Things Money Cannot Buy by Carol Zenallis It is my firm conviction that the greatest miracle in the world is the transformation of a life. At one time, George Zenallis owned and operated the biggest and most expensive night clubs in Akron, Ohio. He was nationally known for the big name stars who performed on his stages. He is one of the most likable and affable men that I know, and one can easily understand why George Shearing stayed after hours in the club just to entertain George and the rest of the boys. Carol Zenallis, his pretty wife, tells how, through her illness, she and George found God. It started back many years before when national Prohibition was first repealed. George was one of the first to obtain a liquor license. He opened a restaurant and bar called “The Brass Rail” on Whiskey Alley in Canton. Four years later, he sold it at a profit and with two other men bought out “Bender’s Tavern” in Massillon. It became known from coast to coast as a famous restaurant. Later, he bought “The Giant Cafe” and then the “Old Mill” and the “Yankee Inn” in Akron. Across the years, he had rounded up and put under contract the best entertainers in show business. There was Ted Mack and his band for a fall opening in Canton. Traveling with him were the Andrew Sisters. All the top names were waiting for an opportunity to play his clubs: Count Basie, Artie Shaw, Tony Bennett, Mel Torme, George Shearing. He was “big time” in the field of night club entertainment. Then there was Johnny Ray. He came in one evening looking for a job. George bought him a topcoat, paid his room rent at a hotel, and hired him at seventy-five dollars a week to play the piano. Later, when Johnny was making ten thousand dollars a week and more, he would still come back to Akron and play George’s clubs. It reminded him of the old days. George bragged that his clubs were the top two liquor buyers in the city. In the eyes of the public, he was a success, but I wanted him out of the liquor business more than anything in the world. It was wrecking our home life. It is difficult to be in the liquor business and not drink — George was drinking at least a fifth a day. He drank with everybody. “If you don’t drink with the customers, they get mad,” he said. “And you cannot afford to make enemies in the cocktail business.” The fact that he was losing me did not seem to matter. One night a violent storm was raging as I turned into our driveway. The power lines had been torn down by the hard winds and the torrential rain was so heavy, I almost missed the house. Yes, house was the right word because it takes two to make a home and all I had was the children. Immediately, the children were taken up to their bedrooms and tucked in and I hoped they would not sense my fear. I was always in a constant grip of fear when left alone, and the electrical storm terrified me even more. Going back down the stairs, I could hear the house groaning and creaking as it struggled to stand against the surging wind. One could actually hear the nails screeching out of the boards and shingles. Petrified, I dialed the phone and asked for George. I was afraid of dying. “Please, honey,” I begged him, my voice shaking with fear, “please come home and be with us.” There was silence on the other end except for the background music and the laughter of those near him at the bar. Finally I heard him say, “There is nothing to be afraid of. Who is afraid of a little wind? If danger comes, you and the kids get down in the basement and get under that heavy steel table.” “Please...,” I pleaded and a sudden flash of lightning broke the phone connection. The house shuddered as I crept into my room to spend the night alone. Standing in the middle of the bedroom, shivering with fright as the lightning made weird reflections on the draperies, I felt like the loneliest person in the whole world. There was no one to turn to—no one. In my desperation I dropped to my knees, “Oh, Theoma,” I prayed (calling Him by the Greek word I had used as a child—the word for “my God”), “I don’t know if You are listening to me. I hope You are. Please protect us.” Suddenly I remembered my childhood and the many happy times spent at a little Christian mission in Cleveland. I could remember the preacher saying, “When you are saved, you know you are saved.” What does “saved” mean, I asked myself. My prayer continued. “Theoma, teach me ”what it means to be saved. Please lead us to a place where we can be taught this together. Please help us—help me.” Getting up from my knees, I remembered my Bible. I reached into the night stand for it and with shaking fingers opened the flyleaf and saw the date: 1932. It was the year I had attended the Christian mission in Cleveland. Suddenly, I realized it was the first time since we had been married, almost eleven years, that the Bible had been opened. “Please, my God,” I cried out, “forgive me.” A strange calmness and peace came over me, and while the storm raged outside the house, I crawled into bed and prayed once again, asking God to show me where to read. The Bible fell open to the Book of Revelation and chapter after chapter moved beneath my fingers as I turned the pages in fascination. I do not know how long I read, but I finally laid the Bible beside me and got up and stood at the window. Outside, during the vivid flashes of lightning, I could see the tall poplars bending from the frightening force of the wind. But the