Ever since this book was first published for the author, S. O. Susag, by
the Standard Printing Company, Guthrie, Oklahoma, in the year of 1948, it
has been in steady demand. These many testimonies of outstanding answers to
prayer have been an inspiration of faith to many people, and they will
continue to be an encouragement to every earnest and honest seeker for an
increase of faith in God's precious promises. "Jesus Christ the same
yesterday, and to day, and for ever." Hebrews 13:8.
In contemplation of printing this fourth edition, the undersigned publisher
contacted S. O. Susag's daughter, Mrs. Art Rustand (Goldie Susag), and
requested further information about her late father. In February, 1976, she
relayed the following notes of interest to the reader:
"My father was born in Steinkjer, Norway, on March 28, 1862. He came from
Norway to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and was in the store business for a
while. In 1892, they moved to Paynesville, Minnesota, where they engaged in
farming. After they moved to the farm he was converted, and in the year of
1895 he received his call from God to the ministry of the Word. He traveled
as a missionary to the Scandinavian countries for many years. He also
served as pastor in Grand Forks, N. D., and as an evangelist for years. In
fact, at the time of his death, which was in Culbertson, Montana, when he
was 90 years of age, he was traveling around holding services. His death
was attributed to his age. He was up and around until three days prior to
his passing. At the time of his death he made his home with his second wife
in Medicine Lake, Montana. He died on July 8, 1952, and was buried beside
his first wife (my mother) at the Church of God Cemetery near Wendell,
Minnesota."
--Lawrence D. Pruitt Guthrie, Oklahoma, March 8, 1976
"And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them
in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them,
and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them and not
forsake them." (Isa. 42:16). This Scripture seems to fit into my life's
experiences.
I was born in Norway. My parents were Lutherans. When I was two years of
age an incident occurred which I have never forgotten. It was this: My
Grandmother on my mother's side--a very godly woman--used to visit us at
least once a month.
On the occasion to which I refer, as she was about to leave us, Grandmother
said to my mother, "Ellen, I would like to speak to you 'under four eyes'
(that is to say, privately). Does the child understand anything that is
said?" Her reply was, "No, he doesn't understand." Then Grandmother
proceeded to say, "I have been wondering what would be the best way to pass
out of this world without being a trouble to anyone, and the Lord has shown
me that someday I shall lie down as usual to go to sleep and wake up in
glory and this may be the last time that I shall see you; so now, my
daughter, I feel constrained to urge you to seek the Lord." Again she said,
"I am sure the Lord has shown me that I shall go that way." Four years
later she went to glory just that way.
My parents had not given their hearts to God, yet they taught us to live
right. The only religious services we ever attended were those held once a
month in a country chapel. Other Sundays we would sing together in our home
and father would read a sermon to us out of a book.
We would then repeat the Lord's prayer and sing another song.
One afternoon, when I was two and a half years old, a number of we children
were invited to a neighbor's for lunch and play. As we passed the pantry
window on our way in, we saw a number of dishes filled with nice red
berries. One youngster suggested that we help ourselves to the berries, and
this we did. After a few mouthfuls I began to scream and ran home. Mother,
hearing my screams, rushed out to meet me and, picking me up in her arms,
asked me where I was hurt. I couldn't tell her but kept screaming. Finally
mother began to chide and shaking me, said, "Tell me where you are hurt."
Still I could not speak, then mother fell upon her knees and cried, "Lord,
my child is dying in my arms and I cannot find what is the matter with
him." I was then able to speak and tell her the cause of my trouble.
Putting my hand over my heart I said that I was having pain there and not
in my stomach. Mother questioned me as to whether the lady had given us the
berries, and I told her, "No," that we had helped ourselves to them. She
said, "I will tell you how to get rid of your pain: Go and tell the lady
what you have done and giving her your hand ask her to forgive you, and I
am sure the pain will leave you." Mother went with me and when I confessed
to the lady she took me up in her arms and wept with me. After confessing
the pain all disappeared.
* * * * *
When I was about eleven years of age it seemed that a voice was continually
speaking to me and saying, "You ought to be a better boy; I want you for a
preacher." I did not understand at the time that it was the Holy Ghost
speaking to me. Mother often wept over me and said, "Child, O child, what
shall I do with you! You make me more trouble than all the other eight
children put together."
At the age of fifteen I was confirmed and at the following preaching
service I was supposed to participate in taking the Lord's supper (as was
the custom of the church). Before that service I went out into the woods to
pray. I asked the Lord to forgive me for partaking of the Lord's supper,
for to refrain from taking it would bring disgrace upon my family.
From that time on, the Lord continued to talk to me, saying, "You ought to
be a better young man." It seemed as though I could not be better at home
in Norway so I determined to sail for America.
I had been in America about a year and a half when I met a distant relative
who was thought to be lost in this country, because his family had not
heard from him for two or three years. He invited me to go into a saloon
with him and have a glass of beer. We went in, and also played several
games of pool.
In the meantime I took off my coat and hung it on the back of a chair. In
the inside pocket of my coat I had my billfold containing about one hundred
dollars, all the money I had, and also my valuable papers. When I went to
reach for my money my billfold was gone. The saloon keeper seemed to know
what had taken place and handed me five dollars. I had no work as there was
none to be found. It was the custom in those days for the saloons to give a
free lunch with a glass of beer. I went at noon every day and bought a
glass of beer so I could have the free lunch that went with it. I lived
that way for about two months.
