Called to Preach?
Throughout my elementary and junior high education math was my strongest (and easiest) subject, and writing was my poorest subject. This trend continued through high school.
High School
I took every math course taught in my high school. All grading periods and all exams in math courses had the same grade, A. However, I seldom got an A in English. During the last semester of English Composition my senior year, I decided to try my best on the term paper, a major part of the grade. I tried my hardest to see if I could make an A. I worked on it weeks in advance, finishing it far ahead of the deadline so I could go over and over it. I got a B+. Math was fun and easy because the “rules” were always the same, but English composition was filled with “exceptions” that I could seldom remember. I could spell quite well, and I could write in complete sentences, but grammar and punctuation had too many exceptions.
Preaching
At some time during my last couple of years of high school I attended revival meetings at the other church on our charge. At the end of one of the meetings I responded to another invitation, and after praying at the altar, I felt God calling me to some special form of full-time Christian service. I knew of only two kinds of such service, and those were pastor or missionary. At that time I gave testimony to being called to preach, and I began moving in that direction. I chose to go to a Christian college to prepare for seminary.
At that time the church made a practice of asking people called to preach to speak in an evening service. I did this several times. Then during a time of doubt I was asked to preach and tried to develop a sermon, but my doubt about the Bible being God’s word was so great that I could not bring myself to speak when the time came. From the pulpit, I told the congregation about my doubts and asked the people to come pray for me at the altar. As people gathered around me, I found I could not trust what members of my family said because they had told me that someone we could not see (Santa Claus) was real, and that was not true. Finally, a visitor that evening, Ollie McCoy, said something that made sense to me. “The Bible cannot be the words of good people because it says it is God’s word. It cannot be the words of evil people because it condemns them to hell. So it must be God’s word.” Although I could give a more sophisticated answer now, that convinced me then, and it is still a good answer.
Missions
Also about that time some people in our church began a WGM Prayer Band, something that would be expected with the relatives of both the Abbotts and the Belknaps attending there. I attended, not because I sensed any call to missionary service, but because Christians were supposed to pray for the lost.
In 1959 several members of my mother’s family went to Detroit to greet Uncle George’s family when they landed at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Before this they had traveled to and from Burundi by ship, but this time we could greet them when they landed. As soon as my grandmother saw her son (George) get off the plane, she went running out onto the tarmac to embrace the son she had not seen during the last four years. Security then was quite different from now, and no one even tried to stop her. Then the whole family went to another aunt’s house in Detroit for a wonderful reunion, and I got to see my cousins again.
College
When I left for college later in 1959, Grandpa Ben gave me a drawing of a young man in a very small sail boat with one triangular sail on which “EDUCATION” was written. The man’s hand was on the handle to the rudder. “BIBLE” was written on that rudder. The caption said, “Give her all the sail she’ll take, Lad. Just keep a firm grip on the rudder.” That has been a great influence for the rest of my life including everything from getting a PhD to writing material for my websites.
As a freshman I took a year of classical Greek in preparation for seminary. I was also required to take a year of Freshman Composition. By some odd twist of fate I tested into Section A (the highest one) of Composition. Since I could not write well, I decided to try a different way to get my “A.” Miss Taylor, an elderly lady apparently could not see well at all. I sat in the front row every day to be sure that she could see that I was there. I made it a point to answer at least one question every day. I tried to look interested in all that was going on in the class.
Miss Taylor called roll at the beginning of each class, and each one there answered, “Present.” After she finished calling roll, the guys in the back row often climbed out the window! The class was held on the ground floor of the building, and the ground was only about six inches below the window sill. I do not believe I ever missed the class—I got my A (but I still did not know how to write).
During my sophomore year I took another year of New Testament Greek in further preparation for seminary. In addition I took the second course in General Psychology and was fascinated by it. That was the beginning of my major in psychology. A major in psychology seemed to be a good choice because pastors can use it both in interacting with parishioners in general and in counseling those with problems specifically. I was pre-enrolled in seminary during this time.
One of the highlights of the psychology course was how we used it on our professor, Dr. Paul McNeely. The course was offered during winter quarter at 11:00 AM, just before lunch at noon. Many of us wanted to get out of class early so that we could beat the crowd descending on the cafeteria as soon as classes were dismissed at 11:50. We had studied about classical conditioning and soon noticed that Dr. McNeely was no longer dismissing class when the bell rang, but he did so when students began putting their coats on.
Applying our new knowledge about stimuli and responses we used the new stimulus of putting on coats. We designated a person sitting in the center of the front row to put on his coat earlier and earlier before the bell rang at 11:50, and we all followed by putting our coats on. Over time we ended class at 11:45, 11:40, and 11:35 with no problem. However, one day when he put his coat on a little before 11:30 and we followed suit, the chimes on the roof sounded as we were walking out the door—causing him to look at his watch. We never got out of class early again, learning that cognitive variables can overrule conditioned responses.
Bonnie
During my freshman year I was a member of the Ministerial Association on campus, as were a number of other “preacher boys.” One of the ministries of the association was a jail ministry to men and women who were prisoners in nearby cities. Each Sunday morning those going to minister in the jails met on campus for a time of prayer, and then divided into 8-10 groups before leaving. I became the person in charge of the ministry to the Boyle County jail in Danville, about 20 miles away.
The first Sunday of my sophomore year, as we were singing in the jail, I looked down the cell block and noticed a beautiful young lady standing on the steps singing so the women on the second floor could hear and see her. On the way back to Asbury I nudged my roommate, pointed to one of the young ladies in the back seat, and said softly, “I’m going to date that girl.” Our first date was the next Saturday night—and we married when she graduated four years later. She went to one jail service, got a husband, and never went to another jail service.
Of course, that developing relationship influenced me in several ways relative to missions. When I found out that she attended Foreign Missions Fellowship (FMF) Saturday afternoons, I also began attending as well. She also attended the WGM Student Involvement group in a home near the campus. Neither of us felt any call to missions, but supporting missionaries would become part of our lives.