I'LL NEVER PRAY AGAIN!

The true story of a man, who swore he would never pray again! He said he didn't need God, or anyone else. He has learned differently!

************************************************************************************   I was an illegitimate child at birth. My father, then twenty one years of age, was killed one month before I was born. He had been shot in the back of the head, and left beside the N&W Railroad tracks in Sands Siding West Virginia. My Mother, having no one to help,  and no place to take me as a baby, gave me to my Fathers Mother, (my Grandmother) when I was 41 days old.

My grandmother was 55 years old,  when she took me into her loving care. Just the two of us, both living in a house that was cold in the winter, with no electricity, or running water, but a few broken windows, and holes in the floor.   I grew up in a little Community in West Virginia, called "Sands Siding". Population: about 150 . (When every one was home). Now, it is far less than that.

My Grand Mother received $13.00 a month ADC (Aid for Dependent Children) for the both of us, when I started  grade school. When I entered High School, we drew a whopping $21.00 a month. I was thinking a few weeks ago, it took us five  years,  to draw what I draw in social Security now in "one month"!   How did we make it? My grand mother knew how to pray, and pray she did!

I left High School in the twelveth grade, at the age of 16. I went to Chicago in 1951 to find work. There I met a beautiful girl by the name of Bonnie. She was (15) years old when we began to date. In 1954, I came back to West Virginia,  and we were soon married. We loved each other, and wanted a family right away. Her parents were Christians, and I soon began to go to Church with them. One night a Lady Evangelist, shared the love of God, and I gave my heart to Him at about the age of twenty. My joy was full, and, I thought that being a Christian was the greatest thing going.

I thought that everything at the Church was going fine, and, not knowing about the (political side) of a Church  I stumbled onto a Church meeting by accident one Morning.

I have since found out,  that Churches for the most part, especially Denominational Churches, "are the most political institutions in the world". I was walking past the Church, when I noticed the door partially open. Being a young convert, I walked in to see what was happening! I had run into a "secret meeting" in progress.  There were five brethren, and, they were talking to the young Pastor of the Church. One Brother said:  "Pastor, your  shirt sleeves are  too short"! Another said: "that the Pastors wife did not wear hose". After a few minutes of this, one of the brethren said: "The Church don't want you as Pastor, so, we will have a Church meeting and vote you out"! Only one Old Brother in the group, (Brother Hiram Mounts) stood and said: "Brothers, we shouldn't be doing this, this is wrong"! It didn't stop the meeting. The Church voted perhaps 95% "to keep the Pastor".

Then the Brethren decided to use "plan B"! "They would withhold the tithes"!  This normally always works  if you are trying to get rid of your Pastor, especially if he has a family.   Finally they starved him out, as they would give him nothing in the way of finance and support. I loved the Pastor, and couldn't understand how Christians could do this! I was standing on the front porch  of the "Clerk of the Church" one day, when the young Pastor came by and asked the Clerk:  "if he could give him a little money, as his children needed milk"? I watched the Church clerk, as he  pulled out a large roll of bills, and gave the Pastor ten dollars. I could not understand as a young Christian, how older men in the Church could treat a Pastor so cold, and, almost ruthless! I went back to Chicago to find work, and  in a few months I began drinking. I never did get grounded in the Word as a young Christian, and, I was still mad and hurt over what I saw the Brothers do  to this young Pastor, for he  had four children, and was a fine Pastor. They just wanted a change, and to put another man in as Pastor, and they got it!

I remember well my first drink! It was as if I could almost hear a voice say: "Don't do that"! With trembling hands I put the drink to my mouth, and from that time forward I grew progressively worse in my drinking. Having read later: "that when the evil spirit leaves a man, and, he returns and finds the house cleaned and garnished, he brings 7 more worse than himself". I soon found out that to be  true! I became full of hate! I hated everyone, and every race, and nationality. By this time I had seven Children, six boys  and one girl. As the years went by, I drank more and more. I always worked and provided for my family, but I was destroying everything by my drinking. Of course I was also into sinful living, and going down, down. I met a man who was doing "armed robberies", and he asked  if I wanted to come along on one?

I said yes! After thirteen armed robberies, I was caught and sentenced to Prison for "one to seven years". While in Prison, I soon began to pray again. I said: "Lord, if you will get me out of this place, I'll serve you all the days of my life"! I made parole the first time up. After getting outside, I forgot all about my promises to God. I began to drink again. Soon, I was sent back again to prison, for another robbery, this time 2 to 7 years. 

