Being a Calvinist Before it was Cool

Today on the program, I am welcomed by my friend, fellow pastor, and man that I respect very much, Dr. Ronald McKinney. Stay tuned. Conversations with a Calvinist begins right now. Welcome back to Conversations with a Calvinist.

My name is Keith Foskey, and I am a Calvinist, and I am excited today to be joined by, as I said before, a friend, a fellow minister, and a man that I respect, Dr. Ronald W. McKinney. He has pastored the Kinsey Drive Baptist Church for 29 years in Dalton, Georgia.

He and his family moved to Dalton from Dallas, Texas. He graduated from Bell Haven University in Jackson, Mississippi with a Bachelor's of Arts in Business and Art and a minor in Bible and Greek in 1967.

He received a Master's of Divinity from Reformed Theological Seminary in Clinton, Mississippi in 1974, and after seminary, he was the Executive Director for Multicommunication Ministries Inc., an international ministry that produced radio and television programs as well as publishing books and periodicals.

He served as Editor-in-Chief of The Sword and Trowel, an international theological journal that had 28 ,000 subscribers in 48 countries, and he has published more than 800 articles and essays. He and his wife, Dr. Bonnie McKinney, a high school English teacher, have been married for 44 years.

They have three children. They are married and have 10 grandchildren. Well, brother, thank you for joining me today on Conversations with the Calvinist. Thank you, Keith.

Glad to be with you, brother. Glad to be with you.

Yes, sir. And it's interesting how we came to know one another. You and I both share a theological distinction among Baptists, and that is that we are both on the side of what might be referred to as New Covenant theology.

Is that correct? Is it okay if I tell the world that?

It's fine. I've told the world that a long time ago and continue to tell them, but yes, I believe in the grace of God, without doubt, and I also believe that we're living in the New Covenant. There are a lot of things that God has fulfilled that we're no longer under the old covenant or the law in any sense.

We are free because we are in Christ Jesus. He's our all in all.

Amen. Amen. And it's interesting because I believe that I don't remember how we first became acquainted on Facebook, but I believe it was regarding New Covenant theology. I was reaching out, talking to people, reaching out, asking questions, and your name came across as somebody else recommended you to me, and so I reached out to you.

Yes, sir.

I believe that's how it happened. I don't remember the person, but I do know that I was given your name, and immediately I think I responded to you recommending a couple of books by John Reisinger. Yes, sir.

Yes, sir. It's interesting that you mention Mr. Reisinger because just last night I was telling one of my fellow elders, Brother Andy Montoro, that I was interviewing you today, and I said, I'm interviewing Ronald McKinney, and he goes, I know that name.

How do I know that name? And I said, well, I began to talk about John Reisinger. I began to talk about your relationship with him, and he goes, oh, I know that guy. I don't know how I know him, but I know him.

And Andy was a pastor in Long Island, New York. Yes. Yes. And back he knew Al Martin and those guys. Is that someone you're familiar with?

Oh, yes. I knew Al Martin and Walt Chantry and a number of men there in the Northeast. And when we first came to Grace, and that was back in actually would have been closer to the late 60s, early 70s, we were looking for brethren that believe something like we did because we couldn't find anybody locally.

I mean, in the city where my father, who also became a Calvinist, he couldn't find anybody to fellowship with because the Presbyterians didn't believe it, and there were no other groups that believed it.

The Lutherans didn't believe it. I mean, so he was kind of left alone, and he began to reach out and he found John Reisinger, who was in Pennsylvania at the time. And John was an itinerant evangelist, and they finally got him to come down to Lake Charles, Louisiana.

That's where my dad had been pastoring. And it started a new church. He left a very large church in the city because he was of another denomination and started a new work, and he got John Reisinger to come down and speak for him.

And quite an interesting story how John came down to Louisiana. And one of the things that happened is he preached to this new group who had come to understand the amazing grace of God. And I'm telling you, they were so excited.

They wanted to meet all of the time, and they found a place in an old building that they rented and they redid and filled. I mean, the people came and they were having teaching and preaching continuously.

And John Reisinger came in and he said, I've never seen a group who have grown so fast in such a short time. And but they were hungry for the grace of God. Now, you have to remember, we came out of a denomination, the Similes of God.

