Old Country Preacher - The Life & Times of Billy Kelly

since the time of the great backwoods revivals of the late 1800s that swept through the eastern and southern states there have been brush harbors and count meetings main lay throughout the south some of the camp meetings are several weeks long or they're several weeks scheduled during the year where preachers and laymen alike may come for spiritual physical and mental renewal one of the unique characters of our generation is a Baptist preacher who was born in the mountains of East Tennessee brother Billy Kelly living only up to like him before his day and he certainly is the last of those lap preachers who can equally blend higher education with a plain simple and sometimes antiquated ways of life the first ball he threw dangers Dan laid it over centerfield fence and they beat us for two to Absolution that ballgame I slipped set and what bought me a fifth of liquor I was a joke with Donald's pool hall where on gage Street Knoxville there's an extra long flight of steps went up I went up went back to the restroom I don't how much ever the drug well drunk enough have knocked me out and I that was about 2 o'clock afternoon now lay down that red school floor dog drunk vomited all over the floor Waller did it close tore holma trousers man I was office fixed you ever seen in your life and about 6 o'clock that evening some little boys was leaving the pool hall and they went down and when they got on the street while this some fellas handing out tracts and they to keep them give them off their back they said they said won't you go fight a foolish little red kelly's in a fat dog drunk give him some em tracks well they came up family in that drunken stupor they took him outside in the pool hall and it was look like a church pew it was a church pew it was a padded church pew they sent me down that thing they got tal's put the cold water fountain put them on the phase try to sober me up downstairs with a crystal hamburger plays he got tomato juice gave me the way the jews try the best to sober me up then they put me in the car stuck my head out to winning all around the block trying to get fresh air to me and trying to eat my sobered up and finally the aspects that go revival with them I said I came I gave ever excuse I can think of and then the big and hit me I said I got a date tonight and my girlfriend won't let me go because I needed she is bad shaped I was they said let's go call her well I said ok though I knew she would go let me go we went back that pool all got on the extension line and they said is okay Fred goes Revival she said Lord our mercy if he's going revival taking my own well I try to get out of that deal i crawfished ever we are good I didn't get out of it finally I told us in the looking more go but I'm gonna sit on the back seat and when the invitation starts I will get up well New York's won't be a cigarettes what I'm gonna do so I've got in I thought there's going to little church out somewhere they hold me to the University of Tennessee audit all 5,000 people had already jammed in there for revival service and when I got out of swoop liquor that could walk one going one side one another the said you'll have to take him point at me upstairs Irene if we're to keep the drunk so up step through Wed got up that is hot if you've ever been a drunk you know what I'm talking about I went to sleep I don't know what it's something about under what they preached about but when he come time for the invitation that 504 Squire stood up and they began to thing if you won't joy real joy wonderful joy let Jesus come in your heart well I thought I've had a lot of good times I'm going to chicken fights and dog bites and I played a little fiddle and honky-tonks and and I've gone here and there the dances and I've drunk liquor and I've had some good times and they were saying if you want real joy and then they got the singing are there any rivers that seem to be unlawful are there any mountains you cannot tow through ah God specializes in things that seem to be impossible and he can work on a miracle for you boy about that time on old boy stepped up and he was the vice president I've seen your class I the president had 180 students graduated that year old Jim ruffler stepped up put his arm around me said red where is he going for used to die tonight I said go to hell same place you're going I knew here the hypocrite the kind importantly go church on Sunday live like a devil rest of the time I said go to hell same place you're going he looked at me in tears running down he said Ridge you about to go to hell but you won't go for I'm a coin he said I got saved not before last more about that time he said to us it read said stick your foot out and go to meet you halfway now listen I've been preaching 45 years almost 46 I just got 46 now and I've never told anybody to ever stick their foot high well God made him I never have but I stood there and I didn't know this then I found this out later somebody stepped up to the bailiffs book nor Fanning and said to him if you get that redheaded boy coming on the balcony