Hellfire and Brimstone Preacher

I mentioned in the previous post that Scott almost burned someone’s house down, here’s the story…

The weekend he went to preach in “view of a call,” (That’s when southern baptist preachers go preach, and the church votes wether or not to call him as pastor)  at Steven’s Street Baptist, and  we were trying to make a great impression, he lets them know right off…he is a hellfire and brimstone preacher! 🙂

The church selected a beautiful historic home in town that had recently been renovated for us to stay in for the weekend.  We met the owner of the home and the church had all kinds of goodies for us at the house.  Someone had brought us bacon to have for breakfast on Saturday morning, along with some homemade cinnamon rolls. My mouth was watering thinking about Saturday’s breakfast!

Scott is usually the breakfast chef in the house.  Saturday morning, He went to the kitchen to start the bacon and the cinnamon rolls.  The owner of the home had suggested we make the bacon in the oven.  That it cooks evenly and comes out just perfect.  We normally just fry ours in a skillet, but Scott decided he would give the oven a shot, plus we thought the oven may be less messy compared to frying.

Well, the kiddos and I are just hanging out in the house waiting to sink our teeth into some bacon and cinnamon rolls.  When Scott says, man the oven sure is smoking.  He opens it up, and tries to remove the food to see what is going on, but when he did he spilt some grease and a flames started in the oven.

Scott immediately hollers for me to call 911.  I scramble to find my phone and I turn back around to look at the kitchen and the whole room is starting to fill with smoke.  The 911 Operator answers and she must have thought I was crazy.  I realized I did not know the address of the place we were staying.  But I would not leave the house  to walk outside to get a landmark for her until I got all of my kids out of the house.  So I am running around screaming at my kids to get out of the house and the only place I could think to put them was in the car, because they could be semi-pinned up and I could quickly jump in the car and leave if we needed too.

So after scrambling to get them all corralled and into the car, I realize I can run over to see some street signs to figure out the cross streets for our location.  As soon as I give her street names I hung up the phone.  I ran back to the entry of the house to check on Scott and he is doing his best to fan the smoke that is now engulfing him in a pretty thick fog.  I holler for him to get out and I remembered that I had saved the home owners number to my cell.  I called to let her know that I believe we started a fire and the firemen were on the way.  She was very calm and said she would be right over.

About that time, Scott exits the house and said he could hardly breathe anymore, so he could not stay in there.  We were both just sick to our stomachs.  The home owner had just got done telling us yesterday that this was her dream house.  In addition, we were a little embarrassed because this was our first big weekend in Cookeville.

We start to hear the sirens.  Man, their response time was quick!  I think there were a least three trucks that arrived on the scene.  At this point, neighbors are all coming outside to see what is going on.  (We were Mortified!)

However, the kids thought the whole thing was awesome, of course!

Soon, Sheila, the home owner arrives. I can’t help but start to cry the moment she walks up.  We felt like we had ruined her dream home.  She immediately grabs our hands and starts praying.  Instead of praying for her house, she prays for Scott and I that we would have a great weekend in Cookeville and all would go well with Stevens Street. She stated in her prayer that her house was not as important compared to the safety of our family. When she said Amen, I felt a sweet peace rush over me.

Soon, a lady pulled up to the house.  It was the 911 operator.  She was very kind, but firm with me.  She told me I should never ever hang up on an operator.  That I should remain on the line with them until help arrives.  She drove over to make sure we were alright.  Which I thought was very thoughtful, and I learned a valuable lesson. I will never hang up on an operator again, but I hope I never have to call one again!

The firemen eventually came out letting us know that the fire had been contained in the oven, but that there was a good bit of smoke throughout the house and some ash in the kitchen.  They said they believed there was minimal damage and the house would probably just need a new stove.

They plugged in these monstrous fans and started sucking all the smoke out of the house.

Eventually, they brought the pans out from the oven.  Check out those cinnamon rolls!  And it only took me a second to see why we had a grease fire?  Can you figure it out? 🙂  You can answer in the comment section.

We could not enter the house for about an hour while the smoke was being released.  And, soon we had to leave to go to some of the events that the church had panned for us.  But, I am happy to report that we found out that afternoon that we did not ruin Sheila’s dream house, even the oven survived!  The kitchen needed a good deep cleaning and the smoke smell soon left the house.

Now we had a deeper bond with Sheila and her family, and the church had some great “material” to tease Scott with!

So, the church voted Scott and fiery preaching in! 🙂

I mentioned our friendship with Sheila getting stronger… Her family is one of the builders that came over and gave us lots of great input into our house.  In addition, she is helping Lyla and Levi with a reading program for homeschool.  She was one of the many blessings that came from that “blazing” weekend!

When we moved to Cookeville, our church had a pounding for us.  If you don’t know what a pounding is… It’s when a church “pounds” you with hospitality and love.  They stock your pantry and fridge with food and household supplies.   We were definitely pounded and blessed by our new church family.  We received so many wonderful items, food, and gift cards.  But we also received two other things… Multiple fire extinguishers, and 40lbs of Bacon!!!!

Needless to say, Scott will never cook bacon in the oven again!  Here are some pics from our pounding.