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with her. I guess it was because I’d heard them sing together so often that I knew how to fit just right with mom’s voice.
    This was early on, around the time I was three years old. Being so young, I didn’t know it was called harmony and that the part I was singing was called tenor and that it was a third above the lead and so forth. But it must have sunk into me deep, ’cause that’s the only singing lessons I ever had!

Chapter 2
PREACHERS AND PROPHETS
    I learned more about Christianity from my mother
    than from all the theologians in England .
    â€”John Wesley, 18th-century evangelist and circuit rider
    I t wasn’t too long before I was singing on Sundays with my mom and dad. Our church was called Low Gap Free Will Baptist Church. It was about five miles down from where Brushy Creek hollow ends at Highway 32. It was a little whitewashed one-room church house with a potbellied wood stove in the middle, same as so many around that part of eastern Kentucky. Our church had congregational singing out of hymnbooks, with everybody joining in and singing together and praying out loud at the same time.
    A lot of mountain churches, like the primitive Baptists and the old-time Baptists and the Church of Christ, didn’t allow musical instruments in their services, and some still don’t. They only sing a cappella. But the Free Will Baptists welcomed guitars and banjos and mandolins and whatever you brought to make a joyful noise unto the Lord. We didn’t have choirs because everybody was expected to join in and sing.
    There was a little Holiness Church not far from where we lived, just a few miles down an old back road, and they had electric guitars in their services. They got down with it. It was real foot-stomping, wall-shaking music, and I think God loves that as much as any other gospel music. When I was a little older, I’d go by there and hear the worship music coming from inside, and I’d be thinking, “Oh, man, playing electric guitar in church! That must be somethin’!”
    Our church wasn’t quite as raucous, but it was a sweet, holy place. Some hymns were mournful, but most were joyous. There were a lot of songs about the wonder of God and the gloriousness of God and the love of Jesus. And we sang hymns about the price He paid on the Cross for the forgiveness of sin.
    After the congregation sang a few hymns and got things warmed up, the preacher would usually call me and Mom and Dad out of the pews up by the altar to sing a few songs. One of my earliest memories is my mom holding me up in her arms in front of the congregation. I wasn’t more than three years old. She’d carry me down the aisle and set me on the pulpit with my little ol’ legs dangling down, and I’d sing harmony with her and my dad, who’d play guitar. We’d do our gospel numbers and lead the service for a while, just the three of us.
    I remember a hymn we loved to sing called “Prince of Peace.” It dated back to the 1870s, and the words were printed in one of the old Baptist hymnbooks they had at our church. It was a favorite of Mom and Dad. Some of the verses were so pretty, and they stay with me even after all these years: “I stand all bewildered in wonder and gazed on God’s ocean of love, and over its waves to my spirit came peace like a heavenly dove.” These were what they called praise hymns, and there was an awe-struck quality in the music and it really touched my heart.
    Singing with my parents in church was great. But there were some things I didn’t much like. I was sort of shy at that age, and I didn’t want to be the center of attention. That was one thing. Another was that I didn’t like having to give up my chewing gum. Just before we’d go up to sing at the pulpit, my mom would make me spit out my gum, and I hated that. It was always right about the time the flavor got real good and tasted the best. My brother and