Chapter 4: Road Trip

For days we all helped – or watched in fascination – as John made final tweaks to the old bus in preparation for our trip. Finally the day came. We packed up the bus and piled in. John mostly drove while the rest of us lounged on pillows or peered out the windows. Our first visit would be to Isla Vista, close to Santa Barbara – maybe a twelve-hour drive – then further south to Calvary Chapel in Orange County, and other places where God was moving. At the Ranch we had seen a film of Calvary Chapel. It was full of hippies and surfers. The worship was fresh and different, with rock bands writing original worship songs.

We stopped in Berkeley to visit Jack Sparks, who headed Christian World Liberation Front. After a night spent in one of the several houses run by CWLF, Jack and his wife sent us off in the morning with Danish pastries and prayer. Along the route we stopped at a deserted beach at sundown, walking the white sand and wading into the waves. Gulls cried in the cool of the evening. The Lord Jesus seemed to be right there, in the beauty and the calm.

I was dozing when we pulled into Isla Vista, a village of off-campus housing for the University of California at Santa Barbara. Lifting my head, I saw a flat beach town filled with flat-roofed apartment buildings – ugly and characterless to me in contrast to the wild mountains I loved. When the bus stopped, we were surrounded by welcoming young people – brothers and sisters as they called each other – singing and smiling. 

I wanted to stick close to my Ranch friends, but they split off in all directions, delighted by the warm welcome. I felt abandoned and nervous in a strange environment.

Sandy, an artist with curly white-blond hair, befriended me. We walked across a weedy field while she asked me questions and talked excitedly about Jesus and about the church. I liked her, thankful she had singled me out. 

Barb was another who reached out to me in those first days. In the twilight we walked along a cliffside path to a meeting. She sang a song, “He tastes like honey in the rock.” I was struck by the thought that song conveyed – that we could taste the Lord; that he is sweet. 

We felt like royalty, the way the church honored us. In their meeting space – a converted apartment-building garage – they treated us to a lavish potluck that flowed right into a meeting. Different people called out songs to sing. Anyone could stand up and tell something they had learned about the Lord or some Bible verse that impressed them.

Gene Edwards was out of town at the time. We had heard about him while at the Ranch, but he remained a mystery for the time being.

The church members opened their homes and apartments to house us all. Some of us were placed together. I wanted to be with one of my Ranch sisters, but I was by myself in a spacious suburban home with a kind young couple. They explained where the breakfast foods were, since they had to leave early to go to work. The house, beautifully decorated, seemed impersonal and sterile after our Ranch life. In my insecurity, I clung to my hippie mountain existence as the one thing that made me special.

Many of the saints (as they collectively called themselves) lived in houses and apartments clustered together. A group of us walking down the street one evening passed the second-story apartment of some of the sisters. Nancy was on the balcony in her robe. She greeted us with a big smile, and we stopped to talk. There was something comfortable and yet magical about that, like being in a different kind of world where everyone was family. 

After a fun day at the beach, we divided up to go to meetings in homes. I was taken to a meeting in an apartment with maybe 15 people. I had never heard anything like the songs they sang – loud and victorious – or the kinds of declarations they made. It was alarming. I didn’t have a category in which to put this almost aggressive worship.

Walking in the dark to the house where I stayed, I was disoriented. This didn’t seem like the Lord I had encountered during my brief time of knowing him. As I took a bath and puzzled about all I had seen, I told the Lord I didn’t like this place and wanted to leave. There in the bathtub, I had a sense of the Lord speaking directly to me – not in words, but so definitely that it seemed as if he spoke out loud: “Stay. Open your eyes to what is here.” 

A day or two later, we said our goodbyes and headed south to continue our tour of churches. I breathed easier to be back with my Ranch family, where I belonged. Barely outside of Santa Barbara, our bus broke down on the highway. John tried to get it going, but ultimately our painted bus had to be towed back to Santa Barbara. We spent more days with the saints in Isla Vista, waiting for the bus to be fixed. At last, without seeing any more churches, we headed back to the Ranch.

