n Tennessee, at a meeting, he sought to defy
and brave a gospel message from the venerable brother James Hurt, by
taking a front seat; and then how his soul was convulsed and his heart
melted, as God's message wrenched the bolted door of that heart; how he
struggled with the agonies of conviction for sin, during the long, weary
hours of night; and how the joys of pardoning love through Christ came
to his soul with the brightness of the morning. As these conversations
were reviewed, he told of frequent backslidings, and how far away from
God he had been. Then he told of some things he had done in the Sunday
School and in the Church, and then at times gave his opinion as to the
best way of conducting a series of meetings and other things pertaining
to Christ's Kingdom. During these conversations the question was asked:
"Bro. Penn, are you satisfied and sure that you are in full discharge of
your duty?" After a pause he replied, as if conscience was awakened:

"No Sir. I am not satisfied, and have not been for years past." Then
said he: "You are the first man that ever asked me that question." Then
the writer made known some impressions about him that must have been
made by the spirit of God, for he never had just such an interest to
burden his heart previously, and that was that God had a peculiar and
wonderful work for him to do. "But," said Bro. Penn, "at my age, in my
profession and in my condition, I cannot believe it to be my duty to
preach the Gospel"--his age being at that time forty-two years. Among
other things said at this time by the writer, as he now remembers them
one was: That the Spirit of God leads and teaches us in strange ways,
often, as to what God would have us do, and that our methods of holding
meetings seemed to the writer as being deficient in some things, and
that the good of the cause required a change from the ruts and grooves
in which these meetings had been run, and that we were making our
services monotonous and chilling out spirituality by common methods of
conducting divine service, in protracted meetings. Another thought was:
That he and men like himself, as lawyers, that were given to talking and
that knew much of men and the world, if the love of Christ was burning
in their souls, might do a great work in going out and helping in such
meetings, even if they never engaged regularly in the ministry.

But it was in Tyler, Texas, at a Sunday School Institute, in July, 1875,
that a new era wa