It was Pentecostal, but it also was very Arminian. And they did not like the grace of God. I say the grace of God because when it got down to it, because we were teaching that God is the one who initiates salvation and God will draw you, that they felt that that was just not right.

And so they excommunicated my dad and my brother, who was an evangelist, and my uncle, who was also a teacher. And so all of us went through the process of having to leave a denomination that we'd been in for many, many years.

My dad was an early preacher in the Assemblies, and he had, I think, a great influence. And they were so upset because he was one of the better preachers, I'll say. And he was called in, well, just to give you a little bit of that background, because that's so very important to everything I will tell you, is dad was in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and he was getting ready, they were getting ready to build a new church.

It was expanding. And he had begun to preach on total depravity. Now, he didn't identify it as just total depravity, but that's what he was preaching. And man, there was so many things that were going on.

But when he got on the subject of election, he preached a sermon that is actually available for people to hear on Sermon Audio. It's one of the best sermons I've ever heard on the subject of election.

But he preached on election, and immediately there was rebuttal and there was, well, it caused discord. In fact, the Sunday that he preached that he had two or three of the deacons who got so upset, they ran up to him and they grabbed him by the lapels and just kind of shook him.

He said, what are you doing? What are you doing? That is wild to think. He had threats on his life, even. It was but nobody had heard this before. This was so new, and yet it's so much in the Bible, you know, and we found Spurgeon.

He did read Spurgeon prior to that. And my uncle, who had been converted, and if I may go back to 1956.

The Conversion of Uncle Lamar and the Sovereign Grace of God

Yeah, I want you to tell the story about your uncle. You told me the other day, I told my wife, I've actually told a couple of people. It's a wonderful story.

It is the most remarkable thing, and yet I know God saves all men the same way. But my, he had an experience that just was unusual. He had he grew up in Los Angeles. He was in Inglewood, California. He did.

His father died when he was very young, and his mother was quite old even when he was born, so he didn't have a lot of upbringing. My dad, who left home when he was 17, and Lamar was only three, they were 14 years different, so they didn't have much to do with one another.

But one day, my dad got a call from my grandmother, and she said, Don, she said, Lamar has been arrested. He's in jail. He's facing a long time in San Quentin. He said, would you help me? And so dad said, I don't know what I can do.

But he took time off from a pastor of the church, and it's about 1800 miles to California. And we were taken out of school, went out there just waiting for the trial. And so the day that it came up, and I'm going to give you a picture of what it looked like because this was a big courtroom.

It's a one that we can see sometimes on television. It's a Los Angeles courthouse, and it's large, has a large balcony for people. And anyway, the judge came in, and he had been having several men come in who had been involved with drugs and so forth, and all of them got a sentence.

They were sentenced almost immediately. And my uncle, who is a third time offender, when the jailer brought him in and the judge said to him, he says, well, I can see, young man, that you haven't learned your lesson.

And with that, my grandmother, who is quite old at that time, she almost fainted and she reached over and grabbed my dad's arm and said, oh, Don, do something. Well, he stood up in the gallery and he says, Your Honor, I'd like to speak to you.

May I have? I've come from Louisiana and I'd like to have a talk with you. And he said, well, this is highly unusual, but come on. And so they went in his chamber, Lamar and my dad and the judge. And when they went in, my dad says to the judge, he says, now, I know he's guilty.

I know that he's done wrong. And Lamar says, I was thinking in my mind, boy, you're really helping me out. You're helping me out a whole lot. But he began to appeal to him from the standpoint that his father had died when he was young and his mother was older and didn't have anybody to watch over him.

And but the judge said this, which was to me the amazing thing, he says, now, I don't know why I'm going to do this. I don't know why I'm going to do this. And I can look back now and I say, I know why.

God moved his heart. He moved his heart. And brother, we took him home, which was an unusual thing because it was really strange because we had a very simple life. We didn't go to movies. We didn't watch television.

We were we were we go to church all the time, even Saturday sometimes. You know, I'm just saying it was a quiet life at home. We had dinner together and we would listen to the radio if it were news or something.

And then we went to bed at eight or nine o 'clock. It was just a very simple life. We brought this man in. Who was who was an offender, I mean, he was he had done some things terrible and it was frightening in one way.

But my dad said he told my mother when we got home or he said to my uncle, he said, Lamar, he said, I've just got some rules. I said, you cannot you cannot touch my wife. And that was one. He said the second is, he says, you must go to church.