Now we all had decisions to make. As I saw it, my only choices for my next home were the Lighthouse Ranch and The Church in Isla Vista, as the saints called it. I was leery of the Lighthouse Ranch. A young girl who had lost a leg to cancer came to our Ranch after staying with them. She told us that when she asked to be excused from work duties because she was feeling sick, they rebuked the spirit of sickness and made her get up and work. I heard that kind of report more than once. On visits to the Lighthouse Ranch, we saw dormitories crowded with bunks stacked five high. I didn’t get the impression of a loving atmosphere like the one at our Ranch.

I really didn’t want to go anywhere but where I was. I wanted to stay in our beautiful mountains, to tell the people there about Jesus. Kathy and I discussed that option on long walks. But where would we live, once the Ranch was closed? We did not want to return to our old lives.

Road Trip Part 2

Besides the people who lived on the Ranch, there were two couples who lived nearby and were pretty much a part of us. Don Parker, a forest ranger, and his wife, Linda, were several miles down the road. They came to the Ranch a lot. Joe and Pam lived on a commune in the area. Like me, they had come to Christ through the Rising Son Ranch. These two couples had not come with the rest of us on the bus. They decided to make their own road trip to Isla Vista by car, so some of us went with them for a second look. These “second-timers” included Kathy and me, and a brother named Chris.

On this second trip, Kathy and I stayed together, sleeping on couches in the living room of a married couple with a baby. I might not have felt at home in this different sort of church, but I was impressed by the love and hospitality we received.

The last night changed everything.

Gene Edwards, back from his travels, finally made his appearance. He was older than we were – in his 40s. With his mustache and slicked-back hair, he looked like someone from a different era, maybe the Old West. While we were mostly in jeans and granny dresses, he wore suit trousers and a collared white shirt. His every movement was deliberate, whether rolling up his sleeves or putting on his reading glasses.

After some singing and worship, Gene stood up and boomed out in a Texas-drenched baritone, “I saw a miracle in Eugene! Praise God! Praise God! Praise God! Praise God!” Each “Praise God” was punctuated by a fist pump – first one, then the other – up, then across, then up, then across. His whole being radiated power and life. It was electrifying. He – Gene Edwards – was electrifying. The meeting continued with worship and singing and praise. Gene said he couldn’t tell us yet what the miracle was, but he would in good time.

Chris and I walked out of the meeting room in a daze. We sat in a little park across the street and marveled at what we had just seen and experienced. This was the life of the Lord as we had never known it before. Joy flooded us; our faces seemed to glow as we talked. We both knew that night that we would be moving to Isla Vista to be part of this. As for the miracle Gene had talked about – we could only imagine that someone had been raised from the dead. What else could generate that kind of reaction?

The next day as I walked along the street with some newfound companions, we met Jim and Carol, whom I had not seen before. Jim was dressed in business attire and a dark wool coat. That set him apart from the casual jeans most of us wore. He told us about the business that he and Carol had started, silk screening and marketing Christian posters. He asked me, “Are you moving here?” I said, “Yes,” and he laughed happily. Of course I had no idea then how our lives would be intertwined, but I found him attractive – handsome with thick, dark curly hair and a friendly manner.

In the next weeks, I received two pieces of mail, little cards from Sandy and from Barb. They hoped I would move down and join the Church. I was happy and grateful to be wanted.  

The Rising Son Ranch was buzzing with questions and speculation about this miracle. We couldn’t wait to learn what it was. One early evening Barbara called me to the phone. I took the call in the little office beside our food storage area. It was Sandy from Isla Vista. She spoke excitedly about the miracle: a group of Christians in Eugene, Oregon, had all decided to move to Isla Vista to become part of the church life there. I felt let down. This was the miracle? It didn’t seem as exciting as someone raised from the dead. Yet Sandy’s enthusiasm was contagious. She asked if I was moving down, and I said yes. She asked me to be her roommate, along with a couple of other single women in the church. I felt pleased to know that I was wanted, with a place waiting for me.

As the time of our move drew closer, Sandy told me that she had decided to move in with a married couple from Eugene. I would be rooming with three other women who were strangers to me. All my insecurities came rushing back. But I had made the decision to go, and I was going.

