Saturday's Heroes — Part 1
by Murrell Ewing
United Pentecostal Church conference
Kind: conference session
Scripture: 2 Corinthians 6:1-10

Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/murrell-ewing--saturdays-heroes--part-1
Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page.
Free to copy and share with attribution.

------------------------------------------------------------
thank you my beloved superintendent from the state of louisiana my honor tonight goes to my general superintendent the assistants the general board and the committee that selected the speakers for this meeting thank you for including me and thank god for allowing me the privilege to be a part of such a great body when i received the letter and invitation to speak tonight i just simply when i saw what it was i bowed my head and began to cry i do not feel worthy to stand here tonight in any sense of the word but i told god a long time ago that whatever you and my brethren feel that i'm capable of doing i'll do my best to fill that request i stand here tonight with a great feeling of unworthiness but yet an inner sense of a deep purpose of the holy ghost for this service tonight i have received letters beautiful comments telephone calls of prophecy i stand here tonight very encouraged that god wants to do something in this place i appreciate so very much the beauty of the spirit that i feel in this conference but i believe tonight god would like to break in upon us in a manner and a way that would be more than just a good conference service and for us to have that i feel it would be imperative for us to enter into a dimension of worship a dimension of spiritual worship not just because somebody asked us but because we're worshiping him out of hearts that love him because he is worthy of our praise how many of you tonight would like for us to get into a higher dimension of worship and spiritual frame of mind that god could do a work among us tonight praise god i do not want that tonight because i stand here i want that because we all stand at this point in time i want god to do something among us tonight to us and for us that would change the course and direction in some people's lives that have been sidetracked perhaps steered away from the main purpose of your calling i want god to just simply do a work among all of us tonight and because he's worthy why don't we lift our hands and our voices together and for just a little while let's worship him in spirit and in truth everywhere in the building father we love you father we lift you up we magnify the holy and righteous name of the lord hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah thank you for this gathering thank you for this people thank you for your gospel thank you for your truth thank you for this setting tonight thank you for the purpose of the holy ghost in this meeting hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah oh let's worship him with a loud voice everywhere in the tabernacle hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah i ask you to reach over and touch your brother or your sister by on the shoulder let's pray for one another right now let's pray for one another that god would do a work in every one of our lives here tonight hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah

thank you jesus thank you jesus thank you jesus thank you jesus hallelujah hallelujah we're just about to be lifted into a higher dimension of praise hallelujah hallelujah there's something about when pentecostals begin to clap their hands and magnify the lord the book says clap your hands all your people let's lift him up with a hand clap tonight i feel miracle power walking in this house tonight huh oh oh holy breath of god breathe from one end of this auditorium to the other oh hallelujah worship is to the heart what plowing is to the soul it breaks up the fallow ground of our soul that we can receive the word of the lord hallelujah everybody on god's side let's give him a hand praise again god heal somebody while they're praising your name right now fill somebody with the holy ghost while the people of god are blessing your name right now hmm oh hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah i god i feel the miracle working power of the holy ghost that work in this

place hallelujah hallelujah thank you jesus thank you jesus thank you jesus hallelujah i feel tonight the holy ghost is going to minister to somebody this bill and the devil's been trying to tell you it's just about over for you god's gonna breathe something in your heart tonight hallelujah to let you know life is still worth the living glory all right i want everybody tonight you know what hallelujah means i don't have to go through that and tell you but everybody tonight that gives yourself to jehovah if you've got to gotta got room enough you can make a swing i want you to i want you to just kind of make a throw that right hand as high as you can get it and shout hallelujah until you vibrate the floor you're standing on right now would you do it everybody together huh we worship you god time wasted preacher not on your life time we spend preparing our hearts to have a move of god is never wasted hallelujah hallelujah how many of you will help this poor country boy preach tonight i'll tell you now unless god helps me you're about to hear the biggest flock you ever heard but if god will just speak to us tonight and use us as a mouthpiece i would be so honored let's thank god tonight for what the lord wants to do in our midst would you so beautiful god you're so beautiful cop you're so beautiful god hallelujah hallelujah i've had i don't know how many would you remain in this beautiful seat spirit and just be seated for just a moment here i've had i don't know how many to ask me brother ewing are you going to sing tonight and i came to this to this hour without any intentions of singing but knelt in prayer just before coming and my friends had gathered in my room and laid hands on me and while we were praying the holy ghost kind of nudged me to sing a little song and brother billy cole just now said all of us we then as workers together with him beseech you also that you receive not the grace of god in vain for he saith i have heard thee in a time accepted and in the day of salvation have i secured thee behold now is the accepted time behold now is the day of salvation giving no offense in anything that the ministry be not blamed but in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of god in much patience and afflictions in necessities in distresses in stripes in imprisonments

