The Rambling Man and the Tornado

AS I THOUGHT ON MY WAY 59-0610

  E-22    Some time ago a young colored boy rushed into the meeting when the altar call was being made. He come from the outside. And he come up, and he said, "I want to become a Christian tonight." "Why, certainly, we're always glad to see that." And said, "The reason I want to become a Christian, I've been a rambler." And said, "I was out rambling around once, and--up in the north woods," and said, "I got without money." And said, "I hired myself to a lumber camp where there was an aged colored woman that done the cooking, and I was going to assist her and--and then to wash dishes and so forth for her, to get enough money to go on." Said, "We slept in a little back room with a large piece of canvas to separate her part from my part." And said, "One night with my head under the cover, I was awakened by voices that was speaking loud by my window. And I pulled my head out from under the cover," and he said, "I heard one man say, 'Jim, let's hurry back to the cabin as quick as we can, because we may be swept completely into eternity in the next few moments, for that tornado is headed right this way.'"

  E-23    Said, "Then I could not but wonder when I jumped to the window and looked and seen that long funnel shaped cloud, and just one constant blast of thunder and lightening. And see when the lightning, the trees rooting up, and that great long serpent tail was coming right towards our cabin." Said, "I heard the canvas rake, and the aged old woman said, 'Son, come over on my side; I've got a lantern lit here.'" And said, "I went over, and she said, 'Are you a Christian?'" Said, "I said, 'No, I'm not a Christian.'"

Said, "Did you ever pray?" Said, "No, I've never prayed." Said, "Well, you better be praying, for these twisters lay everything flat on the ground."

  E-24    Said, "Reverend, I got down by the side of that old woman on that little box where the lantern set. But I was too scared to pray." He said, "I couldn't get my thinking right." And he said, "Every time I'd start to pray, a tree would root up and slam against the cabin; the windows would go out." He said, "I was too scared to pray." He said, "And now, the only thing I could do was sit and watch that calm old saint with not a bit more worry of nothing in the world, constantly speaking to Somebody that she was acquainted with." And I said, "Lord, I'm too scared to pray. But if--if You'll just let me live, I will pray after this."

  E-25    You see, it takes trouble sometimes to make us realize, to turn our hopes to God, turn ourselves over to Him. I believe it was Job who thought on his ways, and he wanted to make them sure, not only on his ways, but his children's ways. And he come God's only way that God ever did make for man, the burnt offering and under the blood. Many of you are sure that... You have read the story of Job. And he said, "My children's been out having parties. And peradventure they have sinned; I'll make an offering for them." He wanted to be sure while he was normally and right.

  E-26    You know I think if mothers and fathers tonight in this fair land of ours, if they spent more time on their knees praying, bringing their children to God through prayer, instead of out in these parties drinking and running around, we'd have less juvenile delinquency.