Hello everyone. This blog post is an actual audiobook, originally written in 2013. It was initially intended only for family and close friends, but I decided to share it with a broader audience because it could potentially help others see that if God can take someone with a humble background and use them to evangelize, He can do anything. Its message is applicable to everyone. Listen and share it widely with your family and friends. May God bless you.
Free Bus Tickets to Heaven: An Invitation to Salvation for My Family and Friends (An Audiobook). The Public Edition.
Copyright 2013 by Alfreda Lockett Evans
Read this first. By reading this book or listening to an audio version, you agree to the following: all rights reserved. Alfreda Lockett Evans gives permission for this version of this audiobook to be distributed in any form for the salvation of anyone. It must never be changed or incorporated into any other material without permission of the author. Use it only for the glory and honor of God. I desire that, as I open my life and heart to others, many will be saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost.
All scriptures are from the King James Version of the Bible.
About the Author: Alfreda Lockett Evans has co-authored articles in nursing journals and has written and presented published poems and short stories. She is a prophetess, a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, a Sunday School teacher for Young Adults, and a Christian Writer. Her children’s book, The Little Boy in Blue – Free Learns About Life After Death, was published in 2009. Her book, Strolling Through a Rose Garden Called Life -Living Holy from Birth to Death, was published in 2011. The Night Death Came Creeping in My Room was published in 2012.
Mrs. Evans is a retired registered nurse who worked initially as an ICU and CCU nurse in hospitals in Texas and Landstuhl, Germany; as a faculty member of Texas Woman’s University for 5 years; as a school nurse practitioner in the Dallas ISD for 12 years; and for 20 years as an advanced practice nurse for spinal cord injury patients. She lives in the suburbs of Dallas, Texas, with her husband, Ebed M. Evans, Sr.
About the Audiobook: Evangelist Alfreda Lockett Evans shares an intimate, autobiographical message for her family and friends: an open invitation to accept Christ and the Holy Ghost. Using the recurring image of a bus headed to heaven, she recounts growing up in Galveston, her family’s hard dynamics, and the stabilizing influence of her grandmother and church. Alfreda describes the moment she surrendered to Jesus, the miracles and healings God performed for her siblings and loved ones, and how her search for answers became a lifelong ministry. The episode ends with a clear, compassionate call to salvation and practical next steps for those who want to come aboard.
Dedication: This audiobook is dedicated to all my family members who are currently alive as well as those who have gone on before, and to all my friends who have been a part of my life’s journey. Please know that you are loved.
Acknowledgments: Thanks to Sister Lily Francis for her editorial skills and to my wonderful Husband, Elder Ebed M. Evans, Sr. for everything.
Table of Contents:
Chapter 1. The Beginning
Chapter 2. The Uninvited Guests
Chapter 3. Our Family Tragedy Turned Blessing
Chapter 4. The Visitor Who Changed My Life
Chapter 5. God Begins to Save My Family
Chapter 6. The Couple on a Mission
Chapter 7. Your Turn: God’s Plan of Salvation
Chapter 8. Living a Life of Holiness
Chapter 9. All Aboard!
Introduction: August 6, 2013. This is the second day in a row that God has awakened me after about four hours of sleep, with a letter to my family forming in my mind. It finally hit me this morning that I should write to you. I warn you, this is going to be a somewhat lengthy letter, but I hope you will read it slowly and with careful thought. For those who hate reading or are too busy to read, I’m also going to put it on a CD so you can listen. You might also listen to it on my podcast.
This letter is autobiographical because I feel you must know something of my history to understand what God has done with my life. Many of my family members don’t know me because I have become one of the older members of our clan. Some of you know me, but we haven’t spent much time together in a long time. Nevertheless, we are family because we share the same gene pool, and I love you all.
The takeaway message of this letter is that Jesus Christ is coming soon, and He does not want any of us to be lost. I have been given the responsibility of sharing my story with my family and friends, and I hope you will hear or read it, understand it, and be saved. I’m going to start with my childhood, as far back as I can remember, so those of you in the younger generation in my family can really feel where you came from.
God asked me in a dream, “Where are the souls that I intend to be saved under your ministry?” I didn’t have a good answer. I didn’t even know that I had a ministry at that time. On another occasion, I dreamed that I arrived in heaven driving a bus with very few passengers. I knew that couldn’t be good. So here I am trying to get more people on my bus. Obviously, that’s where the title of this letter-turned-book came from. The Free in the title is a play on my name, Freda. Get it?
Family and friends, I want you to be saved. I want you to know Jesus as your Lord and Savior. I want none of my family members to end up in hell because I love you with Storge Love. Storge love is family love. It is the bond among mother, father, sisters, and brothers. It is the natural love among kin people. This is the type of love we refer to when we say, “blood is thicker than water.” This is the type of love God stirred in my heart toward you after I was filled with the Holy Ghost. True story.
Storge love is enhanced by Agape love, the kind of love God has for us all. Once you know who Christ is, you want to make sure the family God gave you knows Him too.
I am now a minister of Jesus Christ, trying to fulfill the mandate He has placed on my life. (The mandate is told in my book, The Night Death Came Creeping in My Room. My sister Christine is also a prophetess and a missionary, carrying the Gospel of Deliverance.
Family and friends, won’t you climb aboard my bus? It is bound for heaven. After you hear my story, I pray that your answer will be a resounding yes. All abooaarrrdd! And I thank God that I am Free.
Chapter 1. The Beginning. I was born the fourth child of five to Lillie Mae Evans Lockett and Jesse Benfoot Lockett. Benfoot is possibly an Indian name because my grandmother’s mother was full-blooded Cherokee. I had four siblings: John, Willie, James, and the baby girl, Christine. Both my parents and paternal grandparents were born in Crockett, Texas, a small farming town in Houston County. My parents lived on the rural side of Crockett, near Austonio, Texas. Granny Ada was something of a mother figure to my mother, Lillie, since Lillie’s mother, Grandmother Mary, had passed away. When my parents married, Granny Ada became the matriarch to both Lillie and Jesse B.
After Will Lockett and Ada divorced, Ada moved from Crockett to Galveston, Texas. Because they were very close to Ada, my parents decided to move to Galveston as well.
Galveston in the 40s was a bright-lights and big-city kind of town. It is an island city approximately 50 miles south of Houston, Texas. My country family moved to a part of town where a jukebox sat on every corner, and alcohol flowed freely.
I was born on July 20, 1945, at John Sealy Hospital in Galveston. About a year and a half later, my sister was born. So there we were: two young parents with five children born between 1941 and 1947, within six years of each other. My parents had high school diplomas but no higher education. We lived around the corner from Pawpaw Bud and Granny Ada.
My parents did not get along well. They fought a lot, and the last fight ended in real violence. Although I was only three years old when the event occurred, I can close my eyes at 81 years old and recall explicit details.
Chapter 2: The Uninvited Guests. I remember the night we moved in with Paw Paw and Granny. My oldest brother, our rock, John, was only seven. He put some of our clothes in a sheet and threw it over his left shoulder. He had us join hands as we ventured out into the night. From left to right as we walked around the corner, the lineup was: John, Cookie, me, James, and then Willie. We were on our way to our grandparents because of a major blowout in our home between my mother and father
My older brothers wanted to keep us safe as we passed the juke joints with their loud, riotous music and stumbling drunks. So they made sure they stayed outside our little group. We made that scary trip to our grandparents’ house, and John knocked on the door. When Bud and Ada opened the door, we filed right past them and sat on the couch. We just moved in. Later, Pawpaw told Granny that if she would quit her job and raise us, he would work and take care of us all. Granny agreed, and for the next 17 years they raised us. Granny was 48 years old when we, her uninvited guests, moved in.
A few years after we moved in with my grandparents, my father also moved in with us, and that became our core family. That was Bud, Ada, Jesse B, John, Willie, James, Freda, and Cookie. My mother lived around the corner, and she became more of a big sister to her children than our mother because Ada was the matriarch. When Mama lost her husband, she also lost her children and her mother figure. She had no one.
I learned to read around age 3 years old by reading my brother’s comic books. My brothers were very creative. Daddy wore heavily starched uniforms at his job at the furniture store, and they had to be professionally laundered. My brothers took the cardboard inserts from the laundered work shirts and turned them into action figures. They drew and cut out Superman, Batman, and Robin action figures, then performed plays for the neighborhood children. After the show, we would go around the corner to Mama Lily’s house and play on her front steps. All the kids in the neighborhood called our mother Mama Lily because she was so sweet to everybody’s kids. She would make ice cream and freeze it in the metal refrigerator ice cube tray, and we’d all share it.
By the time I went to school, people thought I was smart. I made straight A’s most of the time, and I joined the National Honor Society. Our local newspaper published the names some of the Honor Roll students, and I made sure that my name was there each reporting period. I wanted my mother to be proud of me so that she would love me and come and get me.
Although the Lockett kids were clean and well fed, we were very poor, and we lived in the worst section of town. But all the kids in our community were also poor, so it felt normal. When the Cedar Terrace, Palm Terrace, and Bay View home government housing projects were built, we dreamed about moving into those beautiful homes. Yes, we longed to move up to the projects.
My siblings and I lived a somewhat “schizophrenic” life. We had our at-school friends, and we had at-home friends. Because we lived in the ghetto, our at-school friends never visited our home.
We walked to school, which was several long blocks from where we lived. Our at-home friends dropped out as we crossed Broadway, the main street in Galveston at that time, and we picked up the at-school friends. All the black kids in Galveston went to either Booker T. Washington Elementary or David W. Carter Elementary, depending on where you lived.
We walked to school, which was several long blocks from where we lived. Our at-home friends dropped out as we crossed Broadway, the main street in Galveston at that time, and we picked up the at-school friends. All the black kids in Galveston went to either Booker T. Washington Elementary or David W. Carter Elementary, depending on where you lived.
My at-school friends and my at-home friends all went to Booker T., but those two groups never mingled. The at-school friends were the kids of teachers, preachers, and the more well-to-do. Cookie and I were blessed because our Granny was a seamstress. We seemed to be well-dressed like the at-school friends because Granny could make clothes for us. My brothers’ artistic talents also made them sought after by students and teachers. They were the school’s artists. (I couldn’t draw stick figures, but I was outgoing and smart, and that made me popular. Some of the teachers were disappointed that I couldn’t draw, though.)
So that’s how the Lockett kids came to lead somewhat “schizophrenic” lives. When we crossed Broadway, going to school, we picked up at-school friends, and our at-home friends would meet us at Broadway as we walked home.
One saving and enduring feature of our strange life was Jerusalem Baptist Church. The Lockett kids were raised in church. If anybody’s kids were at church on Sunday morning, we were there. Granny was the Women’s Mission President, so we were there when others weren’t.
Ms. Gloria Dean was my favorite Sunday teacher. She was a wonderful teacher who left a very positive impression on my mind about the Bible and the concept of going to Heaven. I am a Sunday School Teacher today, possibly due to her influence.
We were in the Children’s Starlight Band Choir, on the Junior Usher Board, and we were actively involved in the Youth Department. Granny took us to church, and I am eternally grateful to her for the positive influence church had on our lives.
The scripture in Proverbs certainly applies here. Proverbs 22:6, says,
Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it.
Although we lived in the ghetto, the Lockett kids and some of our at-home friends were very serious about church. Two of our best friends, Doris and Tricia, had a grandmother who owned the bar closest to us. She had a room she let us play in on non-school days, and we would play church.
Our little group went door to door in our neighborhood, inviting people to church. We wrote little invitations on pieces of paper and went door to door, passing them out.
One day I knocked on Mama Lily’s door, and I remember saying, “Mama, when you come back to church, I want you to come to Jerusalem Baptist Church.” She agreed with tears in her eyes. That Sunday, she gave her heart to the Lord. She became a lifelong member and never left. She told me later that it broke her down that her own child had to cause her to return to Christ. I was about 10 years old when this occurred. It seems God was already in the process of making us missionaries.
Chapter 3. Our Family Tragedy Turned Blessing. A family tragedy occurred when I was 13 years old that God used to bless us all. Paw Paw developed an eye condition that was attributed to his work environment in the Grain elevators.
He was given a $10,000 settlement because he was going blind. For us, that might as well have been a million dollars. We went from rags to riches! It was a sad time because Paw Paw was losing his eyesight, but a very happy time because we were finally able to move out of the deep ghetto into a beautiful house.
I will never forget the house Granny found. Before the sale was complete, we kids would go by after school to visit the house. It was a dream come true. We couldn’t get in, but it was wonderful to look at. It was just one block north of Broadway and one block west of Central High School. The house was white with green trim. It had a white picket fence and a swing on the porch. The Victorian-style house had very high ceilings and a wide central hallway. Oak trees and deep green grass were in the yard.
Cookie and I could finally have a bedroom with doors that closed, and my brothers could have their own room. We felt like we were in Heaven. We had a house like our at-school friends and no longer lived in the ghetto. This was a pivotal point in our lives.
Now I’ll move quickly through the rest of my story so that I can proceed to the real purpose of this letter. I continued through elementary school to junior high. At that time, there was only one black junior high school, so all black students from both Booker T and Carver went to Goliad Jr. High. Finally, we advanced to high school, and all black students attended Central High School.
My high school years were great. I was captain of the drill squad, the Cha-Cha-Rettes, a Latin dance group that performed at halftime for our high school football games. We were 250 members strong. We had billowy satin blouses and skirts with glitter everywhere. White drill boots and satin flowers in our hair completed the look. We were modeled after the Rockettes, and we believed we were as expert with our high kicks as they were.
I was popular in high school and graduated third in a class of approximately 250 students. (I should have been Salutatorian, but one sad and prideful moment caused me to get the only F that I had ever received up to that point. As a result, my position dropped to third rather than second. Mr. Dansby shot me down. What a life lesson!) I was also chosen Most Likely to Succeed in my Senior Class.
The summer of my junior year, I attended a month-long chemistry workshop at Prairie View A&M College. I was so excited by what I learned that summer that I decided to attend Prairie View after I graduated from high school. The fall following graduation, I enrolled in the school’s nursing program, finally able to pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a nurse.
Unfortunately, the program lost its accreditation that year, and I decided to transfer to UT in Austin my sophomore year. The University of Texas in Austin had been a segregated school up to that point, with only a very few black students in attendance. In 1964, the school became officially integrated, and I decided to attend. How I got there, and the experiences I had, will be in that upcoming book, Mama Lillie.
I graduated in 1967 with a B.S. degree as the third Black person to graduate in nursing in that school’s history. Oddie Stephney and I were married in March 1968, and our only son, Oddie Stephney, Jr., was born that December.
Oddie Sr. went into the Army, and I followed him as much as I could. We traveled to Louisiana, North Carolina, Indian Head, Maryland, and on to Germany. I loved military life, especially our time in Europe. I worked as an RN and a Department of the Army civilian at Landstuhl General Hospital with a pay grade of Lieutenant.
During all that time, we visited church sporadically, only when we felt like it. When Oddie Sr. got out of the Army, we were ready to begin our life as civilians. We built a new house in Lewisville, Texas; I completed a master’s degree in nursing, and he completed his undergraduate degree in psychology. Everything seemed to be going well, and then something began to happen in my spirit. Around this time, a strange longing, crying, and sadness began in my heart.
Chapter 4. The Visitor Who Changed My Life. One day a young man came to our house. His name was Gary Freason. He was a student in a Bible College in Dallas, working on a PhD in Theology. He asked if we wanted to start a home Bible study, and we agreed. At the end of the first day of the Bible study, Gary asked me a question. He asked me, “If you were to die tomorrow, where would you spend eternity?”
Well, I didn’t think it was right for him to ask such a personal question, and I told him so. What I didn’t want him to know was that I didn’t have an answer, so I cut him off. After he left, I got down on my knees and said, “Lord, if what Gary said about you is true and if you are really real, I want to take myself off of the throne of my life and put Jesus on the throne.”
No lightning flashed, but I felt a deep sense of peace. I knew that something different had happened. That happened in November 1974. From that day on, I began to hunger and thirst after righteousness. A deeper longing started in my heart. I became restless, and I was fearful of death. I knew my need was spiritual, but I didn’t know what to do about the pull I felt. Although I attended a local church, I felt the pull was more than a need for mere church attendance. I began an active search for God, going from one church to another, looking for an answer to the longing in my soul.
In 1975, God began to deal with my heart and stir up my desire to know him in a real way. About that same time, my youngest brother James was involved in an automobile accident, and he broke his neck. He became a quadriplegic, only able to minimally use his hands. He was paralyzed from the neck down, and it absolutely broke my heart to see him in this condition.
Before his accident, I knew that I loved him. But after this accident, I found out just how much I loved me. Finding an answer for my brother’s state became the driving force of my life. I had been a nurse for about eight years by that time, so I knew the physical problems and the wasting that his strong and healthy body would go through.
I went to a Christian bookstore in Carrollton, Texas, looking for a book on how to believe God for healing when one of the workers in that store witnessed to me about being filled with the Holy Ghost. God began to put people in my life, and by March 1975 I was saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost.
I thank God for my friend Evangelist Deborah Perrin, who introduced me to Full Gospel Holy Temple Church in Dallas. Because I searched for my brother, I found salvation.
Chapter 5. God begins to save my Family. Immediately after I got saved, I called my sister, who was also my best friend. I told her how to really live for the Lord and how to get the victory over sin and shame. When she saw how God had blessed me and changed me, she wanted to come to my church in Dallas and see about this Holy Ghost I was talking about. God saved and baptized her with the Holy Ghost in a miraculous way, but she still had doubts, although she heard herself speaking in tongues. That night, she had a dream, and she saw the nail-scarred hands of Jesus gently lowering a victor’s crown upon her Afro-styled head. All her doubts were settled that night.
After my sister was filled, we both went to Lamarque, Texas, where James lived with his wife and son. Janice and “Beany” went to church, and Cookie and I, as brand-new babes in Christ, prayed that he would be filled with the Holy Ghost. He received the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in tongues. He later visited me in Dallas, and my pastor, Apostle Lobias Murray, prayed for him again. James wanted to be sure that he had it like Cookie and I did.
James passed away five years after his accident, but he was full of the Holy Ghost when he died. My book, The Little Boy in Blue, is a fictionalized story of his experience and death. James passed away as an adult, and God spoke to me about the truth revealed in the book. In the book, I portrayed him as a child so that even a child could understand the truth about life after death.
The next person that God saved and filled with the Holy Ghost in our family was my own mother, Lillie Mae. I prayed with her in a small back bedroom of her home, and the Holy Ghost filled her. She also came to Dallas so that Apostle Lobias Murray could pray for her. She was so very happy that she was able to serve God as He required and that she knew that she would go to Heaven when she died. My mother passed away February 8, 1985.
The evening of my mother’s funeral service, we were all sitting around my stepfather’s dining room table, singing some of the songs that Cookie and I had written. One song stirred up my Aunt Mamie, my mother’s sister. Some of the words to the song were:
You can’t hide; no, you can’t hide.
The Word is gonna find you, and you can’t hide. You sinner,
You can’t hide, no you can’t hide; the Word is gonna find
you, and you can’t hide.
We sang that song and others and really enjoyed each other’s company. After that, Cookie and I left and went our separate ways. Some time later, we got a call that our Aunt Mamie was in the hospital. She had cancer, and she was near death. Cookie and I rushed to her bedside, and when we walked into the room, Aunt Mamie began to cry and praise God because she was so happy to see us.
She told us she wanted to be filled with the Holy Ghost. She said that the song that we sang the night of my mother’s funeral haunted her. But the way she remembered the words of the song was different than the way we sang it.
She remembered,
You can’t hide; no, you can’t hide.
The devil’s gonna get you, and you can’t hide. You sinner,
You can’t hide, no, you can’t hide;
The devil’s gonna get you, and you can’t hide.
Cookie and I prayed with Aunt Mamie, and she was baptized with the Holy Ghost. When all was said and done, God flooded her soul, and she passed away not long after, knowing that she was saved and on her way to Heaven.
When I first got saved, Granny Ada was not excited about my being Holy Ghost filled because she had raised us in another denomination. Remember Jerusalem Baptist Church? Cookie and I lived holy before her, though, and when she passed away in 1994 at the age of 94 years, our grandmother was filled with the Holy Ghost too. She also came to Dallas, and Apostle Lobias Murray prayed for her salvation and her infilling of the Holy Ghost.
My other brothers, John and Willie; my own son, Oddie Jr.; his father, Oddie Sr.; and my precious sister-in-law, Pamela, have also gone on to be with the Lord. God gave them all tremendous testimonies of deliverance before He took them home. I am so happy that God made me a part of their deliverance. I share their stories now because it is so important for my remaining family members to know how God saved and filled them. They are in heaven awaiting our arrival.
John’s Story. The night Cookie and I prayed Mama through to the Holy Ghost, I was witnessing to John when God told me to look at my mother. She was crying, and I asked her why. She told me she had been trying for days to be filled with the Holy Ghost. It took only a few minutes before she began speaking in other tongues as the Spirit of God gave utterance. Acts 2: 4 says,
And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave utterance.
When John saw his mother get filled with the Holy Ghost and the great joy that it brought her, he repented of his sins. But he got scared, and he ran out of the house. For years following that, he ran from me when I went to Galveston. He would often refuse to come into my Granny’s house but would talk to me from across the street. He would often say, “You make people feel funny”.
Those of you who knew John also probably know that he was an alcoholic. He just didn’t want to yield his will to God. I prayed and prayed for him, and God gave my husband and me a plan. John loved sharp-looking shoes. We took a beautiful pair of alligator boots to Galveston and told John that we would give them to him if he would just come into my grandmother’s house and let us minister to him. Well, the love of the boots won him over, and he came into my grandmother’s living room. God gave me specific words to tell him. I said, “John, if you find yourself on your bed of affliction and you know death will overcome you, this is what you should say: ‘Father, forgive me of all my sins. Save me and fill me with the Holy Ghost. Take me to heaven when I die.’ I told him to say it with meaning and power, and God would do it.
John practiced what he was supposed to say repeatedly until he felt like he had it. What he didn’t realize was that he was repenting, even as he practiced. Now, I know a deathbed confession is risky, but this is what God told me to tell him. A few weeks later, my brother John was found dead on his bed, a victim of a heart attack.
I was devastated because I thought he had died without salvation. I thought my brother had gone to Hell. But my pastor’s wife called me from Dallas the day of his funeral, and she said these words to me. She said, “Sister Alfreda, I dare say that while your brother was lying on his bed of affliction in pain, he cried out to God, and God saved him and took him to Heaven.” Well, as you might imagine, I shouted all over my grandma’s house because I knew God was telling me he had saved my brother John.
Willie’s Story. My brother Willie was a fireman, a Chief in the Galveston Fire Department. He was a heavy cigarette smoker, and this, along with his high blood pressure, caused him to need a heart transplant. The prospects did not look good for a 50-year-old man who was a smoker to receive a transplant. But God gave him a miracle. My son had had a successful heart surgery in Houston earlier that day. My sister and I were so excited and motivated by Oddie Jr.’s success that we went to Galveston to pray for my brother. His children, his son-in-law, Kent, Cookie, and I grabbed hands and prayed fervently for him. We prayed until the Spirit of God moved in that room. Following the prayer, Cookie and I returned to Houston. His wife, Pam, called us at midnight. She said a doctor from John Sealy Hospital in Galveston was on his way to Dallas, Texas, to pick up a heart for Willie, and that she and Willie were on their way to the hospital. Willie received his transplant that night, and some weeks later God filled him with the Holy Ghost. Years later, my precious brother Willie passed away following a diagnosis of lung cancer. Those who knew him also knew that life on earth had little meaning after the loss of his wife, Pam. He is in Heaven now.
Pam’s Story. My sister-in-law Pam was like a sister to Cookie and me after she and my brother fell in love and married. It was a love affair that no earthly trial could defeat. Willie and Pam had four sons and a beautiful daughter: Willie Shawn, Joel Gerrard, Darius, Miriam, and Byron. Pam was an excellent caregiver. But the strain of Willie’s health issues took a serious emotional toll on Pam, and she fell victim to liver cirrhosis. I was in Houston taking care of Cookie, who was recuperating following surgery for colon cancer, when we heard that Pam was close to death. Although Cookie was only a few days post-op, we drove to Galveston to pray for Pam. Pam received the prayer, and it is my conviction that God saved her and took her to heaven upon her death.
Oddie Jr’s. Story. My son had a dissecting aortic aneurysm on two separate occasions. He was married to his childhood friend Kim, and they had two beautiful daughters, Gabrielle Caprice and Abigail Janice. When the aneurysms occurred, God gave my son a miracle. On both occasions, he survived, and he thrived for 15 years. But on July 10, 2005, my son had a stroke. He was only 36 years old. Any mother whose son is or has been sick or injured can imagine the pain, the concern, the sense of helplessness that such an experience can bring, and that mother will be able to empathize with my personal pain. He was my only child, and so his stroke was quite upsetting. On the other hand, my son was raised to love God and to live for Him. And he was not doing what he needed to do. It appeared to me that the more I prayed, the worse his behavior became. One night I made up my mind that the devil would not have my child because I did not raise him for the devil to destroy. So I told God, sincerely, that I wanted him saved no matter what. I sent my petition to the Throne of Grace, and I left it there. I was very much aware that when we give God our loved ones, we must do it without reservation. Whatever God does to bring them into subjection to His will is good, and we must accept it. Many Saints want their children saved, but they try to tell God how to do it. We must realize that whatever God does is God’s business. Our responsibility is to cry out for them until God’s will is manifested in their lives. While Oddie Jr. was still in the hospital following the stroke, one of his friends from my church, Full Gospel Holy Temple Church in Dallas, TX, came to visit and to pray for him there. Thanks to the late Elder Adrian Autry, a Holy Ghost-filled minister, God filled my son with the Holy Ghost. Following his stroke, my son came to live with me for a while, and we had a beautiful time of fellowship. He and his wife later remarried, and he was able to spend some quality years with his children. He passed away June 5, 2008, and is in heaven today.
Marsha’s Story. I’ve told you about several family members who got saved and have gone on to heaven. But I want to tell you about another family member who’s alive and well right now. She’s a wonderful woman of God. Her name is Marsha. Marsha is my first cousin and the youngest of my father’s brother’s children. We had an experience in February 2005. Her mother, my Aunt Myrtle, passed away, and the funeral was pending because they were able to take care of all expenses except the opening and the closing of the grave. Marsha had been praying and crying out and seeking God about what to do because the funeral was scheduled, and yet they didn’t have that final money. That morning, I had an interesting experience. I went to the mailbox and got a check I didn’t expect. It was for $1,000. I was so excited. I thought I had $ 1,000 to spend on whatever I wanted. I was already planning how I’d spend it. Marsha called me crying and said, “We have the funeral scheduled today, and we don’t have this final $1000.” Of course, I instantly knew what that money was for. I remember thinking, “Aw, man. Okay, I can help them out, and I can give them half of the money.” But as God would have it, when she told me she had been crying and seeking God about what to do, and she only had a short time left- maybe an hour or two before she had to have the money. I opened my mouth and said, “I can take care of that final $1,000 now.” You know that had to be God. When I said that, Marsha instantly dropped the phone. She ran through the house crying and praising and glorifying God. And God filled my sweet cousin with the Holy Ghost as she gave Him glory and honor. She still lives for him today, and I am so happy to have been a part of that salvation.
