LeRoy Wallace

I was thirty-two years of age before I was saved. I should have been saved a long time before that. My parents had the old-time religion, and I always went to church. I didn’t take the way, though. I went to the meetings more for a place to go than anything else.

When I was about twelve years old, my father backslid and went the way of the world. He started drinking and using tobacco. My mother hated the things he was doing, and I believe that’s what kept me and my two brothers from doing them despite the environment that we lived in. My dad was a logger, and in the logging camps nearly everybody used tobacco and drank.

My folks drifted around for a good many years and finally settled down in 1910 in Yakima, Washington. I married and settled in Idaho. One day, my wife and I got a letter from my dad. He said he was saved and had quit using tobacco. I didn’t think too much about his getting saved, but I thought a whole lot about his quitting tobacco. I had seen him run out of it; he was like a wild man. We made a trip to see for ourselves what had happened. Dad sure had quit tobacco, and was as jolly and good-natured as he could be. I saw my uncle while I was there, and God had cleaned him up too. In the past, he had at times taken the last dime from his family to buy liquor. The Gospel didn’t appeal to me, though. I thought, I don’t use tobacco and I don’t drink, so I don’t need the Gospel.

We went back to Idaho and some people came through holding Gospel meetings. We didn’t go to church meetings held in town, because it was too far, but when they were held out near our place, we went every chance we could. During the first of these meetings, I felt the call of Christ. I could have been saved that night just as well as not. I cried like a baby all through the service. As the tears flowed down my cheeks, I knew it was God dealing with me.  God didn’t show me my sins. Instead, He did as that old song says, “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling.” That’s the way He called me that night. At the close of the service a young man came and asked me if I would pray. I said, “Not tonight.” I believe there will be many a soul in Hell because they said, “Not tonight.” I might have been one of them, but God gave me another chance.

My wife got saved that night. I knew Christians didn’t dance or play cards, and I had respect for the Christian people, so I thought I better give up these things for the sake of my wife. I was so bound by them, though, that I just didn’t believe I could give them up. To my surprise, the very desire for them left, but that was all that left.

God left me alone and I went on for two years. My wife and I had always read the Bible and she continued with this, but I paid little heed to it. She asked several times if I would pray, but I had no more thought of praying than anything. I would always put her off in one way or another. We had two boys who were six and four when my wife got saved. They would get down to pray, and sometimes I would kneel with them. God left me alone, though. That is a dangerous place to be.  

We went to see my folks in Oregon. They said Gospel meetings were being held in Sunnyside, Washington. Of course, my folks were going to those meetings, and so we went too. My wife had asked me dozens of times if I would pray, but I had always put her off in some good-natured way. I wasn’t bothered that she was a Christian. That night in Sunnyside, she asked me again. I said, “Just to please you, I’ll go and pray.” It was the first time I had ever made a promise like that. I began to look for some excuse. We had three boys by this time, and I was holding the youngest, about six months old, who was sound asleep. I thought I had it solved. I didn’t think she would want to wake up the baby just so I could go pray. But when that altar call was given, she grabbed that boy out of my hands and gave me a shove toward the altar. It happened pretty quickly. Now I thank God for that start. I might have been in a devil’s Hell if I hadn’t gotten that start.

On the way down to the altar I thought to myself, I’ll never pray so anyone can hear me. I’ll just pray a little prayer to myself and that will be it. I was just as sure of that as anything, but as I was kneeling there, that same Jesus who had called softly and tenderly a few years before was right there again. I prayed a little prayer to myself, and the next thing I knew, God showed me my terrible condition. I felt myself slipping into Hell. I didn’t have to ask the minister what to do or anybody else. I knew exactly what to do. I tell you I prayed so everybody could hear me. God put the prayer in my mouth, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” That’s all I said. I repeated it over and over. I’ll tell you, I wanted God to save me more than anything else. I lost sight of everything around me. All I could see was my soul slipping into an endless pit. That was mighty real.

I don’t know how long I prayed. I prayed until I couldn’t pray any longer. Then, while I was still kneeling there, the old devil jumped all over me. He said, “You have made a fool of yourself; there is nothing to this old-time religion.” But just at that moment someone began to sing that old song, “He took my sins away and keeps me singing every day.” It seemed like a great wave of joy and peace came over me and filled my life. I can tell you there was a wonderful change. One moment the horrors of Hell were sweeping over my soul and the next the joy bells of Heaven were ringing in my soul. I jumped to my feet and said, “My sins are all gone!”

I have had fifty-five years to try this out, and I’ll tell you that’s long enough. It hasn’t been all flowery beds of ease. I have gone through some of the hardest places anybody could, but the hard times never robbed me of that peace. I thank God for the old-time religion.