Monday, October 16, 2006

From Hopelessness and drugs to Jesus - Part Two

On my last blog entry, I shared how I came to "Jerry's Place". Even though Jerry had named the ministry on 53rd St. "Where Angels Rejoice", for some reason, that name never did stick. It was always referred to as Jerry's Place or just Jerry's. As was quoted in the newspaper article posted below, Jerry never did advertise the meetings that he was hosting in the home he shared with his mother Myrtle. This was a spontaneous movement, a local tributary of the movement that naturally flowed into the national river that had already been named the Jesus Movement.

My best recollection is that Jerry had invited a Pentecostal preacher from Indianapolis, "Pop" Bunch, to do a series of preaching meetings that were scheduled to last one week. By word of mouth young hippie types like I was, heard of what was happening and came en masse to investigate. As I mentioned in my first entry, something happened to me that first night that radically changed the course of my life. It is now thirty five years later and the change that took place has lasted.

I not only came to Jerry's that night, I came to Jesus! I believe the day I spent at the farm house (mentioned in my first entry) that afternoon in the late summer of 1971, pondering my life and future, was heard by God as a prayer.....and He began to set in motion a set of sovereign circumstances to birth me into His Kingdom! When I crossed the threshold of Jerry and Myrtle's house that night, I was a young man with a wounded heart. I had been carrying the baggage of rejection for seven years and was in desperate need of the knowledge of God's unconditional love for me.

Having been raised in a non Christian unchurched home, I wasn't even sure that God existed. I can recall going to church/Sunday school with a friend as a young boy on two occasions. I was freaked out by both experiences. I did try to read the Bible once while serving in the army at Ft. Bragg North Carolina. I was lying on my bunk and opened the New Testament that was given to us. A friend saw me and told me to start in the book of Revelation. Well, as you can imagine, that didn't bring me much relief.

The rejection that I referred to was as a result of the night in 1966 when my dad woke me in the middle of the night to inform me that my mom was pregnant ( not by him) and had run off with her boyfriend leaving my dad to raise me and five siblings. I actually joined the army three years later in an attempt to escape the stigma of this experience. So, that first night at Jerry's, I was "ripe for the pick'in."

The meetings at Jerry's continued for longer than a week. I know I was there almost every night for approximately one year. I also know that there was much controversy surrounding Jerry's teachings and at one point several of us left because of them. After thirty five years, I don't recall many of the details surrounding what was taught. But I do know what I caught. I received (whether through Jerry or divinely by the Holy Spirit) a revelation that God loved me unconditionally and that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who had died on the cross for my sins. He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords who will return to the earth to establish a kingdom of righteousness, justice and peace and this kingdom is available to me by grace (it is a gift) through faith in Jesus Christ!

I have always been, and will eternally be grateful to Jerry and Myrtle Street for opening their home and allowing God to minister to those of us that did not feel comfortable in the organized church.

Randy Hornbeck

Wow! These two groovy guys are
Randy Hornbeck and Donnie Adams
at the wedding of Jerry Street, 1974

1 comment:

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