“You certainly seem to spend a lot of time with the Sunday afternoon Bible Class,” Mother mentioned one day as I came into the house from a rugby game.

“They are an educated, high society group, Mum, and they’ve accepted me. They call me Edward. I sure like that better than Eddie.” 

The next Sunday afternoon our young men’s group had a guest speaker, Mr. Arthur Halliday. He was short, well groomed, and delivered an in-depth Bible study on the imminent return of the Lord. At the conclusion of his discourse he asked the entire class, “Would you young men like to come to my home today for tea?” This was completely unexpected. We glanced at each other. Since we had nothing planned, we accepted his invitation.

“I hope his wife will be a good sport when we all land at her doorstep,” Roger, one of the young men, commented as we walked along behind the country gentleman.

“I hope she’s a good cook,” I countered as we turned into Mr. Halliday’s front gate. 

As the gate clicked behind us, I saw movement at the window and the front door opened. A sweet little lady was introduced as “Mrs. Halliday”. She received us graciously and invited us into their living room where a little boy about the age of my sister Joan was standing. “This is our son, John.”

Suddenly the kitchen door opened and four girls like stair steps entered the room. Mr. Halliday explained, “I have five daughters. This is Gladys, Grace, Elsie, and Ruth.”

We nodded and smiled.

Once again the kitchen door opened and the fifth girl appeared. I caught a glimpse of the blue of heaven in her eyes. What a lovely girl, I thought. “Gentlemen, this is Milly,” Mr. Halliday proudly announced. I couldn’t take my eyes off her as she set a tray on the table. She glanced up shyly and her gentle eyes met mine. I was no longer interested in the sandwiches or the flavor of the cake or what we were drinking. When the meal ended, I remained in the room while my pals filed out heartily thanking our host and hostesses.

My mind raced as I considered how I could stay long enough to speak with my beautiful young hostess. Just then she began to clear the table and passed right by me.

“Excuse me, would you come to church with me?” I blurted. This sudden invitation must have surprised her. Her cheeks turned a pretty pink.

“Why, yes, I could do that, “ she murmured shyly and continued to clear the table. 

“Thank you! Thank you!” I beamed, as I made my way out the door. 

Work went faster for me that week as I anticipated Sunday. 

On the appointed day, I nervously knocked on the Halliday door. My heart skipped extra beats as she joined me for the walk to church. Later as we walked to her home, she agreed to walk with me the following week, and then again the next week. 

As I walked her home the third time she surprised me by asking, “Eddie, would you do something for me?”

“Why, yes, of course. What is it?” I would have been happy to trek deserts without water, or scale the highest mountains without shoes.

“Would you come to my church?”

“Your church? What church is that?”

“A Pentecostal Church,” she replied.

My mind raced. I thought she was Baptist like her father. I had heard Pentecostals were a cult, rolled on church floors, and had no church manners at all. As we neared her house I decided quickly, “Okay, I’ll come with you this once.” 

She looked happy, and we discussed the details of when and where we would meet.

All through that week I worried about the Pentecostals and their church habits. The next Sunday I met her in the front of their simple church building, as we had agreed. We entered the vestibule, and several people came up to us and shook my hand. “God bless you! Thank you for coming.”

We found a seat and the meeting began with some exuberant choruses after which people gave testimonies of what God had done for them. I listened in awe. Before I knew it, the minister was up front introducing his topic, “Hell.” He began to elaborate on this place: its heat, its horror. He paced from one side of the altar to the other, “Hell is real. Hell is hot! And there’s only one way to keep away from there.”

I trembled in my shoes and thought, “Well, for God’s sake, hurry up and tell me!”

“Jesus is the only escape. You must accept that Jesus died on the cross to rescue you. He paid the complete price on Calvary. Raise your hand if you want to accept his free gift of salvation!”

My arm shot up. I wished to be saved. Somehow this minister was able to get through to me what my Sunday school teacher had tried to do for many months.

Milly and I skipped along the pavement as if angels carried us toward home that night. I saw her to her front door.