in tumults in labors in watchings in fastings by pureness by knowledge by long suffering by kindness by the holy ghost by love unfeigned by the word of truth by the power of god by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left by honor and dishonor by evil report and good report as deceivers and yet true as unknown and yet well known as dying and behold we live as chastened and not killed as sorrowful yet always rejoicing as poor yet making many rich as having nothing and yet possessing all things and verse nine i'd like to focus your attention our attention on the phrase as unknown and yet well known before we pray i'd like to share with you this is a message that was born in my heart some several years ago and i have preached it in a camp here or a camp there i preached it at our home church and some of you in this audience tonight may have heard a tape or you might have heard me preach the message but in my invitation for this pulpit tonight many inspirations many sermons that have been born in our hearts i would love to preach but god impressed me that this was the message for this night of this conference and i do not question the lord and i simply ask humbly that every one of you would preach with me tonight and feel it with me if you having difficulty and hearing wherever you are just ask god i feel like the lord will enable us to hear and feel together what the spirit would like for us to accomplish here tonight i'd like to wait for just a moment to give you the title of the message because the title was born out of an experience and i will wait just a little while to give you that title but if you will now let's ask god humbly to anoint the lips of his feeble servant to anoint our ears to hear and to melt our hearts and our spirits together in the presence of god let's pray together jesus christ you're such a great god we love you so much we appreciate you with all of our hearts i humbly ask you tonight for the anointing of the lord to anoint the lips of your feeble servant my mind my heart my spirit my soul anoint the ears of your people and anoint our spirits melt us together in the presence of god and do a work among us here tonight we love you we appreciate you we magnify your beautiful name hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah we love you we love you we love you in jesus name in jesus name praise god and everybody say amen thank you so much you're such a beautiful congregation tonight you may be seated the message that i feel on my heart tonight was born in my heart some time ago joan and i have a very favorite thing that we like to do when we get up in the morning at our home if it happens to be in the winter time and we don't have pressing things that takes us to the office or into the streets of the city we like to build a fireplace fire in the fireplace in the den and and drag our rocking chairs up by that fireplace and drink our coffee together and we use that that time to share heartbeats and thoughts and talk about the work of the lord and i'm

so very thankful for a companion that does share with me the dreams and the heartbeat of the work of god it was on one of these such mornings sitting there by the fireplace and evidently it was probably on a monday morning if i remember correctly because i was scanning through the paper as we were sitting there visiting waiting on her perhaps to bring the coffee or whatever and i was i was scanning through what used to be the family weekly i think they call it parade now but it's the little insert into the sunday paper and i am amused a lot of times at the different advertisements and the different trinkets and things that are offered to the takers in that little family weekly and that that particular family weekly had an advertisement that caught my eye very quickly when i opened up the little paper the little insert i saw advertised there four decorative plates and in each of these plates was one of norman rockwell's paintings a different painting in each plate and i immediately was my attention was arrested because norman rockwell happens to be my favorite artist and when i looked at those those pictures some of them i had seen and one or two of them i had not seen and as i started enjoying the beauty of the paintings in these decorative plates i was i was thrilled all over again because norman rockwell had the unique ability to take a feeling of a moment and capture it on a piece of canvas which is very very difficult to do it's very difficult even to capture the feeling of a moment with words sometimes when you're trying to repeat it to somebody else that was not there but rockwell had that unique ability to capture the feeling of a moment and transmit it via canvas and i noticed these plates and i scanned of course the familiar ones and enjoyed them again but then the last plate had a picture in it that i had never seen before and when i saw that painting when i saw that that scene and that feeling that was captured in that picture by the artist and my eyes fell to the bottom of the picture and i saw the title i just burst out crying i just i just lost lost control and i went to weeping and i had to explain to joan what it was all about and when i tried to explain to you tonight you may not understand i hope you do and i hope the feeling would would grip your heart it was it was the the drawing of of two young fellas i guess one of them looked like probably he was by his gangliness he must have been probably about 11 years of age that's what he looked like and and the other the other fellow was was a little bit shorter and and he looked to be about nine maybe nine years of age and they were engaged in a in a little football game just the two of them and the older the older boy he was somewhat gangly and and as my my dad used to say in farm language when you see somebody kind of grow up quick like that and he kind of they call it look like they're spinning up you know i guess that's what beans and all used to do i'm not that up on farm language but it looked like he had just kind of spindled up you know if that's if you understand that terminology and it looked it looked that he probably

