Chapter I: Part 1

PERSONAL EXPERIENCES

of

S. O. SUSAG

By S. O. SUSAG

Minneapolis, Minnesota

FOREWORD

This book of a few of my experiences is written to show how the pioneer ministers worked, and how the Lord worked with them through his Holy Spirit. One outstanding fact in those days, when even though their training was limited, was their burning passion for souls shown in labors, fasting and prayer, and a heaven-born conviction and zeal for the truth. The Holy Spirit had revealed to them an unshaken faith in the Word of God; a faith that would not waver in the most trying and, to man, surprisingly unreasonable cases. My prayers are that this book will bring faith and encouragement to many a soul who is seeking God for help when all other help has failed.

I should not have waited so long before doing this writing, for because of that waiting the incidents are not written in the order which they should have been, and so many have been forgotten. Since many have indicated an interest in my experiences, may this book as it goes forth in Jesus' name bring honor and glory to God.

--The Author Year 1948

PUBLISHER'S PREFACE

Ever since this book was first published for the author, S. O. Susag, by the Standard Printing Company, Guthrie, Oklahoma, in the year of 1948, it has been in steady demand. These many testimonies of outstanding answers to prayer have been an inspiration of faith to many people, and they will continue to be an encouragement to every earnest and honest seeker for an increase of faith in God's precious promises. "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever." Hebrews 13:8.

In contemplation of printing this fourth edition, the undersigned publisher contacted S. O. Susag's daughter, Mrs. Art Rustand (Goldie Susag), and requested further information about her late father. In February, 1976, she relayed the following notes of interest to the reader:

"My father was born in Steinkjer, Norway, on March 28, 1862. He came from Norway to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and was in the store business for a while. In 1892, they moved to Paynesville, Minnesota, where they engaged in farming. After they moved to the farm he was converted, and in the year of 1895 he received his call from God to the ministry of the Word. He traveled as a missionary to the Scandinavian countries for many years. He also served as pastor in Grand Forks, N. D., and as an evangelist for years. In fact, at the time of his death, which was in Culbertson, Montana, when he was 90 years of age, he was traveling around holding services. His death was attributed to his age. He was up and around until three days prior to his passing. At the time of his death he made his home with his second wife in Medicine Lake, Montana. He died on July 8, 1952, and was buried beside his first wife (my mother) at the Church of God Cemetery near Wendell, Minnesota."

--Lawrence D. Pruitt Guthrie, Oklahoma, March 8, 1976

"And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them and not forsake them." (Isa. 42:16). This Scripture seems to fit into my life's experiences.

I was born in Norway. My parents were Lutherans. When I was two years of age an incident occurred which I have never forgotten. It was this: My Grandmother on my mother's side--a very godly woman--used to visit us at least once a month.

On the occasion to which I refer, as she was about to leave us, Grandmother said to my mother, "Ellen, I would like to speak to you 'under four eyes' (that is to say, privately). Does the child understand anything that is said?" Her reply was, "No, he doesn't understand." Then Grandmother proceeded to say, "I have been wondering what would be the best way to pass out of this world without being a trouble to anyone, and the Lord has shown me that someday I shall lie down as usual to go to sleep and wake up in glory and this may be the last time that I shall see you; so now, my daughter, I feel constrained to urge you to seek the Lord." Again she said, "I am sure the Lord has shown me that I shall go that way." Four years later she went to glory just that way.

My parents had not given their hearts to God, yet they taught us to live right. The only religious services we ever attended were those held once a month in a country chapel. Other Sundays we would sing together in our home and father would read a sermon to us out of a book.

We would then repeat the Lord's prayer and sing another song.

One afternoon, when I was two and a half years old, a number of we children were invited to a neighbor's for lunch and play. As we passed the pantry window on our way in, we saw a number of dishes filled with nice red berries. One youngster suggested that we help ourselves to the berries, and this we did. After a few mouthfuls I began to scream and ran home. Mother, hearing my screams, rushed out to meet me and, picking me up in her arms, asked me where I was hurt. I couldn't tell her but kept screaming. Finally mother began to chide and shaking me, said, "Tell me where you are hurt." Still I could not speak, then mother fell upon her knees and cried, "Lord, my child is dying in my arms and I cannot find what is the matter with him." I was then able to speak and tell her the cause of my trouble. Putting my hand over my heart I said that I was having pain there and not in my stomach. Mother questioned me as to whether the lady had given us the berries, and I told her, "No," that we had helped ourselves to them. She said, "I will tell you how to get rid of your pain: Go and tell the lady what you have done and giving her your hand ask her to forgive you, and I am sure the pain will leave you." Mother went with me and when I confessed to the lady she took me up in her arms and wept with me. After confessing the pain all disappeared.

