Eighty Years of Memories

In Eighty Years of Memories, Bob Rooks shares some of his most interesting memories from the time he was three years old until his eighty-fourth year. He was the youngest of six children born to a godly but extremely poor farm couple living in the hill country of northwestern Georgia. His mother died when he was five, but her influence in those early years of his life had a lasting effect in his spiritual development. He learned from his daddy after he became a pastor that when he was born his mother had prayed that he would become a preacher. He preached his first sermon at the age of twenty-two, and sixty-two years later he still preaches occasionally and teaches a large Bible class.

Though many of the stories in this book are related to Bob's preaching ministry, a number of events described go beyond what could be called typical "preacher experiences," and should be interesting to those readers not particularly interested in "preacher stories." As a self-trained pianist, he was also involved quite extensively in ministries that were open to him because of this gift from God. He shares some of these experiences. His first pastorate was in Mississippi, but following graduation from seminary he answered a call to come to California and has remained here for fifty-four years.