was the master of that little that little set to that little game and he's the one that had the he had the helmet and and what shoulder pads were available he had them under his little makeshift jersey and and he had his little football trousers with the you know cut off to the knee and and he he really looked the part and the other the other little fella when i explained to you the position that they were in in this little this little confrontation that they were having one one of them of course the bigger boy he was naturally carrying the ball you understand i mean he was he was the one he was the one that was in control of the situation and the the little fella was the one that was having to try to you know defend and and the picture shows the bigger boy doubled in a 90 degree bend here and the football helmet that was had been on top of his head was now it was going through the air it was leaving his head going through the air and the football that had been so caressed in his midsection had been totally knocked loose and he was in the process of a great fumble and all of this and you'd had to have seen the shock that was registered on the face of that boy that thought he had it all under control and about all you could tell about the little fella was that his right shoulder was planted firmly into the stomach section of that bigger boy and his face was toward the viewer of the picture and i have never seen such a bulldog look of determination on anybody's face in all of my life the surprise on the older boy's face the bulldog determination on the younger fellow's and anybody that had any heart at all could tell that it was a decisive moment in somebody's life you understand nobody else was pictured they were just there themselves no one else was pictured in the picture and my eyes dropped to the title that was at the bottom of the picture and it just simply said two words and that was saturday heroes when i read those two words saturday heroes i guess maybe my heart and my spirit identified with what norman rockwell was evidently trying to portray with that picture you see in the minds of those young men in their in their fancy in their make-believe world they they were not they were not really aware while they were just playing somewhere on a vacant lot or maybe an empty field besides someone's house they weren't really aware that a strategic moment was about to break upon them they were not really really aware that something of significant was was about to take place but in their mind in their mind they had probably seen enough football they had seen enough of the high school games on friday night and they may have even seen enough of the college players on their saturday night playing turf and maybe even enough of the professional scene on sunday afternoon that probably they were they were well well saturated and and totally given to the make-believe world and probably in their minds the the barbed wire fence that

that was bordering the little field where they were playing probably in their mind instead of it being a barbed wire fence that was that was rows of bleachers i'm talking about in there and they're fancy rows of bleachers and and those those tall pine trees just beyond the the barbed wire fence that that was not pine trees at all that was that was big tall light poles that that that was shining lights on the field that they were playing on and and the old weeds that was lazily waving in the breeze that was that was not weeds in a field at all that was the waving of the hands of the fans and in their make-believe world they were as tough as anybody else in their make-believe world they were as good as the next one in their make-believe world they were they were just as just as sent far as as the high school boys or the college boys or the professionals it really didn't matter to them and they were playing in their own world and the the the lines you know that was that was not that was not pine cones strong across the field that they had marked that was that was really white lines across their their little pasture that they were playing in and then the title saturday heroes i i guess the reason that i started crying when i read that is because there was something about that that i identified with there were some things in my yesterdays and some things in my past that had happened to me that i identified with that you see as long as they were the fumbling the ball as long as they were you know just just just just playing and learning how and and all of this it was fine but but then there came the time and that in the life of that little underdog that little nine-year-old boy when he got up enough grit and enough courage and he finally made a hit on that boy that had been pulling him around by the nose and when he finally got up enough courage and and he really did dig in his feet and he and he hit him with everything he had he hit him so hard that he knocked the helmet off of his head he hit him so hard that he fumbled the ball he hit him so hard that he knocked him to the ground and once and for all he was not the underdog anymore he was the hero but once time and chance had offered him a situation to be a hero he looked to the barbed wire fence and in the moment of reality it was really not bleachers yes it was just a fence he looked at the light poles they really weren't light poles it was just pine trees he looked for the coach he looked for mom and dad he looked for grandma and grandpa and it really wasn't the waving of the hands of fans yes it really was just the weeds blowing in the breeze hero you might be right but just a saturday hero he knew in his own mind and heart that if he had been on the friday night playing field with the high school boys and if he'd have done that kind of a that kind of a feat that somebody would have stopped the game walked over said timeout fellas let me give this little man a handshake i've never seen no better than this