By this time I had become a hate machine! I had never experienced so much hate! I suppose the only people I cared for was my family, and I was sure giving them a hard way to go. During this stay in Prison, I was standing at the bars of the cell one day, and I recall saying: "I don't need God! I don't need anybody! I swear I will never pray again, or ask God for anything as long as I live"! After two years, I came home once again. My heart was hard, and my habit of drinking was worse than ever. One day while drinking in a forest preserve, a storm came up. My wife went into the house, along with my sister In-law. I stood to my feet, and with a beer bottle in my hand, I shook it into the Heavens and said: "If you are really up there, strike us all down dead"! My Brother in-law (who is now dead) said: "Bill, don't talk like that"! At this point, I had been back slidden about 15 years since the Church incident. I grew worse and worse with my sinful life. I will only say, it was a very ungodly life I was living.

The many times that God spared my life while out in sin, were many! Many times I could have been killed, but God was merciful. Once, the Chicago Police told my wife: "that they were not going to arrest me, they were going to blow my brains out"! Once, they left me alone in the back of a Police wagon with the doors open, and just walked away. I knew that they wanted me to run, and I would have been shot immediately for attempting to escape. Oh, the mercies of God are past finding out! OH, THAT YOU MIGHT KNOW THIS WONDERFUL SHEPHERD!

One night soon after the "challenging God" experience in the park, I had a dream! I dreamed that Chicago was hit by a "nuclear blast". After the blinding flash, I knew in my mind "that the heat wave would come next". It did, and I just disintegrated! The dream was so real, that I made plans the very next day to move from the Chicago area. I moved by myself! I lifted stove, refrigerator, washer, dryer, no problem, I was going to move! I moved a hundred miles West Of Chicago. Then, after moving I got to thinking: Why the "fall out" will come this far! I continued to drink and run from God.   Then one day while driving, (I was a semi-driver) toward Peoria, Illinois, it was a  very foggy day, and very difficult to see.

The thought came to me so strong: "Just what do you want in life"? Peace of mind I thought, just peace of mind! Then I was given an illustration, by whom  I believed to be the Lord, it said: "Your life is like this fog, you keep driving and waiting for the fog to break  so you can see better where you are going, but it isn't breaking", and you just keep driving on and on.   In months past, I had passed a little "A frame Church" on my route, and, I thought,  I might just go there the next Sunday  morning. I asked the wife if she would go to Church with me, and she answered yes! It was January 1969, when I made my way back to the Church again. (as I edit this message, this next January, 2012, will be   43  years since that day) While  at  Church that Sunday morning, I don't recall one word  the Preacher said! My mind was racing. I could not pray! I wanted the Spirit, (as He had done so many times in the past), to deal with my heart, but He didn't! I recalled the Scriptures: "No man cometh unto me, except the Spirit draw him". He sure wasn't drawing me!

I said in my mind, "I have waited to long! God has dealt with me for so many years, and I have played around and turned Him away, and now He doesn't want me any more"!  This was a strange service indeed! I don't recall what the Pastor preached, as he was leaving the Church anyway,  and moving back to Southern Illinois. After his message  he just sat down on a seat on the platform. No music, no altar call, no singing, As a matter of fact, no one was doing anything, "just sitting"!  If  I have ever seen a Church service so ordered by the Lord, it was this one!

Then it happened! Some young Lady about twenty five years old, came running forward   and fell down on her knees at the altar. She began to pound on the altar with her little fists, and crying out: "Somebody help me please, will somebody help me"? The Pastor never moved!  The congregation (never moved) no one moved to help, or pray, with this young lady. As God is my witness today, I did not open my mouth, but I prayed this silent prayer in my heart: I said: "God, help this woman, I can't help her, because I am in worse shape than she is in"!   Oh; praise God, all at once I found my self running to the altar, and as I knelt there that day and prayed, I was a completely broken man. I prayed with all of my being: "Dear God, please forgive me of my sins! I have messed up everything that I have touched! I have messed up my life, and I have caused untold harm and hardship to my Wife and family. Forgive me please! Help me to be the Father I should be! It seems that every thing I touch I ruin".

I said: "God, I know I am old now, (I was then 36 years old) (I am now nearly 78) twice that old-but if there is anything left of my life that I can do, I will do what ever it is you ask me, or show me to do! As many of you know who have experienced this glorious transformation of sins forgiven, I came away that morning a new Creature in Christ Jesus. I promised the Lord, that where ever He wanted me to go, I would go! The Pastor was still sitting in his chair watching what was happening, but there was still no response from him, or, the congregation. They just stared! As I said, it was a strange service!  I prayed with the young lady who was so desperate, and she was also wonderfully saved that morning!  I stood up and sang for the first time in many years:  Jesus is the sweetest name I know, and He's just the same, praise  His Holy name, that's the  reason why I love Him so, for Jesus is the sweetest name I know!  And so help me: STILL NO ONE GOT UP!  After the dismissial I found out later, that the girl at the Altar, had been a "bad girl", and no one wanted to pray with her!  Unbelieveable, but true. And that in a "Denominational Pentecostal Church"!

