I was 45 years old when the Lord saved me by his grace and I will forever be grateful. Several years after that, I felt like the Lord wanted me to preach. Obviously I had no experience, no schooling, I didn’t know what to do. Then, the Lord blessed me with two people in my life that gave me an opportunity to do what I felt like the Lord had called me to do.

One was Richard Jackson, one of the great preachers I have ever heard, wonderful evangelist, at one time pastor of a mega church of over twenty thousand people in Phoenix, Arizona. He had just moved to Brownwood to open the Jackson Center and his assistant was a lady named Vicki Vaughn. The two of them made and still make a great difference in my life. I went to classes under the two of them, Richard a great preacher, Vicki Vaughn the best Bible teacher I have ever known. With what schooling they put into my dense head, I got the opportunity to preach. I will forever be indebted to them for what they did for me.

So, at that point I started preaching and I kept getting more and more opportunities to share my testimony and to preach and even got some revival opportunities. One that I remember very vividly was, believe it or not, at First Baptist Church in Stephenville. Great people. Wonderful people. But one night in that revival I’m preaching on the woman at the well. I’m about halfway through with my sermon and all of a sudden this young lady – 20 something – comes walking down the aisle in a long dress and barefooted, more like a stroll down the middle isle.

She’s shouting “I am the woman at the well”! She repeated it and repeated it and I glanced down at the pastor of the church who was in the front row and he just bowed his head as if to say, “It’s on you buddy”. I didn’t know what to do. Richard and Vicki hadn’t prepared me for this. I was frozen. This young lady gets to the front of the church and she starts talking about the woman at the well. She’s saying, “We are all the woman at the well”. For about ten minutes she preaches a great sermon and then she looked at me and said, “I’m sorry Pastor. It was just on my heart”.

She turned around and walked back to her seat and that was it. I just started preaching again and we made it through. I’m sure it’s probably happened to most preachers, and even stranger things than that, and I guess it’s part of the deal. If you’re going to commit to preach, you’re pretty sure to have some unusual things happen to you.

Through my years as a sportscaster, I have had a lot of memorable nights in Stephenville, but that night at that church will always be near the top of the list.

Until next time, so long everybody.

***

‘Out of the Box’ with Dallas Huston is published each Monday morning at BrownwoodNews.com. Dallas was the radio voice of the Brownwood Lions and Howard Payne Yellow Jackets for more than 55 years. He currently is Pastor of Center City Baptist Church and hosts a Men’s Bible Study in Brownwood on Monday evenings. Your comments are welcome at [email protected].