The preachers I've known over the years have been key influences in my life. Two that always come to mind when I think about that are Arnold B. and Virgil F. Reverend B. was the pastor of the church I attended in college. I spent a lot of time with him, at his home, in the church, and at various retreats for our college group, the Wesley Foundation.
Arnold was memorable because of his near-white hair, his glasses, and his ready laugh. As a rule, preachers aren't supposed to have much of a sense of humor, but Arnold not only appreciated a good joke, but wasn't beyond telling one, or participating in a prank, himself. I got to know him; his wife, Helen; and his son, Alan, quite well during the four years I spent at Tech. After I left, Brother Arnold was there when I needed help in getting my first job, after I left college/ It was partly because of his influence that I went to seminary, and I'm sure he must have been disappointed when I left after only six weeks. He never mentioned that to me, though, and we parted as good friends. After many years of service, he retired from the ministry, and we still keep in toubh from time to time.
Virgil F. was the pastor of the United Methodist Church at Pikeville, Kentucky, when I first moved there in 1978. He reminded me a lot of Arnold, with the same loving disposition and ready laugh. His daughter Becky was in the youth group I helped lead for a while, and almost a carbon copy of her father in personality. Virgil was replaced as pastor after about three years, a source of some bitteress for me. He died a few years later. As with Arnold, I recall many hours spent with him and his family in their home and at church.
Neither Arnold nor Virgil qualified as "great preachers", and I can't say any of their sermons still stick in my mind. What I remember of both of them, though, is that they, and their families, were consistent in manifesting to me the love of Christ. There can be no better witness.
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Back in 1968, as a country boy from West Virginia, I had barely heard of Acapulco. I don't know as I had even seen any movies featuring it. Our group did not stay at a fancy hotel, but a rather plain one above an isolated patch of beach. Few of my memories are connected with the food or sights we saw there, though we did visit a Go Go club one night.
The memories that stick with me most have nothing to do with beaches or hotels or pretty girls. Walking down to the beach one evening from the hotel, which was on a hill, several vivid images came into my mind. It was a cloudy day, but my thoughts weren't on the weather. Instead, I saw in my mind'e eye a scene in which I was walking back to the beach, after having just been saved from drowning. My friend from my group, Tim, met me as I came out of the water, and said, "There was nothing I could do. I can't swim."
I passed the thoughts off as just another day dream, and continued on down to the beach. My friend Tim was there. I walked out into the water, and off to the left, in the direction of a cliff. All of a sudden, the bottom fell out beneath me, as I stepped into a hole. I could not swin, and I began desperately floundering about. I came back to the surface twice, yelling "Help!" when my head came above the surface. There was no time to think that I might die. After what seemed a proverbial eternity, I felt hands grasping me, and a couple of grinning Mexicans who had been swimming nearby got me back to the bearh.
As I got back to the beach, my friend Tim came out to meet me. He said, "There was nothing I could do. I can't swim." When I got back to the hotel, life never seemed brighter.
I know I have an appointed time to be with the Lord. It was not that day. I don't know why the Lord gave me the vision of those events to me, since it was not of avoiding the danger, but of being saved out of it. Premonitions are something I have mixed feelings about, since the knowledge can come from the wrong sources, but I have no doubt that they are real.