saved said they don't tell what happened this meeting and he had everybody in the house to bow their heads to go to praying for me and I didn't know that and I looked around a little boy said read the old stick foot out goddamn each eye away and I looked around everybody had their head bowed everybody was a praying I didn't know his praying for me and he just kept saying stick your foot out Gumby J boy well to eat him off my back I felt a lot of stick my foot out and that'll be hid and I'm standing right next to the aisle I stuck my foot out and what I did mothers are falling it but now that I come I'm gonna tell you listen let's gonna go downstairs walking wouldn't fast enough next thing I was in a truck that was based enough next thing I'm in a dead run boy slid in that order like a ballplayer sliding in the hole hallelujah the Kanade people begin to try to talk to him and I wouldn't talk to him one interest in them my trouble was between me and God and I felt like Jesus was sitting on a throne like that thing in Washington of Abraham Lincoln sitting in that big chair I felt like Jesus said about 1215 feet above my head in a big old chair like that looking at me and I slowly ever could look up but since a dirty black not so low so good look up boy did you I prayed about our life some things I confess to half a dozen times making sure got them in and after a while I said here goes I'm a little tarnished I write back now I looked up toward him and I said God if you can save me save me if you can use me use me more about that down Oh Lord these are those of salvation came out of the land it's better than hey I'll tell you I got born again I mean saved redeemed heaven bound save forever and forever and I didn't I didn't know all about it I didn't know if I've known then what I know now I've still been running I guess ol ugly people look good hey many God I come out that building that night it is you like the stars came out old dress parade and we get the we get me to say work that you saved it seemed like the trees is clapping her hands and saying we're glad you born again if seemed like me God the Father the Son the Holy Ghost all that crowd is in heaven was leaning over the battlements of glory saying we're glad we're glad that you say you born Kian the strings of the old-time southern gospel music happy and holy shouting of the praise to God 11 London preaching may be heard at the Greer Baptist camp meeting in Greer South Carolina their brother Billy Kelly presides as the patriarch of this summer phenomenon he is truly a mountain man and a man of God loved and admired by the humble and the aid of the spiritual world his faithful and consistent testimony has been heard by thousands in the camp meetings he is conducted as well as in local churches all across America Miller was born in Oliver Springs Tennessee in the year of 1932 my past is longer than a mold I mean buddy I could sit here and talk I guess from now till doomsday and never tell all the things that's happened in my life I was born in Oliver Springs Tennessee April the 17th 19 and 32 and some of the happiest days I guess I ever spent on the face of this earth was in Oliver Springs Tennessee my grandfather had land of inheritance about 165 acres on each side of the farmers old Poplar Creek the other side was Indian Creek I fished our hunted I enjoyed life as a young man and I thought that's a grandest place in all the world well my mother and daddy couldn't live together my daddy was passed to the First Baptist Church at Oliver Springs Tennessee at one time and my daddy back still on the Lord and moved to Corbin Kentucky at 1938 and bought an old beer joint and I had an old hotel now I never seen my daddy Drake never never done drag he won the Custer but he just he just went to the bottom and there's a fussing going on we came back to Knoxville and I finished the first grade Knoxville then went back to Oliver Springs and what Scarborough School out there which is in a portion of Oak Ridge Tennessee and by the way my forefathers owned all that whole country my great-great grandfather's own 9,000 acres in there Billy attended carson-newman College where he played football and met dot his lifelong companion when I went off to college why I met her and I was talking to an old boy over the name of chesty and said the administration building and I saw her come walking across the campus there and I said to old Chester I said y'all comes my wife y'all is my wife and I said do you know where he said yeah I said introduce me to her and we'll her name was dark Frost and I said the hill I said I believe I need frostbitten and so he told her over there their apartment and introduced me to her born I saw that girl I'll tell you it's truth goose-pimples jumped out on me chilled books I got an office fixed you ever see in your life and come to find out my diction couples a likud but anyhow I thought that was a sweetest prettiest brown-eyed gal I'd ever seen in my life and I just I don't know what it's loved her from the moment that I saw her and I wanted her to be my wife in his early days before he was