The school house was large and it was filled. It was said that there were
two or three congressmen in the crowd. I got up and spoke for an hour and
fifteen minutes on the message the Lord had given me and when I was through
I said, "Shall we close the services now, or has anyone a place to offer so
we can continue the meeting, as I understand that the school house is
closed against us?" The clerk of the school board (who with his family were
professors of religion) went over to Bro. Holman and asked him who had told
Susag that the school house was to be closed. The Board had only met just
before meeting and decided to close. Brother Holman replied that Brother
Susag told him that afternoon that the Lord had told him that they were
going to close. The man went back to his seat. Then I said, "Is it true or
not that the school house is to be closed?" Brother Holman answered, "It is
true."
One man in the audience sat on the front edge of the bench so deeply
interested in the service that his mouth would be wide open, and after the
meeting was over he stuck a five dollar bill in my hand and said that the
meeting had been worth that to him.
A man in the audience, who was an infidel, said, "I own a store building in
Mechinoch, a few miles away, that these two preachers may have as long as
they please, if some one can furnish a stove and wood to warm up the
building." The stove and wood were promptly furnished, and we went there
accordingly, and continued our services.
I am sorry to say that many who heard the Word of God preached in that
school house rejected it and became real outlaws. The family of the school
board clerk lost their salvation and two of their sons, who had previously
professed salvation, became bootleggers.
At the store building a number of people got saved. One man sat in the back
seat every evening and left as soon as the preaching was over. I saw that
he was under conviction and one evening I got to him before he had left,
and I asked him if he did not want to get saved and he told me, "Yes."
While praying with him I felt a hand on my shoulder and a man said to me,
"Brother Susag, Brother Susag, never mind this man; there are thirty-three
at the altar and this man has not been sober in fourteen years." I said,
"If he has not been sober for fourteen years he surely needs salvation and
I will stay with him until he gets saved." And I did; and as far as I know
he remained a true Christian and lived the life.
The first revival meeting we ever had in our neighborhood was held in our
own house. The house 16 x 24, two rooms down stairs and one room upstairs.
As many as thirty-eight slept in the house; the women and children slept
upstairs and the men downstairs. There was one bed in which the children
slept and the women slept on the floor as did the men downstairs. People
were saved, sanctified and healed. It was salvation the people wanted in
those days.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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