This is tape number A-658 in the
Springs of Living Water Tape Library.
Copies may be obtained by writing Springs of
Living Water Tapes, mailbox 32636, Spring Lake Park,
Minnesota 55432.
Every generation should be blessed with individuals emulating
the virtues and compassion of the greatest one
who walked this earth, the Lord Jesus Christ.
There is a statement recorded in the Acts
of the New Testament.
Speaking of a prophecy that came to pass
on the day of Pentecost.
And in those days I will pour out
of my spirit upon my servants and handmaidens.
Yes, it is happening.
After hearing and seeing Katharine Kuhlman, one can
only attest to the record and state, Katharine
Kuhlman is a handmaiden of God.
The Katharine Kuhlman story was given to thousands,
gathered at the Full Gospel Businessmen's Fellowship International
Regional Convention in Washington, D.C. Literally hundreds
of lives, both men and women, were challenged
to believe God for a miracle.
The miracles did happen.
And they are still happening.
As you listen to her story, you challenge
to believe that Jesus Christ has the answer
for your life.
Here is Katharine Kuhlman.
You know, when I was invited to be
here this afternoon, I was told it was
a ladies' meeting.
But help me, I was never in a
meeting of my life.
I saw so many ladies in trousers this
afternoon.
I didn't think there'd be a man in
the place.
Really, I really didn't think there'd be a
man in the place.
There's one taking my picture right now.
I hope that you have not come this
afternoon to see Katharine Kuhlman.
I would feel very badly if I said
that you'd come for that purpose.
One thing I'll tell you, if you are
here today, and you've never met our wonderful
Jesus, if you've never seen Him, if you
do not know Him, if you've never become
acquainted with the Holy Spirit, you've missed the
most important thing that could possibly happen to
you.
I'm going to do something.
I want to read just four familiar verses
to you from 1 Corinthians.
They're verses that you are well acquainted with.
But perhaps they mean a little more to
me than anyone else in the auditorium today.
God hath chosen the foolish things of the
world to confound the right, and God hath
chosen the weak things of the world to
confound the things which are mighty, and base
things of the world and things which are
despised hath God chosen, yea, and things which
are not to bring to naught things that
are, that no flesh should glory in His
presence.
One of the greatest secrets that I have
found in my lifetime is the fact that
He will not share His glory with any
man or any woman.
God will not share His glory.
Jesus will not share His glory with any
individual.
The Holy Spirit will not share His glory
with any person.
Know that.
The very minute a man or woman begins
sharing the glory and wanting to share the
glory with Him, it's right then the power
is lifted from that of their ministry.
I am probably a stranger to most of
you.
Many of you that I have met since
I have come to Washington, D.C. today,
I'm meeting for the very first time.
I know that there are those who feel
that probably my father must have been a
minister, my mother must have been deeply religious,
but you know the strange thing?
I was not brought up in a deeply
religious home.
Not really.
My father had an aversion to preachers.
He just despised them.
Believe me, I tell you the truth.
My father hated preachers.
And if my father saw a preacher coming
down the main street of Concordia, Missouri, before
he would pass that preacher on the street,
he would go across the street to keep
from speaking to him.
Then look what he got.
Mama was brought up in the Methodist church.
Dr. Wolfe, of course, was of the firm
conviction that the only folk who would ever
get to heaven, he really, he lived and
died with the firm conviction that the only
folk who would ever make heaven would be
Methodists.
He didn't know, of course, one thing about
salvation.
Grandpa Walkenhuis didn't know one thing about being
born again, not a thing.
He didn't know there was such a thing.
Nobody in the Methodist church in Concordia, they
don't know it yet.
And I often have thought since that if
Grandpa Walkenhuis did make heaven, I'm not so
sure he did, but if he did, he's
going to get the shock of his life
when he finds some Baptists there.
Because he certainly did this old mama, which
he married Papa because Papa's background was Baptist.
He didn't work at it at all, but
then it was like that.
Papa was mayor of our hometown.
Papa was mayor of Concordia, Missouri, and you
probably don't know anything about Concordia, Missouri.
Nobody ever heard of it.
It's not on the map.
It has one main street.
I met somebody who was Lutheran, introduced himself
as being Lutheran here since I'd come to
the auditorium.
And I said, oh, I have so much
in common with you because I was brought
up in a Lutheran town.
Concordia was Lutheran.
Everybody was Lutheran.
Everybody.
Everybody was Lutheran.
That's why they had the Concordia Lutheran Seminary.
They go to Concordia first, and then how
I ever escaped being Lutheran I'll never know.
I'll never know except it was just the
will of God.
And I was one of those youngsters.
Papa was mayor.
I probably was a spoiled brat.
I don't know.
I said it.
Don't you dare say it.
But I was the meanest kid in town,
always.
If things didn't happen, I made them happen.
I did.
I didn't mean to be bad.
I didn't mean to be mean.
But it was just my makeup being so
close to the country.
They had a kid picnic, a school picnic.
Everybody went out on the farm wagon.
I was the kid.
All the other kids would come back from
the picnic in the farm wagon, but I
came back riding the horse.
