Gospel Meetings-Shannon Hills 04 — Worth Ellis

I have not been in a series of meetings, well, in a long time, when I was so conscious of the fact that the Lord is speaking the heart. And I just wondered if some of you dear people would be mean enough to sit in your seat and trust the Lord Jesus as your Savior and go away and not tell me about it so I can rejoice with you.

I wonder. You wouldn't be that mean, would you? Good. So if you have trusted the Son of God as your Savior the night previous to this, please come up tonight and tell us about it after it's over. That's our need.

That's what we live on. That's what keeps us going. And it would be terrible if you would go away and keep it to yourself. I was in Hinton, West Virginia a week or two ago, and I finished last Sunday a week ago, and two weeks of meetings, and a man told me, he says, I was saved and you were here four years ago.

And it's the first I've heard of it. So that's not fair, is it? So if you trust the Lord Jesus right in your seat. Now, we give you an invitation to come to Christ every night, and if you want to come down to the front, wonderful.

If you want to stay in your seat, we don't care. The only thing we're concerned about is that you trust the Lord Jesus Christ. But don't, don't be mean enough to keep it to yourself. Let us know so we can rejoice with you.

Mark 1 and the First Sermon of Jesus

Mark's Gospel, chapter 1, and our reading commences at verse 14. And so we ask God's blessing on this word. Our Heavenly Father, we thank Thee in the name of the Son of God for the privilege of opening Thy book.

We bless Thee for this word Thou hast given to us, that Thou hast not left us in darkness, Father, to be confused and carried about by the babble of human voice and opinion, but hast given us Thy word.

And so tonight we pray Thee to honor the word, to glorify Thy Son. We roll upon thyself, O mighty God, the burden of this service, and pray Thee, uphold thou thy servant, that thy servant may uphold thy Son.

Amen. Now, after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel.

I believe that one of the most interesting books a person could ever read, one that would be filled with humor and one that would be a real education, would be a book composed of the first sermons of all of the preachers in the world.

I never will forget when I established my reputation one December night in 1948, when I mounted to the platform with a whole handful of paper, and must to Europe for forty-five minutes. That's the reason it's so hard for me to quit now every night.

I got started off on the wrong foot. But you know, I have the notes to that sermon at home in my book, and sometimes I get them out and look at them, and I would not dare. I would never have the nerve to try to preach that sermon again.

I believe a book of first sermons would be very, very interesting indeed. Now tonight, with your kind permission, I would like for us to consider together the first sermon of the greatest of all the preachers who ever lived in this world.

And the first thing we notice about this man's sermon is its brevity. No comfort nor consolation for long-winded brethren who have no sense of value whatever concerning time. It's only six words long.

It is pointed, personal, pertinent, and it's powerful, and it's right square between a man's eyes. Notice these words of the Son of God in the latter part of verse 15, "...repent ye, and believe the gospel.".

Two very simple points which proves to me that while some of my brethren may laboriously lay out their sermons with all these A's and little b's and Roman numerals that I can't read above ten anyway, and these little letters underneath them are just a little superfluous, the Son of God had a very simple outline, only two points.

The first sermon he ever preached, and it simply said, "...repent ye, and believe the gospel.". Now, there are many wonderful things we can learn from this first sermon of the Lord Jesus Christ. For example, those of us who preach the blessed gospel message can thank God that it is a proclamation.

When we preach the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, that he was crucified for our sins according to the scriptures, that he was buried and raised again the third day according to the scriptures, we are proclaiming to you the good news of the salvation of God through faith in the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and so the gospel is a proclamation.

It is also a declaration. We read in Paul's epistle to the Romans, chapter 1, that the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is a declaration or establishment of the righteousness of God, for never in the annals of human history was God ever declared to be more righteous than when he himself exacted the penalty of our sins when he plunged the soul of divine judgment into the bosom of his only begotten Son.

And we need to remember that a full and a free and eternal salvation was never offered to the likes of you and me at the expense of the infinite righteousness of God. So the gospel of Jesus Christ is a proclamation of the love of God.

