The Genesis of Our Relationship with Southern Hills

For several years I attended the Sermon Seminar at the Austin Graduate School of Theology.  It was and is one of the finest intensive Bible study opportunities that I know anything about.   One year I rode to Austin with Eddie Randolph, who served as the preaching minister for the Southern Hills church in Shreveport at the time.   One night Eddie wanted to take me out dinner.  Over dinner he asked me to think about the possibility of coming to work with the Southern Hills church at some point in the future.  I didn’t think much of it at the time.  I had no plans to leave Minden, but Eddie had planted a seed.

Actually the germ of a seed had been planted even before that.  While still in Cedar Rapids, I was invited to present some of my holiness material at Pepperdine.  One lady, who came to my class, told me that she intended to buy my book and send it to her father.   He was very much interested in holiness.  She said he lived in Shreveport, Louisiana.   I thought that was nice, but I never dreamed it would have a later impact on my life.

Sometime after I moved to Minden, I got a call from Darline Cook, wife of Charles Cook, who was one of the Southern Hills elders at the time.  She told me that she was in a group that was studying, He Died To Make Men Holy.  She said the group wanted me to visit them some evening.  They wanted to ask me some questions about the book.  That’s always scary.  You wonder if it’s going to be a heresy trial.

The teacher of the class was Earnest Garrett, the father of the woman I met in California.   He was about a hundred years old, but he was incredibly sharp.  He was a brilliant man.  I was told that he helped develop the Poulan chain saw, many years earlier.  

When I got there, it was clear that the members of the group were thoroughly familiar with my book.   As I got to know these people later on, I came to understand they were dedicated Bible students.   Earnest had not only become familiar with my book, he had gone to the library and made an effort to read the original documents of every quotation I cited in the book.  He even pointed out the fact that I had inadvertently put down the wrong volume number on an encyclopedia citation.   They gave me the third degree, but I was fairly familiar with all of their questions, and I didn’t have a great deal of difficulty answering them.  Many of these people would later become my good friends.

In those years Southern Hills invited area preachers to speak to the congregation on Wednesday evenings.  I had several of those opportunities, and in the process I got acquainted with the people.  I remember one lady in particular who introduced her herself to me.  She said, “My name is Mary Berryman.”  I said, “I know who you are.  I grew up in Clyde and your father-in-law baptized me.”  Mary has been a good friend ever since.

Because of these experiences I developed a close relationship with some of the people at Southern Hills.  It was about to become an even closer relationship.