* * * * *

When I was about eleven years of age it seemed that a voice was continually speaking to me and saying, "You ought to be a better boy; I want you for a preacher." I did not understand at the time that it was the Holy Ghost speaking to me. Mother often wept over me and said, "Child, O child, what shall I do with you! You make me more trouble than all the other eight children put together."

At the age of fifteen I was confirmed and at the following preaching service I was supposed to participate in taking the Lord's supper (as was the custom of the church). Before that service I went out into the woods to pray. I asked the Lord to forgive me for partaking of the Lord's supper, for to refrain from taking it would bring disgrace upon my family.

From that time on, the Lord continued to talk to me, saying, "You ought to be a better young man." It seemed as though I could not be better at home in Norway so I determined to sail for America.

I had been in America about a year and a half when I met a distant relative who was thought to be lost in this country, because his family had not heard from him for two or three years. He invited me to go into a saloon with him and have a glass of beer. We went in, and also played several games of pool.

In the meantime I took off my coat and hung it on the back of a chair. In the inside pocket of my coat I had my billfold containing about one hundred dollars, all the money I had, and also my valuable papers. When I went to reach for my money my billfold was gone. The saloon keeper seemed to know what had taken place and handed me five dollars. I had no work as there was none to be found. It was the custom in those days for the saloons to give a free lunch with a glass of beer. I went at noon every day and bought a glass of beer so I could have the free lunch that went with it. I lived that way for about two months.

During the late winter I got a job at night work, which consisted of pushing loads of stone in a wheelbarrow for the building of the Stone Arch Bridge over the St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River for the Great Northern Railway Company. The planks upon which we had to walk became very slippery and on one trip the man ahead of me slipped back in the wheel of my wheelbarrow upon which I had a large stone. The force of his fall threw both stone and wheelbarrow into the river. The man behind me, seeing what was happening, flung himself face down over his wheelbarrow, and in the dark, grabbed me as I was going over the plank into the river. He caught me by one of my arms and held me until help came and I was pulled out. I was hanging from his hands about fifty to seventy-five feet above the river.

After that experience I could not make myself walk those planks anymore, so I was again out of work and so terribly discouraged. A few nights later I walked onto the Tenth Avenue bridge intending to jump off into the river to end it all. As I took hold of the railing someone from behind me called out and said, "When you jump, your troubles will begin." I looked, to see the man who had spoken but there was no one on the bridge. The way he spoke had sent a chill through me. It was after eleven o'clock at night and I seemed to realize that it was the Lord who had spoken to me.

After sometime in America I found that I was still the the same young man as before in Norway. It seemed that I was unable to do better. Thinking to improve matters, I decided to go to school and study for the ministry. After two semesters in the college certain things happened which turned me into an infidel. I quit school, went into business and got married. Soon after I contracted tuberculosis of the lungs, and the doctor said there was no help for me, as both my lungs were like soup. During the depression of 1892 I lost all I had. In my sinful condition I called on God and He healed me.

We then moved to the farm and one afternoon a young man came to our home and asked me to attend a service with him that evening. In answer to my query as to what kind of service it was to be, he informed me that two women evangelists were conducting the meeting. I replied that I was not in favor of women preachers but I would go with him as I was not afraid the women would hurt me. As a matter of fact, it was through these women that I was partly awakened spiritually, but did not yet give up my infidelity.

One evening I was very tired and sleepy and went to bed at precisely nine o'clock. I went to sleep at once and had a dream. I dreamed that I had become a minister of the gospel and that I was traveling all over the United States and Canada, as well as in a number of European countries. Hundreds of souls were turning to the Lord in the meetings and many healings and miracles were performed. It would take a long life to accomplish all that I saw done in my dream. I awakened and felt so refreshed and rested, that I thought it was morning and put on the light but found I had been in bed JUST TEN MINUTES! I did not sleep anymore that night but spent the time in meditating on my dream which convinced me that there must be within the human body a positive something that would continue to live forever and my infidelity vanished.

A few months later (March 12, 1895), the Lord spoke peace to my wife and me at the same time in our own home, and called us into the ministry. He brought us out of darkness through three visions and showed us the evil of all sectarian division. All this was giving us light on the beautiful Church of God without our having heard any preaching on the subject, nor did we know anyone who believed as we did.

