Wanda

THE WOMAN WHO CHANGED MY DIRECTION

I'm convinced that when God brings a man and a woman together, it's not just so they can love each other and populate the world with beautiful offspring — though that is a wonderful part of the package. When God brings a man and a woman together, ultimately His purpose is to unite two people who can serve and glorify Him more as a team than as separate individuals. Of course, sometimes God can do more with a person when he's single. But often, He prefers to join two of His children together as one to accomplish His plans. I'm glad He operates that way, because I needed Wanda Young.

   Wanda was a beautiful girl. There's no other way to say it. She had flawless brown skin, a dynamite smile, pretty eyes, and perfect figure. But more than that, she carried herself like a true lady. Everyone who knew her loved her.

   I had dated several girls during my high school years. As a jazz musician, I tended to attract a lot of attention. But Wanda

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attracted mine. When I saw her, I recognized more than a pretty face. There was something special about her demeanor that infected my heart, and the only remedy was to get to know this sweet girl better.

   She was one of nine children — six boys and three girls — from a fine Oberlin family. Her father, James Young, was the lead cook at the cafeteria of the Oberlin Theological Seminary. He looked like a cook — large stomach, kind face. Her mother, Florie, was a godly woman who died when Wanda was just twelve. This left Wanda's father in a terrible depression from which he would never fully recover. But Wanda's older brother, Alden, stepped in admirably to help raise Wanda and her older sister Ruth. Two of Wanda's remaining siblings had died at young ages, the other four had moved on to college and work and the military.

   Oberlin was a small community, so Wanda knew who I was. In fact, her parents had been good friends with my grandparents years before. She knew I played in the high school band. But early on she didn't appear to have eyes for me. She played it very cool.

   During our junior year, Wanda and I were assigned to the same homeroom. I smiled at her often, and she smiled back. But her overall manner was still chilly.

   Then one day I saw her walking through the hallway by herself, and I got brave. I said, "Could I carry your books?" She smiled and replied, "Sure." And suddenly, the ice began to break.

   A few weeks later, Oberlin High School announced its annual Sadie Hawkins dance. To my pleasant surprise — and elation — Wanda asked me to be her date. Later, she told me that the girl asking out the guy was not her idea of a "proper" date.

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But, she said, there were other girls in our homeroom class who had their eye on me, so she had to move quickly. We had a great time, and I discovered the beautiful Miss Young was also an excellent dancer.

   After the Sadie Hawkins dance, we started dating regularly — and I did the asking. I walked her home from school whenever I could, and we talked about everything under the sun. The war that was raging in Europe cast a cloud of uncertainty over our world, but we both dreamed of a bright future. Wanda told me of her hopes of becoming an elementary school teacher. I filled her in on my plan of becoming a world-famous jazz musician.

"YOU'RE THE ONE"

   As Mr. Young's depression grew deeper, Alden became Wanda's primary guardian and caregiver. He took his responsibility quite seriously. He made sure she completed her homework, was in the house before dark, and was in church every Sunday — whether she wanted to go or not. His strictness was especially evident when it came to my relationship with his sister.

   One afternoon, I asked Wanda if she would come hear me play at another school's dance the next evening. At first, Wanda didn't seem interested. Then she told me she would like to go but that her brother probably would never allow her to go someplace where she would have to spend most of the evening sitting alone.

   Alden actually surprised us. He agreed to let Wanda go. But there was one condition: He would go with us. Wanda was horrified at the thought of her twenty-nine-year-old brother

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acting as a chaperon, but she assented. I turned out to be the first of many "dates" where Alden, without complaint, sat with Wanda while I performed with my band. Years later, Wanda realized just how special her brother's efforts were.