an experienced preacher or well known he began holding meetings wherever there was a warm heart or a listening ear let's let Billy tell you about two of those early meetings I started abridging and the McColl Avenue Baptist Church said we'll set up a tent out here in this section we'd like to organize a church out there if we could said we can't reach those people they won't come to our church is a big Southern Baptist Church and back in those days there wasn't any Independent Baptist churches are there so they said we'll put a tent up let's go and preach so I went out there and I preached this woman had 15 kids and her husband was in the penitentiary and that whole family made a profession of faith will it impress the community and others got saved and then as a result of it while we organized the Timothy Street Baptist Church in Knoxville Tennessee I felt met a God to go to Oliver Springs were born and there see if I can hold revival meeting well Gorman walls was a celebrated hero from World War two he's one of the lone survivors of the Bunker Hill itself they made a representative out of the state of Tennessee old garment was a family friend of ours been with our families and friends crosses and my mother was a cross and all the cross family walls fabulous friends when he came back to Oliver Springs from war he built a big old tabernacle and he let people go down hold meetings and all that Lauer told him I said government and I let me use that Tabernacle to yell how much just pay the light bill didn't have it well I stayed with that so I went on boats brochures I had a big banner pretty to go across the street and announce the meeting all I've been on the radio long the new radio announcers now call them and ask them to announce a meeting here everybody was announced in the meeting and everybody knew the leaders going on I knew the well I just didn't figure that building will hold of them and it's seat 2,000 and I just didn't feel like it we'd have enough for whom the first night we had 35 in a building it seats there too Nelson fighting he was like enough to sing a song boy without let down I took over the next day and I got in touch those review announcers I said look down sit they said we're telling there were 30 minutes and there's telling it but buddy the crowd was nothing well to make a long story short I preached that week I couldn't get enough money to pay the light bill I begged a lie big eyes brokers a convict I wanted to hear my song leader love offered I had no money I'm in a bad fix well down towards the weekend a little boy got saved and his daddy was a mailman and he tamed him he said preachers and a good time quit taking up money for the lights said God told me to pay the light bill said I don't care how long you stay here I'll pay the light bill so he had that relea mailman well over the weekend Milford he he pastored Pisgah Church about physical Baptist Church they came in and I guess the biggest crowd was about 150 that's all it'll notathome that seats mm well I preached the second week and I said this is it I won't quit mom tell you right now I'm gonna quit I said these people on this door revival nas gonna get up telling us what's gonna tell them I said I was gonna say listen listen do you hear I said this place a 40-foot for mail like I'd hear the screams I al and I said I'm a getting out of here I said you know this is a revival meeting I'm going to quit well that's what's gonna tell them just that about the time I got that not lies don't tell him that I don't know jump that plate that will get door and Sun and he said preacher hope you don't think I'm taking over but said governments would sing a song and he started singing when I said go ahead I don't preach no hell so he starts saying a little song that you've heard it many of a time and most quartets and solos it's singing sing about three verses of it and that's it I saw a one traveler and tattered garments clad coming up the mountain it seemed that he was said his back was heavy laden this strength was almost gold yet he shouted dados allah' delivers will come and then he solo and if you know the original song it's got 24 verses if I remember correctly and he didn't even want about not a one of well I've got if I said folks y'all come on back tomorrow night we'll we'll try to get in tomorrow night now as no tell us don't quit but that song got me going another thought so the next night I'm down again I'm gonna tell them they're not for a fact it's over with this is it and just about that time out of war got up again said preacher I hope you don't try think I'm taking over but God won't say again and he son the same thing well I started preaching and I heard the doors rattling double doors wait at the end of the hall at all and was used inside door we turned all the lights out except down close to the front I'll save on the light bill I hired those double doors red lead now I couldn't see it's dark back through there find outs made out is my white hair pop oh and someone with great aunts and uncles how about ten or twelve them I said pop all y'all come on down here now