We commenced preaching at once and our first convert was a lady who was saved in our home. (Sister Hendricks, now Myhre, who is a minister). Our first case of healing was when the Lord healed me of blood poisoning in my left arm, caused from the scratch of a rusty nail. I caught cold in it and it swelled so fast that when I got into the house I could not get my clothes off and they had to be cut off with scissors. My wife and a young brother prayed for me, but I did not get immediate relief. My entire arm turned blue and yellow and soon my sides began to turn the same way. I had read in the Bible that the sick were to be anointed with oil. The young brother anointed me accordingly, and the swelling began to go down immediately, insomuch that the next morning there was no symptom of any thing wrong whatever.

* * * * *

The next experience of healing was of the restoring of my hearing to my right ear. My wife had gone to services and I stayed home to take care of the children. I had laid down beside them to get them to sleep and had dropped off to sleep myself, and dreamed that I saw Jesus standing beside the bed. He said to me, "Do you know John Pederson?" "Yes," I replied, "he is my neighbor." And Jesus said, "Isn't he a blacksmith and does he not make sleighs? And," he continued, "if he were to make one for you and you were to break it, wouldn't he fix it for you?" "Why, certainly," I replied. "Well," Jesus continued, "I made your ear in the first place and don't you think I can fix it?" "Yes," I said. Then He stepped up to me and touched my ear with two fingers and I jumped out of bed and MY HEARING WAS PERFECT! I shouted glory to God.

* * * * *

The youngest of our twin boys, who was nearly five years of age, was taken with double pneumonia and suddenly passed away. My mother-in-law prepared him for burial. As I was preparing to drive to town to get a permit from the doctor to bury the little one, the Lord said to me as I was on my way to the barn to get the team, "Why do you not go back and pray again?" I immediately turned around and went to the little corpse and laying my hands on him prayed and wept, and after a little while he came to life. He was not only alive, but also perfectly well. When I knelt down to pray my family did not dare to speak to me; they thought I had lost my mind.

About three years later our baby daughter, some ten months old, was sick and I was planning to leave home on Friday expecting to be gone over Sunday. The little one grew steadily worse and at eleven o'clock on Sunday night she passed away. There was great consternation in the family. The oldest boy fainted when his grandmother laid her out. After everything had quieted down and all had retired, except my wife who remained up, she went to the little body, held it in her arms as she knelt beside the bed until she was tired, then, laying the baby on the bed and laying her hands on it, prayed until life came back into it. When I returned Monday the child was as well as ever. In both cases grandmother prepared them for burial.

A little while after this experience the twins were out in the barn feeding the horses. Somehow in their actions one boy accidently stuck the tine of the pitchfork right into the eyeball of the other boy. Wife hearing their screams, ran out and brought them into the house. She washed the blood from the injured eye and laid the boy on the bed; then she and the twin brother laid their hands on him and prayed the prayer of faith. He went to sleep and slept untill morning, and all that remained on the eyeball was a small white spot in the center which disappeared after a day or two, and his sight was not in the least impaired.

* * * * *

A similar case happened at Bruce, South Dakota, while I was pastor at Brookings and White. The little three year old daughter of Brother and Sister Hi Tellinghuisen was playing in the yard with an old rusty sewing machine oil can. She fell on it, the spout striking right into the center of one eyeball. She was taken at once to a physician who ordered her to be taken without delay to a specialist to have the eyeball removed. The parents then called me over the telephone to come at once. When I arrived and saw the eye, it looked to me like a dried up prune stone. I anointed the child, but could find no words to utter in prayer. I could only groan, but the Lord witnessed to the healing. (I think this took place on Saturday at 11 o'clock a.m. and the next day, Sunday, she was brought to the services perfectly well.) (At this writing she is teaching school).

* * * * *

On March the 20th, 1904, wife was taken with quick consumption. Her fever was so high that she was delirious. As long as I remained beside her praying, she would be rational but as soon as I ceased praying her mind would wander. Over a week later, on Saturday, Brothers O. T. Ring and Carl Forsberg came to visit us. We then had agreement in prayer for the healing of my wife, and from that time on her mind was clear, yet she continued to go down. A number prayed for her but she grew weaker and weaker, until in the month of August. When the neighbors would come in to visit her, they would say to me on leaving, outside of the house, "We are sorry to say it, but we do not expect to see your wife alive again."