It is a declaration of the righteousness of God, but it is also an invitation, for we always invite you to come and receive the Son of God as your Lord and your Savior. But now, while the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is a proclamation, a declaration, and an invitation, the burden of my message at this particular point, and what I want you to get at this, is that the text of the sermon of the Son of God very definitely teaches us that the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ carries with it all the force of a very definite and deliberate command.

Notice, there is no sense of wavering. It's in the emphatic sense. Repent ye and believe the gospel. And while God condescends to reason, as we read in the Old Testament in Isaiah 118, come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord.

Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red, they shall be as crimson. They shall be as warm. Now let's remember that. God invites people to come to Him and to reason with Him.

And in Matthew 11, 28, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. God condescends to reason, God condescends to invite, but the gospel message of the Lord Jesus Christ still, and never you forget this for one moment, carries with it the dignity and the force of a command.

The Love of God, Judgment, and the Cross

Repent ye and believe the gospel. You know, there's nothing I had rather preach than the love of God. I don't believe that all the hellfire and brimstone preaching that all the preachers in the world could have preached would ever touch this poor heart of mine.

But at the age of twenty-seven, when I learned for the first time in my life that the God in heaven, whom I despised and did not believe in, loved me enough to give His Son to die for me on a shameful cross, it broke this heart of mine.

And the love of God completely pulverized all of my resistance to the gospel of Jesus Christ. And overwhelmed with a sense of my unworthiness in the light of such love as that, God commended His love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

The Bible says, if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son. Hating Him with all of my heart, and He loving me with all of His, and the love of God outshone the hatred of my own soul.

And He chased me down in my sins, and He broke my resistance with the story of His love. And from that day to this, I have reveled in preaching the love of God. But I'll tell you one thing I've learned in my experience as a gospel preacher, that if we are not careful in the proclamation of the word of the Lord Jesus Christ, that we are apt to put more emphasis on the love of God than we are the judgment.

And many women get the idea that they can take an option on the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I want tonight, by the mercy of God, to dispel all such thoughts from your mind. And I want to tell you tonight, on the authority of the word of God, that you have no option on the cross of Jesus Christ.

The option belongs to God. So far as I can tell, on the authority of the word of God, God is not obligated to save the first sinner of Adam's race. I realize this. The Bible says it's a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am saved.

This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation, yes. The Son of Man had come to seek and to save that which was lost. But nevertheless, if the first soul had never trusted Jesus Christ its Savior, God would have been glorified in the cross of Jesus Christ and would have lived resplendent throughout the countless ages of eternity in heaven, victorious over all of the forces of evil.

And so an overemphasis on the love of the character of God leads some men and women to think, well, if God loves me that much, someday when it's convenient and I haven't got anything else to do, I think I'll get saved.

Now, they take an option on the cross of Jesus Christ. They take an option of God's salvation. Let me give you an illustration of what I'm trying to get across to you. Back in the old days, they used to call it earnest money.

Now they call it an option. If a man saw a piece of property he wanted to buy and it had a thousand dollars value attached to it, he'd say to the man, I'm not sure whether I want it or not, but I'll tell you what I'll do.

I'll put down fifty dollars earnest money. Now, that meant that he was intending to buy it. If he changed his mind later on, he only gave up his fifty dollars and he had no more concern about the property.

And so sinners, because they have preached to them the love of God, the love of God, the love of God, they say, well, Lord, I intend to be saved someday. And some might buy their bedside. They may even go so far as to make a sort of a pact with the Lord and upon their bended knee offer Him a prayer in the form of option money.

Oh, Lord, someday I surely, sincerely intend to be saved. Offer their knees, they go and make their merry way with never any real intention of receiving Jesus Christ as their Savior. And all they're doing is putting their earnest money on the gospel of Jesus Christ.

But I want to tell you this. Now, listen very clearly and get this down. I believe without a shadow of a doubt, I am theologically correct, and it might seem almost screwy to hear the gospel preachers say this, but I believe that we can almost say that the salvation of sinners was almost incidental.