fear of title storm had left me. There was a new kind of fear—a fear of what was to come. “Please, my God,” I whispered through the rain streaked window, “bring George home. Please, my God, bring him home to stay.” As the days went by, an amazing hunger for the Bible developed in me. In the mornings, after George had gone to work and the children had left for school, I would sit at the kitchen table and read. The stories seemed so fascinating and God’s teachings were so marvelous. When I ran across a particularly meaningful passage, I would mark it in red and ask the Lord to let me experience it. One day I was visiting with my mother, a devout Greek Orthodox. “Carol,” she said, “there is a woman on the radio who really knows the Bible. You should listen to her. She teaches the truth. “What is her name?” I asked. “Kathryn Kuhlman.” I did not know it at the time, but this was the next step in God’s answer to my prayer. The following morning, I was ironing in the kitchen when I remembered Mother’s suggestion. I turned on the radio and picked up the voice of Kathryn Kuhlman—a voice which was to become my constant friend and spiritual advisor. Morning after morning, I read my Bible and listened to her. Always, Miss Kuhlman would begin her broadcast by saying, “No matter what happens to you, no matter what your problems are, as long as God is still on His Throne and hears and answers prayer, and just so long as your faith in Him is still intact, everything will come out all right” So I turned to Him — Theoma — my God. I read about Him. I talked to Him. I let Him talk to me through His Word. He was changing my life. But there was one thing about my life that remained unchanged — my health. As a young woman, I had been seriously injured in an accident which had left me with a bad curvature of the spine. As the years passed, it grew worse and with the birth of my children I gradually became deformed. My left hip was two inches higher than my right one and my shoulder blades protruded. My back and shoulders were stiff and I could not move my head without swinging my shoulders also. Sometimes the pain was so excruciating, I could hardly stand it. Then came the final blow. The joints in my body began to swell — knuckles, wrists, knees, ankles — all movement was becoming painful. After a period of time, the pain grew so severe I could not close either hand. We finally made an appointment at the Akron Clinic where I had a complete examination. The doctor called us both in and gave us the results of his examination. “Rheumatoid arthritis,” he said shaking his head. Then turning to George he said, “She will never get well. My own wife is a patient here at the Clinic with the same condition — confined to a wheelchair.” “What are you trying to say?” George stammered. “Isn’t there something you can do?” “I am saying that barring a miracle, your wife will be just like mine in a relatively short time.” We stood there stunned. In my heart, I was resigned to live or die in God’s hands. But George was still grasping, searching for some cure. “Please, doctor,” he said, “money is of no consequence. Can’t you do anything for my wife?” The doctor’s sharp eyes cut into George’s world of financial make-believe. “Let me level with you,” he said. “All the money in the world cannot buy your wife’s health. It is gone. All we can do is try to relieve the pain.” I was shocked, but in that moment I felt a deep sense of pity for George. He had never faced a problem like this. Always before, he would have been able to buy his way out of trouble. But this time, it was different. I read the emotions that flashed across his handsome Greek features: anger, fear, and finally despair. My heart cried for him more than it did for me. In the midst of all his big-time friends, famous entertainers, flashy showgirls, and big money — George actually had nothing. Nothing. This confrontation with reality had shaken him to the core. I thought the doctor’s diagnosis would soften him, but instead it seemed to harden him toward God. He became more and more involved in his business. As for me, at least I had God! I could hardly wait to get home so I could take my Bible and get alone to pray. Reading the Bible lifted me up and thrilled me. How fortunate these people were to be healed by Jesus. Early one morning, George joined my mother and me as we sat in the kitchen listening to the Kathryn Kuhlman broadcast. She was describing a woman from Massillon who actually had been healed of cancer. If God can heal her, He can heal me, too, I thought. I looked across the table at George and then glanced at Mom. “I am not going to have that operation on my spine,” I said, referring to the doctor’s suggestion that surgery might help my condition. “God will heal me.” George just gave me a blank stare! I had definitely changed, but the change was not in my body, which grew progressively worse. The change was in my attitude. I had more patience, compassion, understanding. And even though the hell of George’s life sometimes crushed in on me until I thought my heart would break, I still loved him, and I fasted and prayed for him constantly. I will never forget the first sign of change I saw in George. He called one day from the club. “Your preacher lady is going to be in town next week,” he said. “I thought you would like to try to go to one of her meetings.” “Kathryn Kuhlman? In Akron? George, are you sure?” “Yes,” he said. “I