I believe, that it took the desperation of this young lady crying for help, for me to identify myself as in the same condition. This happened in La Salle, Illinois. Since that time, I have failed my Master so many times along the way, but He has never failed me, and, has  been merciful, and called me into the Ministry in 1972. The trials have been plenty, as we have lost 3 of our children. Two boys, and our only girl. But God is so good, he took away the stony heart, the heart of hatred  and replaced it with a heart of love for others. I have been a Pastor for a number of years, and God has blessed us to reach out to most of the world by Short Wave Radio, and, other methods  with the saving Grace of God.

One day one of my boys asked me this question: "Dad, why is it you have never turned back over the years, was it because of "Sissy's" death"? (She was hit by a car at the age of 6 years old) I said: "No Son, her death had nothing to do with it". I then told him: "that if God could love someone like me, who had challenged him, and,  to tell Him I would never pray again, and had turned their back on him, and still forgive me, that it was a love far greater than I could understand. I can say honestly, over the last 42 years, I have failed many times, but I have never had a desire to ever turn back to the worldly elements again. Much I owe also  to a wife who never left me, and February 13^th,2012  will be our 58th,  wedding Anniversary.

Not long after entering the ministry, I had another dream. In this dream, I again saw Chicago hit by a nuclear device. I spoke to someone who was standing by me in the dream, and said: "You see, I told you that Chicago was going to be hit by a nuclear bomb"!

I have also dreamed of being here in West Virginia, and standing near the N&W railroad tracks, and the sky was filled with Russian planes. There were thousands, and I knew that they were going to bomb our towns and cities. It was an awful sight, to see so many enemy planes.

In another dream, I saw the long missiles, as they were coming into our country, from the direction of Canada. The missiles I saw in this dream, were shiny missiles.

I dreamed just a short while ago, here in the building where I live now (which is a nine story HUD building), I was in the recreation room, and while looking out the window I saw an awful black, dirty, rolling smoke approaching. (It looked just like the scene in NY when the Towers fell).  But this was not NY, it was here where I live now!   I recall asking someone standing by: "what is this"? They said: "They have started bombing"!

I went outside to the other side of the building, and looking over the tops of the mountains I could see the bright flashes of the Missiles as they hit, places like Huntington, Charleston, and Lexington, KY.

Some one asked  me to tell of my "visions"! I have never had a vision! I have had many dreams, all according to Joel: 2: 28...your old men shall dreams, and your young men shall see visions: Dear ones I must add this: In the year of 1972, in Cedar Lake Indiana, I awoke suddenly one morning, after hearing these words while sleeping, from the same book of Joel: 2: 30-31 ...there will be blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke..before the great day ..of the Lord come.

I sat upright in the bed, and asked the Lord: What does this mean? From that time on, I have studied the coming of the Lord for nearly 42  years, (and it isn't what most Churches are teaching today.) The Lord showed me through the scriptures, that these things would happen "BEFORE" THAT GREAT AND TERRIBLE DAY OF THE LORD COME!  It is quite obvious, that Joel is telling of a nuclear explosion, with the blood, fire, and pillars of smoke.

Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. Matt. 24: 35. We are living in the closing hours of time. Persecution of Christians is at an all time high. It is very possible, to wake up any morning now, to find that we have just gone into full scale war over night. (If we wake up)!

Mark 13: 20.Except those days be shortened, THERE WOULD BE NO FLESH SAVED..

WILL YOU COME TODAY?

Oh my friends, as you have read this testimony (and, it was very condensed) of God's mercy, and realize perhaps for the first time in a long while, that the Master is always searching for His sheep, is He looking for you?  Yes, "I swore that I would never pray again", but God in His matchless Mercy was patient with me, and kept looking, until one day He searched in the right place, and there I was, cold, ragged, hungry, depressed, discouraged, and lonely from my backsliding, but He gave me a new Robe to wear. If you are running from God today, why not   turn and say: "I give up Lord! I don't need a ring, a robe, or a fatted calf, I just want to return home with you and be your Son. Forgive me of my sins, and come into my heart to live forever"! Amen!

Will you do it today my friend?

Wait no longer. Now is the accepted time! If the Shepherd could find it in His heart, to forgive such a one as I, will He not willing, and lovingly, forgive you also if you would but ask? Come to Him now, while He is calling. Come!

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