The main thing involved in the cross of Jesus Christ was the glory of God the Father. The Son often felt by the eternal Spirit without God as a lamb without thought. And the death of Jesus Christ gave God a victory over Satan, over the sin-questioned, and when the Son of God shed His blood upon the cross, it enabled God in a future day yet to come to erase sin in its entirety from His unicorn and to reign God-blessed over all forever after sin is absolutely eliminated from His creation.

All of that rests upon the cross of Jesus Christ. And if the first poor, trembling sinner of Adam's race had never bowed his knees to the Son of God, God would have been glorified at the cross because the option on the cross belonged to God and not the sinner.

The Urgency of Salvation and the Danger of Delay

Now is the accepted time, the Bible says. The whole now is a day of salvation. Tomorrow is a day of judgment in the Word of God. And I want to warn you and wake you up. Don't take an option on the cross of Jesus Christ.

You may die and go to hell with your heart filled with good intentions, for the option belongs to God. Remember that, sinner. The option is God's. Two, the blessed avenger goes forth calm. Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.

That's true. God is ready and willing and able and longing to save you. But you have no claim from the cross of Jesus Christ. The claim is God. The only claim you and I have is the claim upon hell because the wages of sin is there.

But God in His mercy is willing to save any man, woman, boy or girl in this auditorium tonight. And so remember that. When the Son of God says, repent ye and believe the gospel, He wants you to know that it's a serious thing to put off the salvation of yourself.

Why God Commands Everyone to Repent

Now I want to give you tonight two reasons why you must repent. Will you turn with me, please, first of all to the book of the Acts, chapter 17. And very, very pointedly here in the story of Paul's sermon on Mars Hill in the city of Athens, Paul was left there at Athens, or he was waiting for his companions to catch up with him.

And when he saw this city of Athens given wholly to idolatry, his spirit was literally boiling within him. He had been walking about through the city and he saw first one idol and then another. And these poor ignorant Athenians were so dishonest of not defending any of the gods, and they had a multiplicity of them, that some of them ran an altar unto the unknown God so they wouldn't leave out any of them and offend them.

And so as Paul was passing through the city, he saw an altar to the unknown God. Now notice in verse 22, here we have Paul preaching in the 17th chapter of the book of the Acts. Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill and said, You men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious.

And I understand on very good authority that the word superstitious is correctly translated religious. And if that isn't the trouble with men and women today, I don't know what it is. They're too religious, but they're not saved.

And these ignorant heathens were so steeped in their idolatry, they were too filled with their superstitions and their religion. Now in the context of Paul's sermon, he goes on and labors at least to tell them that God is not a god that can be confined to things that you make with your hands.

Now notice in verse 30, he gets to the very heart of his message. He says to them here, the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent. And so the first reason you must repent is because God commands it.

Now, you know, there are a lot of people today who talk about keeping the commandments. I had a man say to me once, If you keep the Ten Commandments, you'll go to heaven. I said, That's exactly right.

If you keep them, there's no doubt about it, you'll make it. But I don't know that you're going to keep them, and I've never known anybody that did except the Lord Jesus Christ himself. If you're here tonight, and you believe that keeping the commandments gets you to heaven, I want to ask you this.

Have you kept this one? God commands you to repent, and this is a commandment. Have you kept it? No, but I believe if you keep the Ten Commandments, you'll go to heaven. But God says, I command you to repent.

Have you kept that one? Now, I want you to notice this. He says, The times of this ignorance God winked at. In the margin of your Bible, if you have a scope here, you'll notice it says God overlooked it.

Why? Well, I believe it's simply this. Because God had not given the human race sufficient light in those days, but now that light has come, ignorance is no longer excusable in the sight of God. We read in John's Gospel, chapter 1, in verse 9, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ, he was that true light that came into the world to light up every man.

In that, the perfect light, the sinless humanity of the Lord Jesus was a light that revealed to every man the fact that he had sinned and was coming short of God's standard. For the perfect light of Christ is the standard of God that he has set.

He expects nothing from any of us but a life of perfection, and we cannot render it. And so the Lord Jesus was that true light that came into the world to light up every man. In John's Gospel, chapter 8, in verse 12, Jesus said, I am the light of the world.

He that cometh to thee shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. In the days of that ignorance, because God had not given them sufficient light, God winked at it, or he overlooked it.

