“I feel a sense of personal debt to these “old timers” of the old Fire Baptized Holiness Church. Not only was Floyd Martin instrumental in helping “Jenks” or Elliot Hodge get saved, he was also instrumental in helping a man by the name of Frank Rutledge find salvation. Frank was a wayward son of a Free Methodist preacher. By the time he was saved, he had grown children and grandchildren. He became a preacher of the gospel. I’ve often heard the story of how he was coming home to Missouri when he came to a fork in the road where one way would take him back home, and one would take him to his kin in Nebraska. I’m sure he was tired, and a part of him wanted to go to Missouri. But there was also a pull in his heart to go tell his people about salvation. As he stood at the fork of the road, he made a decision that changed lives. He headed to Nebraska, and held a revival meeting. In that meeting, several of his family were saved and found out about holiness. A couple of those who were saved were his granddaughter Eleanor (Fuller) Filsinger and her husband Arnold Filsinger. They were never the same after that revival. They raised their little family for God. Their daughter, Frances (Filsinger) Hamilton, remembers those old-time meetings there in Nebraska. Elliot Hodge was one of the first few to come and hold a revival for the newly-formed group there. Their lives convinced her that God was real. She learned the power of prayer and of a holy life. Since she is my mother-in-law, I feel a personal debt to her and all those old timers who blazed the trail and gave m husband a heritage of holiness.”

~ Elizabeth Smith Hamilton

Copyright © 2011