Mama had a birthday.
I was not more than six because I
wasn't going to school yet.
And I thought it would be the most
wonderful thing in the world to give Mama
a birthday party, a surprise.
I wanted to please herself.
I didn't tell a soul.
Not a soul.
And I went around Concordia, Missouri, in our
little hometown, and I invited all the ladies
who had been nice to me that I
liked.
Now remember, Mama was the mayor's wife.
And only certain people got in our house,
you know.
And I went around and knocked on the
door and said, Now Monday is my Mama's
birthday, and I'm going to give her a
birthday party, and I want you to come
at 2 o'clock and bring a cake.
I invited 30 women, and each one brought
a cake.
Well, you see,
it was Mama's theology that, ring or shine,
we washed on Mondays.
Always.
It was wash day.
Now nobody ever saw Mrs. Joy Kuhlman with
pink curlers in her hair until that day.
My Mama had a false pride.
My Mama was so proud.
She was Mrs. Joy Kuhlman.
Papa was mayor, but Mama ran the town.
And so she washed after lunch with the
pink curlers in her hair.
Mama took a little nap, and I could
scarcely wait.
I could hardly wait for the thing to
come off.
I could hardly wait to hear the thing.
I saw the First Lady come down the
walk.
I was so excited, bringing her cake.
Behind her, a couple more.
I shall never forget when the front door
rang.
Mama being awakened.
Pink curlers in her hair.
And there was a woman, and she went
ahead in her house for a lot of
money.
Believe me, my mother.
And the woman standing over the cake and
wishing her happy birthday.
And within the next 15 minutes, there were
29 just like her, coming, each one with
a cake.
I'm going to tell you, I ate my
breakfast, my lunch, and my dinner for the
next two weeks, standing up.
It was just like that.
I wasn't quite 14 years of age, when
one Sunday morning, in that little Methodist church.
If you ever go through Concordia, Missouri, that
little Methodist church is still there.
It doesn't seat any more than 100 people.
Mama always went there to church to please
Grandpa.
I went to Sunday school there.
And the only time Papa ever entered that
church was Christmas, when I would give my
recitation.
And so far as I was concerned, when
I gave that recitation, the only person present
was my Papa.
I loved my Papa more than anything in
the whole world.
My Papa was killed.
Killed instantly.
And my Papa was killed before he ever
heard me preach a single sermon.
That Sunday morning, before I was 14 years
of age, I had never seen anyone converted
in that church.
An altar call had never been given prior
to my experience.
I doubt whether there's ever been an altar
call since.
I knew nothing about it.
And this Sunday morning, I cannot tell you
what the preacher said.
I do not know what the song was
that was sung.
I haven't the slightest idea.
But they were standing, singing the last song
in that little Methodist church, when suddenly something
happened to me, just a teenage girl, knowing
nothing about being born again, having had no
teachings whatsoever, but standing there when suddenly something
happened to me.
And it was real to me this moment
as it was then.
It was real to me.
The most real thing that ever happened to
me, when suddenly I began to shake.
Looking back now, it was my very first
experience with the power of the Holy Spirit.
I didn't even know there was such a
person, the power of the Holy Spirit.
Believe me.
I didn't even know there was such a
thing as being born again.
Believe me.
I tell you the gospel truth.
I began to shake.
I began to tremble.
I felt like the meanest person in the
whole world, and I didn't know what to
do.
I couldn't hold the Methodist hymnal in my
hand.
I didn't know what to do.
Nobody noticed me.
I laid the Methodist hymnal down because I
couldn't hold it any longer.
I couldn't hold it in my hand.
That was my first contact with the Holy
Spirit.
It was my first contact with the power
of God.
But I had to do something.
I left the place where I was standing,
and I took to the front pew, and
I sat down in the corner of the
front pew, and I saw, believe me, what
I'm telling you is as real to me
as that moment when it happened, that Sunday
morning in that little Methodist church, and I
began to sob.
I remember not having a handkerchief, and one
of the old sisters came along and stuck
a handkerchief in my hand and put an
arm around me, and she said, Oh, Catherine,
don't cry.
You've been such a good little girl.
We both knew she was lying.
Such a good little girl.
I didn't need anyone.
No one knew what had happened.
The preacher never came near me.
He didn't know what to do with me.
I went home from that church service.
I cried until my eyes were almost swollen
shut.
And walking down the street, I can remember
thinking, I didn't know Mr. Petering had painted
his house.
It looked so wonderful.
I can remember that my feet didn't touch
the sidewalk.
I remember going to the kitchen.
Papa never went to church.
I remember doing something.
He was standing in the kitchen, and I
rushed over to him, and I said, Papa,
Papa, Jesus has just come into my heart.
I will never know whether Papa fully understood
what I meant or not.
I will never know.
I've often wondered.
I've often wondered whether Papa ever understood that
I knew, that I knew, that I knew.
And I can only remember him turning to
me and saying, Baby, I'm glad.
I'm glad.
But that was the beginning.
As simple as that.
From that moment on, I had a great
burden.
Do you understand something?
