Bruce Plummer, born on the Fort Belknap reservation, was twenty-one, stumbling drunk, and suicidal in a drenching rainstorm in Portland, Oregon, when with Native American awareness he crawled under a pine tree to avoid some of the wet. That tree was on church property, he realized the next day, as he watched vehicles coming and later going from the parking lot.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the first time in my life, I heard God. That surprised me,\u201d Plummer said. \u201cHe said, \u2018Bruce, I want you to go down there and talk to a man.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Smelly, dirty, still under the influence of alcohol, he went inside the building and was warmly welcomed by the Lutheran pastor, who took Plummer home for Sunday dinner, where he was welcomed just as warmly by the pastor\u2019s wife.<\/p>\n
Dinner wasn\u2019t quite ready, she said. She offered to wash his clothes and lay out fresh garments while he took a shower if he\u2019d like. The pastor later offered to let him spend the night.<\/p>\n
\u201cI argued with him for ten days to two weeks,\u201d Plummer said. \u201cHe\u2019d tell me, \u2018All I can tell you is this: John 3:16.\u2019 He said, \u2018Jesus is God. If you ask Him, God will come into you.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat attracted me to Christianity was that he said, \u2018Bruce, God can give you a brand new start. He can take all the sins and wipe them all away.\u2019 \u2018Holy cow,\u2019 I thought. \u2018I wonder if I could get a brand new start? If I could get a chance, I would do it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Plummer was again in the shower when God next spoke to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you\u2019re homeless, the absolute best thing is a shower,\u201d Plummer said. \u201cIt\u2019s better than food, to be clean. God spoke to me: \u2018Bruce, how would you like to be clean on the inside?\u2019 God used that word \u2018clean.\u2019 I told Him, \u2018I believe in you, God, but this Jesus thing, man, I don\u2019t know; that doesn\u2019t make sense to me. I thought Jesus was the white man\u2019s god. I don\u2019t know how He could come into me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Plummer recounted his internal discussion.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had to ask God for forgiveness for my sins, that Lutheran pastor told me, to repent. If I did so, He would take them as far as the East is from the West. \u2018But I don\u2019t have faith that if I asked Jesus to come into me, that He would,\u2019 I told myself. \u2018I tell you what, God. I\u2019ll make you a deal. If I ask Jesus to come into my heart, you have to give me the faith to believe that. I want to stop sinning; I don\u2019t want to be a drunk anymore.\u2019 I bowed my head in the shower and asked Jesus to come into my heart.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I reached for the towel, I didn\u2019t have my hand shake. I looked at my skin and I was still brown. I thought if I became a Christian my skin would turn white. And I still know my language! (Anpetu Washte`; it is a good day.<\/em>) I think Jesus came into my heart and gave me the faith to believe it!\u201d<\/p>\n When Plummer told the pastor what had happened, the pastor said, \u201cFrom this point on in your life, every answer to every question in your life will be in this book,\u201d and handed Plummer his first Bible.<\/p>\n That was February 1973. Plummer returned to the reservation to forgive people he had wronged, and was counseled by his girlfriend\u2019s father to go to Oklahoma Baptist University that fall. In the telephone directory he saw a listing for First Indian Baptist Church of Shawnee. There Plummer found the pastor was the acclaimed American Indian Christian leader Jimmy Anderson.<\/p>\n When Anderson asked Plummer if he wanted to be baptized, \u201cI said yes, because I\u2019d told God I would do whatever He asked, and I wanted to be obedient,\u201d Plummer said.<\/p>\n \u201cFirst Indian was a Southern Baptist church, and that\u2019s how I became a Southern Baptist,\u201d Plummer said. To this day, he added, \u201cEvery morning, when I open my eyes, I begin with the same prayer, \u2018Good morning Father, help me walk with you today in my life. Thank you for your love, your grace, and your mercy, and the hope that I have in Creator Sets Free, Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior,\u00a0Aho.<\/em>\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cFor the first time in my life, I heard God. That surprised me,\u201d Plummer said. \u201cHe said, \u2018Bruce, I want you to go down there and talk to a man.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9192207,"featured_media":39750,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_wpscp_schedule_draft_date":"","_wpscp_schedule_republish_date":"","_wpscppro_advance_schedule":false,"_wpscppro_advance_schedule_date":"","_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"","_twitter_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type":"","_pinterest_share_type":"","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_selected_social_profile":[]},"categories":[42,45,8,19],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n