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Sound of Liberty
7286 Hwy 53 West
Dawsonville,
GA
30534
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How God
has Led Me
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Testimony of Brother Ben
Howard
I would like to give a testimony of how God has led
and brought me to the place in His service that I now
stand in this world wide ministry to the beloved Bride
of Jesus Christ. I tell these things, not to honor,
nor magnify myself, but to magnify the office that God
has called me to, and the wonderful works that He has
done in my life. I give all the praise and glory to
God for His leading me by the revelation of His Word,
as well as by dreams and visions. So please bear with
me in my folly, as I start by telling you a little
something of myself, for If I tried to tell you all
the miraculous workings of God in my life, there just
wouldn’t be room enough to write it all here.
I was born in 1939 into a large family in a rural
mountain area in North Georgia, U.S.A. I was part of
a family of 14 children (9 boys and 5 girls), born to
Ben and Eva Howard. When I was born, I only weighed
approximately two and half pounds and everybody said,
“The poor thing will never make it.” My Mama laid in
bed sick for weeks after giving birth to me, not even
knowing she was in the world, and they didn’t believe
she would live. My older sister Stella Mae Mulkey
that resides in Dawsonville, Georgia took care of me
when I was born. She would feed me by taking a piece
of cloth and putting a little sugar and butter in it,
then dipping it in milk (it is what many of the old
timers call a “Sugar Tit”). I survived this way until
Mama got well enough to take care of me. My sister
told me that I was so small, that I slept in a shoe
box, and that it was a miracle that I lived. I am so
thankful to the Lord for the way He has taken care of
me since the day I was born.
My father was a sharecropper, so there wasn’t much
money in our home, we were so very poor. Needless to
say, we had very little schooling. We moved out of
the mountains when I was about 5 years old to a place
where there was a one-room school. A few years later
I began to go there some, walking a long distance.
There was probably 10 to 15 of us, all the grades were
in the same room and was all taught by the one
teacher, which was one of the neighbors that knew how
to read and write some. We all walked to school, and
if the weather happen to be bad, raining or snowing,
the teacher would not even show up. Needless to say,
we that came to school in those days, when the teacher
didn’t show up had a good time, after we got a fire
going in the wood heater. “Oh, for those good old
days.” This brings us to the early fifties, when I
was told that I was in the fourth grade. I didn’t
know very much about reading, but I was getting to be
a teenager and I suppose it was thought to be the
right thing to do. Later I got a job at a sawmill
(sawing logs into lumber), soon I made enough money to
buy an old army jeep and learned how to drive it. By
this time, I was getting into my later teen years. It
was now along towards 1956 or 1957, when some of my
brothers and sisters started attending church
services, and after some persuasion on their part, I
went to church with them. It wasn’t long until I gave
my heart to God, and began to fast and pray. This was
in 1958, and Brother Harold Pettit was the Pastor.
The night that I repented, brother Billy Andrews was
the preacher, “and did he ever preach”. He preached
hell was miserable, and heaven was wonderful and
lovely. By the time he was finished, I was on my way
to the altar. Brother Billy now has a church in
Murfeesboro, Tennessee.
It wasn’t long until I began to feel a definite
calling to preach the gospel, but I had a big problem,
I couldn’t read. I told God (as though He didn’t know
it), that I could not preach, because I could not
read. God spoke to me and said, “I will teach you to
read.” Then I began to try to read in the Bible, but
I still didn’t know the words. At this time, I began
to pay close attention to what the preacher would call
the words when he read. I would always get the person
I sat next to in church to turn my Bible to the place
where the preacher was reading, and I would remember
what he called each word. Then, I began to see how he
arrived at the knowledge of what he called a
particular word. I noticed, when he said the words
“the” and “then” that they were pretty much the same
word. The word, “then” was the word “the” with an “n”
on it. The same with the word “them”. It was the
word “the” with an “m” on it. Again, I would watch
the words, and I realized you could add “ir” to the
word “the” and the word became “their”, then I finally
began to get the hang of learning to read. I believe
it was God showing me how to know words, teaching me
to read, just like He said He would.
So in the later part of 1958, I knew enough to read
some, and I began to preach the Word of God. Then
along the years of 1959 to the early 1960’s, I bought
a tent from brother Billy Andrews and started holding
tent meetings all over this area. Then in December of
1961, I was married to Joyce Pruitt and we were
married for 34 years, until cancer took her life in
1995. I remained unmarried until November of 2000,
when I married my present wife Barbara, who is also a
dedicated Christian and helper in the gospel.
During the early years of my ministry, I preached
in churches and under tents; also, I joined the church
of God and had many large meetings. It was at one of
those meetings that someone put a gospel track in my
coat pocket, of which I later noticed the title of the
tract was, “$500 Dollars Reward To Anyone Who Can Show
Where Anyone In The Bible Was Baptized Using the
Titles of Father, Son and Holy Ghost.” As I began to
read the scriptures given in the tract, I realized I
had been wrong about water baptism, as to what Name to
use. Then one day while driving along in my car
thinking about this, I turned the radio on and a man
was preaching on water baptism in the Name of the Lord
Jesus Christ. After the message, I listened for the
man’s name and address. His name was brother Homer
Brown, so I got his address and wrote him for
instruction. Then almost at the same time, I heard
another preacher that was preaching water baptism in
the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and his name was
brother Mike Canada of Gainesville, Georgia; who still
has a church there. He was telling about a man named
William Branham and spoke very well of him. He
announced that brother Branham would be speaking over
a telephone hook-up on Sunday night. He also said
that this man (William Branham) was the Prophet to the
age, and the Seventh Church Age Messenger. I thought
to myself, “What is this fellow talking about?” So, I
went to hear this man speak over telephone hook-up,
and after hearing him, I agreed that he was a Prophet
indeed. So brother Mike began telling me about the
Seven Church Ages and the Seven Seals, along with many
other things that brother Branham taught. After this,
I heard brother Branham at least one other time by
telephone hook-up. Brother Mike informed me that
brother Branham usually had a meeting at his church in
Jeffersonville, Indiana on Easter Sunday, and that
they were all going. He said that I could go with
them if I wanted. So I made plans to go with them to
hear brother Branham in person on Easter Sunday,
1966. Then in December of 1965, I received a call
from brother Mike informing me that brother Branham
had been killed in a automobile accident, and that he
and some of the Saints were going to Indiana. He told
me I was more than welcome to go with them, so I
hurriedly made plans to go. I never was privileged to
be in any of brother Branham’s services. Although I
never met him down here (I knew him by the Spirit),
and I know one day, I will see him in glory. So I
attended the funeral services for brother Branham
there in Jeffersonville, Indiana and met many brethren
that believed in what brother Branham had done for the
Lord. At this, for the first time, I begin to sense
that there were differences in what the brethren
believed. I was somewhat perplexed by this, but I
just listened because I did not know what to do. It
wasn’t very long, until I realized that there was a
controversy about the way worship was being carried
out. Also, I began to hear the name Junior Jackson
spoken about (and also met him briefly), but I did not
ask any questions, as I was consumed with grief and
the thought of what to do now. I began to hear some
of the ministers say that they believed brother
Branham was going to rise from the dead and finish the
work of “perfecting the Bride”. I became very
troubled at what I saw, and just wanted to get back
home and try to think about this thing, which I did
as soon as it was feasible.
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