For years I lived outside any Christian influence other
than the prayers of my mother and father. During
that time I did everything I could to dodge a church
service. The only time I would go was when my mother
cornered me. Then when she got me in church, she
would ask me to sing. For her sake I would do it. Then
I would get out of there as fast as I could.

The night I was saved, I could tell that God or somebody
like Him came into my room. My first thought was, If I
open my eyes, I’ll see Jesus. And if I ever see Him, I’ll
have to preach. So I kept my eyes closed.

Then I heard Jesus say deep down inside me, If you
don’t get right with Me, you’re going to a devil’s hell. I
said, “I know it, Lord. What do I do now?” Then I
heard on the inside of me another voice. I recognized
it. It was the Sunday school teacher I had when I
was just a boy. Her name was Mrs. Taggert. I thought
she had probably been old all of her life, but all us
boys loved her.

In the Southern Baptist church, children were promoted
every year in Sunday school. We boys decided not to
be promoted unless Mrs. Taggert could go along. We
were determined that she was going to be our teacher,
or we weren’t going to move up. So she was promoted
too. Mrs. Taggert had the same bunch of ornery boys
for between three to five years.

She was probably the only Sunday school teacher I
ever had. Either that, or I don’t remember the others
because I didn’t like them. But I sure liked her.
Everybody did. Only we didn’t call her Mrs. Taggert.
We called her Old Lady Taggert to her face and she loved
it (or at least she acted like she did).

Old Lady Taggert must have been 80 when she first
started teaching us. She was so sweet, and she loved
every one of us, but she could straighten us out fast.
Nobody ever slept in her Sunday school class. She wore
a little straw hat with a flower on the side of it, and
everybody snapped to attention when Old Lady Taggert
came into the room.

That night as an adult, I was sitting there saying, “God,
I don’t now what to do now.” Right then I heard that
familiar voice: Boys, you have to ask Jesus to come into
your hearts. I thought, That’s Old Lady Taggert!

It was just as plain as if she had been in the room with
me, even though she had long since gone home to be
with the Lord. In that moment, the words she had
spoken over and over to the boys in her Sunday school
class came back to me.

Have you boys asked Jesus to come into your heart?
Boys, you’ve got to ask Jesus to come into your heart.
She said it all the time.

The moment I heard her voice in my spirit that night, I
acted on it. The Word she had taught us back when I
was 12 years old became the foundation for my faith
when I was born again.

Why didn’t I get born again back when she told us that
over and over?

I didn’t pay any attention to it. I heard it. It went in me,
but I never did act on it. I repented a lot, but it never
occurred to me to make Jesus Lord of my life. I never even
thought about it.

Baptists are big on salvation. They get more people
born again than anybody. The Baptists get people saved.

I knew about that. We had lived in the shadow of Hardin
Simmons University in Abilene, Texas. It was second
only to Baylor University in Waco, Texas, among Baptist
schools, and my family went to the University Baptist
Church.Needless to say, I had heard the plan of salvation
over and over again but it had never become the foundation
for my faith.

Then when I heard the invitation that night when I
heard Old Lady Taggert say that I had to ask Jesus to
come into my heart—I didn’t wonder if He really would.
I didn’t hear it with my mind; it came up inside my spirit,
and it seemed like the simplest thing I could ever do.
So I asked Jesus to come into my heart. He did. Actually,
Mrs. Taggert won me to the Lord. God honored her witness
to me 13 years before and the seed of her words sprang
forth into eternal life inside me.

Kenneth and Gloria Copeland