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Old 11-30-2016, 02:48 PM   #12
tentmaker
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Join Date: Nov 2016
Location: West of the Missouri
Posts: 19
Default Re: The Gospel of my salvation ...

3a) I need to add some more to the post which I spoke of concerning the missionary family:

Let me say this first: I'm not wanting to tell sea stories here, but some of the things I experienced in my youth had some effect on me to this day. I did not realize this until lately. Since I have retired I have more time to think about things in my life without having my head all crammed full of other things. In other words time to think about how did I get to where I am today?

As I said earlier my parents lived in a small mobile home park but later, as my dad did a bit better, we moved to a nicer one close by. In 1968 another missionary family moved in to the trailer next door. They were a husband and wife with their grandson, Lee K. (I thought about changing his name so it is not confused with WL, but won’t). Lee was a couple years older than me. He had epilepsy and was mostly home schooled. I was in high school at the time and we became friends. One night after school we were hanging out in my dad’s new car, a used car actually but new to us. Lee pulled out a bible and read to me from Matt 24. (Lee was under 20 years old at the time, and thinking about it now, things like this do not happen very often or not that I’m aware of). I had read the bible before but not that part, or so it seemed. Matt 24 provides some details of the environment existing on earth before Lord’s return in the last days. Lee shared that with me, reading each verse and telling me that the Lord is coming soon, that these verses say so. It sure seemed that way. The headline news of the day seemed to confirm it as well. Lee said he thought the Lord would return before 1970 and to get ready. I remember thinking I did not want him to return so fast as I wasn’t ready (not so sure if I’m ready even now). I would read that chapter again and again to make sure that those things were really so. Around 48/46 years have come and gone since then. One verse in Matt 24 that sobers me is verse 40 … “one shall be taken and the other left”

Around that time a group of missionaries moved to, and lived on, some acreage near to where we lived. Lee and his grandparents soon moved there. Tim and his parents moved there as well, in their humble old motor home. I would visit them and got to know some of the missionary brothers there. I do not recall hearing any of denomination or any name promoted or exalted, except the name of Jesus. I think some of them worked with the orphanages in Mexico. They were good people, good brothers, and they treated me right. One day a scorpion stung one of them. They gathered around the person and prayed over him, next thing you know the wound healed as if nothing happened. To me it was - Wow!! (and they didn’t need Obamacare)

In 1973, Timo invited me to spend a week with him and his parents down in Mexico, about 45-50 miles south of the border. There they lived off of a dirt road a few miles from the main highway in a very humble home with an older Mexican sister named Grandma whom they loved and took care of. They had meetings with the people of the village at that house at certain times of the week. Whosoever would come was welcome to come. Sometimes they even fed them. I quickly found out that their habit was, in the mornings, to get in the word and have some prayer before breakfast and, in the evenings, the same before going to bed. The first night they lent me a bible and we read something from Hebrews. A couple comments were made about the text and then we prayed some. I wasn’t very good at it so they mainly did the praying. Timo’s mom prayed something very softly but she was not speaking English, nor did I think it was Spanish. They all spoke fluent Spanish. The next morning Timo wanted to take me for a hike, so as we get ready to leave he hands me a hat and a rifle. I asked him what was the rifle was for. He said we’d need them in case we ran into any coyotes or rattlesnakes. He said the coyotes would come down and get the chickens, but not to worry we’d be ok. He showed me how to use the rifle, then he put the safety on and told me not to take it off unless he said so. While on the hike I asked him what language his mom was speaking during her prayer. He said he didn’t know, she had a gift from the Lord and sometimes that’s how she spoke when she prayed. Oh, okay, it was a gift. I knew nothing about that sort of thing. Later I wondered if she was praying for me and didn’t want me to know about it. I surely needed it. My hair was down to my shoulders and I was wild and scruffy looking. At that point in my life I didn’t care.
I never knew who sponsored or supported them. They never said “we’re this” or “we’re that” or “we meet on this ground”. But they talked much about Jesus to whom they lived for and served. There’s much more I’d like to share about this family but I’ll leave it right here.

In 1981, The company I worked for hired a young man and they put him to work close to me. I soon found out that he was a devout Pentecostal. A Holy Roller. Everything in his life seemed to be centered on going to meetings, speaking in tongues and having a good time doing it. (Seems a bit familiar except for the ts). He asked me if I’d ever spoke in tongues to which I said no. He became concerned and then told me that I wasn’t saved (he used Mark 16:17 to make his point), that I needed to come to his meeting that night and get the gift of tongues and get saved. To make a long story short I cut off talking to him altogether as the conversations always came back to the gospel of tongue speaking. Later as things calmed down, we just became friends and I left it at that. He had no heart to hear anything that did not pertain to within his circle of meeting.

From these two brief experiences I saw the two sides of tongue speaking. One real and one not so real. Actually it’s not up to me to determine whether they are real or not. The earth is pretty big, there may be more people doing it than we know (real tongue speaking). This was just my experience of it. I myself have never done so, that is, to speak in tongues, and I don't know of anyone who does.



The things I experienced and just shared with you will not fit in LC meeting framework(s) but felt to share it here. I have no desire to make this a case for or case against tongue speaking thread. It's just something I saw is all.
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