read about it in tonight’s paper. Of course I cannot go, but I thought you would like to take the children. Maybe your mother will go with you.” It was too wonderful to comprehend. Not only that I would be able to hear Miss Kuhlman speak in person, but that George had actually called and told me about it. It was a big step for George. “Thank You, Theoma. Oh, thank You, my God,” I prayed. Something happened to me during Miss Kuhlman’s meetings in Akron. I sensed a completeness, a satisfaction in my spiritual life I had never felt before. Listening to the music, seeing the miracles, hearing God’s Word preached — I just loved it. This was what I had been seeking! During those weeks following the Akron meetings, George watched me closely. I knew he could see the change in me. We were both members of the Greek Orthodox Church. The children and I attended many Sundays, but George would only attend on the High Holy Days. Still, I was praying constantly that George would offer to take me to the Kathryn Kuhlman services in Youngstown. Then one day George came into the kitchen where I was fixing breakfast and said, “I bet you would like me to take you over to Youngstown to hear your preacher lady.” I could not answer. It was too marvelous. All I could do was take his hand and blink back the tears. “Well, you are not much of a nightclub goer,” he went on, “so we will take the kids and drive over Sunday.” That was the first of many Sundays we would spend driving the sixty miles from Akron to Youngstown to attend the worship services in Stambaugh Auditorium. George could see it made me happy. And even though I knew he was taking me only to ease his own conscience, I hoped enough of it would rub off on him that he would change. Something was happening inside George. It was very gradual, but he was becoming more and more dissatisfied with his kind of life — and more and more amazed at how God’s power was manifested in Miss Kuhlman’s services. Six months passed and the night clubs continued to operate, the entertainers came and went, and George still thought money was the most important thing in life. The last Saturday night in January, 1953, Artie Shaw closed at the club and George came home feeling especially weary. “The roads are a thick mass of ice. It will be impossible to go to Youngstown tomorrow morning,” he said. That night I prayed, knowing that God could melt the ice if He wanted us to go. And He did — for a very special reason. The auditorium was packed and we had to take separate seats. George was sitting two rows in front of me with Bill, our second son, on his lap. I had Gus (our oldest) and Pattie (who was only a year and a half) with me. When the invitation was given, an unusually large number responded to the altar call. I could not understand why so many were going forward since I believed the altar call was only for atheists and those who had committed great sins. Then Miss Kuhlman returned to the microphone and said, “This altar call is for those who have never been born again—for those who have never confessed with their mouth Jesus Christ and received Him as their personal Saviour. You may belong to a church. But if you have never accepted Him as your personal Saviour, then this call is for you.” I sat upright in my seat. Had I heard correctly? “Oh Theoma, I did not know I had to receive Jesus as my Saviour. I am going to do it right now,” I said. So I took Gus and Pattie and we started down the aisle. When we came to where George was sitting, I gently touched him and said, “Honey, let’s go and receive Christ.” “Not this time,” he said, shaking his head and looking straight ahead. “You go on if you want.” They ushered us to the platform and we knelt far back in one comer. Gus and little Pattie looked at me strangely and I whispered, “Miss Kuhlman is praying for people on the other side of the platform. Now is the time to ask God to forgive our sins.” I bowed my head and began to pray, sincerely listing all the sins I could think of and asking God to forgive me. “Oh, my God,” I prayed, “if I have forgotten anything, please remind me. I want it all forgiven.” Suddenly, I heard a man’s voice praying. I had never heard such a sincere, beautiful voice. And his words! He was asking God to forgive all the things I had forgotten. I was afraid to look up, but finally forced myself to open my eyes. His suit was a shining silver gray and his face — it looked like the face of Christos. He seemed very tall. Suddenly, all the Scriptures I had underlined in my Bible came flashing through my mind. There was the sound of wind. It was getting louder and louder. Turning to Gus I whispered, “Do you hear the wind?” “No, Mom,” he said, staring at me. “Listen carefully. I can hear it. Look with me to see if any windows are open.” Little Gus moved close to me. “No, Mom, there is no wind and no window open.” Then the power of God fell over me. I began to sway. I tried to hold still but had absolutely no control of my body. Then I heard Miss Kuhlman saying, “That is real!” And she came quickly toward me, saying, “This is God.” She came close to me and put her hands gently on my head and began to pray. It was peace — glorious peace. All the voices faded away and I heard only the sound of the wind and saw the name of Jesus before my face, appearing as a ladder all the way to heaven — Jesus — Jesus — Jesus — Jesus. After the service, I met George at his seat. I could see that he