One day she said to me, "We have done everything we know to do except to send to Brother E. E. Byrum for an anointed handkerchief." I asked, "Do you want me to send for one?" to which she assented, and I sent for one. We received it by mail August the 23rd at 1 o'clock. I placed the handkerchief upon her and kneeling beside her laid my hands on her and prayed. She was so weak that it seemd as if she would pass away before I could remove my hands, so I soon said "Amen." She remarked, "This does not look very encouraging, does it?" I answered, "No, it does not." Then she drew one of her hands from under the covers and said, "Do you believe that any flesh is ever coming to these hands?" "Dear," I answered, "I do not know." Then she said, "I believe that it will happen." I asked, "Why do you believe it?" She told me that a scripture had come to her while I was praying. She said that it was the one about Naaman: "His flesh came again like the flesh of a little child and he was clean." 2 Kings 5:14.

Two hours later she was perfectly well, but weak, of course.

* * * * *

On one occasion I received an urgent call to come to Norway Lake to pray for Mrs. John Evenson who was ill with tuberculosis. While on my way there I battled with devils, it seemed as though my buggy was full of devils, whispering to me and saying, "You are going to be arrested and put in jail." However, after driving sixteen miles, the Lord assured me that He was going to raise Sister Everson up, even if she were dead when I got there.

As I drove into the driveway I saw a number of men by the barn. It was the Constable and others. Jumping out of the buggy, I proceeded to unhook my team when Mr. Everson appeared, and said, "The hired man will take the team; come along with me." We went into the house and into the room where the sick woman was. Mr. Everson sat down in a chair beside the bed, taking his watch out, he then took his wife's hand in his to count the pulse. She was unconscious. I spoke to her two or three times but she did not hear me. I knelt down and asked the Lord to restore her to consciousness. Then I arose and spoke to her again. After a bit she opened her eyes and I said, "Brother Susag is here. What do you want him to do for you?" She replied, "I want you to anoint me and pray for me." I immediately proceeded to do as she requested, following which she sat up in bed and asked for something to eat.

The constable, with others, was waiting outside the house to arrest me if the woman had died. Mr. Everson went out to them and they asked him how things were going. He told them that before I prayed for her, her pulse was 124, and when I took my hands off, her pulse was 82--which is normal!

Thirteen years later she was taken sick again. Mr. Everson, not being saved, called for the doctor they had previously employed. The doctor refused to come, saying that Mrs. Everson "had lived for thirteen years on something more than human. I can do nothing for her. If she has faith, she can live another thirteen years." Then they telephoned me. I drove two miles in my automobile and was taken seriously ill and had to return home and go to bed. I was very sick for two days. Mrs. Everson died in the meantime, and I was well.

On one occasion Brother C.H. Tubbs and myself held a meeting at Bowbells, N. Dakota and a number of people were saved. We were to have a baptismal service. It was the month of February and we would have to go three miles to the nearest lake in which to baptize the candidates. There was no place there for the changing of clothes and it was slow traveling as we rode in a lumber wagon. Sister Stolsy, who wanted to be baptized, had been in poor health for five years and had a baby five weeks old. The Constable, on hearing of it, came to us and said, "If you put that woman through that hole in the ice, I'll be there with a warrant for your arrest." So Bro. Tubbs said, "We better go see Sister Stolsy," which we did. He said, "Sister, it does not look reasonable for you in your condition to be baptized." She wept and said, "I have wanted to be baptized for some time and now that I have the opportunity I am denied the privilege." Then I said to her, "Sister Stolsy, save your tears for something else. I will baptize you if I have to spend the remainder of my life behind the bars," and she was baptized. The constable witnessed the baptizing and saw that when she came out of the water she looked the very picture of health. Three days later the constable and his wife were baptized in the self-same place.

* * * * *

I have baptized hundreds of people from Canada to San Antonio, Texas; from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific, in every month of the year, in the lakes of Norway, Sweden and Denmark as well as in the North Sea, in all kinds of weather--once in the Red River at Grand Forks, N. Dakota, in a snow storm in zero weather, and I have never yet heard of one person having taken cold from being baptized, but on the other hand, MANY HAVE BEEN HEALED!

It pays to obey the commandments of the Lord. While I was pastor in Grand Forks, N. D., from December, 1919 to November, 1925, I baptized over two hundred persons.

* * * * *

Once in company with Thomas Nelson, C.H. Tubbs and my wife, we held a tent meeting in the country northwest of Colfax, Wisconsin. Several people were saved and some were healed. This stirred up great opposition so that on a couple of nights an angry mob was on the spot throwing stones, sticks and lumber and bottles on the tent, demanding that we come out and they would cut me to pieces. One night a minister of that community was in the tent, and as he saw the stones come rolling through the tent, he became badly frightened and said to me, "This is worse than in a heathen land." "Yes," I replied, "but are they not your people?" He said, "Yes," and then getting down on his hands and knees crawled out the back way from under the tent and escaped to the woods.

