2,000 And Counting: Soul-Winner Still Going Strong

Written by Polly House

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	Photo Gallery: Nell Kerley

STATESVILLE, N.C., 9/4/07 -- She is a 74-year-old widowed great-grandmother with diabetes, arthritis, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, no kneecaps, screws holding her ankles in place, and absolutely no shame when it comes to leading people to a saving relationship with Christ.

"So," Nell Kerley asks, "what’s your excuse?"

Kerley is a soul winner extraordinaire.

"I’ve been a Sunday school teacher forever," Kerley said, "but until just a few years ago, I had never shared with anyone what it takes to go to heaven. Can you believe that? I just never had. I bet there are a lot of people in our churches like that."

In 1998, at age 66, Kerley decided to make a change. Her church, Bethel Baptist in Statesville, N.C., offered FAITH Sunday School Evangelism Strategy training and she enrolled. "I needed to learn how to witness to people," she said. FAITH is a strategy of LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention.

"Learning to share Christ with people was the best thing I ever did," Kerley said. More than 2,200 salvations later - 2,250, as of Aug. 29, 2007 - she isn’t slowing down.

Near fatal accident

From her quick sense of humor and easy laughter about most things, no one would ever suspect the serious health issues Kerley endures.

Kerley and her late husband, Sam, were severely injured in an automobile accident in 1975. "Both of us nearly died," she said. "Our legs were crushed. Sam was thrown through the windshield and I had to pull him back in. I remember talking to God asking Him to take us together. We were both ready.

"But, just as plain as anything I heard God telling me, ‘No, Nell, I’ve got some things for you to do yet.’ So I told Him He’d have to do some miracles."

Both the Kerleys were in Iredell Memorial Hospital in Statesville for six months, undergoing multiple surgeries and therapy. Sam eventually had one leg amputated. Nell’s legs were wired and screwed together and her shattered kneecaps replaced with artificial ones. However, multiple staph infections necessitated their removal. Her husband eventually died of complications of kidney disease.

"It was hard, so hard. Many times I didn’t want to keep going," Kerley said. But she remembered what God said: "Nell, I’ve got some things for you to do yet."

First convert

FAITH opened a new ministry opportunity for her. "On our first FAITH visit, our team went to a home to visit a man and his wife. The couple didn’t want to pray to receive Christ, but I knew Danielle, the 15-year-old daughter, had been listening. I told my group that I wanted to talk to her. So I just asked her, ‘Danielle, you’ve heard all we said tonight. Wouldn’t you like to give your life to the Lord?’ and she nodded and said, ‘Yes, I would.’ So we prayed and she received Christ."

Kerley said that first salvation was like a drug to her. "I just couldn’t wait to do it again."

Hospital missions

Kerley has ongoing health issues related to the accident. She’s been in the hospital time and time again for surgeries on her feet and legs and several times for other broken bones she sustained from falls. "After all," she quipped, "you can’t walk good when you don’t have any kneecaps."

Through the years, Kerley developed a warm relationship with hospital chaplain Tom Sherrod. As she was able, she would accompany him on his rounds, talking to people about the Lord.

"She has such a gift for evangelism," Sherrod said. "She loves to talk to people, and they love to talk to her. She can take the simplest conversation and bring it around to talk about a person’s salvation."

As a licensed practical nurse and former employee at the hospital herself, Kerley had a special relationship with the nurses. She recalled one particular incident with great humor.

"One night, I was in the hospital, hooked up to all kinds of IV bags, and I had to go to the bathroom. I called for a CNA (certified nursing assistant) to come help me since I couldn’t manage by myself.

"She came in and we got me to the bathroom. I … thought, ‘You know, she can’t go anywhere. She’s a captive audience.’ So right there, in the bathroom, I asked her, ‘Honey, do you have a church? Would you like for me to tell you about the Lord?’

"And, you know what? She gave her heart to Jesus right then and there." Kerley laughed at the memory. "I guess if you’ve got the nerve to witness to someone in the bathroom, you can witness anywhere."

Kathy and Ivory

Kathy Borders is a nurse at Iredell Memorial. Six years ago during one of Kerley’s hospital stays, Kerley attempted to talk with Borders.

"But I told her I was too busy to talk right then," Borders said. "I really wasn’t. I just didn’t want to talk to her. I was scared. She asked me if I’d come back later, though, and I told her I would.