For just a few minutes, I want to
take the lid off of my heart.
Somebody asked me today whether I've gotten much
criticism from being a woman preacher.
You know something?
I don't consider myself a woman preacher.
I've never thought of it as that.
I'm a woman.
Would to God I'd been born a man.
I wished and wished over and over again
that when Papa and Mama had a child,
that it had been a boy instead of
a girl, that it saved me an awful
lot.
I remember this.
When they named me Catherine, God saved us
Papa's sister, called up and said, My goodness
of life, whatever you do, don't name that
child Catherine.
Ever mule in Missouri is named Kate.
They farted on the name.
And I was such a disappointment to Mama
when I did come.
She expected something with long black hair, like
Papa's.
And when she looked at me, I didn't
even have fuzz on my hair.
No.
I never think of myself as a woman
preacher.
I treasure the truth.
I am a woman.
I was born a woman.
And I try to keep my place as
a woman.
And I want to say to the women
here in this auditorium, please, whatever you do,
don't try to be a man.
We were born women.
I recognize the fact that I am a
woman, and with it I try to be
a lady.
I never try to usurp the place or
the authority of a man.
Never.
That's the reason I have no church.
I leave that to the men.
I am a woman.
I know my place.
I know to that which God has called
me.
I do not believe that those who know
me best think of me as being a
woman preacher.
I never do.
Never.
I never do.
I can only tell you that with my
conversion there came this terrific burden for souls.
When you think of Catherine Kuhn, think only
of someone who loves their souls.
Not somebody who's trying to build something.
Only for the kingdom of God, that's all,
souls, souls, souls, remember, I give my life
for the salvation of a lost soul.
Nothing, nothing in the whole world is more
important than that, than souls.
And with my conversion, there came this terrific
burden for loss.
To this very day, and as recent as
this past week, I have received mail from
folks in Idaho where I first began preaching
the gospel.
I've had no education.
I said to Dr. German, Dr. Ray Charles
German, our modernistic minister who for 52 years
was in modernism, and I said to him
the other day, I said, Dr. German, here
we are, worlds and worlds apart.
You have had all the education.
Here you are with all of your degrees,
educated beyond your intelligence.
All that I knew is what Jesus had
done for me.
I've been born again.
That's all that I knew.
I knew that I had been born again.
And I went to little churches, denominational churches,
a little Baptist church, a little country church
that had been closed for months and months.
They couldn't afford a preacher.
And I asked if I might preach in
the church, and my argument was, it's closed
anyway.
You have nothing to lose.
My first meeting, I slept in a turkey
house.
Now, if you don't know what a turkey
house is, it's where they would hatch out
turkeys.
And the woman said, well, we have no
place to put you.
All of our rooms are filled.
It's a country place.
But we'll scrub out the turkey house.
And if you don't mind sleeping in the
turkey house, mind sleeping in the turkey house,
I would have slept on a straw stack.
Any place.
Because of this which is on the inside
of me.
If all of the forces of hell defile
me regarding my call to preach the gospel,
it's as real as my conversion.
If something I've got to do, if I
have to stand on the street corner and
do it.
If something I have to do, if I
have to live on bread and water.
If ever you've been called of God to
preach the gospel, you've got to, if your
call is genuine, if your call is of
the Holy Ghost, you can live on bread
and water.
You'll preach it.
My call to preach the gospel, and I've
never questioned it.
I have never questioned my call.
I had a sister who got the word
she was in Spokane, Washington.
An older sister.
She heard up there that her baby sister
was preaching.
She got so scared.
Though I had just come back from a
grant store having bought a 15 cent.
Now remember, you have to be at least
80 years old to understand what I'm talking
about now.
I paid 15 cents for a pair of
stockings.
Lyle stockings.
It was all the money that I had.
I had just come back from a grant
store having put out my last 15 cents
for a pair of Lyle stockings so that
I could preach that night.
I got this telegram from my older sister.
She didn't send me a buck.
She didn't send me 50 cents.
In the telegram she said, Catherine, be sure
you've got your theology straight.
And I didn't even know what theology was.
I didn't know what she was talking about.
But that burden for souls.
That burden for souls.
In the little country churches.
I'd wait until the farmers were through with
their day's work and they'd come in to
the little country churches.
I wasn't very wise in my personal work.
But a farmer never got out of there
unless he got down on his knees and
was born again.
That's all I knew what to preach.
If a place had been filled with Christians,
I still had to preach.
And being born again was all that I
knew.
But beloved, I had the greatest teacher that
any human being has ever had.
And that's the Holy Spirit.
The glorious Holy Spirit as He began to
unfold the world.
One day I shall never forget it as
long as I live.
I had a sorrow.
I had a heartbreak.
A late Saturday afternoon walking down a dead
-end street and literally it was a dead
-end street.
I can go to the very place.
I can go to the very alone.
Looking up I shall never, beloved, these things
that I'm telling you are as real to
me this moment as the hour when they
happened.
In that moment, knowing nothing about the fullness
of the Holy Spirit, everything that I know,
He has taught me.
Please stop your machine at this point and
turn your tape over.