and closer plenty seats down here it you see I don't want to preach tone don't were said but I know that the invitation started at night the first step dad I was my old football and he got in there came down gotten older and I heard him crowd oh god I'm a sinner save me for Jesus sake and that not boy did this is art I was gonna quit that meeting but as a young preacher just starting out God showed me something that night well it looks like it's all over huh when the devil said throw the towel in and quit when there's no more tomorrow's it's all over you washed up nothing to it praise God he just fixin to do something he's just and God showed me that as a young man and I lose I believe I told brother Pete yesterday that word discouragement vete that that's there been my mindset said I've been run off I've been to churches that actually voted me out as the Evangelist run me all voted me out while as I and I've had them to say all kinds of things about me and call me everything you can lay that lay their tongue to but there's a few things that I throw it out of my thinking Kate oh listen buddy I told starting out and you cater or don't just a and Yale I'll tell you what that word discouragement left me Amen to God they could trust me they told me a thing you won't do you want to do I make shut down shop here but I'm particular death is another place to get to and I got time study about that outfit brother Billy has been admired by some of the Giants for God of our century one of them is dr. Harold E Seidler pastor for 42 years of the Tabernacle Baptist Church in Greenville South Carolina dr. Sattler recently went to be with the Lord but before his graduation he had this to say about one of his most illustrious members for over 35 years Billy's is God's man he's the unusual manner I sometimes say that Billy Kelly is an institution that's more than just a personality he's an institution he his culture is different from the average man I appreciates humble things in common things in ordinary things more than an older man would he's bid that we had made that way he sees things along the side of the highway that most of us would pass up and pass by but he sees them and our does he see them but is he's a lesson the God it is we get from these things that he sees in life's pilgrimage appreciate me and like brother Harold Sadler a very learned man well the wisest men I know and I see him brother Harold Sadler that of all the preachers I know across this country I be he's one of the most the most conscientious preacher I have met my life I've never seen him in a sports shirt like this he always has on a coat at a time I saw him in his own yard mourn grace with a suit on in other words he stayed ready that as a signal to me that he's ready to go but God any minute to witness to the hospital and Here I am in my sixties laying in the hospital up there and I heard Somerset flee and here he was 80 years old chef's feet is barely moving coming down through the halls of the hospital to visit me I mean I mean listen buddy 6:30 in the morning I've been on trips with him and he said to me at Pontotoc Mississippi said can I ride home with you I said yell we wrote home and got home for him to catch a plane out to go somewhere else to preach most conscientious Prix driver made and I'll tell you doubles my heart but me and liked him and Bob gray and fella psyche jet love me and had confidence in me to give me a doctor's degree and I appreciate it from the depths of my heart among his lifelong friends and associates there are many who would give personal testimony of his great influence on their lives one of those outstanding personalities is brother Clyde Carter but the Carter was for 35 years the pastor of the First Baptist Church in dark Virginia he is now the associate pastor of the Union Baptist Church of Gaunt Virginia where brother estriol Amburgey as the pastor he tells of his meeting with brother Kelly for the first time and the beginning of a lifelong friendship nepeta whiffle whiffle for Ginny why he said ah he's in a meeting of power with Kenneth love and man brother Fred Arrington hath heard and paulie's we better Jack grizzle was betting it was telling us I've got the meeting and we decided to up our hearing so brother Bill got up to preach that night and I don't know me and brother Fred we talked it over after we left but lear's determined not to like him but anyhow he got in to preach he told us three or four subjects that he said I could preach on but he said I'm going to preach on the blood tonight and he started preaching and he'll on the test a few minutes of me and rather friend and sent out of the interpret seats as I can Oh God got a hold of us had that knife that we shouted and praise the Lord well we just had the good greatest time leave her head and work so when he got through priesthood we what happened told it week we were singers we could sing we tried it so hidden by just come up and sing we could have her that night and sung we musta son ten or fifteen songs that one of the greatest meetings I was ever in my life I fell in love but bill kill it