During the late winter I got a job at night work, which consisted of
pushing loads of stone in a wheelbarrow for the building of the Stone Arch
Bridge over the St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River for the Great
Northern Railway Company. The planks upon which we had to walk became very
slippery and on one trip the man ahead of me slipped back in the wheel of
my wheelbarrow upon which I had a large stone. The force of his fall threw
both stone and wheelbarrow into the river. The man behind me, seeing what
was happening, flung himself face down over his wheelbarrow, and in the
dark, grabbed me as I was going over the plank into the river. He caught me
by one of my arms and held me until help came and I was pulled out. I was
hanging from his hands about fifty to seventy-five feet above the river.
After that experience I could not make myself walk those planks anymore, so
I was again out of work and so terribly discouraged. A few nights later I
walked onto the Tenth Avenue bridge intending to jump off into the river to
end it all. As I took hold of the railing someone from behind me called out
and said, "When you jump, your troubles will begin." I looked, to see the
man who had spoken but there was no one on the bridge. The way he spoke had
sent a chill through me. It was after eleven o'clock at night and I seemed
to realize that it was the Lord who had spoken to me.
After sometime in America I found that I was still the the same young man
as before in Norway. It seemed that I was unable to do better. Thinking to
improve matters, I decided to go to school and study for the ministry.
After two semesters in the college certain things happened which turned me
into an infidel. I quit school, went into business and got married. Soon
after I contracted tuberculosis of the lungs, and the doctor said there was
no help for me, as both my lungs were like soup. During the depression of
1892 I lost all I had. In my sinful condition I called on God and He healed
me.
We then moved to the farm and one afternoon a young man came to our home
and asked me to attend a service with him that evening. In answer to my
query as to what kind of service it was to be, he informed me that two
women evangelists were conducting the meeting. I replied that I was not in
favor of women preachers but I would go with him as I was not afraid the
women would hurt me. As a matter of fact, it was through these women that I
was partly awakened spiritually, but did not yet give up my infidelity.
One evening I was very tired and sleepy and went to bed at precisely nine
o'clock. I went to sleep at once and had a dream. I dreamed that I had
become a minister of the gospel and that I was traveling all over the
United States and Canada, as well as in a number of European countries.
Hundreds of souls were turning to the Lord in the meetings and many
healings and miracles were performed. It would take a long life to
accomplish all that I saw done in my dream. I awakened and felt so
refreshed and rested, that I thought it was morning and put on the light
but found I had been in bed JUST TEN MINUTES! I did not sleep anymore that
night but spent the time in meditating on my dream which convinced me that
there must be within the human body a positive something that would
continue to live forever and my infidelity vanished.
A few months later (March 12, 1895), the Lord spoke peace to my wife and me
at the same time in our own home, and called us into the ministry. He
brought us out of darkness through three visions and showed us the evil of
all sectarian division. All this was giving us light on the beautiful
Church of God without our having heard any preaching on the subject, nor
did we know anyone who believed as we did.
We commenced preaching at once and our first convert was a lady who was
saved in our home. (Sister Hendricks, now Myhre, who is a minister). Our
first case of healing was when the Lord healed me of blood poisoning in my
left arm, caused from the scratch of a rusty nail. I caught cold in it and
it swelled so fast that when I got into the house I could not get my
clothes off and they had to be cut off with scissors. My wife and a young
brother prayed for me, but I did not get immediate relief. My entire arm
turned blue and yellow and soon my sides began to turn the same way. I had
read in the Bible that the sick were to be anointed with oil. The young
brother anointed me accordingly, and the swelling began to go down
immediately, insomuch that the next morning there was no symptom of any
thing wrong whatever.
* * * * *
The next experience of healing was of the restoring of my hearing to my
right ear. My wife had gone to services and I stayed home to take care of
the children. I had laid down beside them to get them to sleep and had
dropped off to sleep myself, and dreamed that I saw Jesus standing beside
the bed. He said to me, "Do you know John Pederson?" "Yes," I replied, "he
is my neighbor." And Jesus said, "Isn't he a blacksmith and does he not
make sleighs? And," he continued, "if he were to make one for you and you
were to break it, wouldn't he fix it for you?" "Why, certainly," I replied.
"Well," Jesus continued, "I made your ear in the first place and don't you
think I can fix it?" "Yes," I said. Then He stepped up to me and touched my
ear with two fingers and I jumped out of bed and MY HEARING WAS PERFECT! I
shouted glory to God.
* * * * *
The youngest of our twin boys, who was nearly five years of age, was taken
with double pneumonia and suddenly passed away. My mother-in-law prepared
him for burial. As I was preparing to drive to town to get a permit from
the doctor to bury the little one, the Lord said to me as I was on my way
to the barn to get the team, "Why do you not go back and pray again?" I
immediately turned around and went to the little corpse and laying my hands
on him prayed and wept, and after a little while he came to life. He was
not only alive, but also perfectly well. When I knelt down to pray my
family did not dare to speak to me; they thought I had lost my mind.
About three years later our baby daughter, some ten months old, was sick
and I was planning to leave home on Friday expecting to be gone over
Sunday. The little one grew steadily worse and at eleven o'clock on Sunday
night she passed away. There was great consternation in the family. The
oldest boy fainted when his grandmother laid her out. After everything had
quieted down and all had retired, except my wife who remained up, she went
to the little body, held it in her arms as she knelt beside the bed until
she was tired, then, laying the baby on the bed and laying her hands on it,
prayed until life came back into it. When I returned Monday the child was
as well as ever. In both cases grandmother prepared them for burial.
