It is story time again. I have taken to sharing some of the funny and some of the important stories from my life. The feedback has been good and I will continue to do so every now and then until someone lodges a strong complaint. Some of my previous stories can be found in these posts.
- https://steemit.com/christian-trail/@reonlouw/stories-from-my-childhood
- https://steemit.com/christian-trail/@reonlouw/a-story-about-a-widow-and-a-gossip
- https://steemit.com/christian-trail/@reonlouw/four-channels-only
- https://steemit.com/story/@reonlouw/you-re-in-the-army-now
In this blog, I want to tell you about Testimony night.
I was raised in a traditional Pentecostal church. For those of you who have never experienced it, you should go to one at least once in your life. Typically, such a church is small, with less than 200 people in attendance most Sundays. Everyone knows each other well and there is a lot of joy and a lot of rhythm in the music.
The typical preacher during my childhood learned his skill in a tent without a sound system. He was most probably recognized as someone gifted in this area because he had a booming voice that did not need any amplifying. That he now had the power of a microphone did not change his style one iota.
Preaching like this is hard work and doing it twice on a Sunday (morning and evening) takes some doing. The traditional Sunday lunch was a big meal with more meat than we had during the rest of the week combined. And it was followed by the sweetest deserts you can imagine, also in large portions. All of this did not make for an energetic, enthusiastic preacher for the evening service. He would be speaking to the same people and thus had to have something completely new about which to raise his voice and pound the pulpit.
While testimony night is a good idea, I think it mostly coincided with how big the pastor's lunch was and whether a guest speaker was readily available or not. In such a service a sermon was skipped to allow anyone and everyone the opportunity to share something God had done in or for them in recent times. I want to share a story I found funny as a child.
Testimony
A matronly lady stood up during one testimony night and told of her conversion many years earlier. Salvation stories are always popular and often retold. This lady emphasized her sinfulness in a passionate description of her early life. Tears covered her cheeks as she spoke.
"Brother and sisters, I was a bad woman! I lied and cheated. I smoked like a chimney. I drank like a fish. I stole from my employer. I was rotten!
I am ashamed to say, brothers and sisters, that I slept around. I jumped on every man that would look at me. The brothers here can testify to how bad I was!"
Needless to say, some of the brothers had some explaining to do when they got home that evening... 😌
Testimony night was often encouraging as we shared in one another's real-life experiences. And heard stories of faith in action and God in action. I think my love of story and specifically my love for the real-life story of where people are actually living, was born on these evenings. Don't underestimate how fascinating you are and how much people can learn from what you have experienced.