Before I left, I turned the ownership of our land over to Jim, who still lived there. I intended to leave my old life completely behind. We went to town and signed papers to make the transfer legal. After making the down payment, I had been making the monthly mortgage payments from a trust my grandmother had left me. Jim had no source of income at the time and I didn’t know what would happen with the land, or how he would make the mortgage. I just knew I was free of entanglements – free to follow the Lord.

The Move

The day finally came when I said goodbye to my beloved mountains and drove down Highway 101 to Santa Barbara. Most of us had decided to move to the Church: all of the Ranch leaders, the two couples from the area, and a lot of us younger people. At least I had that security. My Ranch family would be there as well.

I moved into an apartment in a fourplex on one of the little flat streets of Isla Vista. My roommates were Cheri, a strong Christian who was a travel agent; Ethel, the sister of Mike, who was one of the dedicated young men of the Church; and Carol, who was separated from her abusive husband and had two-year-old twins, David and Jennifer. Cheri’s face radiated joy; she was proper and exact in all she said and did. Ethel, minimally connected to the Church, pretty much kept to herself. Carol was sweet and I liked her; given my lack of interest in young children, though, I was not excited to be sharing an apartment with them.

The first meeting after I arrived was a shock. The atmosphere was one of discord. Men would stand up and argue with each other. This felt like a different church from the one we had visited. I was dismayed. What had I let myself in for? 

I soon found out that a major clash was underway. A group within the Church opposed Gene’s leadership. I felt myself to be a neutral party to all this, with a valid choice before me – though I did not know or understand what the conflict was about.

Word spread of a meeting at Gene’s house, very secretive, where he would speak. Later I found out that he did because some in the Church had ordered him not to speak in Isla Vista. He was avoiding conflict by holding meetings on private property. The secrecy of the meetings added a flavor of danger and excitement. They were held after dark. The house was full to overflowing, with people all around the house and filling the back yard. All the windows, as well as the sliding glass doors of the living room, were thrown open, with microphones and loud speakers to amplify the message. When Kathy Smith and I got to the meeting, the house was already packed, and we joined the crowd in the back yard. Gene offered a choice: follow him or follow the other people.

After the meeting, I sat with Carol and Cheri in our apartment and said, “I don’t know which way to go.” My roommates were clear: They were standing with Gene. They would be going on with the Church. We prayed, sitting in our living room. If they had had any doubts, I would have floundered in confusion. Their certainty reassured me. 

Over a period of nine months, many people left the Church. Among them were the Ranch leaders, as well as Kathy Smith, who was my best friend. All the young men kept meeting with Gene’s group. So did several of the couples. It was painful to be separated from the only family I had known during my brief time as a Christian. Weldon and Pat and John did not talk to me about our respective decisions, at least not then. I think they too were uncertain about what to do.

I wonder now why I did not go to them, to see what they were thinking, to ask their advice. I can only think that already I had developed an “us versus them” mentality: those who were not with us were against us. I did seek out Lenny and the others from the Ranch who had remained with the Church; we discussed what was happening and prayed together.

The meetings of the church became clandestine and exciting. Gene delivered sermons – we called them messages – that set all of this in a scriptural context. He spoke about Paul and the opposition he faced from the Judaizers that sought to bring his new churches under the Jewish laws.

At around this time, Gene held meetings where anyone could meet with him privately to discuss issues. I cringe to think of it now, but I signed up for one of the time slots. I waited patiently in the outer meeting room, where many people milled around, until it was my turn to be escorted into the private room where Gene sat. Nervously, I sang him the simple song I had written about Jesus before I was even saved, accompanying myself on the guitar. I thought I might comfort him in the midst of the attacks against him.

As an unexpected response, Gene invited me to lunch. He and his wife Helen and I sat outdoors at a natural foods restaurant nearby. Helen was kind and smiling. Gene asked me questions about myself. I was flattered by the attention, as if a celebrity had looked on me with special favor. By then, without question, I was part of the Church in Isla Vista. Wrenched out of my comfortable existence at the Ranch, I now found my identity in the Church.