MY CONVERSION

Dan - 5 years old

Soon after they were married, Mom & Dad had some association with the William Street Baptist Church.  Since Mom had been attending the Baptist church prior to their marriage and since the Baptist pastor performed their marriage, they attended that church for a brief time. I was placed on the Cradle Roll of the Baptist Church as well as The Salvation Army.  However, Dad, being raised in The Salvation Army wanted to go back there.  So my recollection of church attendance is The Salvation Army.  I received a birthday card from both churches on my second birthday.  I still have them.  They are filed away in Papa's Papers, several three ring binders, where I have been placing keepsakes.  Maybe, if and when I finish this blog and I have the energy, I may try to put Papa's Papers into a document and, if interested, I could email them to you.  That's not going to happen for a few months, maybe a year or more.

My primary Sunday School class was known as The Sand Tray Class.  This class predated the popularity of telling Bible stories with the use of the flannel graph, at least that was so in The Salvation Army.

The sand tray was a big box, which was about a foot or foot and a half off of the floor and was about three feet wide and six feet long.  Those dimensions are my guess as to its size.  It was filled with sand.  As the teacher told the Bible story, little figurines were place in the sand.  I remember that the bottom of the box was painted blue so that when a river needed to be in the story presentation, the sand was parted and the blue bottom of the box served as the river. 

When I was about eight years of age, I attended some special meetings at The Salvation Army with my Dad.  Dad was in the habit of walking out near the end of the service when the speaker would give an invitation to receive Christ.  This particular night the guest speaker, after delivering his sermon, gave an invitation to come to the altar, the penitent form as it was called in The Salvation Army.  Dad stood up, as usual, and moved to the aisle and I followed him. I thought we were going home.  When he reached the aisle instead of heading to the back door, he walked forward.  I followed and knelt down at the altar beside him.

Within seconds Tom Jones, an elderly gentleman and father of my uncle Charlie Jones, who married my Dad's sister Ivy, came and put his arm around me.  Though Dad led the way, he did not receive Christ that night, but I did.  Mr. Jones led me to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and He became my personal Lord and Savior.  It was a year or two later that Dad finally surrendered and prayed to receive Christ as his Savior.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog