Herbert Carter

My parents were good people who took us to church wherever we lived. I was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on June 17, 1917. Shortly after that, my mother became extremely homesick. She persuaded Dad to give up his good job of teaching and move the family down to the home farm in Richland Center. I always thought that God didn’t want this little red-haired boy to grow up in a big city. We endured several years of poverty, some worse than others, and we moved often.

Although I didn’t truly understand salvation, I was taught to live a good life. Nevertheless, boys will be boys. One time my friend and I had a chance to go to town. In the dime store there, I picked up a little vise. It looked good to me, so it came home with me. However I was so condemned, that a week later I told my friend, “I’m going to take that vise back to the store. My conscience can’t stand this.” I made my first mistake by stealing and my second one by telling my friend. He said, “Oh, don’t do anything like that. They will put you in jail and you’ll be there the rest of your life.” Sadly, I decided not to take it back. After that experience, other things started creeping into my life, like picking up candy bars in the store and stealing watermelons. These things didn’t help my guilty conscience.

The Lord spoke to my soul so clearly that He was almost shouting at me.

Once in a while a minister named Melvin Gander would come to our town to preach. He was associated with the Apostolic Faith work in Portland, Oregon. My sister received salvation, but I couldn’t get my conscience cleared up enough to pray so I could believe that I could be saved.

Years went by. One day Reverend Gander came to see us. There was something different about him, and I knew it was his relationship with God. I was convinced that what he preached was the way to go, although I was not sure I could do it. I was twenty-one years old, newly jilted by my girlfriend, and just out of a job. Reverend Gander invited me to go with him to Minnesota Lake and get a job there. That sounded good to me, so off we went.

For some time I strove to get real salvation in my heart, something that I could be sure of, but it seemed to be in vain. One Saturday night a young man invited me to go out and see the bright lights with him. I felt discouraged about finding the Lord, so I decided to see what was in the world. That night the country seemed to be full of liquor and dancing. We picked up two young ladies and another young man, all crowding into a small car. As we stood watching the crowd gather in one of the places we stopped, the thought came into my head, I could marry one of these young ladies, inherit a farm and be set. About that time, The Lord spoke to my soul so clearly that He was almost shouting at me. He said. “Are you going to spend the rest of your days with these?” I looked around the room. The jukeboxes were blaring and not a single face had a smile on it. I told the Lord, “If You will save me so I know it, I will live for you.” That next morning was Sunday and I don’t remember what Reverend Gander preached about, but when he asked us to come and pray, I was one of the first to go. Because God had talked to me in the dance hall the night before, I believed that He would save me, and He surely did.

I knew that I needed to make right the wrongs in my past. I found out the name of the manager of the dime store about the time I had stole the vise, and wrote a letter, enclosing some money. The letter came back with a note that the man could not be found. Two more times I tried, with different addresses, only to get the same results. So I gave the money to the Lord. The candy bars and watermelons were still on my conscience, and I drove to Wisconsin to make amends for them.

It was in May of 1939 that God had saved me. The next winter I lived in Minnesota Lake and went to church there. I received my sanctification at that church. What a wonderful experience! It has given me stability all of my life.

By this time I heard about the Apostolic Faith camp meeting in Portland, Oregon. I wanted to go, but it was a busy time in the blacksmith shop where I worked, so I decided not to mention it. But the Lord knew my heart. One day I was trimming the feet of a horse that had just been shod, kneeling down with the horse’s hoof on my knee to rasp the hoof. The horse decided to put his full weight on my knee, which gave way, letting the hoof down onto the calf of my leg. I finally got him off my leg, but I couldn’t walk too well for a while. I decided that maybe this was my opportunity to go to camp meeting.

My cousin wanted to go to Vancouver, Washington to see his mother, so we set off together. Our old car had poor tires, and plenty of play in the steering. Between us we had forty dollars. We had only three dollars left when we started through Washington. Yet somehow the Lord helped our gas to stretch and our patched tires to last until we got to the Portland campgrounds. The man who met me at the gate treated me as if I was his long-lost brother. I felt like I had come home.

It wasn’t too long until my world changed again. On December 7, 1941, Japan dropped the bombs on Pearl Harbor, and I knew that soon I would be in uniform. I had seen many soldiers come back from war without salvation, so I talked with an old gentleman at the church and said, “I don’t know if I can keep my salvation if I go to the army.” He said, “You read your Bible every day and pray, and you will stand.” That sounded good.

I talked with an old gentleman at the church and said, “I don’t know if I can keep my salvation if I go to the army.” He said, “You read your Bible every day and pray, and you will stand.”

On May 8,1942, I was drafted. The first night at bedtime the barracks were noisy with the excitement of everything, and I wondered what to do about my devotions. My bunk was on top, but I decided to just go ahead as if I were at home. So I got down to pray on the floor by our set of bunks. All of a sudden you could have heard a pin drop in that place. Even though I got some remarks, from that day on it was accepted that I would read and pray each day.

I never had to take a back seat because of the Lord. One time something broke and there was a lot of cursing and swearing going on around me. When it was reported to the officer, he asked, “What did Herb say?” The others replied, “He just smiled.” I was grateful to have the Lord with me in all of my comings and goings in the army. Once while in North Africa, I had to take a load of hand grenades to another town. The distance was too far for the amount of gasoline I could put into the truck, so I had to carry extra gas cans along. The road was so pocked with bomb holes that the bottoms were hammered out of the gas cans, allowing gas to leak down through the grenades onto the muffler. I drove on prayerfully, hoping the truck wouldn’t ignite, and the Lord got me there safely.

In situation after situation, the Lord kept me and I was thankful for the day I could come home. I have never had any desire to go oversees again, but I know God will take care of a person wherever he may be, because God took care of me.After coming home, I met a young lady and was married. Since then, God has been with us all the way. We have eight children, and through the years there has been some hard places, but God has always helped. When the Apostolic Faith camp meetings were started in Murphysboro, Illinois, the Lord gave me the baptism of the Holy Ghost there. About three years ago I lost my eyesight but I still feel the joy of the Lord in my soul. It really is wonderful that I have the same peace I received in that little church in Minnesota so many years ago.

I’ve lived by this motto: Regardless of what the obstacles are, if we will put the matter in the hands of God, He will make a way through even when we think there is no way.