   A year flew by, and Wanda and I were getting more and more serious. One evening, I was invited to play a solo for a musical program at the Methodist Church, and Wanda attended with me. I was dressed to the nines in a new Rust-checkered suit and vest. And I stood up there and played a jazzy arrangement of "I Must Tell Jesus" with our piano player Frank Williams accompanying. Wanda sat there in the front pew, watching me with those lovely brown eyes. After the program, she congratulated me and told me how proud she was of me. Then she said, "You know, while I was watching you play and hearing you, I realized that you're the boy for my life."

   Oh, man, did that ever feel good to hear! I hugged her tightly and — for the first time — gave her a big kiss.

THE OTHER MAN

   A few weeks into our senior year of high school, my jazz orchestra traveled to Mansfield, Ohio, for one of our biggest engagements yet. It was a tremendous dance that drew hundreds of folks.

   When I got home, I looked forward to seeing Wanda and telling her all about our big weekend. But Wanda had news of her own.

   Before I could dial her number, Wanda called me. Her sweet voice was filled with added enthusiasm as she welcomed me home. She said, "Howard, come over here right away.

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I've got some exciting news to tell you!"

   I made my way to her house as quickly as I could. I greeted a young woman who was bursting with joy. I'd never seen her so happy. I said to myself, I hope she didn't meet a new dude while while I was out of town. Turns out, she did meet Someone.

   "Let me tell you what happened to me," she said. "While you were away, four guys came to our church from Biola Institute in Los Angeles. Two were trumpeters, one was a trombone player, and the other a pianist. And they were going across the country in this old Model-T Ford. And they happened to stop by Oberlin, and the pastor invited them to come to our church to lead a youth revival meeting."

   Wanda was a member of an integrated Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) congregation, where her sister Ruth played piano. Her pastor, Miss Elsie Gatherer, was a bit of an anomaly in the C&MA. She was a Nazarene preacher from Scotland. She had come to Oberlin years ago as an itinerant preacher. But her passionate expository preaching was so profound and effective that the local C&MA asked her to stay on as as the Oberlin church's pastor, much to the chagrin of national denominational leaders, who disapproved of women preachers. But Miss Gatherer's ministry was so Christ centered it was difficult to dismiss her.

   Wanda explained that Miss Gatherer had asked the traveling Biola students to play their music and deliver their testimonies to the congregation full of teenagers. Their joyful music expressed their love for Jesus, Wanda said. And then the young men spoke about how God had brought strength and peace into their lives despite heartaches and personal losses. This resonated with Wanda, who had, in effect, lost both her parents when her mother died. As the students continued to

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share their hearts through words and music, it became clear to Wanda that they were for real. These young men were determined to give Jesus their all, because He had given His all — His life — for them.

   Suddenly the personal pain and bitterness Wanda had hidden in her heart began to melt away, and she realized what she had been missing all those years since her mother's death. "Howard," she said, "last night I went forward and gave my heart completely to Jesus Christ."

   I went to the all-Negro Mount Zion Baptist, and Wanda went to the Oberlin Alliance Church. Wanda occasionally joined me at Mount Zion, where we would sing together in the youth choir. As far as I was concerned, we were both good Christians. But Wanda's news seemed to signal something greater. Though our relationship had been getting serious, we had never really discussed our religious lives. Now it seemed to be coming to the fore in a major way, and I didn't know what to think.

   Although I didn't understand it, I was glad for Wanda's testimony of her born-again experience. After all, I told myself, a little religion never hurt anyone. I had mine, and now she had hers. But it wasn't long before I found that Wanda had something more than just mere religion.

THE ULTIMATUM

   A few days after Wanda's announcement, I asked her to go to the movies with me. She refused to go. This was odd! Wanda and I had always enjoyed going to the movies together. Something wasn't right.

   But my greatest surprise came when I asked her to go

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dancing with me. She had always been a wonderful dancer and enjoyed it as much as I did. But again she turned me down. This new Wanda troubled me. She was no longer interested in the fun things we had always done together, or even in my work as a jazz musician.

