Converted by Grace
In writing about one’s "Conversion and Call" the words of Paul come to mind, "… God forbid that I should glory …", Gal.6.14.
My parents were in assembly fellowship in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. It was a privilege to be born into a Christian home yet frankly, in my youth it was not counted as such. As the youngest of three boys I was bent on following my older brothers in whatever way they went. Our father, the product of a home broken when he was but six, had attended 14 different schools by the time he graduated from high school. Needless to say his youth had little stability and raising three sons from that platform was no easy task. But his mother had taught him one very valuable lesson, the Bible is the Word of God. Saved in his early twenties he eventually met and married our mother who came from a Christian home. Their objective was to raise a family to be saved. Yet memory spells out various times of tension in knowing how to raise these boys. "How much liberty do you give them?" and "Where do you draw the lines?"
I recall clearly one Sunday evening at six years old being deeply troubled during a Gospel meeting. Exiting the meeting the question came to me, "Stu, what will your friends across the street say if you tell them you received Jesus as your Saviour?" And sadly at such a young age I chose them and refused Christ.
Teenage years were spent pursuing various pleasures with many friendships to distract me. These were the restless times of the 60’s and early 70’s; a generation being swept along in the wave of material growth and the careless attitude of a youth culture moulded by drugs and alcohol. I didn’t want to be a Christian. They didn’t know what life was all about! Time was being swallowed up by things to do, places to go and people to see! And one day at a time Satan was robbing me of my soul!
By the time I had graduated from high school and attended a year of college many of my companions were becoming regular alcohol and drug users. Though my upbringing had restrained me thus far I also fell to the pressure of peers and became one of the same. I dropped out of college in my second year and entered the working world, though pathetically below potential. Soon I took up the sport of Motocross, offroad racing of motorcycles. Yet a collision with a fallen rider’s bike found me with a severely broken leg. God had shaken my life and my father asked me as I lay in the hospital bed, "Stu, don’t you think God is speaking to you?" I had no answer for him but the answer I knew full well. Six months later I returned to work hardly able to walk.
New Year’s eve 1974-75 found me partying with companions in London, Ontario. But it turned out to be a miserable affair as the thought hit me amidst of it all, "1975 is just around the corner, the Lord might come this year and you’re not ready!" Driving home the next day on icy roads we came very close to a fatal accident. My first thought was, "You could have been in hell!" Two weeks later a series of gospel meetings with the late Lorne McBain and David Oliver commenced in Sarnia. The first week I attended two nights to please my folks. But troubling circumstances that weekend brought me to conclude, "I can’t run any more. I have got to get this matter settled!" I went to Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night’s meetings and became increasingly convicted about my soul’s need. Slipping up to my bedroom that Wednesday night I sat in my bed with a number of Gospel tracts and started reading. My brother next in age, whom God had saved over a year earlier, saw my light was on and stepped in to say "good night." He was shocked to see me with tract in hand and asked what I was doing. I told him what I had never said to another, "I want to be saved." He tried his best to point me to Christ but my darkness became only deeper. As he left the room I picked up where I had left off reading in that old worthy tract, "God’s Way of Salvation." There it said not to think of how I felt but of what God in His love had done in giving His Son to die for my sins. And for the first time in my life, despite all that I had ever heard and known, I simply saw that, "Christ died for me!" It was settled! I could now turn out the light and at age 21 lay down in rest, both for the night and now for eternity!
Called by God
Bible readings on Rom.6-8 in Mimico, Ontario, April 1978, brought two blessings: settled assurance of salvation, and a desire to study God’s Word. Though the flesh still plagued me I was a "new man" and nothing could "separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Having been baptised and received into the fellowship of the assembly in Sarnia, life had taken a new course. Inconsistent employment at this time prompted an exercise before God regarding returning to school. After only one and a half years in my home assembly I was led to move to the city of Guelph to attend college; so, with only one week’s notice and no accommodations arranged I set out after the Sunday night Gospel meeting. The words of the Lord Jesus had brought courage only days before departure, "as My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you."
With school completed Nancy and I (whom I had met at a conference shortly after starting school) began courtship and were married in July, 1979. Almost 14 years were spent in the assembly at the Yorkshire Street Gospel Gall in Guelph while employed in engineering work. They were good years in that the oversight gave me many opportunities to grow and exercise what gift they saw. Children’s work was a tremendous training ground as well as the Bible readings and helping in Gospel work. Time and experience would see the added responsibility of helping in the oversight of the assembly.
In October of 1989 brother Norman Crawford visited the assembly and stayed in our home. On the Friday evening before he had arrived I was impressed with the words of 1Cor.9.14, "they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel." Surely this wasn’t for me! There was too much need in the home assembly! I couldn’t be making that sort of a change! I booked off from my work Monday morning to have a conversation with brother Crawford and also shared my thoughts from 1Cor.9. He was very pleased and suggested that we share a gospel series in Guelph. The following fall of 1990 we did so and the intervening months served to press us more towards a final decision.
The question confronting us was, "Where shall we go?" Years before Nancy and I had fleeting thoughts of missionary work. When I mentioned this to David Oliver he said, "We need men in the States!" To which I responded, "I’ll never go to the States!" January 14, 1990, while praying early that morning I was once more impressed, but now with a response to the question "Where?" It was, "the States," and opening the book "Streams in the Desert" the Scripture for the day was, "He putteth forth His own sheep." But that’s a big place, "Where?" Time and prayerful waiting drew our minds to Michigan. After a particularly prayerful weekend, on December 4, 1990, I read the Choice Gleanings calendar, "Fear ye not, stand still, and see … The Lord said … Go forward, Ex.14.13,15."
Having had the confidence of my brethren in Guelph made known, they then suggested that both Sarnia and Nipissing Junction (Nancy’s home assembly in North Bay, Ontario) be invited to join in commendation to the Lord’s work. It was humbling, yet most encouraging, to have these three assemblies join to express their confidence in our work and calling of God. The early months of 1991 were spent initialising applications to immigrate to the U.S. An offer to purchase our home was settled minutes before we left to join brother Larry Perkins for tent meetings in July, 1991, in his home town, Alpena, Michigan.
In August my employment was complete and we moved to Sarnia to be on the border of Michigan. It eventually took over five years to obtain our immigration visas to the U.S., and on December 30, 1996, we crossed over the bridge from Sarnia into Michigan and presented our visas to the officials. The next day the Choice Gleanings calendar read, "Until we were gone over, Josh.4.23. As thy days, so shall thy strength be, Deut.33.25. Take therefore no thought for the morrow, Matt.6.34."