He still begged me to go with him and talk with the poor woman as well.
“Will you promise to be the legal father of those children the first chance you get?” I urged.
“Yes, I will do anything,” he said, and there was agony in his voice, “for I shall die in this state and be lost.”
“Then the Lord will convert you on credit,” I said. The poor man was made happy right there. A short time after, when an ordained minister came up, he married five such couples.
We had some wonderful testimonies during these meetings.
One night a man got up and said: “I came here with my neighbor to scoff. But as the meeting went on he said to me, ‘Jim, let’s get out of this; it is too hot.’ ‘No,’ I said, ‘let’s stick it out.’ And now, friends,” he continued, “I wish you would pray for me; I want to find this religion you speak about.”
Another old man testified and said: “I was a soldier in the Russian war, and one time was called up to be court-martialled for being drunk and disorderly. All I had done was to sing a little ditty in the presence of my chief officer, and he thought I was drunk. When the investigation was held, my character in the past was examined. They looked up the records and said, ‘Sergeant H— has a clean sheet, he has never been before the court in the past, let him go free.’ My friends, when this revival commenced I felt that I was very wicked, and the sins of my life came before me. But now, bless God, I have got a clean sheet; Sergeant H— is forgiven through the blood of the Lamb.”
Another poor man, who had been an Independent in England, said: “When these meetings commenced I thought, ‘What are these people making so much fuss about? I am a member of an Independent church, and I am good enough.’ But the Spirit of God showed me how far I had wandered, and now I am at the feet of Jesus and trusting in God alone for salvation.”
A quaint Roman Catholic Irishman attended the meetings and used to give his testimony: “Be jabbers! you are the best praste that ivver came to these rayjans,” he would say. “No praste ivver blessed the paypul like you have. I wish the dear man would stay wid us and get some young gurrls to come here, and then mesilf and some others of the poor b’ys might get a wife.” (He was a bachelor, and remained one.)
One day during the revival a fellow came to the door and asked the kind lady of the house for Crosby. She said, “Come in.” “No,” said he, “I want to see Crosby out here.” I was called to the outer door, where I met a man who, like many of his neighbors, was living a wicked life, and thus setting a very bad example to the poor dark pagan Indians.