You must. And even the the judge said you need to go to church to hear your your brother. So he started going to church. Now, here's a man who had never really attended church. The only time he ever went to church is a few times when my dad was out there and his mother would say, let's go and hear him, you know, but that was just, you know.

But he he went to church and it wasn't a large church, but it was a sizable church. And Wednesday nights, my dad always taught. He was not one to kind of do different things. He was he was a Bible teacher.

He had read the Bible when he was converted, which is another story in of itself. When he was converted, he was he just his whole life changed. And he read the Bible until literally I say he's like John Bunyan.

If you prick him, he bleeds Bible. He just loved scripture. And but what happened was, he said on a Wednesday night, he'd been there 11 days. And on a Wednesday night, just something simple Bible teaching.

He was in the back pew and he began to shake. I mean, the hold in the pew, he was he was under such conviction. I mean, it wasn't any powerful preaching or anything like that, but just the word of God.

And he got out of the in the aisle and he ran down and he literally flung himself over the the altar that was there and he cried out to God. He could he didn't know how to pray. He just say, oh, God, oh, God.

I'm telling you, it was the most moving thing and he prayed for the longest and he couldn't seem to come get through it. Of course, there were people praying with him and so forth. Somebody says, let go.

Another one says, hang on, whatever. But the thing was with him, he wanted release from his burden of sin. Brother, I saw it so clearly when God broke through. Here's a man that didn't know how to pray, lay me down to sleep.

He didn't know how to talk the language. He didn't. All he did was you could see him with his hands raised and he was praising God for what he said. My sin has been relieved. It was. Well, it went on for a couple of hours.

I know that people will question me about all the kind of things that went on and so forth, but I'm going to tell you, brother, it was as real and genuine as it could be. I was a changed man. He stayed up all night with my dad.

He took dad's Bible. He said, Don, teach me. And dad began to teach him and they stayed up all night and he began to read immediately. See, he was a felon or a criminal, and it was hard for him to get a job.

He was back in Louisiana, and of course, he's from California. And dad gave him some work around the church and he would trim the trees and mow the grass and things such as that. And but the rest of the time he was reading and studying.

I mean, immediately. It was like day and night or night and day because he came. He became so engaged with God and the word prayed. He grew more in a month than most people do in a year. You know, and even he began to memorize the Bible.

And he memorized the book of Hebrews first because I sat there and I listened to him, Keith. And he would say, you know, God who's hundred times and in diverse manners, spaking times past of the fathers by the prophets after these last days spoken to us through his son, whom he's appointed heir of all things.

And it became I listened to him recite the whole book of Hebrews. And it was such an amazing transformation. He began to pray, seek God. Well, my, he grew more in a few months than most people do in years.

He began to study. He studied different theological things, but he was guided by my dad. So but what happened was he wanted to he wanted to go back to California and study. Well, he was he had to pay his fine and all that.

And three years made application to go back to California. The judge who had given him permission to be out of state probation thought he had done a wonderful job in rehabilitating LeVar. And the truth is he had nothing to do with it.

God had made the difference in his life. So he went back to study, went to a school, Los Angeles. It was an Armenian school. And he was going through the classes. Well, let me tell you how he he had to take some English because he didn't have enough points or whatever for getting in.

So they wouldn't let him take Greek. And but he said, if I take the Greek test at the end of the semester and I pass, will you allow me to continue on? And they laughed and they said, well, yeah, that that would be all right.

He took the test at the end and he had made 100 on his paper. They said, how can that happen? Well, what had happened, he had to go by the trolley to go to school and back as he memorized the first 10 chapters of the text for the Greek textbook.

And he could he could write it down. Man, they were amazed. But he just he lived to study the scriptures and he loved church history and all this. Well, he had a professor there, the Greek professor. I think his name was Dr. Walken, if I remember correctly.

And he would say, Lamar, he says, you need to you need to check this out. You need to read Charles Hodge. You need to see read Augustus Strong or, you know, he mentioned these theologians, these older theologians that were all dead.

But he said he would go get the books. And he would read them. And he began to read about the absolute sovereignty of God. He said, that's the God that I know. That's the God that I experience. He changes you by his grace.

He just makes you a new man. You know, he's he's and he was just so involved with that. And he began to study. Well, he was learning something about election. And even he wrote to dad and said, well, wait a minute.