A little while after this experience the twins were out in the barn feeding
the horses. Somehow in their actions one boy accidently stuck the tine of
the pitchfork right into the eyeball of the other boy. Wife hearing their
screams, ran out and brought them into the house. She washed the blood from
the injured eye and laid the boy on the bed; then she and the twin brother
laid their hands on him and prayed the prayer of faith. He went to sleep
and slept untill morning, and all that remained on the eyeball was a small
white spot in the center which disappeared after a day or two, and his
sight was not in the least impaired.
* * * * *
A similar case happened at Bruce, South Dakota, while I was pastor at
Brookings and White. The little three year old daughter of Brother and
Sister Hi Tellinghuisen was playing in the yard with an old rusty sewing
machine oil can. She fell on it, the spout striking right into the center
of one eyeball. She was taken at once to a physician who ordered her to be
taken without delay to a specialist to have the eyeball removed. The
parents then called me over the telephone to come at once. When I arrived
and saw the eye, it looked to me like a dried up prune stone. I anointed
the child, but could find no words to utter in prayer. I could only groan,
but the Lord witnessed to the healing. (I think this took place on Saturday
at 11 o'clock a.m. and the next day, Sunday, she was brought to the
services perfectly well.) (At this writing she is teaching school).
* * * * *
On March the 20th, 1904, wife was taken with quick consumption. Her fever
was so high that she was delirious. As long as I remained beside her
praying, she would be rational but as soon as I ceased praying her mind
would wander. Over a week later, on Saturday, Brothers O. T. Ring and Carl
Forsberg came to visit us. We then had agreement in prayer for the healing
of my wife, and from that time on her mind was clear, yet she continued to
go down. A number prayed for her but she grew weaker and weaker, until in
the month of August. When the neighbors would come in to visit her, they
would say to me on leaving, outside of the house, "We are sorry to say it,
but we do not expect to see your wife alive again."
One day she said to me, "We have done everything we know to do except to
send to Brother E. E. Byrum for an anointed handkerchief." I asked, "Do you
want me to send for one?" to which she assented, and I sent for one. We
received it by mail August the 23rd at 1 o'clock. I placed the handkerchief
upon her and kneeling beside her laid my hands on her and prayed. She was
so weak that it seemd as if she would pass away before I could remove my
hands, so I soon said "Amen." She remarked, "This does not look very
encouraging, does it?" I answered, "No, it does not." Then she drew one of
her hands from under the covers and said, "Do you believe that any flesh is
ever coming to these hands?" "Dear," I answered, "I do not know." Then she
said, "I believe that it will happen." I asked, "Why do you believe it?"
She told me that a scripture had come to her while I was praying. She said
that it was the one about Naaman: "His flesh came again like the flesh of a
little child and he was clean." 2 Kings 5:14.
Two hours later she was perfectly well, but weak, of course.
* * * * *
On one occasion I received an urgent call to come to Norway Lake to pray
for Mrs. John Evenson who was ill with tuberculosis. While on my way there
I battled with devils, it seemed as though my buggy was full of devils,
whispering to me and saying, "You are going to be arrested and put in
jail." However, after driving sixteen miles, the Lord assured me that He
was going to raise Sister Everson up, even if she were dead when I got
there.
As I drove into the driveway I saw a number of men by the barn. It was the
Constable and others. Jumping out of the buggy, I proceeded to unhook my
team when Mr. Everson appeared, and said, "The hired man will take the
team; come along with me." We went into the house and into the room where
the sick woman was. Mr. Everson sat down in a chair beside the bed, taking
his watch out, he then took his wife's hand in his to count the pulse. She
was unconscious. I spoke to her two or three times but she did not hear me.
I knelt down and asked the Lord to restore her to consciousness. Then I
arose and spoke to her again. After a bit she opened her eyes and I said,
"Brother Susag is here. What do you want him to do for you?" She replied,
"I want you to anoint me and pray for me." I immediately proceeded to do as
she requested, following which she sat up in bed and asked for something to
eat.
The constable, with others, was waiting outside the house to arrest me if
the woman had died. Mr. Everson went out to them and they asked him how
things were going. He told them that before I prayed for her, her pulse was
124, and when I took my hands off, her pulse was 82--which is normal!
Thirteen years later she was taken sick again. Mr. Everson, not being
saved, called for the doctor they had previously employed. The doctor
refused to come, saying that Mrs. Everson "had lived for thirteen years on
something more than human. I can do nothing for her. If she has faith, she
can live another thirteen years." Then they telephoned me. I drove two
miles in my automobile and was taken seriously ill and had to return home
and go to bed. I was very sick for two days. Mrs. Everson died in the
meantime, and I was well.
On one occasion Brother C.H. Tubbs and myself held a meeting at Bowbells,
N. Dakota and a number of people were saved. We were to have a baptismal
service. It was the month of February and we would have to go three miles
to the nearest lake in which to baptize the candidates. There was no place
there for the changing of clothes and it was slow traveling as we rode in a
lumber wagon. Sister Stolsy, who wanted to be baptized, had been in poor
health for five years and had a baby five weeks old. The Constable, on
hearing of it, came to us and said, "If you put that woman through that
hole in the ice, I'll be there with a warrant for your arrest." So Bro.