“Eddie, you have made me so happy that I could burst,” she beamed and then disappeared behind the door.

I rushed home, anxious to share the good news with my family. I found my parents comfortably situated in front of the living room fire. “Dad! Mom! I’m saved!” 

“Oh, that’s nice Eddie. There’s some cake on the table if you wish,” Mother said.

“Cake - Mother, you must not have heard me! I’m saved from hell!”

But she HAD heard me. I felt frustrated and alienated. My parents did not understand what I was telling them just as I had not understood what my Sunday school teacher had been teaching for several months. Why could they not respond to my excitement, even if they did not understand?

Milly and I visited each other’s churches regularly. Once I invited her to a missionary service at my church. The guest speaker was an enthusiastic German woman, Miss Alma Doering. She waved her middle-aged hand at us, “I have trekked across Africa three times,” she said, as I visualized her thin legs wading through marshes, “and the need is very great. So great that I have cried and cried to the Lord for more workers. Young people with more physical strength than I. The Bible says, Say not ye there are yet four months, then cometh harvest (John 4:35). The harvest is ready now. People are dying without Christ as I speak!”

Miss Alma Doering’s stirring words went to both our hearts. At the invitation we walked forward, hand in hand, to dedicate our lives to be missionaries. Following our dedication, Milly and I discussed our leaving to go to Africa as early as possible.

A retired missionary heard of our zeal and spoke to me. “Eddie, I advise that you go to Bible School in order to prepare yourself for the work.”

I listened to his advice and wrote to the school. I gave them all of the information that they might need for my admission. After posting the letter I ran from the bus stop up the hill to our home every day to see whether I had received a response.

A few months later a letter arrived. I grabbed the missive from the mantel where my mother had put it and ran out the back door. Flossy, now slow and gray, licked my hand as I plopped down on the grass beside her and opened the letter. My hands trembled as I read,

“Dear Mr. Ware,

We appreciated your letter and are delighted with your enthusiasm, but the truth is, you are too young to start Bible School. Possibly in four years when you are eighteen you could apply again.”

My mind reeled. “I thought that souls were dying, Flossy! What does that have to do with how old I am?”

Later that evening, I showed the letter to Milly. She, too, was discouraged.

“I guess all we can do is be missionaries here,” she sighed.

We started to look for opportunities to witness for Christ in our own back yards. I learned that the young men’s Sunday school class was going on the street to witness as a group so I decided to join them. We stood on a corner in town and sang and read portions from the Bible. Milly’s oldest sister, Gladys, saw us and asked if she could join us. We were glad for the company. After a few minutes she asked timidly, “May I say a little something?”

“Well, yes. Certainly you may.”

Before our eyes a diminutive woman was transformed. Her eyes shone as she spoke with fervor, “Now none but Christ can satisfy, no other name for me! I’ve found life, and peace, and lasting joy, in Jesus.”

I watched in amazement. I recalled that Gladys also wanted to be a missionary. Her plans to go to China were prevented by circumstances.

Nevertheless, she continued to work tirelessly for others. To her family’s dismay, she often brought unwed mothers home with her. Since she generously gave her money and possessions to others in need, she owned nothing. Even though her family sometimes thought that her unselfish generosity was extreme and fanatical, her sincerity was admired.

My joy during these weekends of service and work with the church youth group did not carry over during the week. I found it difficult to think positively about my job. Furthermore, I was frustrated by the difficult challenge to win my heathen employer to Christ.

He was totally unreasonable. Daily he gave me enormous boxes of small machine parts to assemble and then cursed me for completing the assigned task!

Finally, after tolerating too much abuse, I shared with my dad that I was unhappy with my employer and my job and explained the reasons. Within a short time, he found employment for me at another office machine factory where I learned to hand make templates.

Anxious for me to advance in my career, some months later Father asked me to consider a new opportunity. “How would you like to go each morning on the Workman’s train to downtown London and learn to operate and repair calculators?”

“Calculators are new and exciting. I would love the job!”

