HOW THE LORD LEADS
Once on my way to Platte, South Dakota, I got lost. I was driving slowly trying to think of where I had gotten off my route—when suddenly a man in a field on a tractor waved me to stop. He climbed over the fence, and here it was Brother Walter Ratzlaf. He said, "How come you are here?" I answered, "I'm lost." "Turn around," he answered, "and we will drive down to the house."
Going to the house, there was a young lady I had known in North Dakota. He introduced her to me as his wife. The last time I had seen them, they were in North Dakota. Both of them were now members of the committee for the young people's convention of North Dakota, which was to convene the following Friday, Saturday and Sunday. George W. Green of Bertha, Minnesota was to have been the guest speaker, but they had just gotten a telegram from him saying that he could not be there. Brother Ratzlaf said, "The Lord must have sent you here. Could you be our guest speaker?" I answered, "Yes, if you want me. I am on my way home, and Brother Green was expecting to meet me at my place, and I was planning on taking him from my home on to the convention." Again, I could see how the Lord directed many times, unbeknowns to me.
A lady brought her sister who was in the last stages of tuberculosis to the camp meeting at Saint Paul Park, Minn. Wife and I prayed for the sick woman and she was instantly healed. So they insisted that I go to their place and hold them a meeting. I was very busy, so it was sometime before I could go. Finally they wrote asking how much I wanted to hold the meeting. I wrote that my carfare round trip was to be $26.50, and I thought I ought to have that much. They answered that they would give me that much, and that much more. I went and started the meeting on Friday evening. The folks I was to stay with lived six miles in the country and we secured the Methodist Church in town for the services. We had two services on Saturday, three on Sunday, two Monday and two Tuesday. Tuesday night they left me in the church. I had coal enough to keep me warm. As I had no money to go to the hotel, the next morning I walked out to their place in the loose snow, arriving about dinner time. I had dinner and that evening they took me to the meeting and left me again. I have no recollection of how I got away from there. It seems to me a family in town, who knew some of my relatives, kept me for a day or two. My carfare, which I still have coming from them as well as the rest, is the only meeting I had held in 52 years on which I had set a price. A brother belonging to another denomination who often attended the services and who was an agent for the Furges Kalls Woolen Mills, Minnesota, whom I met some years later, asked me, "Did you ever get any money from that meeting?" I replied, "I have it all coming," so he gave me five dollars and a pair of seven dollar trousers. That experience was one of the "all things." This was the only time I ever set any price on my ministry.
PRAYER CHANGES THINGS
Brother Masters and I were holding meeting in Hereford, Minnesota. Brother Masters was doing most of the preaching, and I was exhorting and giving the invitations. One evening after he finished preaching, I dismissed the meeting immediately. As we were going to our room between eleven and twelve, he asked, "Why did you not give the altar call tonight?" Then he added, "You did right, but what was the reason?" I answered, "Too much Masters." He replied, "The Lord help me!" and on his knees he went. He stayed there until between three and four o'clock in the morning. The next night I did not need to give an altar call, for the people flocked to the altar of their own accord.
* * * * *
MY FIRST PREACHING TRIP
I was standing in a wagon driving home from Hawick, Minnesota. The Lord spoke to me and said, "I want you to go to Belgrade next Sunday and preach." I replied, "I do not know what to preach." The Lord answered, "You go and open your mouth wide, and I will fill it." I argued that I did not have the money to go. He answered, "I'll tend to that."
When I arrived home from Hawick, there was a letter from an old brother about 80 years of age living at Norway Lake, Minn. He said, "The Lord has been telling me that you ought to go to Belgrade and hold them a meeting, and I am sending you the carfare." So I went.