was confused and afraid. He did not want to talk about it; reality had always scared George. “Yes,” he said, “I could see you had some kind of experience. That’s okay, but it’s not for me. Carol, I am not going to be a hypocrite. I have been born once and just don’t see the need to be born again. It’s just as simple as that.” I had been right about one thing. It was impossible for George to attend the meetings and hear the Gospel and remain the same. He was examining his life in a way he had never examined it before, and was slowly realizing that he lived in a world of make-believe. During the next two years, he often mentioned the hell he had created for himself and for us. “What’s the use of making money and losing your family and soul?” he mumbled one night. But I kept sending prayer requests into Miss Kuhlman’s office and waiting for the time when the Holy Spirit would break through into his life. Then one afternoon in 1955, he came home early. “I’m sick of it,” he said, groping for the right words. “What do you mean?” I asked. “I mean I’m sick of myself and sick of the life I have gotten myself into. And Carol,” he said, putting both hands on my shoulders, “if you will have me, I am going to be the best husband and father in the world.” His eyes were sincere, moist with tears, as he continued. “I’m going to sell the clubs. It is just not worth it to lose all that is precious just to make another buck. I am through with liquor and all that goes with it. I am going to be a different man.” And George became a different man. He still had a long way to go before he made his total surrender to Christ, but he was on the way! An old friend learned George had sold his clubs and offered him a job as a restaurant manager. It was a big cut in pay and we had to radically change our standard of living, but George said it was worth it to go to bed at night feeling clean inside. Things were not easy. His old acquaintances were always coming in the restaurant and offering him drinks. “Come on, George,” they would tempt him, “have a drink with your buddies.” But George never gave an inch. Eventually his old buddies realized he was sincere and stopped tempting him. The children and I kept praying for George to make his final commitment. Even though he had made such a radical change, I knew his life was still empty. He had cleaned up his life, but that was not enough. He had to let Jesus Christ come into his life and take full control. My arthritis was getting worse and I kept remembering the doctor’s wife in the wheelchair and knew I could soon be like her. The calcium deposits in the joints were extremely painful and the only relief seemed to come from hot compresses and heating pads. It was in August, 1957, a blessed day for us, far more blessed than we realized at the time. We were on our way to the service in Youngstown when George asked, “How does it happen?” “What do you mean?” “How do people get healed?” he said. “I don’t know, I guess it is just the grace and mercy of God.” Little did I know that the answer was less than an hour away. We arrived at 10:45 A.M., but the auditorium was already packed. The only place we could find to stand was far back under the balcony. Miss Kuhlman was praying for the sick and we heard her say, “Someone is receiving a healing for the spine.” She kept repeating it. Then she walked off the platform and pointed to the center section of the auditorium and said, “The Spirit bears witness—the healing is across the shoulders. I turned to George and whispered, “Oh, I wish I could have that healing.” He turned and said, “Then why don’t you ask the Lord for it?” I could not believe it. George was giving me spiritual advice. “Of course!” I gasped. “What is the matter with me?” Lifting my hand upward, I quietly said, “Lord, I will take that healing.” With my eyes shut, I saw the Spirit of God as a pure white rod moving slowly, high across the audience from the stage toward the balcony. We were standing under the balcony and I saw it disappear over the top of the overhang. I continued to stand with my hand outstretched, ready to receive anything God gave me. And then, when it was directly over me, I suddenly felt a great overwhelming joy bursting in my heart. I wanted to shout; I wanted to sing. I was instantly aware that I had been healed of the curvature of the spine and the dreadful rheumatoid arthritis. “Praise the Lord!” I kept repeating over and over. George pulled me close to him. “Something wonderful has happened to you, Carol.” On the way home I found I was able to close my fingers into a fist, something I had not been able to do in years. The pain was gone from my back and shoulders. There was no denying the power of God. Two weeks later, we were able to return to Youngstown. When Miss Kuhlman gave the invitation for those who would accept Christ, I looked at George. His face was twisted in agony and torture as the contending forces in his life battled for the victory. I bowed my head in prayer, “Oh, Theoma, give him the victory.” When I lifted my head, he was not in his seat. Then I saw him. He was on the platform, kneeling in humble repentance receiving the Lord Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour. There were no vain promises, there was no bargaining with God, there was nothing hypocritical; he was simply surrendering everything he had to Jesus Christ. George had come home.” A Clown Laughs Again: Chapter 14 |