J.C. PENNEY BORN AGAIN
The late great business man and entrepreneur, James Cash Penney (1875 - 1971), founder of the J.C. Penney stores, in his autobiography entitled "Fifty Years with the Golden Rule," tells of his being in the Battle Creek Sanitarium one night when he thought he was dying. He wrote several letters and went back to bed thinking he would not be alive the next morning. But, he was alive when morning came. He got up and as he was walking down the hall he heard some people singing the words of the late great hymnist, Civilla (Durfee) Martin’s, hymn in the hospital’s chapel: "Be not dismayed whate’er betide. God will take care of you." It was a few people having an early morning prayer meeting; and, he slipped inside and sat at the back! Someone read from the Holy Bible and led the group in prayer! James Cash Penney spontaneously said, "Lord, I can do nothing. Will You take care of me?" He says, "In the next few moments something happened to me...it was a miracle." At that moment, he became a born-again Christian true believer! He saw something big in that little prayer meeting and it saved him!
(From a sermon by George Dillahunty, Take Time For Almighty God! 10/18/2009. Sources: 1. "In Quest of God’s Power," by Charles L. Allen, c1952 Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company, pp. 56-68. 2. "The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Bicentennial Hymnal," c1957,1996, 1999 Charlotte, North Carolina: A.M.E. Zion Publishing House, ISBN 0-9655-4261-0, P. 467.)