MY CONVERSION
When I was a boy of about thirteen, my father said to me one evening at the setting of the sun, "Water the stock." Soon some boys arrived, and, being a real boy, I forgot my work and played.
A little later my father asked, "Have you done what I told you?"
"Yes, father," I replied.
He knew I had not, and I even now recall that he said not a word but walked away in the twilight so burdened and bowed because of hearing a falsehood from his own boy that it suddenly gave him the appearance of an old man. The boys left, and I watered the stock. Then, boy like, I forgot, went to bed and slept. During the next forenoon Mother called me to her and said:
"Do you know your father neither went to bed nor slept all last night?"
I replied, "No, Mother, I do not know. Why didn't he sleep?"
Mother's answer was, "Your father spent all last night praying for you."
My saintly mother's words and tears went through my heart like an arrow and rang like a bell in my ears, and I became powerfully convicted of sin. Just following that a series of revival meetings were held which continued for several weeks. I became a seeker and had no rest until I found it in penitence and a consciousness of pardoned sin. I was the only convert during the meetings, and critics said, "He will backslide in a few weeks. The revival is a failure." But I am here to tell the story that I am still saved by grace.
I could never reward my father for that night of prevailing prayer, but he lived to see me become a minister, a missionary, and to hold the highest position on the mission field, and then the Lord called him to his eternal reward. My mother entered into rest about two years previous to that time.
It is my hope and prayer that the story of my father's night of prevailing prayer may encourage other parents to pray as he did. Parents may not always through prayer be able to break the wills of their children and compel them to surrender to Jesus, but I do believe that my father prayed until God sent such conviction through the Holy Spirit that sin became such an unbearable burden that I gladly yielded my will to the will of my God; prayed until my sins were pardoned, the burden removed, and I was genuinely converted. I firmly believe that the same heavenly Father will hear the cry of other parents, and for their encouragement I leave this testimony concerning God's answer to my father's fervent prayers.
After my conversion I rejoiced many days in the delight of that precious experience. For months I had a real and precious joy in the consciousness of pardoned sin, but after a time I found that I did not have a continuous, abiding peace and rest. There was a longing for something more than it seemed I now possessed. As a boy I tried very hard to be good, and as I look back I believe that I lived a very correct outward life. I lived among a very godly people, who set a high ideal before me, one to which I felt I could not live. I observed my daily prayers, but suffered many an inward defeat.