But now that Jesus has come into the world and showed people what God expects, and has gone to the cross and died for them, and been raised from the dead, and is alive in the glory of God's right hand to save them, and to give them his Holy Spirit, and to give them the power to live the life that God expects, God says, all right, no excuse.

I command you to repent. He overlooked it, see, because there was not sufficient light. All right, you say to me, well, where does the force of such a commandment come from? What is the driving power behind it?

All right, notice in verse 31, please, and look. The force of this command here is stated very clearly. Because he hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man, Jesus Christ, whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.

And when God commands all men everywhere to repent, the force behind the command to repent, it lies in the fact that Jesus Christ has been resurrected from the dead, which guarantees the resurrection of every human being that ever lived.

In 1 Corinthians 15, 22, for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. And in verse 23, but every man in his own order, Christ the first one. I ask you, what does it belong to Christ at his coming?

And so the force behind this command to all men to repent and to turn from their sins is the resurrection of Jesus Christ, guaranteeing the resurrection of every human being that has ever died, followed by the subsequent judgment of all of those who refuse to obey the divine edict and will not repent.

That's the force behind the command, see? God raises the Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and the power and the insoluble life of Christ the God ascended into the glory, and with the keys of death and hell, thank you to this girl, triumphant, victorious over sin, grave, death, and hell and Satan.

And God has given him authority over all flesh. And this is the assurance, it says in verse 31, that God gives that all will be judged who refuse to repent. That's the force behind the command, not my preaching.

It's a resurrected Christ at God's right hand, who is coming back someday to put his enemies down under his feet and to destroy them with the breath of his mouth. And there's the force, dear friend, behind this commandment.

And reason number one why you must repent, the God of the heaven commands you to repent and raised his son Jesus Christ from the dead and gave him authority to judge you if you don't repent. There's the command.

Repentance as an Absolute Necessity for Salvation

Now, that's the fourth commandment, you see. Now, that's reason number one. Now, reason number two is found in Luke's gospel this time, chapter 13. Would you like to turn to that? Now, remember reason number one why you must repent?

God commands it. Reason number two is this. Because it is an absolute necessity to salvation, regardless of one's moral condition, whether you are an Apanajah or a Dananoth, whether you are base and immoral, or whether your life is absolutely exemplary, whether your life is beyond any criticism whatever, the Bible says that none are excused from the necessity of repentance.

The authority, the Lord Jesus Christ. Luke's gospel 13. Now, look at these verses, will you? In verse 1, there were present at that season some that told him of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.

Now, these fiery Galileans, you remember? Simon Peter was a Galilean. You remember how tempestuous he was in his makeup, how quick he was to act? They were fire and a zealous kind of people. But according to this story, apparently, they were offering up their sacrifices one day, and Pilate's soldiers swooped down upon them, and he mingled their blood with their own sacrifices.

And the people said, my, those Galileans must have been terrible sinners to suffer such a fate. But Jesus said in verse 2, will you look at it? Answering and said unto them, suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans because they suffered such a fate?

I tell you, no, but unless ye repent ye shall likewise perish. See it? Now, you know, straight to say, just as we were trying to emphasize on Sunday night, there are some people who think that only murderers and robbers and harlots and thieves and crooks in the penitentiary are sinners, there are some who think that only murderers, robbers and thieves need to repent.

But Jesus said to these, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Now, he brings before us a very interesting story, beginning in verse 3. Verse 4, Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem.

Most interesting story. I searched my Bible in vain and I can't find anywhere that tells us about this incident. The Son of God just refers to it. Evident it might have been at lunchtime one day and these men locked off work to eat their sandwiches.

They were sitting in the shade of the tower of Siloam. And for no known reason at all, the tower all of a sudden fell upon them and asked all eighteen of them to repent. Well, right away throughout all the environs of Jerusalem went the word.

Did ye hear about the eighteen men upon whom the tower of Siloam fell? What wicked and godless sinners they must have been. But what did the Lord Jesus say? Do you suppose these men were sinners above any of the other people in Jerusalem?