on friday night or saturday night or sunday afternoon college nor professional i've never seen no greater playing than this he knew that if his dad would have been anywhere around that dad would have come running out on that old field and patted him on the back and said boy i'm proud i'm just proud to be your daddy man that was good you're the underdog but you turned out to be a hero my hat's off to you was all right as long as they were just playing around but when a moment of truth when a moment of challenge when a moment of victory when a moment of accomplishment had offered itself to him it was not enough to just dream that there were bleachers dreamed that there were spotlights on the field dreamed that there were hands of the fans waving and dream of them screaming in ecstasy that was not enough but to turn around the desire for a claim the reach for somebody to give me just a little of of just just a handshake anything when that dawned on me i realized how often life presents us with circumstances just like that it was not just two little boys now it's you and i as long as the ordinary events of the day carries us into the mundane it's all right that there's no bleachers it's all right that there's no waving of the hands it's all right that there's no acclaim but come the time of of a true moment of accomplishment come the time when the stage of life has been set and we are offered the beautiful chance to have a victory to have an accomplishment we look for somebody to give us a hand clap we look for somebody to give us a wave of the hand we look for somebody to say i'm with you i'm behind you but how many times do we wake up to see what we dreamed in fancy to be the bleachers filled with people what we thought in our fancy to be everybody watching and everybody looking but yet at the moment of truth we turn around to view and there's nobody there but just us our convictions heroes yes yes yes yes nobody knows any any better than the one who was the underdog that came out on top nobody knows any better than he did that he was a hero nobody knows any better than the one who played through and got victory over the temptation nobody knows better than the one who fought the battle and came out with a victory nobody knows better than he the hero of the moment but the thing that makes it so bad is that we play so well to the crowd we play so well to the bleachers we play so well to the waving of the hands we play so well to the screaming of the fans we play so well as it were on the stage that set until sometime when the bleachers are not there and the waving of the fans are not there and the screaming of a claim is not there we lose sight of the fact that we really were heroes

nobody knew any better than that little fella that he was a hero but it's trying to get the horror of the moment the handicap that he was under trying to get all of that scene painted with just the vehicle of words to his mom and dad that night around the supper table oh if you'd have just seen that cocky look on old johnny's face if you'd have just seen what happened when i gritted my teeth and hit him as hard as i could hit him if you'd have just been there if you could have just seen what happened and so many of life's challenges and victories we have to just simply write off hero but just on saturday yes no one was there to see good oh god good all right yes i think probably the reason that i broke down and cried was when i saw that picture was my own experience in in high school and i share these things with you tonight to give you the setting the foundation for what i feel the holy ghost would like to impart with us tonight i was the first young man in our church who came into the high school scene there was a young lady who is now our church secretary at home she and her husband serve as secretaries and she's the office secretary and she was a couple of years ahead of myself she was the first girl in our high school that we had a high school of between four and 500 between nine and twelve and you know not a big high school but yet it wasn't just you know she was the first girl in that north lake charles high school that came through with convictions about dressing out and pe and and all of this business and it was such a catholic oriented place in town until the pressure was was tremendous in fact they just simply wrote it off as we were a bunch of lunatics and and they said that if you don't dress out and and all of this business regardless of your religious convictions of ungodly attire if you don't dress out well then you just you just don't make the grade well my dad was a great big six foot four 250 pound black-haired gentleman and he didn't take no for an answer real easily and my dad he did what he could through us and through the channels but finally it came down to where he had to go to the school and he had to make his appeal to those those people well to make a long story short because of his persuasiveness and and not giving in they finally acquiesced that we could dress out in a tire that would be conformable to our christian principles and not unduly expose our bodies to to the world and and they of course the officials and and the pe officials didn't take it sitting down they didn't like the defeat that they had suffered so they decided they would take it out on that little bunch of humble pentecostals from that little pentecostal church that was trying to get started in north lake charles and so the pe teacher in the girls class she just made a made a statement you know kind of kind of safe face she said well kids like that will never amount to a hill of beans anyway and that that's the way it was written off and that girl she stood true to her convictions and the young people of that church i was the first boy that came along the next year or the next and we stood true through our convictions and and and the thing about it that was so beautiful is that that school that