Chapter 6. A Couple on a Mission. In October 2012, God started my husband, Ebed Sr., and me on a journey to rekindle my relationship with family, present Christ to them, and pray that they would receive the Holy Ghost if they would. We called ourselves a couple on a mission for Christ. One of our first stops was in Crockett, Texas. One of my dear aunts, Aunt Gracie Evans, who was 91 years of age at the time, and her oldest son, Ernest Jr., along with my first husband, Oddie Stephney, Sr., were all saved, sanctified, filled with the Holy Ghost, and now in Heaven with Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The letter you’re reading or listening to right now is an active part of the mission God gave us.
Chapter 7. Your Turn. God’s Plan of Salvation. I am writing to you today to offer you an opportunity, family, to be saved. Some of you might not even understand the plan of salvation because you were not raised in church. Others may not understand who the Holy Ghost is. But hopefully you will understand once you read or listen to the rest of this letter. First, let’s talk about God’s Plan of Salvation.
I wrote about this initially in my book Strolling Through a Rose Garden Called Life. Jesus wants everyone to hear the Gospel and be saved. Fortunately, the Plan of Salvation is very simple. Let’s review it.
God created Adam so he could enjoy fellowship with Him. From Adam, He created Eve as his companion. Mankind fell into sin because of Adam’s disobedience to God. That disobedience brought death into the picture as God’s punishment for sin. Sin is the transgression of God’s law, and all disobedience is sin. God, a just and holy God, could not allow sin to go unpunished. The only way to satisfy God’s holiness and justice was for someone to die for man’s sin. God looked around for an individual who would be able to satisfy both his justice: The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:17), and His holiness: Be ye holy; for I am holy (1 Peter 1:16), so that fellowship between God and mankind could be reestablished. God needed someone who was a relative of man but who also knew no sin. God realized that the only person in existence who was pure enough to serve as a sacrifice for our sins was Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God.
God asked his only Son to do several things.
- To assume the form of a man.
- To go into a sin-cursed world.
- To model holiness.
- To live a life led by the Holy Ghost.
- To die for mankind so that they would not have to die for their own sin.
- To be raised from the dead.
- To return to heaven.
- And stand in Heaven as an intercessor for mankind.
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, in obedience to His Father, suffered a horrible death on Calvary’s cross as a substitute for man’s sin. Man’s salvation cost everything for both God and Jesus. God gave His Son, and His Son gave His life, so that man could be saved, as stated in John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Jesus willingly gave up his life in obedience to his Father, so that men might be saved. This is clearly made known in John 10:14-18:
14 I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.
15 As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.
16 And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.
17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.
His message is reinforced in John 6:40, which states,
40 And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.
The pathway to salvation is easy for us because Jesus has already done the hard work. When an individual comes to God for salvation through Jesus Christ, that person must acknowledge that he is a sinner, must be sincerely sorry for the sins that he has committed, and be willing to give up his sinful life and live God’s way.
Every human being who has ever existed and will exist in the future is a sinner until he has been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ. This includes the wealthy, the movie stars, the self-righteous, those of other faiths, and everyone else.
As we read Romans 3:23, we see God’s purpose of sending His Son to die for our sins,
For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
After one realizes that he is a sinner and is ready to be saved, he must repent. Repentance is simply asking for forgiveness, turning from sin, and intending to never commit it again.
Acts 17:30 shows that everyone must repent of sin.
30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:
If an individual simply asks for forgiveness and means it with his own heart, Jesus will cleanse him from all sin.
Jesus promises that if one repents, he will receive the individual and not cast him out.
According to John 6:37, the scripture states
37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
To be saved and born again simply requires speaking a simple but sincere prayer in obedience to God. When an individual prays the following prayer, or one with similar words, and means it with all his heart, that individual is saved. These are the words:
*“Father, I’m sorry for the sins that I have committed. Forgive me for all of my sins. Save my soul and give me the power to be holy. If you save me, I’ll live for you.”
Anyone who prays this prayer and really means it is saved.
A person must believe he is saved, not because of what he feels or thinks, but because the Word of God says he is. When God forgives an individual, that individual must receive that forgiveness and forgive himself.
Once an individual has received salvation, he then needs the **Power of the Holy Ghost to stay saved. The gift of the Holy Ghost is a second act of faith that follows salvation. Acts 1:8 states the following,
8 But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
Acts 2:38 informs us that the Holy Ghost is for everyone.
38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Someone might ask, who is the Holy Ghost, and what is his role in our lives?