The reason for this unseemly tumult was because I had preached that baptism was by immersion and other truths. The situation was that two grown young people, the son and daughter of a minister in the community, were among those who were to be baptized. But the fact that there was no water nearby in which they could be immersed seemed to give the opposing element great satisfaction. However, we continued to advertise that there would be baptismal services on the coming Saturday afternoon. Friday night it rained heavily and near the tent there was a low place covered with green grass where the water settled and the water was deep enough in which to baptize the new converts.

This goes to prove that the Lord's resources are limitless. The next Sunday night, being the last night of the meeting, after all had left the tent except Bro. Tubbs and myself, and as I was not making any move towards leaving the tent Brother Tubbs asked me whether I was not going home. I answered, "No, those people who threatened to cut me to pieces are coming back to pull the tent down and I want to be here when they come, but you go on home; I want to be here alone." But he said, "No, I will not leave you."

It was about a hundred rods or more to the house where we were staying and there was no other house near by. We put out the lights and sat waiting. A number of times Bro. Tubbs urged that we go home, declaring that no one would come, but at almost midnight a plank was thrown on the tent and out ran Brother Tubbs for home; and then just as I was coming out of the tent a big plank was thrown on me, striking my right shoulder and also hit my head. It might have been quite serious but that I was wearing a stiff derby hat at the time. As it was, I was almost knocked out.

I said to them--there were between fifty and seventy of them, "Just a minute men, I am alone here; please do not destroy the tent; it has no feelings. Take me and cut me in pieces as you said you wanted to do. If I have done anything wrong I am willing to suffer for it." This I said as I walked slowly toward them, "But if it is because I have preached the Word of God to you folks and you do not receive it, you will meet it at the judgment bar of God," and I continued to walk toward them. They said, "Do not come so near." "Are you afraid of me?" I asked as I continued preaching to them. Then they commenced backing up. Finally, it seemed I had no more to say. One man said, "Give us more of that." At this point Brother Tubbs appeared with eight of the brethren, whereupon the crowd turned and ran for their rigs and vanished into the darkness.

About eighteen months later I held another meeting in this same community and the attendance was very good. A number of the same people who had claimed that they wanted to cut me to pieces were also there. Eight souls had gotten saved and the attendance was increasing. All of a sudden, as I was closing the service, the Spirit of the Lord said to me, "This is your last service here. You will leave in the morning on the 4 o'clock train for Grand Meadows, Minn." Saint and sinner alike, said, "You can't close now; look at the manifest interest and the growing attendance!" "But," I said, "the Lord tells me to close." They insisted that it could not be that they all were wrong and I the only one that was right. So I consented to stay, but had I but left on that morning train I would have escaped the terrible storm that swept over that part of the country. As it was, I could neither get away nor continue the meeting. On the farm where I was staying they had to have a rope extended between the house and the barn for two days in order to find the way from one building to the other.

* * * * *

I had held a number of revivals for Brother Millar of Racine, Wisconsin. One time, in this connection, I had a dream that I saw a pasture with green grass and beautiful sparkling water running through it and as nice a flock of sheep as I ever saw were feeding in it. But in this beautiful pasture that should have been utilized for good pasture. I felt impressed to tell Bro. Millar of my experience so wrote him of what I had seen in my dream. In his prompt reply he said, "You had better come with your 'stump-pulling machine' and pull them out."

Some time later, on a very hot Sunday at noon I arrived in Racine, all tired and worked out. I asked Bro. Millar whether there was to be an afternoon service. I understood him to say, "No, there would not be." I said to him, "I want no lunch so please take me to my room." And this he did. I undressed immediately and was soon fast asleep, but before long I felt my bed being shaken and heard someone speaking to me but it seemed I just could not wake up. The shaking increased and I heard a voice saying, "Brother Susag, Brother Susag." I looked up and there was Brother Millar! He said, "Why, Brother Susag, have you undressed? The chapel is full of people who are waiting for you to come and preach." I told him I had understood him to say that there would be no afternoon service, that he should go back and that I would follow as quickly as possible.

I had no message. I opened my Bible and from Genesis to Revelation the Scriptures did not seem to mean anything to me. I prayed and still no message. Then coming down stairs I met Sister Anna Hanson who was just starting for the service. I said to her, "Please give me a text to preach on." She said, "O you will have a text." I told her I was in earnest, that I could not think of a single text in the whole Bible that meant anything to me, that I was too worn out to think. Sister Hanson then said, "I have often wished I might hear you preach on the first text I ever heard you preach on and that was in Chicago. The text was, 'The Lord weigheth the spirits.'" Then the Lord opened my understanding and I had a text. At the close of the service Sister Hanson walked ahead of me to the parsonage and into the kitchen where Sister Millar was. She asked, "How was the service?" Sister Hanson answered, "The right message for the right people at the right time." Sister Millar said, "Well, praise the Lord!" and when Bro. Millar came in he said, "Praise the Lord," and jumped and shouted and said that every stump had been pulled--twenty-two of them!