that night I invited to come to my church soul to be these he came never will forget but he pulled in them and to church you loved Elton he said how in the world he you oh you get out of here he said I'm gonna call my wife at the bus and tell her I'm in a hole of here well we had a great meeting in the and cuz I had him back to second time and I've didn't withdraw the bill many times I bent his camp meetings I spent the whole week quit he stated to his home and well he's my friend I love it now the dips by heart he tells me that I look like he's dead and the vigilance I guess of greatest friends with well I know he's a great a friend as I ever had in this world Billy has not only touched the lives thousands through his preaching but mountain music and gospel music have been a vital part of his private and public life I will need you in the morning cry the bride Riverside when our sorrow has drifted away I'll be standing at the portals when the gates open wide the pony aha by the repair you Oh in the body that it's bearable now choir god I've always camping in the southeastern part of the United States I want you to pull it stopper down and I mean let er rip Humpty let's go down here we go down Oh mommy we pull up start you want to say it you happy Epis Lee I just think a few months ago I got a little boy 16 years old 16 years ago went home to be in the Lord you know one of these mornings I was talking to brother older brother lettuce on the call with God I listened few to give me a million worlds like this one I wouldn't bring him back on these mornings the old ship was on come sailing in God you know what the verse here says I will meet you in the morning at the end of the way on the streets of the city of gold where we all can be together and be happy for a while the years and the agents your old it'll be a morning thank God when that old ship as I come sailing in I leave a young man will walk out on the sunny banks of sweet deliverance thank God take me by the hand and we'll shout all over him on these bad days maybe you got a mother dad brother sister maybe some of you precious mothers walk down through the jaws of death to bring a little child this world maybe you've got a child over there we get out that course you feel free wind got no claps all cheered oh nothing tired of stairs y'all to say it join in with us would you I will meet you in the morning at the end of way on the streets of that city of gold where we all can be together and be happy for a while the u-turn me AJ shower and the party ah there Oh we everybody side I ever be here if the horny when phony when I and ranchera and the day Oh and the bunny that shitty shitty beer man say male horse brother Kelly is the writer of a popular gospel song like a prodigal son and he has been the source of inspiration for other evangelists songwriters dr. Tom Hayes evangelist from Saluda North Carolina is the writer of the very popular gospel song new grace the dr. Hayes tailed you in his own words of his unique close relationship and friendship with brother Kelly personally I can't hardly imagine a time when I didn't know how Billy Kelly he's been such a big figure in my life my family life he challenged my pastor to a footrace when I was just a boy and outran him up his driveway he preached on the back of a truck with my mom and my sisters doing the singing I you know in a downtown preaching occasion and then I guess I remember some of Billy's sermons as some of my favorites I remember as a boy hearing and preaching on the subject he'll burn you fields down as he preached on God's judgment and brother Billy's preaching has always been of the old school with the various themes the blood of Jesus the second coming he would preach a sermon on hail the place of the Damned all those great Simon's made impressions on me as a boy and I'll always be grateful for his impact upon my life at brother Kelly's home and farm near Greer South Carolina is where he seems to be most relaxed many evangelists visit brother Kelly's home for advice counsel and to draw upon his vast years of experience one of his recent visitors was evangelist Randy brown who gleaned from his write fields of spiritual insight brother Kelly sometimes is philosophical and his convictions affirmed he has very definite views on current issues and especially the Word of God I'm 63 years old and Iraq remembers a boy getting out one day in the yard on Sunday with a hole cutting some weeds down and my grandma hollered me put that hole up boy this is the Lord's Day they didn't play ball on Sunday I'm talking about people believed anything we didn't go swimming on the Lord's Day and people we went to school is that a revival meetin they turn school I go down that church for revival services and people and fear God now you take in Romans chapter 3 and verse 18 he says this there is no fear of God there's got to be a fear of God l fear God this day and time that's really shack up why used to be for manners are done that in the community I went with some crooked woman and forsaken his family best got the Ku Klux Klan went that honor and give him a