had made such such a deal and and it just well we were the scum of the earth you might say whether the outcast you you get the picture and but that that that same school official them had had to watch that first girl that came through graduate four years later salutatorian of her class they had to watch that same girl's sister who graduated in my class the next year graduate valedictorian of her class they had to watch the next year when the piano player from that same little humble pentecostal church graduated valedictorian of her class they had to stand by and watch the next year as the accordion player the sister of the piano player graduated the next year valedictorian of her class they had to stand by and wait for another one of the musicians of that little humble pentecostal church graduate the next year valedictorian of her class about five or six years in a row one of the musicians from that little humble pentecostal church that they said kids like that will never amount to a hilly beans anyhow graduate with top honors in their classes you see it don't take many situations like that to put a little a little a little spunk you tell me i can't do it you tell me we don't have it in us bless god we'll show you i will not try foreign we see when i come along they saw my size i always have been rather hefty for my age they they they saw a chance that they they wanted me and for the first time in my life i was wounded it amazed me and the school principal talked to my dad the school principal and the coach drove drew me into the office and they set me down and just they said we need you the school needs you we we need you and and your efforts and the school spirit that it will generate and and all of this we need you and it was it was my very happy honor mostly to tell them i'm sorry but sports is not our particular cup of tea i will do what i can for the school and i will do everything i can for the school spirit but as far as me being a part of your athletic program i'm sorry i will be unable to participate in that well when they made all of these gestures and i didn't swallow that hook line and sinker then they turned on me and they started making fun and i don't know whether you've ever been in a situation like this but for a boy that's a boy for there to be connotations that he was didn't sit well with the flesh of merle ewing and i can tell you that i never did participate i never did allow myself to bend at their at their persuasion and then fun making and i'm happy for that but i can't always tell you that it was because i loved god that

much i had a great deal of assistance and it was that six foot four dad weighed 250 pounds that had a belt as long as a freight train looked to me like i never will forget when my daddy started to take his belt off the sound that was the most excruciating pain to my consciousness was when he whipped it out and when the tip end of that belt come around those belt loops it sounded like i started walking lightly some of you been there too had you you know what i'm talking about but you see i honored that dad and i honored that little humble pentecostal church i honored that teaching but i can't always tell you that i did it sitting down on the inside for somewhere within my guts there was that overwhelming desire i just wish i had one chance to show you you think boys that have convictions or sissies if i had one chance to get on that field i'd do as good as every one of you i'd do as much as the last one of you i could hold every one of you at bay if i just had a chance to show you i hope you understand what i'm saying tonight we do some things we do strictly out of self-discipline not because flesh always wants to be that obedient i never will forget one day i was in a pe class all of them were dressed in their pe attire and i was dressed in my in my jeans and t-shirt stuck out like a black bear in a bowl of buttermilk in more ways than one i was the biggest we were all out in the middle of the field we were nobody was during the day and we were all out in the middle of the football field having our little pe class we was playing football and across the end of the field up by the goal post walked the star football player of the whole school and he was on his way from somewhere off out in the boonies back to the school building and when he got right underneath the goalpost he looked out there and saw that little pe class and i don't know until this day what come over that boy but he stopped right under that goal post and looked at us and then he commenced to run him toward us i couldn't believe my eyes and and when i tell you he was the star football player he had credentials yes when he ran he ran all over he ran with his knees he ran with his elbows he looked like a freight train coming down the middle of that field and and when when the when the little fellas in that pe class saw what was going on they they scattered like covey quails that guy was coming right down toward and i don't know what it was that got a

hold of him to make him want to show off like that but whatever got a hold of him got a hold of me too and whatever made him want to show off whatever was in me made him not want to yeah i understand so they all left leaving me i knelt down in the ground on one knee i planted my toes in the dirt i got just off the side far enough that it looked like i was going to let him go by because he was walking i mean running down the center line and when he got about two yards from where i was honey i dug my toes in the dirt and i lunged at his midsection and all i can tell you is great was the calamity thereof i'm not gonna lie to you it'd like to kill me but i'll tell you what while i was trying to get up out of the dirt i looked over there and there he was rolling around moaning and groaning trying to get up too coach camp where are you mr mills where are you where i need you yeah all right but i didn't have nobody but that little bunch of p.e boys yes and they didn't see me because there's in the bleachers trying to hide from that freight train hero you might be right i was a hero just on all saturday oh god it's all right unknown i know no bleachers no fans yes i'm happy to tell you that that same school that had given us such a hard time and that same coach when i graduated from that high school that coach gave me now this is when i first got into that pe class you know how i made my grade see they acquiesce to let us make our grade but you know how i made mine i made mine the first two years in high school by cleaning the mud off of the foot football players cleats i made mine washing the towels and the underwear and the and the uniforms i made mine by keeping the mud out of the dressing room i made mine by cleaning the commodes and the uranus yes that's the way i made my grade first two years but before the fourth year was over that coach came out to me and he said merle i'll tell you what i want you to do i want you to be the teacher of the class this here's the great book you call the shots you tell your class what to do you call the roll you take them make them run laps run

hurdles whatever there's to do and at the end of the six weeks you give them the grade that's coming to them i'm happy to tell you that i didn't lose all in that situation i gained some respect there that i thank god for until this day