Philip W. Brown

I was born January 10, 1898 at St. Albans, Vermont, the youngest of five boys, into a home where the Bible was an open Book, and was read to us every day.

My father was a lay preacher in the Methodist Church and both parents were teachers of the adult classes. Though my father held in question some parts of the Bible, I thank God I believed it all as the inspired Word of God. Some good books in our home were an inspiration to me to take the way of the Cross, as  “Pilgrim’s Progress.” However, my younger years were sinful, but little known by others, and many nights I wet my pillow with tears for my sins. But, one night at my bedside I felt my load of sin was too heavy and I realized I had to forsake all my sins and repent, and when I did, Jesus saved me and put victory in my heart, and I could then live right.

A year or two after this, while I was attending a university in a nearby city I began going to a Holiness Church where I learned about sanctification, and soon the Lord sanctified me in my own room. How I shouted and praised God! Then from another source, I heard that I could be baptized with the Holy Ghost and fire as in Acts 2:4. I thought: That is for me, I’m going to have it!

That is for me, I’m going to have it!

There was some wonderment, as I heard much against it, but I began to pray that God would lead me among people who had it, if it was His will. He soon answered, because in a very few months God had an instructor from the State Agricultural College in Kansas to come to Vermont to collect two carloads of grade Ayreshire cows and ship them to a Correctional Institute farm at Hutchingson, Kansas. He made St. Albans his headquarters and he soon inquired for a young man to assist him in the trip to Kansas. I, with several others, volunteered and as God would have it, he selected me. I was just under 21, so needed my parents’ consent, which I received. I thought right then, “Maybe now I’ll find God’s people.”

After an interesting trip of some two weeks in the cattle cars, during which the World War I Armistice was signed, this college professor asked if I would like to do some milk testing for the Holstein-Friesen Association for a few months. I took the opportunity and again asked and received permission of my parents.

On my last job of testing I came down with scarlet fever and after six weeks in a hospital, I started out with my two heavy suitcases to look for God’s people in Kansas City, Missouri. After only one inquiry at a Holiness Church, I was told that if I wanted to believe in the baptism of the Holy Ghost with speaking in tongues, “go to the Apostolic Faith.” He said it rather bluntly. I went, and though it was daytime, one of the members was there to answer my questions.

That night there was a meeting and that one meeting settled all questions for me. At once I quit my good-paying employment and any thoughts of returning home, and I started to seek the Lord in earnest. Before this I confided to Brother James Damron, Sr., the pastor, that I wanted to get my baptism, and then continue my work as a milk tester and give out church literature. But he very kindly said, “I believe the Lord wants you to stay here.” And stay I did and got a job helping a “steeple-jack” paint chimneys and flag poles, then helped as a truck painter later.

“I believe the Lord wants you to stay here.”

During these few weeks, Brother Ray and Sister Freda and others, came to help us on a Sunday morning, and at their first service with us, I received the baptism of the Holy Ghost. There was an afternoon meeting, but I was at the altar still speaking in another language when the meeting began. I missed my dinner, but what did I care! I had found what I so long had craved!

There I heard much about the yearly camp meetings in Portland, Oregon, so I determined to go at any cost. As soon as I arrived, I so wanted to see “Mother” Crawford (as we called her), the Founder and Leader, and went directly to her home. As soon as I saw her and heard her speak I was “captured.” I knew she was one I could safely follow. I felt that she was indeed as an oracle of God to me. I have felt the same way of her successors, as I know this is the work of God and not the work of man.

The Rose City camp meeting was my first camp meeting, which was in 1919. After the 1920 camp meeting I returned to Kansas City and was there for three years before returning to Portland to stay. I wanted to be my best in the music part of the services and hoped that I could be of service in the Portland meetings.

As the Lord would have it, when I was at the 1923 camp meeting Brother Ray Crawford asked me to stay in Portland to play the piano in their services. So it has been my God-given privilege to play in Apostolic Faith services all these 50-odd years. The Lord also gave me a talent, which I did not have, of writing many songs and anthems, which are used in our services. I did not make them for any remuneration, but gave all the songs to the church, feeling that God would most certainly bless, and He has, and I thank Him.

A few years ago our son, Larry, urged me to write my early history in the Gospel, and lately Brother Clifford Friesen made the same request. I had already written most of it, but His request made me feel I had better do something more about it.

If I had as keen memory as I wish I had, I could write a book and a good sized one, I’m sure. But I do remember the determination that sustained me through these many years: If others have made the Goal, I can, too, in spite of all the devil can do.

Now in my senior years I find I have no regrets whatever that I took the way of the Cross, though at times it has been stony. My hope is bright that I will soon see my Savior and hear His “Well done.”

Philip W. Brown was born of school teacher parents. When he was very young, a serious illness caused him to be hearing impaired. However, that did not hinder his musical prowess. He was an accomplished pianist when he moved to Portland in 1923, and accompanied the church orchestra for 25 years. He wrote his first hymn in 1934, and after that time he wrote more than 250 hymns
and anthems. He served as a music missionary to the Hawaiian Islands in 1947; in 1948 moved to Chehalis to assist the music department of Apostolic Faith Church. He married Margaret Young in 1950, and they had one son.

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