Tubbs said, "We better go see Sister Stolsy," which we did. He said,
"Sister, it does not look reasonable for you in your condition to be
baptized." She wept and said, "I have wanted to be baptized for some time
and now that I have the opportunity I am denied the privilege." Then I said
to her, "Sister Stolsy, save your tears for something else. I will baptize
you if I have to spend the remainder of my life behind the bars," and she
was baptized. The constable witnessed the baptizing and saw that when she
came out of the water she looked the very picture of health. Three days
later the constable and his wife were baptized in the self-same place.
* * * * *
I have baptized hundreds of people from Canada to San Antonio, Texas; from
the Atlantic coast to the Pacific, in every month of the year, in the lakes
of Norway, Sweden and Denmark as well as in the North Sea, in all kinds of
weather--once in the Red River at Grand Forks, N. Dakota, in a snow storm
in zero weather, and I have never yet heard of one person having taken cold
from being baptized, but on the other hand, MANY HAVE BEEN HEALED!
It pays to obey the commandments of the Lord. While I was pastor in Grand
Forks, N. D., from December, 1919 to November, 1925, I baptized over two
hundred persons.
* * * * *
Once in company with Thomas Nelson, C.H. Tubbs and my wife, we held a tent
meeting in the country northwest of Colfax, Wisconsin. Several people were
saved and some were healed. This stirred up great opposition so that on a
couple of nights an angry mob was on the spot throwing stones, sticks and
lumber and bottles on the tent, demanding that we come out and they would
cut me to pieces. One night a minister of that community was in the tent,
and as he saw the stones come rolling through the tent, he became badly
frightened and said to me, "This is worse than in a heathen land." "Yes," I
replied, "but are they not your people?" He said, "Yes," and then getting
down on his hands and knees crawled out the back way from under the tent
and escaped to the woods.
The reason for this unseemly tumult was because I had preached that baptism
was by immersion and other truths. The situation was that two grown young
people, the son and daughter of a minister in the community, were among
those who were to be baptized. But the fact that there was no water nearby
in which they could be immersed seemed to give the opposing element great
satisfaction. However, we continued to advertise that there would be
baptismal services on the coming Saturday afternoon. Friday night it rained
heavily and near the tent there was a low place covered with green grass
where the water settled and the water was deep enough in which to baptize
the new converts.
This goes to prove that the Lord's resources are limitless. The next Sunday
night, being the last night of the meeting, after all had left the tent
except Bro. Tubbs and myself, and as I was not making any move towards
leaving the tent Brother Tubbs asked me whether I was not going home. I
answered, "No, those people who threatened to cut me to pieces are coming
back to pull the tent down and I want to be here when they come, but you go
on home; I want to be here alone." But he said, "No, I will not leave you."
It was about a hundred rods or more to the house where we were staying and
there was no other house near by. We put out the lights and sat waiting. A
number of times Bro. Tubbs urged that we go home, declaring that no one
would come, but at almost midnight a plank was thrown on the tent and out
ran Brother Tubbs for home; and then just as I was coming out of the tent a
big plank was thrown on me, striking my right shoulder and also hit my
head. It might have been quite serious but that I was wearing a stiff derby
hat at the time. As it was, I was almost knocked out.
I said to them--there were between fifty and seventy of them, "Just a
minute men, I am alone here; please do not destroy the tent; it has no
feelings. Take me and cut me in pieces as you said you wanted to do. If I
have done anything wrong I am willing to suffer for it." This I said as I
walked slowly toward them, "But if it is because I have preached the Word
of God to you folks and you do not receive it, you will meet it at the
judgment bar of God," and I continued to walk toward them. They said, "Do
not come so near." "Are you afraid of me?" I asked as I continued preaching
to them. Then they commenced backing up. Finally, it seemed I had no more
to say. One man said, "Give us more of that." At this point Brother Tubbs
appeared with eight of the brethren, whereupon the crowd turned and ran for
their rigs and vanished into the darkness.
About eighteen months later I held another meeting in this same community
and the attendance was very good. A number of the same people who had
claimed that they wanted to cut me to pieces were also there. Eight souls
had gotten saved and the attendance was increasing. All of a sudden, as I
was closing the service, the Spirit of the Lord said to me, "This is your
last service here. You will leave in the morning on the 4 o'clock train for
Grand Meadows, Minn." Saint and sinner alike, said, "You can't close now;
look at the manifest interest and the growing attendance!" "But," I said,
"the Lord tells me to close." They insisted that it could not be that they
all were wrong and I the only one that was right. So I consented to stay,
but had I but left on that morning train I would have escaped the terrible
storm that swept over that part of the country. As it was, I could neither
get away nor continue the meeting. On the farm where I was staying they had
to have a rope extended between the house and the barn for two days in
order to find the way from one building to the other.
* * * * *
I had held a number of revivals for Brother Millar of Racine, Wisconsin.
One time, in this connection, I had a dream that I saw a pasture with green
grass and beautiful sparkling water running through it and as nice a flock
of sheep as I ever saw were feeding in it. But in this beautiful pasture
that should have been utilized for good pasture. I felt impressed to tell
Bro. Millar of my experience so wrote him of what I had seen in my dream.