I was employed there for only one year, when I was offered employment at the same company where my father worked. Eagerly I accepted this new opportunity and became proficient in repairing and assembling typewriters.

During these busy years of advancement I saw less and less of Milly. One day as I walked to the train on my way home from work I saw an old acquaintance from Bow, the little girl that I had stolen flowers for. “Well, hello Eddie! How are you?” she said, her eyes searching mine for the old spark.

“Oh, hello Jean. You’re looking good.” She had grown into an attractive young woman with the wavy brown hair, dancing eyes, and trim figure that I remembered.

“I sure missed you after you left Bow.” 

I didn’t want to tell her that I hadn’t thought of her. “That’s nice! What are you doing these days?”

“I’m a seamstress at Cohen’s.”

The memory of the place gave my stomach a pleasant flip. “I used to live right across from there!”

“Yes, I know. I think of you when I pass your old house.”

We were standing in front of a movie theater. “Uh, how would you like to go to a picture show with me?”

Soon we were seeing a lot of each other while thoughts of Milly drifted farther and farther from my mind. I didn’t go to church as often, and Jean never went.

Money soon became more important to me. I realized that a mechanic’s wages provided a steady job, but not the extras I wanted. Therefore, I applied for the position of a typewriter salesman within the company. I also took side jobs and quickly increased the amount of money that went through my pocket.

One payday I bought a motorcycle that didn’t run, and spent hours working on the engine in our front yard. I was excited about my progress, but found my father did not share my enthusiasm. “Eddie, you must get that eyesore out of our yard. I have not worked all these years to live in a garage now!”

Mother overheard his comment and mentioned softly as he entered the house, “What about the typewriters you brought home when we lived in Bow, Joe?”

Father did not mention the motorcycle again for a week, so I was able to get the two-wheeled wonder working. I decided to ride it to London to work.

“The train is much more dependable, Eddie. You had better not let that contraption make you late to work!”

“I’ll be early!” I said, and gave Mother a hug as I ran out the door.

It took longer to start than I expected, and I left the yard just as my father headed for the train. The wind tossed my hair, and the roar of the engine put me into a world all my own; I was a free man.

The traffic increased the closer I got to downtown. Cars honked at me. A taxi cut me off. I focused on survival as fast cars and impatient drivers made driving a nightmare.

Suddenly a tram crossed in front of me. I looked down and to my horror saw that I was riding on the tram tracks! At that moment I saw my escape. An empty flat bed truck rumbled along the lane next to me. In a split second, I saved my life. I leaped off the motorbike onto the flat bed of the truck. At that same instant, the tram dropped its cow catcher flipping my motorcycle into the air. Traffic screeched to a halt. Alive and unhurt, I took the break in the traffic flow to jump off the truck and mount my motorcycle that was lying on the street beside the tram tracks.

“Watch where you’re going young man! Next time you’ll get killed!”

Similar warnings bounced off me as I kicked the starter. The engine revved and I pulled over into the traffic lane, pleased with my agility.

My father was not impressed when I walked in late for work. He was aware of all that I did and did not do.  I resented the surveillance and made up my mind to get away from it. 

One day, as I listened to the world’s problems being discussed by fellow workers, I found the solution.

“War is inevitable,” one said. 

“Yes, I agree,” said another. “Hitler is begging for a fight. He’s pretty cocky to take us on. Wasn’t the Great War enough to teach the Germans that we’re hard to beat?”

“What worries me,” the first fellow continued, “is what will happen to our business when we all get conscripted. Of course, all of the young men will go first, but how much time will we be given?” 

I decided that it was better to join the forces now, and have a choice, than to wait and be made a foot soldier. My father had been a German prisoner of war in the “war to end all wars,” and I did not wish the same experience. 

My first love was the Navy. At lunch hour I went to the recruiting office and was told, “I’m sorry, young man, but your eyesight is not good enough. We can’t take you in the Navy.” 

Crestfallen, I thought, “Well, if the Navy doesn’t want me, I’ll try the Air Force.” The Air Force was impressed with my mechanical background, and signed me up on the spot. I was eighteen.