While this meeting was in progress Brother Tiffany Flint from Milwaukee came down and asked me to come and hold a two weeks' meeting for him, but I had no open dates. In those days I was, at times, booked ahead as many as forty-two meetings, so I had to refuse him. But he urged, "Won't you come just a few days?" So I promised to go for three nights. When I arrived he said, "I have something to tell you: I have three persons here needing spiritual help." I replied, "Tell me nothing, on the train the Lord gave me three texts, one for each night, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, which I am going to preach on." It happened that each text fitted each one of the three mentioned persons and each one came to service on the very night his particular text was preached on, and received his special benefit.

I am relating all these incidents because I have always believed in the leadership of the Holy Spirit; and now, after these fifty years of work in the ministry I am more firmly grounded in that belief than ever.

Some time later I held another meeting for Brother Millar. One afternoon, as I sat studying, the Lord said to me, "Here is your text; you go down to street so and so, such and such a number and preach at 2:30 this afternoon." After lunch I said to Brother Millar, "Let us take a walk." On coming out I said, "Is there a street in the city of such a name," stating the name the Lord had given me? He said, "I think so; what of it?" I told him that the Lord had given me a text to go down there and preach at 2:30. Bro. Millar then said, "We will take a street car and go down there and see, but I will tell you that if there is a chapel at that number you will not get an opporunity to preach there." We boarded the street car and the motor-man directed us to the street, and as we approached the given number we found a chapel and a meeting in progress. We went in and sat in the back seat. The singing had just stopped and the evangelist took his Bible and went to the pulpit. Bro. Millar smiled and hung his head, looking at me out of the corner of his eye, as much as to say, "I thought so." But I was pretty sober. I took my watch out of my pocket and held it in my hand and after the evangelist had given out his text and had spoken just seven minutes, he closed his Bible and said, "This is queer; I cannot speak this afternoon," and turning to the pastor, asked him whether he had the message. The pastor replied, "Why no, I haven't even my Bible with me." Then, looking over the audience, the evangelist said, "There must be someone here who has the message." Pointing to me, he said, "Haven't you got the message?" I answered, "Yes." "Then come on up here," he rejoined, "and take the pulpit."

On taking the pulpit I promptly explained just how it was we happened to be there at that particular time and proceeded to preach the sermon the Lord had given me to preach. I announced our services and everybody seemed to be well pleased with the sermon. I was not acquainted with any person in the audience, nor did any one know me as far as I knew. A little later a number of them attended our services and eight of them were saved and took their stand for the truth.

* * * * *

At one time I received a series of letters from a leader in a certain Church of God congregation in which the writer earnestly pleaded that I come and hold a meeting for him.

He said that the Lord had revealed to him that I could be a great blessing to him and his congregation. I had never been to the place nor did I know anyone in the congregation that I was aware of. After giving the matter due consideration I felt that I should go, and wrote the pastor to that effect. On the day I was planning to leave I received a letter from the brother, upon the reading of which I began to tremble like a leaf--something I had never experienced before. I was standing on the floor reading the letter. Wife ran up to me and asked me if I was sick or whether there was anything wrong. She took the letter and read it, and said, "There is nothing wrong with that letter." "No," I said, "but I have a feeling that if I go I will meet something I have never met before." Wife answered, "Don't let the devil scare you now; you go, and I will pray for you."

On arriving in the city, as I stepped off the train, a man came up to me and said, "Are you Brother Susag? I am Brother X--; I have come to meet you. We certainly are glad that you have come, but I am sorry to have to tell you that our group is split into two congregations." I quickly reached to take my suitcase out of his hand, and said to him, "I'm going right back home; I'm too small a man to attempt to tackle anything like that." But he said, "No, you cannot go, for we have been praying for you to come and the Lord has shown us that you are the man to help us out." "All right," I said, "on one condition I'll stay. Take me to a hotel, and you inform both parties that I will only stay on condition that all meet together in one chapel and that no one tell me anything about the trouble, for if the Word of God will not make you one, I surely cannot do so." "But," said he, "you surely need to know something about how matters stand." "No," I replied, "the Lord knows it all and He also knows what messages to give me from time to time." "Very well," he said, "I'll take you out in the country three miles to an old couple who knows nothing of the trouble."