No! But I tell you this, except ye repent, ye shall likewise perish, just as they did. Oh, beloved sinner, don't you see it tonight? Repentance is of absolute essential. Regardless of whether you consider yourself to be a sinner or not, the Bible says you must repent.

You might think that you are good enough to get to heaven as you are, but the divine edict has been established. The Son of God uttered the words Himself, He who is God in the body of human flesh and shall not be alive.

Hath he not spoken and shall he not be done? Except ye repent, ye shall likewise perish. Now, I want to ask you a question. Never mind I ask you if you were saved, and not tonight, I want to ask you this.

Have you repented? Have you? The Lord Jesus Christ says unless you do, you are going to perish, doesn't He? Do you believe the words of the Son of God? Do you? All right. Unless you repent, you are going to perish.

Well, you say, well, I believe what you say, but I am not quite sure whether I have repented or not. And that just takes us right into point number two. What is repentance? In the Bible, sense of the word.

Biblical Repentance and the Difference Between Sorrow and Salvation

I think this is a very important thing, because Jesus said, except you repent, you will perish. God has said, I command all men everywhere to repent. Whether a man or a woman goes through some sort of spiritual experience, which is anything short of repentance, they are going to go to hell just the same.

And don't you forget that. They might have a reasonable facsimile. Satan might give them an experience and call it repentance. But if it is not the Bible repentance, Jesus said you will perish. What is it?

That is a big question. But the Bible has the answer. Thank God for the book. You know, I am beginning to love this book. When you have heard all the nonsense I have heard, and all the nonsense preaching I have heard, and all these terrible experiences people have, I thank God when you turn away from all that stuff and just look right into God's Word and see what does it mean to repent.

What does the word repentance, what does it mean? Now, you know, I believe this, that irregardless of whatever section of the country you are in, whenever you mention the word repentance, people's minds immediately turn to tears and to the morning stage.

Now, you will agree with me on that, won't you? When I mention the word repentance, what was the first thing that passed through your mind? Tears, weeping, wailing, and the mourners' binks. Am I right?

Why? Who created this image of repentance? Where did this begin at? Does the Bible substantiate it? Well, I want to tell you this, that the mourners' binks, that the tears and that sighing and sorrow may all accompany true repentance, but it is never a sure sign.

And don't you forget that. And the reason for that is, because there are two kinds of sorrow. Remember that. Now, to show you where they are, turn in your Bible, please, to 2 Corinthians chapter 7, and let us see what the Word of God has to say about the kind of repentance that gets a man to heaven.

Now, you know the strange thing we learn from 2 Corinthians 7, that there is a repentance, now get this, there is a repentance that needs to be repented of, just like sin. And it's plainly stated right here, there is a repentance that needs to be repented of.

Notice in verse 10 of 2 Corinthians 7, For godless sorrow worketh repentance to salvation, not to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world worketh gas. Now, let me repeat that. Godless sorrow, or sorrow toward God, worketh repentance, which leads to salvation.

You see it? And you don't have to repent of that kind of repentance, but the sorrow of the world worketh death. Now, there are two kinds of sorrow, and the reason so many people have been fooled by Satan into believing they have repented and believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and are saved is because they got the sorrow of the world confused with sorrow toward God.

Now, what I'm trying to say to you is, and I'm going to put it in language now that I believe you'll be able to understand, remorse, or so-called repentance in tears and regret, is often simply mistaken for repentance when it's only the result of getting caught.

Man got caught. That's what he's crying about. Well, let me give you an example. Here's a man who frequently bends the elbow, and I talked to one of the poor wrong heads a week or so ago, and he confessed to me that if I was living in it and drink, and he was going to kill me, I wouldn't be a bit interested in giving it up.

And I go into the hospital, and I see this man lying there with his bell like a barrel, dozzled with cirrhosis of the liver, dying from alcohol, and he's weeping and wailing and mourning. And I open my Bible, and I try and get truth from him.

There's one verse of Scripture that man has a block in his mind that even the Holy Ghost cannot penetrate at that particular time. He's concerned about his stomach, or about his pain. He's weeping and mourning and wailing and gnashing his teeth.

