In the summer of 1945, Pastor A.L. Gardin, from the Rossman
Church of God asked my father, Rev Carl Cox, to organize a Church of God in
Brevard, NC. In order to do so, a Tent
Revival Meeting would be scheduled. In
those days many churches especially in warm climates were organized from an old
fashion Revival under a Tent. The new
church would be organized from the people saved in the meetings. They would meet under the tent until the
church could be built or a building found.
The tent was set up one block from Main Street on Caldwell
Street in Brevard. The lot that tent was
placed on nestled around the large brick buildings from the city. A great location for all to see and be
intrigued to what was happening. Very
large crowds would attend in the beginning.
The music program lead by Pastor Gardin, was outstanding. Weekend services had special group singers,
like E.D. Randolph and a ladies quartet, and my mother would play the piano.
These revivals, like most in the Church of God back then,
were very lively. Being Pentecostal
people they would hollar as they say it in the mountains, and jump and dance,
as the Holy Ghost would come upon them.
Running the isles, screaming as they were delivered from their sins,
running down the street speaking in tongues.
My mother was part Cherokee Indian and when the Holy Ghost would fall on
her, she would let out a Cherokee War Cry from the piano. This revival went on for several weeks and as
you can imagine it started stirring up devils in the community as well.
The mayor of the town of Brevard contacted dad and asked him
to come to his office for a meeting.
During that meeting the mayor proceeded to tell dad that the meetings
were to loud and the people were to loud and he would have to shut down the
meetings. Dad said to the mayor, I
cannot shut this meeting down; it’s not my meeting but God’s meeting. The Mayor got into such a rage that dad said
he begin to fear for his safety so he got up and left. The Mayor contacted the Transylvania County
Sheriff that day and told him to go shut the meeting down. The Sheriff came to dad and told him he could
not hold the meeting on that Monday.
Dad immediately contacted the NC Church of God State Overseer and asked
him what to do. He told dad, don’t stop
the meeting, continue tonight, I’m sending my State Evangelist to preach for you tonight.
That night the tent was packed and overflowing. Dad said it was one of the largest crowds he
had during that meeting. The Mayor and
Sheriff had of course been talking and the town people that labeled us Holy
Rollers came to see what would happen.
Pastor Gardin started the music for the night and during Worship the
power lines to the tent were cut so the lights went out and the Microphones
were silenced. Some of the men attending
the meeting went to get their cars and surrounded the tent with their lights
turned on so people could see. They
continued the service. After the worship
service was the Evangelist was preaching pretty heavy
that night and during his preaching, dad notice that 4 Sheriff’s cars drove up
and parked along the street outside the tent and got out of their cars and
grouped together right outside the tent. The Evangelist started preaching hard right at the Sheriffs, he was
telling them they would have to clean that jail up before they could arrest
these people and put them in jail, these were clean people. Dad said his heart sunk when he was preaching, he wanted to just reach out and grab his coat tail and tell him
to take it easy, these guys were already mad as hornets with us, don’t go
egging them on. But he could do that to
a State Evangelist. See my dad was a
very humble man.
The Sheriff told one of his Deputies, a large man of stature
to go into the tent and arrest those preachers.
The Deputy, with a cigar in his mouth, preceded to walk about a quarter
of the way into the tent, stopped and started scanning the congregation. He then took a puff of his cigar and blew it
out and turned around and walked back to the Sheriff. He took his badge off and handed it to the
Sheriff and said I will turn my badge in before I arrest these people. The Sheriff and all his Deputies got back in
their cars and left the meeting.
Bro Richardson continued preaching and they had a great
service, many more people saved. After
the meeting a group of men came up to dad and told him they had the money to
pay his bail, if they arrest him and take him to jail. That blessed him so much.
Later dad told me that the icing on the cake to this story
was the Jailer and his wife, that lived above the jail and took care of the
jail stated that that night the jail house shook, the pots & pans on the
walls shook, the windows shook, and they were scared. The next day the Brevard Daily News printed a
story that the Jail House Shook, and it was reported that there was no
documented earthquake. It was a mystery
as to why this happened but it brought a reverent fear of the Lord to that town
that people talked about for years.
Needless to say, the Revival kept going and the Sheriff and Mayor left
daddy alone.
In several weeks dad organized the Brevard Church of
God. I visited Brevard with my family
many years ago and saw a new beautiful church building.
My dad later went
on to be State Overseer in the Church of God for Iowa & Nebraska.
