All the Way, my Savior Leads Me
The Testimony of Ed Scott
“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out” (Rom. 11:33).
I was born in Kansas on February 5th, 1930, one of nine children. Though brought up in the Methodist Church and baptized as a baby, and confirmed as a teenager, I was not saved. After high school, I went away to college where I stopped attending church meetings and slid right in with ungodly friends.
After two years and not having any money, I chose to attend a vocational school in Omaha, Nebraska. There I went to a Methodist Youth Fellowship and met a pretty girl from Iowa, who was studying to be a nurse. Within a few months we were engaged. At the time the United States was being drawn into the Korean War. A phone call from my parents in January 1951 informed me that the draft board had called me to serve. I had no choice but to drop out of school, leave my fiancée and return home. I was sworn into the US Army on February 14, 1951 and sent to Camp Chaffee, Arkansas for basic training.
While in training I applied for and was accepted to attend the Officer Candidate School (OCS) in Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. After basic training but before reporting for OCS I was able to spend a few days with my fiancée. It was not until I graduated from OCS on April 23rd, 1952 and on my way to an assignment in California that I would see her again. The adage “absence makes the heart grow fonder” did not work for me. She was the same sweet girl but my feelings for her had changed. After arriving in California and knowing I would be going to Korea, I decided the to break the engagement.
While at Camp Chaffee, I met a fellow from Kansas named Charlie Gardner who was also accepted to the same OCS program. He had grown up on a farm like me and we became good friends. His class was a month behind mine, but we saw each other on occasion and when I graduated, we said goodbye not knowing if we would ever meet again. After a short stay in California, I was shipped out to Korea in December 1952. Charlie wrote on his OCS application that he had some experience in photography. Upon graduation, he was sent to New York for training to be a combat photographer. After his training, before being assigned, he was offered a free cruise from New York to Nassau, Bahamas to help film the trip for promotional purposes. In his short time that he was there, he met a Bahamian girl named Deidre, and they agreed to write to each other.
My assignment in Korea was with the Eighth Army Headquarters Battalion in the Communications Company stationed in Seoul. In January 1953, who should I see coming into the Battalion one day—none other than my good friend, Charlie. The Combat Photo Company was also part of this battalion. We really did not see that much of each other because his work took him to the battle front a lot, but I sure did hear about Deidre. After the Armistice, I was the first to come home. We said goodbye to one another not knowing if we would ever meet again.
I enrolled at Kansas State University in the spring of 1954 to earn a degree in electrical engineering when one day who did I meet again on campus? Sure enough, it was Charlie. He had decided to do the same thing and without knowing it, we had apartments less than a block away. He had gone to Nassau to meet Deidre’s family and she had come to Kansas to meet his family and they planned to be married in his home church.
At the last minute, Deidre’s maid of honor got very sick and Deidre prevailed on her childhood friend Phyllis Minns to come with her. They had grown up as friends on the small island of Exuma, Bahamas but both now lived in Nassau. Phyllis was blessed to have had godly parents and her father was strict in raising his five children. He was the only person considered an elder in their small assembly. Being under the sound of the gospel as far back as she could remember, she professed salvation when she was 12 and was baptized at 14. However, when she was 16, her father died suddenly, and her mother moved the family from Exuma to Nassau to be near other family members. Without her father’s influence and being strong willed, she was drawn into the party life of Nassau and away from walking with the Lord.
It was then that 23-year-old Phyllis met a 24-year-old boy from Kansas in September 1954—me! Phyllis had only planned to stay two weeks but after we met, she stayed five weeks. That was long enough however to fall in love. When she returned to Nassau, we wrote to each other almost daily and sometime in November I wrote and proposed marriage to her. She accepted, neither of us apparently giving much thought as to how we could manage. I had two more years of university and was living on the meager GI Bill. I took one semester off to go to Nassau and we were married there on March 25, 1955.
Thus, it was a believer who is not in fellowship with the Lord and a lost unbeliever joined in marriage. But God, in His great mercy, always had a plan for both of us. He drew Phyllis back to Himself and used her to show me my need to be saved. It was in 1958, after we were living in Orlando, Florida with two small sons that I surrendered my life to Christ. In 1961 we learned about a new assembly, Hiawassa Bible Chapel (HBF), and came into fellowship with them. It was there that we were blessed with good teaching, grew in our love for the Lord, and early on committed ourselves to serving and showing hospitality. I was a recognized elder at HBF from 1965 until 2015. In 1990 I took early retirement from my engineering career and Phyllis and I were commended as full-time workers at HBC until 2015. In 2000, we moved from Orlando to Clermont but continued fellowshipping at HBC until 2015 when we joined the saints at Clermont Bible Fellowship (CBF).
In 2001 Phyllis was diagnosed with breast cancer. After surgery and radiation, she was cancer free until 2016 when it returned in a blood related disorder. She was told that there was a chemo treatment that would retard it but that her life expectancy was only about two years. She lived a pretty normal life except for the week of chemo once a month. She died peacefully at home in hospice care on September 21, 2017, with close family members at her side.
Two days before she died, I was taken to the ER with chest pain and diagnosed with congestive heart failure. Later in November 2017, I had open heart quadruple bypass surgery to correct blockages and replace the aortic valve. After recovery and therapy, I moved back into my home in March, 2018. I am still active in the assemblies and speak when asked by both HBC and CBF. I miss Phyllis more each day but thank and praise God for the 63 wonderfully blessed years we had together. Before Phyllis’ passing, He blessed us with two sons, two daughters, five grandsons, three great granddaughters, and a great grandson since her passing.
As I look back, I see that God, in His goodness, went to great lengths to bring Phyllis and I together, restoring her and saving me. But beyond that He was ever faithful in guiding us in our marriage and in His service. Now I look forward to my home call when I will see my Savior face to face and be reunited with the one who made my life down here a foretaste of heaven.