You really can't blame the 200 or so members of the Pryor Baptist Church for not wanting the hundreds of newcomers to be permanent members.  They knew that as soon as the war was over, most of the new people would leave town to go find jobs elsewhere.  They didn't want these new members to vote to build a church big enough to contain everybody, incur a huge debt on the property, and then leave the original members to figure out a way to pay it off.  They were trying to be responsible.

You have to understand something about Baptists.  They are democratic.  Everyone who is a member has a vote on everything the church does.  Each individual church decides what they want do and how they are going to do it.  There is no national governing board to oversee their decisions.  They have business meetings to make these decisions, and everyone has a chance to give their opinion.  And then they vote.

So, after all the newcomers started trying to join, the problem came to a vote on the floor of the church on a Wednesday night.  Do the newcomers become permanent voting members--who might decide to incur a huge debt--that would cause the church to go bankrupt once the war was over and the membership declined?  Or not?  The pastor, E.R. Jacks, said that anyone who asked to join, who had been baptized, should automatically become a member.  A number of deacons disagreed.

I remember that night.  Enough members who wanted to honor the pastor's decision to include the new people, voted to accept them.  The vote was taken.  It was decided.  The church grew, membership jumped, and the building was paid for with the new infusion of tithes and offerings.  I grew up in that church.  I became a Christian, was baptized, and later married there.

The pastor and my dad became close friends--going to football games together to watch the preacher's son, Ken play.  Ken was an all-state fullback, and my dad adored him.   Years later, Ken came back to Pryor after the war in Korea to see my dad.  He was 26 years old.  I was 18.

I began this yesterday by saying that unexpected events have momentous, life altering consequences. There was a tornado.  The church was blown away.  They called a brick laying pastor.  And I married his son.   God has a plan for our lives.   Sometimes He has to blow down a church.