But he began to give him verses. Well, dad began to study, too. He began to see this. So when my uncle graduated from the school, he graduated with in languages. He studied Greek, Hebrew. And what's the other one I'm trying to think of?

But anyway, he was a Latin or Aramaic. It was Aramaic. But he probably knew a lot of Latin as well, because you can't read any of those without getting some Latin. But he he he loved he would go into the depths of what the word meant and, you know, what historically meant.

Well, he came home. And, of course, dad was thrilled and everything. And dad, by that time, was studying. And we had a meeting at the church, and there was a young lady that was playing the piano. And she was probably she was she wasn't a teenager.

She was probably in the mid 20s or so. And Amar at that time was probably 28, something like that. Well, he met her and they fell in love. And they ended up getting married, which was also another story in itself, because her father wasn't happy about it.

He wasn't in the church. And so he was he was upset that she was marrying someone who had yet Lamar's life had changed so much. He was two different people. But they married and he did and went to Texas to try to pastor.

He had done several different places where he pastored. But he became a teacher. And he would help people be able to see this from the scriptures and how it occurred. And he dealt with the difficult problems that you have.

You know, everybody brings up John 3, 16. Or they bring up, you know, verses, you know, God is not willing that any should perish. Well, those are taken out of context. And you got to see where they are in this Bible and what the context is.

And he would figure that out. And he would work with that until he he was able to be satisfied. He says the scriptures will not deny itself. It's not going to be a conflict. And he taught us about the analogy of scripture, things such as that.

I tell you what, he was a tremendous teacher. And my dad, at some point, I don't remember after he'd come home, it was obvious that there was disruption in the church because Lamar was teaching a class.

And he was teaching election. So all of a sudden, dad then preached this sermon on election. And I'm telling you, it was like a bomb went off. You can imagine. They got so angry. They were angry. The scriptures, it was right there and he was quoted.

But they became so angry that God is sovereign. He can do as he pleases. He has every right to do that.

What year would that have been, brother?

That message was preached, I think it was in March 3rd of 1970. I believe it's March 3rd, 1970.

Calvinism Before It Was Popular and the Cost of Conviction

See, I just want to mention here while I'm thinking, I'm listening to this story. And I know we talked the other day and you told me some of it. And I have just been thinking about the fact that so many of the people I know that call themselves Reform, that call themselves Calvinists, are relatively either new believers or they're at least new Calvinists.

They've only become Calvinists in the last few years, maybe the last 10 years. I remember back in the early part of the 2000s, Time Magazine talked about the most influential religious movements. And one of them was the Young Calvinists.

That was Time Magazine. I got that copy.

So, I think about you and your father and your Uncle Lamar. And I think about the fact that you guys, y 'all were preaching this truth before. And when I say before it was cool, I don't know if it's really cool.

But nowadays, guys look at John MacArthur and R .C. Sproul and Paul Washer and all these guys, and they have people to look up to. You guys, I mean, you were looking up to dead guys.

That's the truth. Everybody that we had an interest in had already died. You know, Spurgeon and Sibbs. And I can go down the old Puritans. We were pulling that out. You couldn't buy them then. There were no books.

You had to get them from England in old libraries. That's how you got some of those books. I mean, we were having to have people search over there for certain pastors who were writing, you know, way back and being able to get them.

So, it was a difficult time because nobody wanted to hear this. It wasn't a popular message. And it's still not popular. I mean, I have difficulty here in my city because they don't like what I preach.

They don't like what I preach. And I preached it clearly, I believe, on television. So, they are without excuse. They are without excuse. And so, anyway, there's a lot more that could be said about all this.

And I came along, and I had been in a large church in Memphis. It was the largest church, I think, in the Assemblies of God. It was called First Assembly, and they had 3 ,500 members. And I mean, we had everything under the sun.

You had gymnasium, roller skating, and all the kind of stuff. It was just full of activity. And I was involved in that. But at the same time, I was reading and studying. And I remember that I had an experience, Keith.

I went outside, had a football with me, and I went to a football field close by. And it was getting dusk, and it was beginning to get dark. And I was just kicking the ball, just running, doing a few things.

And I'm kicking the ball, and I saw the stars. It's come out already. And I looked up there, and I began to think. That's just what I've been reading about. I've been reading A .W. Pink's The Sovereignty of God.

