IN 1905, Father was unemployed, so he went to the United States. He returned three years later with a suitcase filled with exciting presents for the children and silk fabrics and other items for Mother. But his most precious possessions were volumes by Charles Taze Russell entitled Studies in the Scriptures.

Father started to tell friends and relatives things he learned from these books. At local chapel meetings, he used the Bible to show that there is no burning hell. (Ecclesiastes 9:5, 10) In 1909, the year after Father returned from the United States, Brother Russell visited Norway and gave talks in Bergen and Kristiania, now Oslo. Father went to Bergen to listen to him.

“Come here, Ottilie,” he encouraged me, “and see what the Bible says.” Then he read to me from the Scriptures. As a result, my confidence in him and what he taught grew. He encouraged me to read the Studies in the Scriptures, so during the summer of 1914, I often sat reading on a knoll overlooking the town.

In August 1914 people crowded outside the local newspaper building reading about the outbreak of World War I. Father came up and saw what was happening. “Thank God!” he exclaimed. He recognized in the outbreak of war the fulfillment of Bible prophecies about which he had been preaching. (Matthew 24:7) Many Bible Students then believed that they would soon be taken to heaven. When this did not occur, some became disappointed.

My Stand for Bible Truth

In 1915, at the age of 17, I finished middle school and began working secularly in an office. I then began reading The Watch Tower regularly. But it was not until 1918 that regular meetings were held in Kopervik. To begin with, there were five of us who attended. We read Watch Tower Society publications, such as Studies in the Scriptures, and discussed the material by means of questions and answers. Although Mother spoke highly of the Bible Students to others, she never became one of us.