My parents were staunch Church of England people and so I was sent twice every Sunday to the Church of England Sunday School, and to the services. When I was 16 I was confirmed in the Church of England and then took a Sunday School class twice every Sunday. At the age of 18 I was on the Church Council, and read the lessons in the church for the vicar. I then had an illness and said to God that if I got better I would serve Him.
I did get better and decided I would be a Church of England clergyman. I started studying Latin and Greek under the curate who was in our parish. I did not, however, get on very well with these subjects and at this time a friend of mine was going to join the Church Army. When I saw his papers I decided that I too would join the Church Army thinking I could thus jump into the Church of England ministry without doing Latin and Greek. I applied to the Church Army and, being accepted on a month’s probation, I went to their headquarters in London.
When I had been with the Church Army a fortnight, I had a private interview with the prebendary Carlyle. Looking back I would say he was a very godly man, but he did not ask me the questions I expected he would. He did not ask me how many times I went to church, and if I took a class in the Sunday School, etc. He was rather blunt, however, and said, “You want to join the Church Army?” I said, “Yes sir.” Then he asked, “Have you ever led any other young man to trust Jesus Christ as his Saviour?” I did not know what he meant by this but I said “No sir.” He then said to me, “Look here young man, if I want eggs I go to the man who sells eggs. If I want chairs I go to the man that sells chairs, and if the Church Army wants souls led to Christ they must go to the man who gets souls.” When he said this to me I was very angry, and could quite easily have smacked him across the face, for I thought, “What right has he to say things like that to me, a good churchman like I am.”
Up to this point I was depending on my church-going and good works to get me to Heaven, and surely if God was going to take anyone to Heaven He would be sure to take me. I was up on a big pedestal of pride, and although thousands of times in church I had said, “God be merciful to us miserable sinners,” the other folk were all sinners not me — never. That Sunday afternoon what Carlyle said to me convicted me of sin. Needless to say my career with the Church Army was finished, and I could have wished all the evils in the world to Carlyle and the Church Army.
From then on for six months I had an awful, terrible burden of sin. So awful was this burden as I saw myself a lost soul that it nearly killed me, for I lost my appetite. It was sending me mad, for I could not sleep at night. If I died in the night, I would go to Hell, and I will tell you that Hell was real to me. (I would that people today had a burden like I had, for then there would be no need to make appeals to them to be saved).
I reached a point when I felt sure that one more week of what I was going through would either have killed me, or sent me mad, and on the Sunday morning September 3rd, 1933, I was walking through the very small village where I lived. My head was down and I must have looked as well as I felt that I was the most miserable fellow in the world. Suddenly God spoke to me, He said, “Go to Bradwell this evening. Go to the Iron Room.” The Iron Room was the assembly Gospel Hall, and New Bradwell was five miles from where I lived. I had never been there in my life, but God spoke again and said, “Go to Bradwell. Go to the Iron Room tonight.”
That evening I cycled the five miles to Bradwell and enquired three times for this place called the “Iron Room.” When I found it I went in and sat in a seat at the back. As I sat down my attention was immediately caught by a big scroll upon the wall above the rostrum in blood red letters, “THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST HIS SON CLEANSETH US FROM ALL SIN,” 1Jn.1.7. I had read that text many times before, for I used to read my Bible and say my prayers. I spent all the time I was there looking at that text, but I thought, “Yes, it might cleanse you, but it will not cleanse me for I am too wicked.” I cannot tell you a thing about the service. I have no idea who the preacher was, or what he was like. I do not remember if there were any hymns sung, I spent the whole time I was there in looking at that text.
When the service ended, I suppose because everybody else got up to go out I did the same. As I stood up I saw one old man at the front of the meeting whom I knew. He used to come and preach in our little village on Sunday evenings, walking six miles out, and six miles back. I was, by now, desperate. If I could possibly be saved then I wanted to be saved, though I did not think anyone could know that in this life. I waited for this old man, and when he came, I said, “Mr. Freeman, I want to talk to you.” I told him all about myself, what a sinner I was, and how frightened I was about the future.
He listened till I could say no more. He then laid his hand on my shoulder and the first words he said were, “THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST HIS SON CLEANSETH US FROM ALL SIN.” I looked at him and I think my eyes must have stuck out like chapel hat pegs, for I was so surprised at him saying the words that I had been gazing at for an hour. He explained to me that I was such a sinner and that God hated sin, and would never have sin in Heaven. While God hated my sins, He loved me, and in that love had given His Son to die for me, and that if I received the Lord Jesus into my life as my Saviour, my sins would all be forgiven. I would then know that “THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST HIS SON CLEANSETH US FROM ALL SIN.”
Even though he told me all this I just could not see it. It was not because I did not want to, for I desperately wanted, if it were possible, to know my sins were forgiven and that I would go to Heaven. That dear old man walked part of the way home with me and talked to me, and in the end he stood on the side of the road and prayed for God to save me. He went home sad, and I got on my bike and started to ride home. As soon as I started to ride, that big blood red scroll appeared in front of me, and all I could see were the words, “THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST HIS SON CLEANSETH US FROM ALL SIN.” Those words seemed to hit me both sides as well, and when I was a mile from home it seemed that a tremendous miracle happened. In those seconds, just there and then, I saw it all as clear as could be. Although I was such a sinner, God loved me, me of all people, and in that love for me He had given His Son to die for me. In just those seconds, I received and trusted the Lord Jesus as my Saviour. Then, from being the most miserable creature in the world, I was the happiest fellow living. It was just as if someone had taken a great sword and cut clean off the whole burden which I had carried for six months. I knew I was saved!
I was so happy that I did the daftest thing it was possible to do. I sat back on the bike and made the front wheel jump right up in the air, and said, “Well, Lord, If you can save me you can save anybody.”
That was the beginning of a very wonderful new life which has been going on now for over 70 years. I thank God I have never doubted my salvation.
When I got home, the first person to whom I witnessed was my dad, a good churchman, vicar’s warden, and morally upright. Sad to say, however, that my dad did not approve of what I told him, and he became quite opposed to me, but years later he was reconciled to me, and I am sure he was saved.
When I was saved I was convinced that the Lord wanted me to give my life in
making known that great and wonderful message in a full time way. Eighteen
months after I was saved I was received into fellowship in the assembly meeting
in the Gospel Hall, Gold Street, Hanslope, where I have been in happy fellowship
ever since. All the time I had the thought that the Lord was going to open the
way for me to do full time evangelistic work, but He kept me working on a farm
for 15 years, where I learned a lot about the ways of the Lord and how to walk
closely with Him. The time came, in 1949, when the Lord made it clear that I
should leave my employment and be occupied in full-time service for Him. So,
with the commendation of the saints at Gold Street Hall we went forth depending
on the Lord alone to meet every need of me, my wife and four children. He has
done that abundantly as we have never made our needs known to anyone but Him. It
has been a great joy to serve Him these many years and now in my mid nineties I
can look over life with the joy of knowing we have been, in some measure,
pleasing to Him.