File:Sharon Rose.jpg

Photo courtesy of Jordan Peterson and Pearry Green.

And away they took me out to the hospital to see my little Sharon, my little girl. I couldn't call her... I wanted to call her a Bible name. I called my little boy Billy Paul after me and after Saint Paul. And then I wanted to call the baby a Bible name. And I couldn't call her the Rose of Sharon, so I just called her Sharon Rose.
And I went out the hospital, and the doctor met me. He said, "Billy, she's dying. Don't go in there." And I stood there till after the nurse turned her back, and I run down there; and I went down to where she was at. I looked at her. And there the little thing, laying there... I never will forget. She's just eight months old. And I remember, I used to come home, I... She'd set out in the yard, and I'd blow my horn like that, coming around the corner, and she'd go, "Goo, goo, goo," just reach... I just loved those little fellows.
And she was suffering so hard, till one of them little fat legs was moving up and down in a spasm. And looked like her little hand was a waving. And I looked at her, and I said, Sherry, honey, you know daddy?" And I was trying to make myself strong. And I said, "You know daddy, honey?" And her little lips got to quivering. And when she looked at me, she was suffering so hard till her little eye went crossed. Oh, my. When I seen that tender little blue baby eye cross...
I didn't know it then, but I understand now. There's never been a cross-eyed child come in line, but what I think of that. There's never been one pass over the platform but what's been healed too. I didn't know the crushing had to bring it forth. But I never think of it till I see that.
That little eye crossing, and she was suffering so hard. And I knelt down. I said, "O Jesus, please, God. I'm sorry for what I do." I said, "Don't take her from me. I love her, Lord, with all my heart. Please God."
Looked like a big black curtain come falling down. I knew she was gone. I raised up, put my hand over on her head. I said, "God bless you, my darling little sweet angel. I'm going to put you in the arms of mother. And the Angel is coming to pack you home in a few minutes. But someday, daddy will see you."
I raised up my head, and I said, "God, You gave and You taken away. I don't know why You're slaying me." I said, "Yet You may slay me, I'm going to trust You as Job did. I'm going to believe You." And I said, "I... Somehow You're breaking my heart. I don't know how I'm going to hold up any longer." But I said, "God, I commit her little soul to You. Take it, Lord Jesus. Put it on the altar with the mother. And someday, let me come to see them." And as I did that, the Angels of God sweetly come down and taken away her little breath, and bore her away to be with her mother. I placed her in-- the mother, put them down beneath the ground.

Sermon: Life Story, Litte Rock, Arkansas, February 1950