That was one of those things that all of a sudden, my mind went to the fact that before God made any of that, made any of the stars and the moon, that he had me on his heart. God, the Father, had chosen me as one of his children before time began, before the foundation of the world.

I tell you what, brother, I was so overwhelmed. I fell on my knees, and I began to praise God and worship him because he was my great creator. And from that time on, everything was changed. And of course, I finally, I was dismissed from my responsibilities at this church.

And then I went back to Reformed Theological Seminary. Reformed Seminary had just begun. I remember when it was first begun. I was in the fourth class to graduate from Reformed Seminary. And my, what a wonderful experience I had.

I didn't become a Paedo-Baptist though. That was, I couldn't be convinced of that.

Amen. And I pray that that never happens.

I don't think it ever will. It was just something. You know, I just, it just did not ring true with me. I didn't accept the whole foundation of that. I just didn't. There's not a, that's not a place where you find that to be true.

But anyway, I went from there to working with John Riesinger. And we had multi-communication ministries, which just simply meant we had radio programs, television programs, and we also published books.

And a newspaper. And the newspaper was called The Sword in the Trow. And John Riesinger, after a few years, was in an accident. And I was asked to continue with it. And I stayed with it till about 90.

When I moved to Dalton, Georgia, I'd been in Dallas, Texas for about 13 years. We started work there. But I felt it was God's moving me here. And I know it was. We had a school that we started in the church here, Christian Heritage School.

And I was on the board for 25 years or 20. Anyway, what happened was is that they built a new facility. They have a $60 million campus. And it's all debt-free. And my wife's the oldest, not the oldest teacher there, but she's been there longer than anybody else.

She would die knowing I said that.

I was going to say, good catch, sir. The legend. The legend. And she didn't like that.

Because she doesn't. And she's not that old. She's done well. She has been a rock at the school. And God prospered things here in ways that I can't explain other than it's just God. You don't despise the day of small things.

God can make of it what he desires. We had a man come here from Maryland, Gene Lindauer. He and his wife were from Maryland. They moved down here to Ringo. And he came to church. And so I asked him to go to lunch.

And we met them and found out. I asked him, what did you do? He says, well, I was a musician. I taught music. Well, come to find out, he was a maestro. He conducted an orchestra. And then what happened was we had his wife, she does scores for orchestras.

She's very brilliant. I mean, just amazing. So I said, well, what about us having a fine arts school? So I started another school called Labrie Academy of Fine Arts. And so now we've got an orchestra.

And well, we had a small orchestra, a string orchestra. And then that grew. In 25 years, we had a full 60-piece symphonic orchestra. They performed four times a year. I mean, God just amazingly brought this man to our little church.

And then God used him. And we saw this beautiful music being played. Labrie, of course, I took that from, what's the name of it, Labrie? I'm trying to think, I'm not sure. Sorry, I have trouble with that from time to time.

But anyway, I'll remember it sometime. But it was something that we did to give glory to God, to praise God. And now we have all these kids that are playing instruments all over this town. Just God was in it.

He made of it, you know. I started with two other men. We started the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in 92. Well, Christian Athletes Fellowship, it's not always that good, as far as I'm concerned. They don't preach the gospel.

They preach a gospel, but it's not the gospel. And so I got involved with it. And we began to work. And at that time, there was not one, what they call huddle groups in any of the schools. Not one. And we were able to see over these years, there are now 68 schools, 68 schools having huddle groups with a leader.

And they have also, they meet in the, excuse me, they meet in the mornings. And they'll have anywhere from, you know, 100 to 200 that attend all over the four counties that are here. I'm just saying God was at work in that.

And the man that was head of it was Chuck Harris, who happened to be a friend of mine, who visited my dad in Lake Charles when he was in seminary at New Orleans Baptist Seminary. And he became a Calvinist.

So we had a Calvinist who was leading the fellowship of Christian athletes. How about that? That's awesome. Isn't it awesome?

God has been good. It's interesting that, you know, we have some similar, our heart is knitted more than you may realize. I have long desired to have a school. Our church actually years ago wanted to start a school and it just never, it never was where we were financially able, but we ended up starting a seminary.

We have what we call a seminary for laymen that we offer. It's a two-year program. But my wife and I have prayed many times about whether or not the Lord would ever give us, because on our side of town, we live in Jacksonville.

