A Personal Account

A spiritually hungry Eskimo man who traveled from northern Alaska to the city of Seattle in 1913 told of coming into an Apostolic Faith service, after being pointed toward the church by a man on a street corner. He said, “As soon as I opened the door and stepped inside, I felt as though someone said to me, ‘These are the people you are looking for.’ I glanced around and saw a long bench below the pulpit; nobody sat on it, and I wondered what it was for. Each person who came into the church went to his seat, but knelt to pray before sitting down. I watched them closely, and said to myself, ‘There is something to that.’

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“When the preacher came to the pulpit, the service started. Then came testimony time, and many people got up (sometimes five stood at once!) and told what God had done for them. One sister said that she thanked God for saving her soul, and that she was glad He doesn’t look on the color of the skin, but looks right down into a person’s heart. Something began to move in my heart, and I felt condemned for the sins I had committed against God. I was surely under conviction! I felt such a hunger for what I heard, and I wanted the preacher to stop preaching so I could pray and call on God to have mercy and take the sin out of my heart.

“At the altar call, I went forward and knelt at the long bench that I had wondered about. With a cry in my heart, I asked God to forgive me of my sins. God heard my prayer and forgave me. I faced the people of the congregation and told them I had found Jesus!”