In his prompt reply he said, "You had better come with your 'stump-pulling
machine' and pull them out."
Some time later, on a very hot Sunday at noon I arrived in Racine, all
tired and worked out. I asked Bro. Millar whether there was to be an
afternoon service. I understood him to say, "No, there would not be." I
said to him, "I want no lunch so please take me to my room." And this he
did. I undressed immediately and was soon fast asleep, but before long I
felt my bed being shaken and heard someone speaking to me but it seemed I
just could not wake up. The shaking increased and I heard a voice saying,
"Brother Susag, Brother Susag." I looked up and there was Brother Millar!
He said, "Why, Brother Susag, have you undressed? The chapel is full of
people who are waiting for you to come and preach." I told him I had
understood him to say that there would be no afternoon service, that he
should go back and that I would follow as quickly as possible.
I had no message. I opened my Bible and from Genesis to Revelation the
Scriptures did not seem to mean anything to me. I prayed and still no
message. Then coming down stairs I met Sister Anna Hanson who was just
starting for the service. I said to her, "Please give me a text to preach
on." She said, "O you will have a text." I told her I was in earnest, that
I could not think of a single text in the whole Bible that meant anything
to me, that I was too worn out to think. Sister Hanson then said, "I have
often wished I might hear you preach on the first text I ever heard you
preach on and that was in Chicago. The text was, 'The Lord weigheth the
spirits.'" Then the Lord opened my understanding and I had a text. At the
close of the service Sister Hanson walked ahead of me to the parsonage and
into the kitchen where Sister Millar was. She asked, "How was the service?"
Sister Hanson answered, "The right message for the right people at the
right time." Sister Millar said, "Well, praise the Lord!" and when Bro.
Millar came in he said, "Praise the Lord," and jumped and shouted and said
that every stump had been pulled--twenty-two of them!
While this meeting was in progress Brother Tiffany Flint from Milwaukee
came down and asked me to come and hold a two weeks' meeting for him, but I
had no open dates. In those days I was, at times, booked ahead as many as
forty-two meetings, so I had to refuse him. But he urged, "Won't you come
just a few days?" So I promised to go for three nights. When I arrived he
said, "I have something to tell you: I have three persons here needing
spiritual help." I replied, "Tell me nothing, on the train the Lord gave me
three texts, one for each night, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, which I
am going to preach on." It happened that each text fitted each one of the
three mentioned persons and each one came to service on the very night his
particular text was preached on, and received his special benefit.
I am relating all these incidents because I have always believed in the
leadership of the Holy Spirit; and now, after these fifty years of work in
the ministry I am more firmly grounded in that belief than ever.
Some time later I held another meeting for Brother Millar. One afternoon,
as I sat studying, the Lord said to me, "Here is your text; you go down to
street so and so, such and such a number and preach at 2:30 this
afternoon." After lunch I said to Brother Millar, "Let us take a walk." On
coming out I said, "Is there a street in the city of such a name," stating
the name the Lord had given me? He said, "I think so; what of it?" I told
him that the Lord had given me a text to go down there and preach at 2:30.
Bro. Millar then said, "We will take a street car and go down there and
see, but I will tell you that if there is a chapel at that number you will
not get an opporunity to preach there." We boarded the street car and the
motor-man directed us to the street, and as we approached the given number
we found a chapel and a meeting in progress. We went in and sat in the back
seat. The singing had just stopped and the evangelist took his Bible and
went to the pulpit. Bro. Millar smiled and hung his head, looking at me out
of the corner of his eye, as much as to say, "I thought so." But I was
pretty sober. I took my watch out of my pocket and held it in my hand and
after the evangelist had given out his text and had spoken just seven
minutes, he closed his Bible and said, "This is queer; I cannot speak this
afternoon," and turning to the pastor, asked him whether he had the
message. The pastor replied, "Why no, I haven't even my Bible with me."
Then, looking over the audience, the evangelist said, "There must be
someone here who has the message." Pointing to me, he said, "Haven't you
got the message?" I answered, "Yes." "Then come on up here," he rejoined,
"and take the pulpit."
On taking the pulpit I promptly explained just how it was we happened to be
there at that particular time and proceeded to preach the sermon the Lord
had given me to preach. I announced our services and everybody seemed to be
well pleased with the sermon. I was not acquainted with any person in the
audience, nor did any one know me as far as I knew. A little later a number
of them attended our services and eight of them were saved and took their
stand for the truth.
* * * * *
At one time I received a series of letters from a leader in a certain
Church of God congregation in which the writer earnestly pleaded that I
come and hold a meeting for him.
He said that the Lord had revealed to him that I could be a great blessing
to him and his congregation. I had never been to the place nor did I know
anyone in the congregation that I was aware of. After giving the matter due
consideration I felt that I should go, and wrote the pastor to that effect.
On the day I was planning to leave I received a letter from the brother,
upon the reading of which I began to tremble like a leaf--something I had
never experienced before. I was standing on the floor reading the letter.
Wife ran up to me and asked me if I was sick or whether there was anything
wrong. She took the letter and read it, and said, "There is nothing wrong
with that letter." "No," I said, "but I have a feeling that if I go I will
meet something I have never met before." Wife answered, "Don't let the
devil scare you now; you go, and I will pray for you."