Jacksonville is a big city, but it is a city that doesn't have very many private schools on, especially Christian private. The only school near us is a Catholic school. And I would love if the Lord would open the door for us to be able to have a school.

It would just be an amazing thing. So seeing you and seeing what you've done is inspiring.

So I tell you what, because it's not something, anything that I did or anybody else. It was God, because we struggled, we struggled. And I was here this morning with three men and one of them was from Romania.

And the reason he came to visit me with two pastors, he's interested in starting a school in his hometown in Romania. Now they have some problems that are with government that's going to be difficult, but they're wanting to begin a school.

I've served on several other Christian school boards. And I know that it's, when you think of having a school, it looks like it's almost, you know, impossible. It's too much money. It really, in the long run, it pays for itself.

And the results of having children under the gospel is to me the most vital thing of all. I just pray that God will answer your prayer and give you, you know, the strength to go through that because, you know, it's tough, but it can be done.

Don't despise the day of small things. I've learned that. You never know what God can do. And he does it well. He does it well.

The State of the Modern Reformed Church

Amen. Well, I want to ask you a question, and I thank you for sharing your history and your story and all the things that God has done. Like I said, just talking the other day on the phone, it was an encouragement to me.

I know it's going to be encouragement to people who are listening. Knowing that you were a Calvinist and you've been a Calvinist now for longer than I've been alive, knowing that you were a Calvinist before it was in any way popular, what would you say about the state of the modern Reformed church now?

And I know I didn't prepare you for this question, so it's okay if you don't have a lot to say, but I'd love to hear your thoughts about where you think the church, especially churches that call themselves Calvinist are today, and where do you think that maybe there are some areas that need to be repaired?

Just what are your thoughts?

And I thank you for asking the question because it's something I think has to be answered because we live in a day when there are people popping up everywhere who say they're Calvinist. And they're hold to this or hold to that.

And there's not a lot of consistency of those that use the name Calvinist. Some of them I wouldn't want to be identified with, and some of them can be obnoxious and they can be difficult to deal with.

Their attitude is we go ahead and just pound away and forget about it. My thinking from what I know of Scripture, and I'm saying that I want to base everything on Scripture, but I know God saves people who are not quote unquote Reformed.

God saves people when he desires to save them, and I can prove that with my uncle. He didn't have an atmosphere of Reformed teaching, but I do know this. They recognized that it was God, and they gave God the glory and the praise.

But I think we have a lot of people who come to it and intellectually can say yes to it, and yet their heart has not been brought to a place of real humility. Now, I believe that we have to, you know, having a broken heart, and I'm not talking about emotions, which people sometimes will say, oh, you're too emotional.

I feel like some of the Reformed people need a little emotionalism in them. They need to have some sense of their joy being exposed. In other words, when they pray and sing and everything, they sing from the heart.

Amen. There's a praise that comes. I mean, I love to sing congregational, the people singing, you know, and rejoicing and giving joy to God, and a lot of it can be very staid and dry and stodgy. I don't think that's necessary, but they're those that they hold to that.

I love God's people, but some of God's people, it's not as easy to love.

That'll be the quote of the show. I think that talking about wisdom of the years, that's true. I love God's people, but not all God's people are easy to love. That's for sure.

That's for sure. But that's, you know, he told us that that's the way it's going to be. That's why we have to love our brother. You know, we were commanded to love. And yeah, I'm grateful. I had a man in my study today.

There were two men. There was a man from Romania and the other two men from a local church and pastor, and we don't see eye to eye on everything. But I know them well enough. I know they have a heart for God.

They're wanting to help this man start a school in Romania. So they're, I mean, the heart of man is what tells if you're really in Christ. You know, I love Calvinistic doctrine because I believe it's true to the scripture, but I'm not one to knock everybody over with it.

I want to give them, first of all, I want them to know what they are like me. I'm lost, undone. I'm a sinner. I have a sinful nature. I need God to change my heart. And, you know, that way we can have fellowship.

I want somebody, you know, a fellowship with it. But I want somebody that knows that being in Christ is joy, joy unspeakable and full of glory. Oh, my. I have a, you know, I'm here at the church sometimes and I'm not trying to praise myself, please.

I'm not trying to glorify myself. But, you know, I feel overwhelmed with the joy of what God has done. I get up and go out in the sanctuary there or the auditorium and I have my hymnal and I start singing.