The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of God. He is the third member of the Godhead, along with the Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. When we receive the Holy Ghost, we can depend on Him to lead, guide, protect, and comfort us.
Jesus knew that when He left earth and ascended to Heaven, we would need help living for God. According to John 16:7, Jesus promised to send the Holy Ghost as our comforter.
7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.
The Holy Ghost was indeed sent to earth to help anyone who would receive him.
Luke 11:9-13 tells us that we must ask for it.
9 And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.
11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?
12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?
13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
The Holy Ghost has been received in several ways. The first is by the laying on of hands by a Holy Ghost-filled believer. This was the case when the Apostle Paul received the Holy Ghost in Acts 9:17:
17 And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.
In Acts 10:44, Believers were filled with the Holy Ghost while listening to the Word of God.
44 While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word.
In all cases, when an individual is filled with the Holy Ghost, he will speak in new tongues, because tongues are evidence that the Holy Ghost has arrived.
Acts 2:4 speaks of the early disciples, who spoke in other tongues when they received the Holy Ghost.
4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
Acts 2:39 speaks of the promise of the Holy Ghost to all people.
39 For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.
Chapter 8. Living a life of Holiness. What is holiness, and why are we told that living a life of holiness is necessary? Many people ask this question. To understand this concept, we must first realize that God is holy and that he requires us, His children, to be holy as well. Several scriptures support this concept.
Psalms 99:9 states,
9 Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at his holy hill; for the Lord our God is holy.
Leviticus 11:44 says:
44 For I am the Lord your God: ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy; for I am holy: neither shall ye defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
According to Unger’s Bible dictionary, holiness is a general term that indicates sanctity, a separation from all that is seen as sinful, impure, or morally imperfect. It means moral wholeness. It is also one of God’s central attributes.
When man disobeyed God, he lost God’s most important attribute: holiness. Sin absolutely destroyed holiness in man. Jesus’s coming to earth did several things for fallen man. We conclude the following:
- Jesus demonstrated that a holy life is possible for a man because he did no sin.
- According to 1 Peter 2:22, Jesus took away the curse of sin by dying for the sins of all men. By doing this, he reestablished a bridge between God and man, giving man a way to return to God.
- The third thing Jesus did was rise again after he defeated Satan. In doing so, he overcame death, hell, and the grave.
- Jesus now sits on the right hand of God, our Heavenly Father, acting as our intercessor.
- Upon leaving Earth, Jesus sent a comforter, the Holy Ghost, to act as our teacher, comforter, and guide.
Family, none of us knows how long we have on planet Earth. We don’t know when our time is up. We don’t know where death is and when our number will be called. God is offering this family a unique opportunity to go to heaven when we die. I don’t really understand why the Lord loves us so much, but I’m sure glad that he does. It is critical that we have faith on this side of death because if we do not get saved before we die, hell is our ultimate destination. I do know that one of the most important things that I’m supposed to do with my life is to share with you, my family, an opportunity to avoid the pits of hell. What you do with this information will depend upon you, but I hope you will receive it. It is extremely important that you respond to the Word of God. I am keeping true to my mission and presenting Christ to you. What you do with the information again is entirely up to you.
If you want to be saved now, you can be saved. Lift your hands now as a token of surrender to God and pray *the Sinner’s Prayer of Repentance.
*“Father, I’m sorry for the sins that I have committed. Forgive me for all of my sins. Save my soul and give me the power to be holy. If you save me, I’ll live for you.” Then ask God to fill you with the **Power of the Holy Ghost. Simply say, “Father, please fill me with the Holy Ghost”. Expect the power of the Holy Ghost to overshadow you, and expect to speak in tongues. Persevere until it happens for you. (Go back and listen to what happened to my mother in John’s story. She prayed for days and God did it for her. )
Then you have to follow on to know the Lord. Caution: this isn’t something you can do once and for all and then set aside. You need to find a good church home where the whole Word is being preached. Then you need to live this life of Christ daily. Call me; let me know where you are in your walk with Christ. You can also reach out to me in the Comments of this post. I will pray for you and encourage you because I want you to make it into the Kingdom of God. If you want to talk, call me or reach out on Facebook. I want to talk to you, family. Cookie and I have lived holy for over 51 years now, taking it one day at a time. I love you, and I know that with God’s help you can make it.
Chapter 9. All Aboard! Okay, family, this is all I have for now. I see you in my mind’s eye in the line of people on their way to Heaven. God did not send me on a mission to Africa, Central America, or anywhere else that He could have sent me. He sent me to you, and I desire that you will be saved, sanctified, filled with the Holy Ghost, and live for the Lord, fully prepared to spend eternity with Him. Now that you have your free bus ticket to heaven, let’s get ready for the trip. All aboard! And I thank God that I am Free.