Three days later at three o'clock in the afternoon, the brother came to see me and informed me that my proposition had been accepted; the group had agreed to the conditions. I preached for eleven days and let them do their own altar work and the eleventh night there was but one congregation and all was peace and harmony. For the first eleven days of the meeting there was not one outsider in any of the services but on the very next night the chapel was filled, and there were seven ministers of the city present in the audience.

* * * * *

An Assembly meeting was being planned, soon to be held in Chicago, at the 74th Street Church of God and the brethren in charge wrote to the ministers of the Scandinavian Publishing work in St. Paul Park, Minnesota, requesting them to provide an evangelist who should preach in the Scandinavian languages--either Thomas Nelson, Emil Krutz or S. O. Susag. Brother Krutz and I were holding a meeting at Hereford, Minn. at the time. We received a letter from St. Paul Park asking us to pray to find out which one of the three of us was to go. Then Brother Krutz said to me, "I know you know who is to go; tell me who it is." But I answered him, that he should go find out from the same source from which I had found out. He left me and after two hours returned and said, "It was a little hard for me to find out because I wanted to go so badly myself, but the Lord showed me that you were the one to go."

On my way I stopped at St. Paul Park and met Brother D. O. Teasley from New York. He said to me, "So you are on your way to the Assembly in Chicago." I said, "Yes, if Brother Nelson is not going." "Why," he said, "he is not going. When I stopped in Chicago the congregation was praying the Lord to send you." God works at both ends.

We held the Scandinavian services at the Assembly up stairs in the Missionary Home. After five days' meeting, quite a few were saved, while down in the English services in the chapel where there were thirty-three ministers, none were being saved. Brother Reardon, hearing of our good services, asked me whether I preached in English, "Yes," I replied, "in my broken way." "Why, then," he said, "do you not ask the Lord for a message to preach down in the chapel?" I answered, telling him the Lord had already given me three messages but someone else gets to the pulpit before me. (This was the time for the free-for-all in the pulpit). Brother Reardon said, "Come with me," and he took me upstairs into a room where a group of the leading ministers were assembled and said to them, "Here is the man who is holding up the success of the meeting." I said, "How is that possible when I cannot even get into the pulpit? Somebody rushes in ahead of me, and one who did so was not saved." To this they said, "We have already attended to that person," and told me that I had better get another message from the Lord, but I said, "No." Then they said, "Will you preach it if the Lord gives you another message?" I said, "I will, if I can get into the pulpit and you will pray for me."

The second day following, the Lord gave me another message. My text was the last clause of the second verse of Proverbs 16: "... the Lord weigheth the spirits." After I had spoken a few minutes Brother Cole spoke up and said, "Please stop a minute, Bro. Susag, do not talk so fast; we do not understand a word you say." I said, "Please pray for me." Then again, realizing I was going quite fast, I stopped, when Sister Cole said, "Do not stop now, go ahead, Bro. Susag, we can understand you well enough." I seemed to be full of the Holy Ghost which seemed to be pressing me on. When I said, "Amen" there were forty-two at the altar crying for mercy.

Listen folks, this was not because of my good preaching, for they could not understand me, but they understood when the Holy Ghost spoke. When I went to the altar to pray with the seekers a man came running on his hands and feet, barking like a dog. He was taken out to another room to be prayed for. He was helped, and the devils were cast out.

After the altar service was over I asked Brothers Reardon and Ebel to go with me to the basement. As soon as we got there I fell on my face to the floor weeping, and saying to the brothers, "I need help, I am in serious trouble. It seems as though devils were tearing my very body to pieces." Thank God for good brothers who are able to help a person in time of need. Brother Reardon said to me, "Get up quick, Bro. Susag, don't lie there and cry for the devil." But I said, "You don't know what trouble I am in." But they said to me, "There is nothing the matter with you. Get up and rebuke the devil, get up and sit on that chair and we will talk to you." Then Bro. Reardon said, "The Lord used you to break the spell in the meeting and there were seven possessed with devils at the altar. The devil became enraged at you and was determined to ruin you." Then I resisted the devil and was free.

We will soon find out when we let the Holy Ghost have His way with us there are seemingly two equally great powers in the world. But thank God, we also find that He is the Omnipotent Ruler over all things.

Brother Tubbs and I once held a meeting at Portland, North Dakota. The wife of the man with whom we stayed professed to be saved and one of the saints. Her husband, as far as I knew, made no profession but was a very fine man and one of the leading business men of the town.