He's sorry, but he's not sorry he's sinned against God. He's sorry his sin is corrupt with him, and he's just very proud, and that's all he's concerned about. That kind of sorrow, the Bible says, worketh death.

Now, there are many people. For example, you may have a meeting like this. And some young man or some young lady, you may come down at the end of a meeting, all torn all to pieces in tears, and you talk to them, and you show them a way of salvation, or profess to be saved, and you'll watch them.

There may not be any change in their life, and a little later on, you'll find out that they had been fighting at home, or it was behind an excitement payment. He was about to lose his car. The bill collector was worried for death.

He was about to lose his job. No repentance toward God. Look, world is sorrow. Sorrow that his sin has finally caught up with him. And the Bible says it worketh death. Death. That's the kind of repentance, Sonny, you need to be repenting of, just like your wickedness of any other kind.

That kind of repentance is wickedness. The kind of repentance you need is sorrow toward God, and a realization that I've sinned against thee, O God. I've sinned against thee. I've broken thy law. That's the kind of repentance that leads you unto salvation, and you don't have to worry about repenting of that kind of repentance, because that will end you on the streets of heaven.

Repentance Is Known by Its Fruits

Now, let me illustrate this to you. To show you the absolute fallacy of this prevailing idea that there has to be tears and remorse and emotion in connection with God's repentance. I'm going to give you three men, just very briefly.

The first one's name is Paul. None of these known to any of you here. The first man's name was Paul, had been attending the service of the gospel center for several years. He had a terrible habit of drinking.

And so he came out one Sunday night, and he heard the gospel message, and he apparently got so in the conviction that he went home, and weeping like a baby, he locked himself in his bathroom and without coming out.

His wife went and knocked on the barricade door. She said, Paul, what in the world is wrong with you? He says, I'm lost. I'm going to hell. Well, come on out of the bathroom. I'm afraid. If I step through the door, I'll punch you in the head with a bell.

Go call the priest. I'm telling him to come. Brother Dettweiler went and talked to him, took the word of God, and opened it and showed him the way of salvation. And he trusted Christ. Well, he was the happiest looking man you ever saw.

Would you say he repented? Less than six weeks later, he was arrested for public drunkenness, lying in the front yard of a house two blocks from the chapel. Number two, his name was Lawrence. He came to the meeting rather intermittently, like so many people do.

They get interested and then wear off. They get interested and they come back. And so he'd been gone for a year. And so he came in one Sunday morning, and I noticed him sitting over there. I was over in the audience.

I forget who was preaching. But the meeting was dismissed, one from the rest sobbing like a baby. And I was so happy to see him, I went over and put my arm around his shoulder. I said, Dear Lawrence, can I do something for you?

He says, Worth, I'm lost and going to hell. Please show me how to be saved. And so after I got him quietened down, I took the word of God and showed him how to be saved. He professed to receive the Lord Jesus Christ, and he showed real signs of life.

And I nursed him. I went to his house. Every time I could catch him home, I'd read a scripture to him. I'd pray with him. I'd just try to do anything, anything, like what's tomorrow. And I believe there are many professing Christians tonight who are dead babies.

Dead babies! They've had a spiritual gas. They thought God was an aspirin tablet. There's fear that's caught up with them. They're looking for a way out, a state prison is all it is. And they're a consortium of things.

And they're about finished, and you know it. Number three. This boy's name was Lewis. I worked with Lewis, drank whiskey out of the same bottle with him. He's a brother of mine, and I used to work together on construction work.

All cut out of the same piece of saw. And I preached to Lewis. And he got apparently on a conviction, and he was told about it. He'd been on a chain gang when he was 16 years old. Had scars on his ankle, worn the bracelet around his ankle while he was working in a chain gang.

He had breath from 16 years old. And so he came to the meeting for a year, two years, three years. One morning, Brother McKay was preaching. The day before that, I'd seen Lewis at Sears Road box. You know what he did?

He came up to me, just like this. He says, What? Tomorrow, I'm coming down and going up. I said, You don't do what? You do what? He said, Well, I'm coming down and going up. Well, what do you mean? What do you mean, I'm coming down to church?