   Slowly I became convinced that our lives were now completely different. We had nothing in common anymore. We were living in two different worlds. I didn't know it then, but Wanda's conversion proved to be a mighty tool in the hand of God to eradicate all my illusions about the place and purpose of God in our lives.

   Seeing Wanda's consistent Christian living challenged me to rethink my own religious experience. I had gone forward to join the church at Mount Zion Baptist. But it wasn't revolutionizing. It was something I did and then put away in a compartment. I had gotten baptized, then went out to perform at a nightclub. In my mind, there was your religious life and your real life, and the two needed to meet only on Sunday mornings.

   But now Wanda, the love of my life, was joining the two parts together all the time, seven days a week. What did this mean for our future?

   Wanda convinced me to attend her church from time to time. Soon, I began to recognize a difference between the teaching at my church and the Bible-centered preaching delivered to her congregation.

   Today I look back at a lot of the preachers we had at Mount Zion, and I realize many of them graduated from Oberlin Theological Seminary, which years ago was a good school, but by the 1920s and the 1930s, had become liberal. (Years later, Oberlin's seminary closed its doors and merged

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with Vanderbilt Seminary in Nashville.) With a few exceptions, the young Oberlin graduates who came to our church to preach always brought a message heavy on philosophy, but never the gospel. In fact, I didn't know what the gospel was. (Of course, there were several outstanding preachers such as Gardner Taylor, James Earl Massey, and Leon Troy, who have gone on to touch many lives with the gospel.)

   I always admired the dynamism of those preachers. Even as a kid growing up, if I saw a man who could preach, I was fascinated. And I remember times I locked myself in my bedroom with a Bible and mimicked preachers in front of my mirror. But, alas, most of the preaching I received was full of soaring oratory but lacking when it came to the basic message of salvation through Jesus Christ.

   However, this was not the case when I went to Wanda's church. Whether it was Miss Gatherer or some other preacher, each time I went, I got the gospel. Unfortunately, I wasn't ready to make the kind of commitment it seemed to demand.

   Before Wanda's conversion, we had talked often about getting married someday. We dreamed of going to college together — her to study education, me to study music. I used to tell her, "I'm going to hit the big time, and I'll buy you fur coats and expensive jewelry. We'll travel the world." And she liked that. But now that she had experienced this transformation, my hopes of making her my wife seemed to be getting slimmer and dimmer.

   One night after church, it all came to a head. Wanda, I suppose had grown weary of my "not getting it." And I had grown tired of not having my old girlfriend. We walked slowly to her house, where we eventually sat together on her porch swing. We sat in silence for several minutes. Then finally

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her soft, gentle hands took hold of mine, and she explained to me that unless I gave my heart to Christ, she would have to stop seeing me.

   Wanda's words cut deep, yet I wasn't willing or ready to change my ways. Losing her was the last thing on earth I wanted to happen, but I didn't have the strength or desire to become something that I wasn't.

   "Wanda," I said, "our difference of ideas on spiritual matters doesn't have to come between us or separate us. I love you, Wanda. And more than anything else in the world, I want to marry you. I'll be a great bandleader someday, making lots of money. You'll never want for anything."

   Wanda took a deep breath, and then I heard her say those most disturbing words: "Howard, even though I love you, I love Christ more. Therefore, unless you accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, I will not be able to see you anymore, because we'll have nothing more in common with each other."

   I was crushed. How do you respond to something like that? She went on to tell me that I should consider giving up my glamorous dreams of superstardom, because there is more to life than fame and fortune. "It is my personal conviction, now that I'm a Christian, that God has something better for you in life than a career as a sax player," she said. "I am going to pray, and our church is praying, that someday soon you'll give your heart and life to Jesus, and then use your talents to serve the Lord."

   She let go of my hand and stood to her feet. I could see the tears welling up in her eyes. Yet she seemed determined to stand firm. "Howard, you keep playing, and I'll keep praying."

   And with that, she said good bye. 

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