Pentecostal Possibilities or "The Story of My Life"
by Milton Lorenzo (M. L.) Haney
CHAPTER 59
Two Glorious Years
I find in the ninth evangelistic year I had twenty-four distinct meetings, including eleven camps. These were held in Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois and Kansas. Had a good meeting in Omaha, with my friend Robinson as pastor. The results were not wide. People were converted, others reclaimed, and some sanctified. A singular element prevailed, and there were hindrances in the background, making wide victory difficult.
At Mound City, Missouri, we had a blessed time with the Lord and His people. There was a record kept there which claimed 138 conversions, and 37 cases of sanctification. The town was small, but God shook it to its innermost centers. Brother W. T. Miller, a business man, was the means of my getting there. He was, and is, a very blessed man. Since that time he has been a traveling man, and in every part of the country where he has been he pushed the work of God. Sometimes he lifts a whole society above its present level, in a single day.
In Sedalia, Mo., God gave us 108 souls. In a shorter meeting at Centralia, Kan., we had 40, and a glorious time. Brother Miller was the pastor and we found him a blessed soul.
In Sterling, Kansas, we had battle and victory. God came in power, and people were made to see they were lost and many fled to the city of refuge. By the record then kept, ninety-three were supposed to be saved. Brother and Sister Helm, from Illinois, had moved to Sterling and were two burning lamps among the people. They were in fine circumstances in Eastern Illinois and she was a dressy woman. There was a long string of flowers on her hat, when she was sanctified, after a fearful struggle with the pride of her heart; and she sprang into the air with a glorious shout! As she went skipping down the aisle the string of flowers broke loose being held at one end, but she went through the crowd with it dangling, perfectly oblivious to what people might think. How the tinsel of the world loses its hold on the soul when God is fully revealed! Sister Helm from that day became an active worker, and I think eternity will show that thousands have been saved by her ministries. Her little girl of eight or ten years came in one day distressed because her mother was sick, and falling down by her bed cried out, "O Jesus, do heal mamma! Do heal her right now!!" and her mother was instantly healed. It was an inspiration to be in Brother Helm's home in those days. What a power such people are to hold up God's ministers.
Our camps in 1884 were mostly in thinly settled regions in Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska. They were generally small, but greatly blessed of God. They were held one week only, but from forty to sixty souls were saved in each. Brother Isaiah Reid, and I, opposed the change of time from one to two weeks for camp meetings. We saw when two Sabbaths were included in a camp, that one set of people usually came at the first, and left before the second Sabbath, and another class came in the second week; so it was difficult to secure the concentration we did with only one set of workers. I think now, the larger camps should be held ten days, but the small ones from five to seven days. If people coming to a small camp know the time is limited, they are apt to come at the first and stay to the last. Saints and sinners, knowing that the time is short, are more certain at once to get right down to business.
Our tenth evangelistic year took in a part of 1884 and 1885, involving services in Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Michigan, New York, Ohio and Nebraska. We had twenty-six meetings, involving ten camps. The following note was made at its end:
"From Oct. 27th, '84, to Sept. 2th, '85, 337 days, I have attended seven hundred and sixty-one services, and God has owned them every one.
"Kenneth, Kansas, Oct. 2, '85. M. L. HANEY."
In December, '84, I held a second service in Sedlia, Mo., Brother Miller still being pastor of Montgomery Street M. E. Church. Miss Jennie Smith, "the railroad girl," had been there, working among the shops by day and preaching to railroad men by night, and many of them had been saved. Being compelled to leave, the pastor wrote urging me to come at once, and help lead these converts into holiness. Oh, if all pastors could see the importance of at once leading their converts into holiness what backslidings would be avoided, what glory would be brought to Christ, and what salvation to men! Coming, I found the pastor joyful over the work done, but especially over the conversion of an old German Roman Catholic. He declared he had never seen his equal. I found the old German had a wonderful experience. His conversion was a marvel, and through the days which followed, he had a wonderful power over the people. He seemed continuously filled with the joy of God, and had been recognized as the leading spirit in the meeting. This naturally led him to feel he had the highest and best experience there was for mortals! I saw that in him, and was concerned about him, and revealed my feelings to the pastor, but he could see no danger whatever. He also urged to press the truth upon him, with the other converts, and get them all sanctified. I saw the devil was using the effulgence of the old man's experience to floor him, and the very fact that God had so marvelously used him, to hedge the way to his becoming sanctified. I renewed the expression of my fears to Brother Miller that Satan was succeeding in leading the old German to rebel against the truth, and it became apparent to Miller that he was badly tempted. One night I preached a sermon on consecration, showing the difference between the repentance of a sinner and the consecration, of a child of God, and the old man was the first to the altar, and God sanctified him wholly! When he came to relate his second experience, he brought out all I had feared in his case and confessed he came near not coming to meeting that night. His statement was, as nearly as I can remember, as follows: "When Brudder Haney preached sanctification I no liked it. I thought I had all the religion that any body had and I no liked sanctification. Tonight I said I no go to church tonight, but the devil he say you go, and if Brudder Haney preach on sanctification, you get up and go out, and if any of the brudders ask you why you go out, you tell them you are tired and you go home to rest. But when Brudder Haney preach this sermon tonight, I saw Brudder Haney was right, and I go to de altar, and God, He sanctify my soul! And now, Brudder Haney, you preach sanctification! When the people like it, you preach sanctification, and, Brudder Haney, when they don't like it, you go on and preach sanctification!" Such a speech, by such a man under such pressure of glory from God, can never be fully written!