"When Nell told me about Christ - how He loved me so much that He died for me - and that all I had to do was accept that love and His sacrifice, I felt this completely unnatural and wonderful peace just flood over me," said Borders. "I had never experienced anything like that before. Never."

Later, Kerley had the privilege of leading Border’s husband, Ivory, to the Lord as well.

"Nell told me I needed to get in church, so I did," Borders said. "I joined Higher Ground Baptist Church and now I do all sorts of things from singing to working with the children to working with the women. Ivory and I love our church and our pastor. Life wouldn’t be like this if it weren’t for Nell."

Borders even changed jobs at the hospital so she could be active at Higher Ground. "I always worked on the floor," she said. "I love working directly with the patients. But, I changed to working in the operating room so I can have my weekends off and go to church. Nell will never know what she did for me. She changed my life."

"Oh, honey," Kerley said, giving Borders a hug, "it was the Lord who took hold of you and changed your life, not me."

Baptist Center

When her witnessing at the hospital was curtailed, Kerley looked for another place of service. She found it at the South Yadkin Baptist Association Baptist Center, where each Tuesday for the past seven years Kerley has shared the plan of salvation with people who come to the center’s clothes closet and food pantry.

"They have to come see me before they can get their things and leave," Kerley said. "I have led so many of the people to the Lord there. It’s wonderful. So many of them have just never had it explained to them how to become a Christian."

Of course, not everyone says yes.

"I had two girls come in and they just laughed the whole time I was telling them about Jesus," she said. "They told me they’d just as soon go to hell [than] give up their men.

"I told them that was their choice, but I could guarantee them they wouldn’t be laughing when they got there," she said.

Sandra Harrison, whose husband, Ron, serves as director of missions for the South Yadkin Baptist Association, has a special bond with Kerley.

"I love Nell," said Sandra Harrison, who serves as ministry director for the association. "I asked her once how she manages to get these strangers to open up and talk about their personal lives to her. Don’t they get mad? She just laughed and said she didn’t care if they did. They needed to hear the truth."

Kerley said many of the people who come to the Baptist Center aren’t married, but are living with someone. Usually there are children in the home.

"That’s not right and I tell them it’s not right," Kerley said. "But I don’t just condemn them. I tell them what’s going to make their lives better. Most of the time when I tell them how to become Christians, they are open to it and will pray with me. I tell those women to get married or get rid of the live-in. I tell the men to marry those women and take care of those children. Most of the men have never heard that they are responsible for the spiritual leadership of their homes. I like talking to the men. I think it’s easier to lead a man to the Lord than a woman. It’s easier to talk straight to men."

Kerley is also adamant about telling everyone she leads to Christ about the importance of church membership. At the Baptist Center, she has a form she fills out on every person she talks with. She gets contact information and spiritual information, and then gives the form to Ron Harrison who arranges for a church to follow up with the new convert.

"People need to be in church," Kerley said. "These new Christians can’t make it on their own. It’s too easy to slip back into their old ways, but if they’ve got a good church to support them as they grow, they’ll be fine."

Bill Fay

Bill Fay, author of Share Jesus Without Fear, published by LifeWay, and Kerley have become "share partners" through the years.

"Bill read about me in something and called me," Kerley said. "I’d read Share Jesus Without Fear so I knew who he was. I was tickled to get to know him. He’s a fine man."

She said, "I tease him that he will give out my phone number to anyone he hasn’t won to the Lord yet and have me take a run at it. Do you know, because of Bill Fay, I have talked to his barber, to a man in prison who murdered two people and a Playboy bunny? Yes! And I led them all to the Lord. Oh, and the bunny is in another line of work now."

Kerley’s smiles and laughter are contagious. The joy of the Lord bubbles out when she sees people receive Christ.

"I look at these people I talk to and see people that Jesus loves and died for," Kerley said. "They just don’t know it. And I get to tell them. I get to tell them how they can go to heaven. There is no greater privilege in the world than that. If God can use an old woman like me, He can use anybody. For however long I have, I’m going to keep talking."

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About Polly House

Polly House is LifeWay's corporate communications specialist and editor of Facts & Trends. She came to LifeWay in 1999. Polly and her husband, Sam, live in Nashville, and are the parents of  Tyler and Travis, both college students. They are members of Crievewood Baptist Church. Polly can be contacted at polly.house@lifeway.com.

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