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Florrie knowed as well as I did a true preacher is the vessel of the Lord. A true preacher is a lamp that lights our feet and burns away the darkness of this world. A true preacher can charge the air in a church and in a congregation, and in a whole community. A great preacher can make the trees and rocks seem witnesses to thepower of the Bible. A great sermon can make time itself seem a testimony to the grace meant for us.
    The best preacher I ever heard was Preacher McKinney who held the revival where I first received the baptism of fire and spoke in tongues. I had been saved before when I was twelve and been baptized in water and joined the church. I’d heard talk of sanctification and the baptism of fire but never thought much about them until I went to Preacher McKinney’s meeting. I’d gone to church all my years without loving it. I’d gone out of duty and habit. My pa had built the church when he come back from the Confederate War. I liked singing and good preaching, but I’d never seen the beauty of fellowship together.
    Preacher McKinney’s best sermon was not the one where I first spoke in tongues and done the holy dance and received the baptism of fire. I was so stirred by that first service I wasn’t hardly aware of the sermon anyway. I looked into his eyes and the Spirit swept me away, as it had to. What happened to me then was meant from the beginning of time. That night Preacher McKinney was the true vessel of the Word, and I was there to receive it.
    Preacher McKinney’s best sermon that I remember, the one that showed me what a sermon could be, was preached a few weeks later in daylight. It was preached in the afternoon in the little church up on Mount Olivet. It was the funeral service for one of the Tankersleys who had gone to Preacher McKinney’s revival and lost her letter in the Green River Church. That’s why the service was held up on Mount Olivet instead of Green River. All of us Holiness people had lost their letter in the Green River Baptist Church.
    It was the brightest summer day you ever saw. The trees was green and the mountainsides was green, and the weeds along the road was green. Pa and me and Joe and Lily had took the wagon up the mountain. All kinds of birdsong sweetened the air. The world was lush and sharp. It didn’t seem like no day for a funeral. The light was so bright it stung your eyes. June bugs circled and buzzed over the grass. The cemetery on the hill above the church was fresh mowed and looked like a garden of stones and shrubbery.
    Preacher McKinney stood calm and cool in the pulpit after everybodywas seated. His manner was different from what I had seen at the revival. There was a great peacefulness and poise in him. “Let us pray,” he said. I bowed my head and listened, for I felt the strength in his quietness.
    â€œLord, we are here to celebrate life and salvation,” Preacher McKinney prayed. “We do not need to mourn the passing of Sister Tankersley, for we know she has gone to a better world, to a long-sought rest. If we mourned we would only mourn for ourselves, for we miss her presence and her inspiration. We will miss her example and her kindness.”
    When the prayer was over we sung “Work, for the Night Is Coming.” It was a slow, simple, sad song that had a strange firmness and comfort. The notes seemed to give voice to the day itself, to the cool little church, to the weeds and woods outside in the sunlight. Out the window I could see a white cloud hanging over the mountain.
    Work, for the night is coming. Work through the morning hours
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    Work while the dew is sparkling. Work ’mid springing flowers
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    Work while the day grows brighter, under the glowing sun
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    Work, for the night is coming, when man’s work is done
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    As soon as the song was over I heard a cardinal in the woods outside. And when Preacher McKinney started talking he didn’t holler like he did at revival services.