Some time before this his Priest had come to his house and greatly insulted him, and he led the Priest out through the door, asking him not to return. He was a born Catholic and his parents for generations had been Catholics. He had lost his wife, and his children were in Ohio, so he thought he would visit his fatherland and see his parents once more. He had notified his father of the time of his coming and the old gentleman met him as expected. They had not gone far when his father stopped the carriage and said to him, "You leave the church!" He replied, "No, fadder, I no leave the church." 'Yes, but you did leave the church!" and took a letter out of his pocket from his Priest in Sedalia, and read it to him!!! "Now," his father said, "You confess to the Priest, and come back to the church, or you get out right now and never come to my house." So he got out of the carriage and did not see his father's house! He did see his mother, but she took sides with the priest, and he returned to America an infidel! and was in that condition when Jennie Smith found him. He had a fine salary in railroad employ and was now in command of one hundred and fifty men. After he got saved he requested of his superiors that no unnecessary work be done on the Sabbath, but they would not grant his request. He said where there was a wreck or any providential occurrence which made it necessary that work be done, he would gladly do it, but he would not compel those men to violate the Sabbath. His boss dismissed him, but he trusted in the Lord. After praying over it, he felt impressed to return to Ohio and visit his children, and he reached the home of his daughter to find her sick unto death. Telling how wonderfully God had saved him, he led her to Christ and she died shouting the praises of God! He went into Cincinnati and secured a place in a railroad company, much better than the one he lost, with a much higher salary and no Sabbath work in it at all! Glory be to God! the faithful covenant keeping God! I ought to add, that when settled in his new place, he wrote me a letter, giving all these facts and assuring me of his heart intention to be true to the end. If Jennie Smith should see this recital, she will have still greater reasons for thanksgiving to God, because such results have accrued to her ministry.
We had this year a blessed time in the Carthage (Illinois) Camp of the Hancock County Association. Brother J. H. Kirkpatrick was for years its President, and a gracious man of God was he. How many precious days and nights, I have had in his home. He was a sufferer for years, but the good cheer of the Lord was in him. He has long been with the just made perfect, in the presence of the King, and I shall see him again! A throng of souls have been saved through that Association, and their record is on high.
We were also identified with the camp at Towanda, Illinois, in 1885, as well as other years. This camp was located badly and difficult to reach, but despite it all, the interest brought about by the holiness movement was so great, that thousands assembled there and it became the birth-place of many souls. A wide revival was there reached through the ministry of John P. Brooks, in his best days work that will really never die. There has come a change in the locality of camps which I trust will be abiding. The former plan was to seek seclusion, now we seek to get the camp among the people.
A series of meetings were held on the Glassfield Circuit to aid Brother Adams, of my Conference, in places that are hidden away from the gaze of the world, but God sees them. How many of the King's jewels will come up from unseemly corners, on banks of rivers, and little towns unknown by this great restless world. The pastor came to me one day blushing, and said, "Brother Haney, I am almost ashamed to ask you, but if you could give a few days to that old deserted church at Kingston, I would be glad." Kingston had been a mining place which prospered for many years. The mines became exhausted and the miners moved away. They were English miners and many of them Godly men, and had a prosperous society. Now for ten years, I think, there had not been a prayer or song, or sermon? in that little old meeting house, except a single service held by Brother Adams of recent date. Located on the Illinois River, Kingston had become a vile Sunday resort for hunting and fishing, horse racing, &c. Many children were growing up without prayer, and death reigned all around. The dear souls had been so long without the Gospel, that it was a treat to them. The pastor could not sing, and when he preached to them there was nobody to sing or pray. I got a brother and his wife, to lead the singing, and the first night I told them that these old musty walls would echo with the praises of God, and the shouts of new-born souls. God gave us an ingathering and people will be in heaven as the result. After dismissing one night, I was standing on the platform when a lady with a white feather in her hat, whirled suddenly out of the second seat into the aisle with a toss of her head, and in a loud angry tone said, "You will not get me to that altar!" I was much amused at her procedure, and had a hearty quiet laugh to myself. She had but one child, a little girl only three years and a half old, who was a natural singer. I had been singing the chorus:
"Come to Jesus, come to Jesus,
Come to Jesus now;
He will save you, He will save you,
He will save you now."
and the little thing had learned it. The next day while her mamma was sewing she was in her little rocking chair singing this chorus, and rocking with all her might. Stopping suddenly, with her face radiant with glory, she looked into mother's face, saying, "Mamma, ain't you coming to Jesus?" Her mother responded, "Yes, darling, mamma is coming to Jesus sometime," but the child answered, "Sometime! O, mamma, that won't do, you must come now!" That night the woman who tossed her head so proudly the night before, was glad to get to the altar of prayer, and after her conversion gave this recital to me congregation. I went to see the little preacher the day following, who had won a star for her crown before she was four years old. "A little child shall lead them."
We had three more delightful little camps in Nebraska, where the Lord heard shouts of praise from lips which before had never praised, and mingled with dear holy souls who have gone up on high. August 18th to 27th, 1885, we were shut in with Doctor McDonald, Wm. Jones and others in a National Camp Meeting at Jacksonville, Ills. Souls multiplied were saved, and the ministry of these men was wonderful. I thought Doctor McDonald the clearest preacher I ever heard, and Doctor Jones was among the finest preachers in this nation, or any other. That the Gospel as preached by such men could be rejected by so many is a proof of the sad havoc that sin has made upon our race. The national camps in the West gave our ministers wide opportunities to understand the doctrine of "Christian Perfection," as taught by the Wesleys, and to enter the experience of heart purity. Who can imagine the glorious contrast between what we are now, and what we would have been had our church, and her ministers, followed the teaching of these men? Let us think, for the salvation of millions of souls is in the balance. It would be well to walk carefully before God, for unborn millions may yet be affected by what we say and do.