On arriving in the city, as I stepped off the train, a man came up to me
and said, "Are you Brother Susag? I am Brother X--; I have come to meet
you. We certainly are glad that you have come, but I am sorry to have to
tell you that our group is split into two congregations." I quickly reached
to take my suitcase out of his hand, and said to him, "I'm going right back
home; I'm too small a man to attempt to tackle anything like that." But he
said, "No, you cannot go, for we have been praying for you to come and the
Lord has shown us that you are the man to help us out." "All right," I
said, "on one condition I'll stay. Take me to a hotel, and you inform both
parties that I will only stay on condition that all meet together in one
chapel and that no one tell me anything about the trouble, for if the Word
of God will not make you one, I surely cannot do so." "But," said he, "you
surely need to know something about how matters stand." "No," I replied,
"the Lord knows it all and He also knows what messages to give me from time
to time." "Very well," he said, "I'll take you out in the country three
miles to an old couple who knows nothing of the trouble."
Three days later at three o'clock in the afternoon, the brother came to see
me and informed me that my proposition had been accepted; the group had
agreed to the conditions. I preached for eleven days and let them do their
own altar work and the eleventh night there was but one congregation and
all was peace and harmony. For the first eleven days of the meeting there
was not one outsider in any of the services but on the very next night the
chapel was filled, and there were seven ministers of the city present in
the audience.
* * * * *
An Assembly meeting was being planned, soon to be held in Chicago, at the
74th Street Church of God and the brethren in charge wrote to the ministers
of the Scandinavian Publishing work in St. Paul Park, Minnesota, requesting
them to provide an evangelist who should preach in the Scandinavian
languages--either Thomas Nelson, Emil Krutz or S. O. Susag. Brother Krutz
and I were holding a meeting at Hereford, Minn. at the time. We received a
letter from St. Paul Park asking us to pray to find out which one of the
three of us was to go. Then Brother Krutz said to me, "I know you know who
is to go; tell me who it is." But I answered him, that he should go find
out from the same source from which I had found out. He left me and after
two hours returned and said, "It was a little hard for me to find out
because I wanted to go so badly myself, but the Lord showed me that you
were the one to go."
On my way I stopped at St. Paul Park and met Brother D. O. Teasley from New
York. He said to me, "So you are on your way to the Assembly in Chicago." I
said, "Yes, if Brother Nelson is not going." "Why," he said, "he is not
going. When I stopped in Chicago the congregation was praying the Lord to
send you." God works at both ends.
We held the Scandinavian services at the Assembly up stairs in the
Missionary Home. After five days' meeting, quite a few were saved, while
down in the English services in the chapel where there were thirty-three
ministers, none were being saved. Brother Reardon, hearing of our good
services, asked me whether I preached in English, "Yes," I replied, "in my
broken way." "Why, then," he said, "do you not ask the Lord for a message
to preach down in the chapel?" I answered, telling him the Lord had already
given me three messages but someone else gets to the pulpit before me.
(This was the time for the free-for-all in the pulpit). Brother Reardon
said, "Come with me," and he took me upstairs into a room where a group of
the leading ministers were assembled and said to them, "Here is the man who
is holding up the success of the meeting." I said, "How is that possible
when I cannot even get into the pulpit? Somebody rushes in ahead of me, and
one who did so was not saved." To this they said, "We have already attended
to that person," and told me that I had better get another message from the
Lord, but I said, "No." Then they said, "Will you preach it if the Lord
gives you another message?" I said, "I will, if I can get into the pulpit
and you will pray for me."
The second day following, the Lord gave me another message. My text was the
last clause of the second verse of Proverbs 16: "... the Lord weigheth the
spirits." After I had spoken a few minutes Brother Cole spoke up and said,
"Please stop a minute, Bro. Susag, do not talk so fast; we do not
understand a word you say." I said, "Please pray for me." Then again,
realizing I was going quite fast, I stopped, when Sister Cole said, "Do not
stop now, go ahead, Bro. Susag, we can understand you well enough." I
seemed to be full of the Holy Ghost which seemed to be pressing me on. When
I said, "Amen" there were forty-two at the altar crying for mercy.
Listen folks, this was not because of my good preaching, for they could not
understand me, but they understood when the Holy Ghost spoke. When I went
to the altar to pray with the seekers a man came running on his hands and
feet, barking like a dog. He was taken out to another room to be prayed
for. He was helped, and the devils were cast out.
After the altar service was over I asked Brothers Reardon and Ebel to go
with me to the basement. As soon as we got there I fell on my face to the
floor weeping, and saying to the brothers, "I need help, I am in serious
trouble. It seems as though devils were tearing my very body to pieces."
Thank God for good brothers who are able to help a person in time of need.
Brother Reardon said to me, "Get up quick, Bro. Susag, don't lie there and
cry for the devil." But I said, "You don't know what trouble I am in." But
they said to me, "There is nothing the matter with you. Get up and rebuke
the devil, get up and sit on that chair and we will talk to you." Then Bro.
Reardon said, "The Lord used you to break the spell in the meeting and
there were seven possessed with devils at the altar. The devil became
enraged at you and was determined to ruin you." Then I resisted the devil
and was free.
We will soon find out when we let the Holy Ghost have His way with us there
are seemingly two equally great powers in the world. But thank God, we also
find that He is the Omnipotent Ruler over all things.
Brother Tubbs and I once held a meeting at Portland, North Dakota. The wife
of the man with whom we stayed professed to be saved and one of the saints.
