Where is all the stress, worry and hatred?” In which, upon examining my heart, there was nothing there but pure beauty. I thought to myself. “Oh my! I got exactly what those people got!” I would spend the rest of the summer rejoicing with the people and in revival until I went back to Michigan later that September.
So this Pentecostal thing is not real just because of a doctrine... But because of a personal experience.
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