When the Lord first spoke to Dr. Rosemary Cosby more than 30 years ago, she listened with unwavering faith.
Even though he told her to go to Salt Lake City.It was 1960 and no one else in her Pentecostal church in Indianapolis, Ind., thought there was any point in a missionary going to Salt Lake City. Getting a foothold in Salt Lake City, with its predominately Mormon faith and few black residents, would be impossible, they said.
Someone might be talking to her, they said, but it probably wasn't the Lord. Even Cosby was puzzled.
"I knew about the Great Salt Lake, I'd studied that in school. But I didn't know about the city. At the time I thought it was somewhere close to Indianapolis," Cosby said in a telephone interview with the Deseret News.
She figured she could visit the city on a weekend, do missionary work and be back home in time for work on Monday. First clue that it might be slightly farther away came when she called a local bus station to check on the price of ticket to Salt Lake City. It was $44.
"That scared me," Cosby said. "I was just making $26 a week at that time. I didn't have the heart to ask where Salt Lake City was."
So she asked another church member about Salt Lake City. He told her it was in Utah, where it gets cold and snows.
"I couldn't understand the Lord sending me that far," Cosby said.
But she did as told and ended up founding the Faith Temple Pentecostal Church in Salt Lake City. Tonight the Black History Dinner Theatre will present the story of Cosby's life in "The Woman Called Mama" at Salt Lake Community College's Grand Theater, 1575 S. State St.
She is currently recovering from surgery and is not expected to attend tonight's performance. Her story, though, is compelling.
It is a story of persistence and faith winning out over hardship. When Cosby first struck out for Salt Lake City she had nothing but $36 and a lot of conviction.
That was enough money for a bus ride to Denver, where a former member of the Indiana church lived. He invited Cosby to preach at a local church after she explained she was headed for Utah to do missionary work.
Cosby might have been fervent about missionary work, but the thought of preaching paralyzed her. At the church she got up to sing but it "scared me so bad I couldn't say a thing."
Another woman in the congregation came and prayed by Cosby and she was able to finish her remarks.
"From that night to this day, that terrible fear has been gone," Cosby said.
With the prayers and a few dollars from her Denver friends, Cosby pressed on to Utah. She spent three weeks in the state, washing dishes at Hillside Manor in the afternoons and preaching around the city in the mornings.
But she was disappointed there was no Pentecostal church to associate with, and when she got her first paycheck, Cosby returned to Indianapolis.
It was a temporary return. The Lord kept after her about Salt Lake City, she said.
So in January 1961, with just $26 to her name, Cosby set out again, this time with her four children. They would walk to Salt Lake City if they had to, she said.
No one offered help. "My pastor didn't think I was supposed to go," she said.
Those early days in Utah were hard, Cosby says now. "But I can't say it was real hard."
Except when she almost lost her daughter Rosalind. The child had come down with rheumatic fever, though Cosby didn't know that at the time. She prayed, as her church taught, that the Lord would heal the sickness. But the girl grew worse.
Neighbors reported the family to the welfare office and the child was hospitalized. As she recovered, the state began proceedings to remove Rosalind from the Cosby home. The family was left intact only after Rosalind's doctor joined Cosby in pleading their case before a judge.
Cosby learned, she says, that doctors save bodies while the Lord saves souls.
She began her missionary work by holding Bible classes for children in her basement apartment and later held church services in a home she rented at 425 Cottage Court. The church followed Cosby as she moved from one home to another.
The church found a home of its own after the Lord began prompting Cosby about Indiana. She thought at first he was telling her to go home. And then one day while driving through the city she noticed a home with an adjoining lot for sale.
The address? 1035 W. Indiana Ave. "Right on the banks of the Jordan River," Cosby said. The home, renovated after it was damaged by an arson fire in 1974, now houses the TLC Teaching and Learning Center run by the church.
The Faith Temple Pentecostal Church moved in the 1970s to 1510 Richards St., where it is still located. Growing membership, though, may force the church to move again, Cosby said.
The Pentecostal movement, which the Faith Temple Church is affiliated with, embraces charismatism. Members seek the gifts of the Holy Spirit, such as healing, prophecy, wisdom and speaking in tongues. Personal salvation comes through leading a Christian life; each member is a missionary, called on to spread the Gospel.
Each church is independent. It is estimated that the Pentecostal movement has more than 3 million members in the United States.
Over the years, the Faith Temple Church has kindled business ventures to help support its work as well as provide members with employment. There is a barbershop, a record shop, the Southern Plantation carry-out restaurant, the daycare center and a radio station.
The Faith Temple Pentecostal Choir, directed by Rosalind Cazares, Cosby's daughter, is renowned. It performed with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in January during the state's Centennial gala.
Cosby now divides her time between Utah and Indiana, where she started a second church in 1984. It's a miracle, she says, what she's been able to accomplish. In 1985, she was awarded a doctor of divinity degree from Trinity Hall College and Seminary in Louisville, Ky.
Tickets for the play, which include dinner, are $15 and $20 and are available at the door or at TLC Gospel Records and Tapes, The Southern Plantation restaurant and KLLB radio station. There will be a reception at 6:30 p.m. and the play begins at 8.