Her husband, as far as I knew, made no profession but was a very fine man
and one of the leading business men of the town.
One day, as we were looking through the bookcase, we found a lot of fine
looking books of Russellite teaching. We asked the sister who had bought
them. She told us that she had bought them--"had bought over a hundred
dollars' worth of those good books." We informed her that they were
unsound, that they taught erroneous doctrine and should not be read nor
handed to anyone.
Our taking this stand made things look as though we would be without a
place to stay. But that evening the Lord changed the situation. The
two-year-old child of this couple was suddenly taken violently ill. The
mother asked us to pray for the boy. Bro. Tubbs plainly told her that the
Lord would not heal her boy as long as she had those books in the house.
When we were just starting to go to the service that evening, the father,
who was holding the child in a blanket in his arms, said to us, "Will you
guarantee healing to my child if I place it in your hands? Otherwise I
shall have to get a doctor before it is too late." Bro. Tubbs answered, "We
can guarantee nothing," and we started for the service.
Bro. Tubbs was already outside the door of the house when the mother of the
child said pleadingly, "Won't you pray?" The Holy Ghost came upon me and I
said, "Yes, on one condition, if you will promise to take all those books
over to the meeting place tomorrow and burn them up before the eyes of the
audience, I'll pray and guarantee healing for your child." She said, "I
won't do that; they are good books and cost $100." "All right," I said, and
stepped out of the door. The father said, "Just a minute," and then to his
wife he said, "Isn't the life of our child worth more than one hundred
dollars?" She said, "But they are good books." He replied, "The ministers
say they are no good. I know nothing about them, whether they are good or
not, but I do know one thing that my child's life is worth more than one
hundred dollars." "All right, then, I'll do it," she said.
I stepped back in the room, threw my hat on the floor, went over and laid
my hands on the child and prayed the prayer of faith and the Lord healed
the child instantly, and the books went up in smoke the next day.
I have seen bookcases and book shelves in many homes that need just such a
purge in order that the glory of God may dwell in the home, and sometimes
even in the churches.
* * * * *
In the years 1915-16 I spent almost thirteen months in Denmark helping the
few faithful workers there to raise up eight congregations and many books
were burned during the time.
One old mother in Israel, when she heard of the books being burned, said,
"I've got only one book and it's a good one." She brought it to me and
said, "If you say this is not good, my salvation goes too." I asked her if
I might mark with a pencil in her book and she said I could. After reading
it a while I laid it aside having marked it here and there. She asked me
what I thought of her book. Not to discourage her, I said, "There are some
good things in that book." She took it and began to find the places which I
had marked, finally closed the book and said, "This book is no good; the
Bible says thus and so and the book speaks to the contrary." Then she said,
"Why have I been blessed many times when reading this book?" I answered,
"Because you were honest and did not know any better."
We pioneer ministers had many things to meet. On getting home one time, I
found that a runaway team had pulled our windmill down so that we had to
have a new one. The well was 204 feet and was hard to pump. After we got
the new one, a neighbor came over and said to my son, Oswald, "See, your
father has been out preaching and so you are able to have a new windmill."
Yes, he had been gone seven weeks and he was eleven cents short on his
expenses. The following year I was gone nine months and five days and I
fared real well--I had $76.76 above my expenses that time.
* * * * *
Sometimes I got to thinking about little Charlie Brown, who I believe was
about eleven years old at the time. When his father asked him if he got
tired, he said, "Yes, I get tired of this walking preaching." So they went
into a grove and prayed and his father said to him, "We will go to the next
town and you preach on some street corner and if no one gets saved, we will
quit and if some get saved we will keep on. What do you think of that?"
Young Charlie agreed to that and a number of souls did get saved. Now
"young Charlie" is Editor in Chief of the Gospel Trumpet.
Then it was empty pocketbooks, empty stomachs and sore feet, but that did
not stop the preaching. Yes, in those days it was souls we were after, and
not money and honor.
* * * * *
I did not have a new suit for sixteen years; wife had only one new dress in
eighteen years. Although we lived on a farm we could not eat butter. We had
to sell that in order to be able to buy more necessary things.
One year wife and the children were raising twenty-two hogs while I was out
preaching in the gospel field, and we had a payment of $500 to make on our
home, or move. When I arrived home in the fall wife met me with tears in
her eyes as she told me that the hogs were all ready for the market when
the price dropped from $6.00 per hundred weight to $2.75. "And," she
continued, "the only reason I can find for it is that we have not given
enough." "But," I replied, "I feel that we have given enough: Our gross
income has been a little over $500.00." She then brought two pencils and
two pieces of paper and said to me, "Come on." We knelt down and asked the
Lord to bring to our minds what we had given, and in our check-up we found
we had given $252.50. Then, almost scaring me, my wife, with tears
streaming down her face, lifted her hand toward heaven, and said, "Lord, we
have done our duty and you will have to pay our bills."
Two days later the cattle buyer came back and said that if he could get our
hogs he would have enough for two railroad carloads. I told him he could
not have them at that price. He said, "They are the nicest looking hogs I
ever saw and if I can get them to mix in with the others I may get top
price for all." "And," he added, "I will give you the old price: Six
dollars ($6.00) per hundred weight." To which I replied, "They are yours."
