Jack Robbins

I praise God for the old-time religion. This Gospel is like a great net, which takes in every kind of person. It took in the deacon; it took in the traveling man; and it took me in. I was an old cowpuncher. I had only one more ride to take, and that was over the Great Divide. But between that last ride, and me stood Jesus.

I was lying in an old shack on the mud flats of the Willamette River, a good many years ago. I lay there with no friends around me. I hadn’t been home to see my mother or sister for years. I was too proud to go home in the condition I was in. I was about ready to “cash in.” As I lay there in that shack, all I could see was my life in panoramic view passing before me; and I couldn’t see one good thing. I could see a lot of bad things. I saw that I had broken an old mother’s heart. I saw many sinful things I had done; and I knew I was not ready to face God with those sins.

We sing a song, sometimes, “Lord, take me back to the faith of my childhood.” My mother had told me about God when I was a boy: and God began to talk to me there in that shack. He stirred me up; and I thought about my childhood days. I thought of that young mother back in a mining town where I grew up, and where I first heard about Jesus. Mother used to gather us around her knees every night and tell us about God and pray with us. It was many years afterwards that I drifted from it all. I went out on the range; I started drinking bad whiskey, riding wild horses, and all the rest of it. I worked out in the sheep camps. I worked in the ditches. I worked hard for years. I would spend my hard-earned money across the bars – to dress up the saloonkeepers and their families.

I sent up an S O S call to God.

But God rounded me up one night. He turned my heart toward Him and caused me to get on my knees in that shack and pray. Full of sorrow – hopeless, discouraged, despondent, and in pain – I sent up an S O S call to God. I had gone to the extreme end of everything; I was sinking and needed help. I had made up my mind to pray until God heard me, or until I died on my knees. Thank God, the moment I began to pray I began to feel better! I prayed off and on for about three weeks. I was getting honest and coming clean with God: I was telling Him I would clean up the old life.

Finally there was a rift in the clouds, Heaven opened, and down in my soul came the living power of Christ which transformed my soul and took out the old desires, and put in new desires. He put love and peace in my soul. A whole symphony orchestra was playing in my heart. He put me on my feet; He put my chin up in the air; and He put power in my life to go forth and do right.

I cleaned up the old life – and paid up for old railroad fares all over the country. When I was a bum I was a first-class one, going around stealing rides. I would knock on the back doors; and I would sleep in the ‘jungles’ in the wintertime – burn up on one side and freeze on the other. I suffered all the pangs of Hell that a man could suffer. Thank God, at last I got down to business and prayed until God answered. When He saved me He broke off the sins that had me bound, and sobered me up. I have been sober these forty years. I haven’t cursed God or man; I haven’t smoked; I have not begged nor stolen anything, nor been down and out since God saved me. Today I can sleep the sleep of innocence and I am praising God for it.

One restitution I made was for a saddle. The night I left home I needed a saddle. I had already taken another man’s horse. I went around to the sheriff’s barn and took his good saddle, put it on the horse, and rode out of the country on it. When God began to deal with me, that saddle got about four or five times larger that it was originally. But I said, ‘I will straighten this up.’ I wrote back to the sheriff, and when he answered he said, ‘I knew you took the saddle, and I was mad when I found it out. But I freely forgive you, just forget it.’ It feels good to be cleaned up; right with God and with man.

Thank God, the moment I began to pray I began to feel better!

After the Lord saved me I joined the church. I was hungry for God and was walking in all the light I had – and all the light they had. After three years I went to an Apostolic Faith camp meeting, and there I heard something that changed my whole life. I heard God’s standard lifted up. I saw they had something I would give every drop of blood to get. I got the light on sanctification, that wonderful, second, definite work of grace that can be wrought out in a man’s life.

“I went after it every night until God did the work in my life. It wasn’t very many days until I poured out my soul to God in prayer and received the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Thank God, He gave me power to preach this everlasting Gospel for over forty years now.

“I have no regret that I ever said goodbye to the world of sin. And because I did, I have a whole family over in Heaven today. Yes, my mother, my brother, and my sisters are over There. They have gone on since I received this great salvation. I told them about it. I wasn’t always nagging them, but by the grace of God I lived it before them; and when they wanted a way out of trouble they came to me. They were glad to take the way of God’s salvation. I am praising God that I quit fighting for the devil and transferred my affections to a new Master.”