One day, as we were looking through the bookcase, we found a lot of fine looking books of Russellite teaching. We asked the sister who had bought them. She told us that she had bought them--"had bought over a hundred dollars' worth of those good books." We informed her that they were unsound, that they taught erroneous doctrine and should not be read nor handed to anyone.

Our taking this stand made things look as though we would be without a place to stay. But that evening the Lord changed the situation. The two-year-old child of this couple was suddenly taken violently ill. The mother asked us to pray for the boy. Bro. Tubbs plainly told her that the Lord would not heal her boy as long as she had those books in the house. When we were just starting to go to the service that evening, the father, who was holding the child in a blanket in his arms, said to us, "Will you guarantee healing to my child if I place it in your hands? Otherwise I shall have to get a doctor before it is too late." Bro. Tubbs answered, "We can guarantee nothing," and we started for the service.

Bro. Tubbs was already outside the door of the house when the mother of the child said pleadingly, "Won't you pray?" The Holy Ghost came upon me and I said, "Yes, on one condition, if you will promise to take all those books over to the meeting place tomorrow and burn them up before the eyes of the audience, I'll pray and guarantee healing for your child." She said, "I won't do that; they are good books and cost $100." "All right," I said, and stepped out of the door. The father said, "Just a minute," and then to his wife he said, "Isn't the life of our child worth more than one hundred dollars?" She said, "But they are good books." He replied, "The ministers say they are no good. I know nothing about them, whether they are good or not, but I do know one thing that my child's life is worth more than one hundred dollars." "All right, then, I'll do it," she said.

I stepped back in the room, threw my hat on the floor, went over and laid my hands on the child and prayed the prayer of faith and the Lord healed the child instantly, and the books went up in smoke the next day.

I have seen bookcases and book shelves in many homes that need just such a purge in order that the glory of God may dwell in the home, and sometimes even in the churches.

* * * * *

In the years 1915-16 I spent almost thirteen months in Denmark helping the few faithful workers there to raise up eight congregations and many books were burned during the time.

One old mother in Israel, when she heard of the books being burned, said, "I've got only one book and it's a good one." She brought it to me and said, "If you say this is not good, my salvation goes too." I asked her if I might mark with a pencil in her book and she said I could. After reading it a while I laid it aside having marked it here and there. She asked me what I thought of her book. Not to discourage her, I said, "There are some good things in that book." She took it and began to find the places which I had marked, finally closed the book and said, "This book is no good; the Bible says thus and so and the book speaks to the contrary." Then she said, "Why have I been blessed many times when reading this book?" I answered, "Because you were honest and did not know any better."

We pioneer ministers had many things to meet. On getting home one time, I found that a runaway team had pulled our windmill down so that we had to have a new one. The well was 204 feet and was hard to pump. After we got the new one, a neighbor came over and said to my son, Oswald, "See, your father has been out preaching and so you are able to have a new windmill." Yes, he had been gone seven weeks and he was eleven cents short on his expenses. The following year I was gone nine months and five days and I fared real well--I had $76.76 above my expenses that time.

* * * * *

Sometimes I got to thinking about little Charlie Brown, who I believe was about eleven years old at the time. When his father asked him if he got tired, he said, "Yes, I get tired of this walking preaching." So they went into a grove and prayed and his father said to him, "We will go to the next town and you preach on some street corner and if no one gets saved, we will quit and if some get saved we will keep on. What do you think of that?" Young Charlie agreed to that and a number of souls did get saved. Now "young Charlie" is Editor in Chief of the Gospel Trumpet.

Then it was empty pocketbooks, empty stomachs and sore feet, but that did not stop the preaching. Yes, in those days it was souls we were after, and not money and honor.

* * * * *

I did not have a new suit for sixteen years; wife had only one new dress in eighteen years. Although we lived on a farm we could not eat butter. We had to sell that in order to be able to buy more necessary things.

One year wife and the children were raising twenty-two hogs while I was out preaching in the gospel field, and we had a payment of $500 to make on our home, or move. When I arrived home in the fall wife met me with tears in her eyes as she told me that the hogs were all ready for the market when the price dropped from $6.00 per hundred weight to $2.75. "And," she continued, "the only reason I can find for it is that we have not given enough." "But," I replied, "I feel that we have given enough: Our gross income has been a little over $500.00." She then brought two pencils and two pieces of paper and said to me, "Come on." We knelt down and asked the Lord to bring to our minds what we had given, and in our check-up we found we had given $252.50. Then, almost scaring me, my wife, with tears streaming down her face, lifted her hand toward heaven, and said, "Lord, we have done our duty and you will have to pay our bills."