One of our neighbors had twenty-two hogs born the same week as ours. The
day they were brought into town people said, "Susag's hogs are the nicest,
but P----'s hogs will weigh 1,000 pounds more than his." They weighed them
and found that our hogs weighed almost eleven hundred pounds more than
P----'s. They took them off the scales twice to examine the scales to see
whether they were correct, but the hogs held their weight, almost eleven
hundred pounds more than the neighbor's hogs. So once more, the Lord
honored his faithful, humble people. There was enough money for the $500
payment and some to spare.
Two years later we had another $500 payment to meet, and when we started to
seed in the spring, I said to the twins, "Let us kneel down right here in
the field and ask God to give us a large enough crop to pay the notes which
will be due in the fall." That year crops, generally, were very poor,
average wheat being from 2-1/2 to 3-1/2 bushels to the acre (of screenings,
or Number Four, as it is called). But the Lord gave us eighteen bushels to
the acre on one piece and on the other, twenty-two bushels to the acre of
Number One wheat. One old lady said, "I can't understand such a thing--only
a fence between."
* * * * *
One time I had a dream of a scene taking place in the chapel at St. Paul
Park, Minn. Brother Nelson, who had just finished his sermon, was standing
by the pulpit with his left elbow on the pulpit and his hand on his chin,
looking at the audience. Then I saw a woman, about two-thirds down the
aisle, get up and shake her fist toward Bro. Nelson. The Lord said to me,
"Do you see that woman?" I answered, "Yes." "You see she is not right with
me in shaking her fist at my servant?" "Yes," I said, "I can see that."
Then the scene changed in my dream. I was sitting on a chair right between
the dining room and the front room at the Workers' Home of the Scandinavian
Publishing Company, and there was a minister sitting behind me leaning his
hands on the back of my chair. This minister I had met once before, and the
Lord said to me, "You had better look out for that man; he is not right
with me. He will get you into trouble."
Some days later I received a telephone message to come to St. Paul Park,
Minn. at once. I went accordingly. On my arrival I found services were
going on in the Workers' Home and very soon I was sitting exactly as I saw
myself sitting in my dream. All of a sudden I saw the woman I had seen in
my dream coming in from the kitchen. I had never seen her before, nor had I
ever heard of her, but recognized her from the dream. Then I almost got
scared. What if that preacher was sitting behind me resting his hands on
the back of my chair, I thought. What's up, anyhow? I did not dare to look
back to see!
The brethren asked me to preach, and when I got up and faced the audience,
sure enough, there sat the very minister I had seen in my dream! I spoke on
the twenty-third Psalm. I'm generally long winded in the pulpit but this
time I cut it short. When I closed, Bro. Nelson said, "Is that all you are
going to give us?" And I said, "Yes."
"Old men shall have dreams and young men shall see visions."
When the service was over, Brother O. T. Ring came to me and said, "Please
come into our room; we want to see you a little." On going into the room I
found that the ministry were there, along with this minister and woman,
also some of the leading workers. Brother Nelson said, "We are having a
little difficulty and we felt that we should call for you. You have had a
lot of experience and we thought that possibly you could be a help to us."
Then I got up and asked whether I might tell my dream. After I had told it
I said, "If this fits, then you let me out." "Yes, it fits," he said.
A number of years later Brother J. S. Lane was to be the evangelist at the
South Dakota State Camp Meeting. We met and introduced ourselves. Brother
Lane said,
"Brother Susag, I stopped at Clinton, Iowa, and a sister said to me, are
you going up to South Dakota and Minnesota? Then you'll meet a minister
that I am afraid of. His name is Susag; the Lord speaks to him whether he
is asleep or awake, but I have forgotten her name." I said, her name is so
and so. "Yes," he said. That was about twenty years after the dream.
* * * * *
It was a wonderful experience the Lord gave me after the baptism of Sister
Swenvorg and the wonderful healing of her eyes, and also the wonderful
glory the Lord sent upon her with the persecution that came with it. That
evening in the service the Lord blessed me so much I had to put both hands
over my heart and had to ask the Lord to stop, as my human body could not
stand any more pressure. This happened in Lukken, Denmark.
* * * * *
I once went to hold a meeting in Bro. William Gustafson's grove three miles
north of Belgrade, Minnesota. The brother met me at the station and said he
had quite a lot of business to do in town so I could stay at that station
until he got through and then he would come and get me. But as quite a long
time passed and he did not come I walked over to a store and asked them if
they knew Mr. Gustafson and they said they did. Then I asked if they knew
whether he was still in town. To which they replied that he had gone home
quite a while ago. So I had to take my grips and walk out to his place, as
the meeting was set and I was to stay in his home. I held the meeting and
some souls were saved, but I never said a word to Mr. Gustafson about his
leaving me in town. I thought that the good Lord could speak to him better
than I could. The Lord gave me grace to treat him as nicely as though
nothing had happened. When the meeting ended I had to walk back to town
again.
At the next year's state camp meeting he came to me and said, "Can we go
over into the timber?" Of course I said, "Yes." On our way over he told me
that a would-be preacher had talked to him about me, accusing me of many
things but that he had found out that they were not true. Then he asked me
to forgive him and he also asked the Lord to forgive him, as he had lied to
me.
It is too bad that such things happen, as a finer brother than Brother
Gustafson there never was.
Then Brother Gustafson told me that the Lord spoke to him telling him he
should have given ten dollars to me for that meeting, but now the Lord
tells him it is to be fifty, and he wrote me out a check for that amount.
* * * * *