good scare on whipping yeah and then sold and so forth and there's a they won't only fear that the Ku Klux Klan is a fear of God if you've done such things is that well times have changed now the end people get on worldwide television and brag about being a queer a homosexual whatever you call them and they brag about being lesbians they boast and the fact that they've taken Bible read now the schoolhouse I remember when Eisenhower marks troops in the Clinton Tennessee and my cousin involved in all that stuff all he could stand the thoughts of integration he ran a country grocery store and a fella coming now running his mouth about integration my uncle reached over a barrel got ax panel and like I read his brains out another one coming then he shot him with a 38 special right here and that bullet went back blowed his job to spot and locked in his neck and he was responsible for setting one of the school ladders on fire and then what the penitentiary or any of it I have preachers feeling it's 50 years old and but now then look what it what it is everybody breaks his I'm afraid of the day down here at Columbia South Carolina and the television was then also the television just zoomed in all the feller and you know what he said and now you know in other words he's coming out of the closet everybody'd know and some people that I've known that I never dreamed of that was that way they've stepped down one they said come through here the other day this is known as dark corner and one of them come up here the dead won't know where the gays hung out and the roll Mountain feller told him elastin an eye on that limb right there so that's about the way I feel about that crowd who the name of God ever dreamed that we lived a day when men would have long hair the rock and roll crowd the Beatles and all that but they started at Elvis Presley in his doings and that age came in men let their hair grow out like women I tell her all the crew hair on her chest be a man instead of their head and this crowd wired bracelets like the women lace on their drawers like the women and all the rest of it they would say that's time whatever they did when they take God out well but it I mean our trouble started short of a stumble you need it better he says go get worse and worse the young preachers starting out with all the other thing was going to get better let's get worse worse yes sir and I used to think it you know it's going to get better I'd hear some of these liberal preachers talking about more Bibles more religious institution more money more preachers everything's getting better there may be more money more institutions more preachers but two getting worse all the time his long years of experience is the goldmine for young preachers I was going down through locks for Tennessee one morning walking with my Bible of the bar I paced G Herald Smith's house Gerald Smith was a household word and every Christian home that believeth they have done this country and they had to Kadlec sitting in the front yard and I said Lord Here I am walking and that's around old buses and that man's got two Cadillacs Lord can you just give me a loan forward to some kind of ride in and the Lord spoke to my heart and said hey you do you boy and he put my boot camp now how many young fellas you known to the church they got a church fight and that ended their ministry right there is over where they couldn't take it they couldn't pay the dues but I tell him to hang in there be faithful to God first of all to find out that he's a shepherd and not a sheepdog gods man commands every situation I said every situation bar none and I believe that with all of my heart and any man's a leader he's got to command every situation and when I when I go into Church I take over why do I take over well what they've had and been working so let's try this way yeah see and you go somewhere in the pastor wants to tell you how to run the revival meeting we'll just let him run it he don't need you so I learned I learned that hey God's man commands every situation and that he ought to wait on God and let the Lord be the leader he's the other shepherd but takes commands from the Lord and does what God would have to do and I tell every young preacher in this country to take that old King James Version of the Bible I read out set that up for the last days one college fella told me said well I can't understand that Oh Bible thees and thous misled when I said to you a college man how is it your grandpa they never saw the third grade could understand it and you a college man and you can't understand it I said your Grandpa's knew what it meant and I'll tell you a man that reads that book as it said in the revelation you may not be able to understand revelation when he in Salem Stan said read it he also has advice for those young preachers who would be greatly used of God now until any preacher young virgin

Channel: Fundamental Baptist Sermons

Views: 132,949

Rating: 4.8265395 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: 4ErkNp1h_hA

Length: 43min 54sec (2634 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 12 2014