<TITLE>05. Par 18-21</TITLE>L-18 But when I started to light it, I heard something a whirling around. There come that tree back before me again. And I knew that God said, "Don't you never smoke." So I threw it down, and run away, and went out in the field, and started crying. And I asked God to let me die. Nobody wanted me; my people didn't. The young people didn't want me, so I wasn't wanted.
But He's come to me; He said, "I'll give you friends; just follow Me." Went on down through life...I was very bashful then (backward).
And--and I--I--I guess you wonder how I ever got married. One--one day, I met a lovely girl. She was a German girl, and she was a Christian. And I started keeping company with her. Now, notice a moment; I want you to get this part of it. I then become a Christian. Going with a girl, after while we got married.

L-19 We didn't have nothing of the world, but we had each other. When the day we got married, we had an old stove (old stove), an old bed, and a little old table. But we loved one another, and that's the main thing. I--I worked hard to--to make her a living. After while, God gave us a little boy, my little Billy Paul. And then, later a little girl come.
And then one day I was coming down from Michigan, and I met a church group. They called them the Pentecostals. I had become a minister of the Baptist church. But I heard these people; they were happy, and they were rejoicing. And I wondered why they were so happy. I'd never heard of that kind of religion. I stopped to listen, and I heard them preaching. I stayed all night. The next day they asked me to preach. And I got up and started preaching, and hundreds and hundreds came to Christ. And the ministers come around and said, "You're a Baptist?"
I said, "Yes."
Said, "Come, preach for us."

L-20 So I put down all the invitations, and I hurried home to my wife. And when she come to meet me, I told her about these happy people. She said, "Oh, Billy, I would like to have that experience." Said, "What do they call it?"
And I said, "They said it was the baptism of the Holy Spirit." I said, "Let us go find Jesus like that." So we did, and we both received the blessing. So I was going to leave then to go on evangelistic work.
So we went to tell our parents. Now, her mother was a refined type of woman, belonged to a great big church. She said, "Now, Billy, them people are nothing but trash. There's nothing to them. You stay away from them. I don't want my girl around them."
I said, "Oh, but they were real."
She said, "No. No."
And I said, "I believe they are. And so I... My wife started crying. And there's where I made my fatal mistake.

L-21 Now, from here, listen. I listened to my mother-in-law instead of God, and forsaken the church, and went on back with the Baptist people. Right away, plagues hit my home. My wife took sick; my father died on my arm; my brother was killed. And everything happened just in a few days. A great flood hit the country and washed away the homes. My wife was in the hospital. And I was out on a rescue with my boat. And one night out in the water, my boat got in the current, and was going over a big falls. I couldn't get the motor started, and I raised up my hands, and I said, "Oh, God, don't let me drown. I am not worthy to live, but think of my wife and baby."
And I tried again, and it wouldn't start, and I cried again to God. And then, just before going over the falls, the motor started, and I got to the land.


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