Two Business Friends Meet Again, Around Jesus Christ

In 1968 I was in my office at 121 Veterinary Hospital in McKinney, Texas. My secretary came into my office and told me there were three men in business suits in the reception area that asked to see me.

“What do they want?” I asked her and she replied, “They want to talk to you.”

I didn’t ask her to send them in but stepped out into the reception area. One of them I knew, the second one I had heard of, and the third one introduced himself as Bob Cavnar.

I had been told about a feedlot with pens that would hold 12,000 feeder cattle, owned by Meat Producers, Inc., and that the president of the company was Bob Cavnar.

So that day, I wasn’t completely surprised by the visit. Bob told me a little about himself and his earlier years and we discussed my earlier years to a lesser degree. He informed me that the two people with him represented some cattle operations and he told me he wanted me to be the veterinarian for the feedlot in Melissa, Texas.

“Mr. Cavnar,” I said, “I am not a feedlot veterinarian, I am an equine practitioner.”

Bob replied, “I’ve heard all about you and I know what you are, but my representatives tell me that you are willing to say, ‘I don’t know what this problem is but I will try to find out,’ and that’s why I would like for you to be our veterinarian.”

It was actually a friend and colleague, M. Allen Anderson, who had told Bobbie about me and my practice.  He was the President of The Premier Santa Gertrudis Association in Texas. He was a friend of Winthrop (Win) Rockefeller, owner of Winrock Farms of Arkansas, whose Santa Gertrudis herd was well known. Rockefeller served as president of the International Santa Gertrudis Association and also Governor of Arkansas.

Allen Anderson knew my work, not only attending horses but also cattle. He was very fond of me, telling me once “I love you more than I do my own sons.” I didn’t really know what to say to that. Anderson made arrangements to host a field day for Future Farmers of America (FFA) boys and Vo-Ag teachers at his N Bar A ranch near Frisco, Texas and he asked me to be one of the speakers. He had 250 hay bales set up on a hillside for seating, which would accommodate 500. I enjoyed young men and they did me, and I talked to those kids for about thirty-minutes about cattle and horses and the livestock industry.

 Anderson was impressed with my knowledge and ability and he had no hesitation to recommend me to Bobbie Cavnar. It was just the devil exalting me, but Jesus in me kept me from being pushed to speak about a cow, what I was confident to say about a horse.

Bobbie and I talked for some time that day.  I was a very busy veterinarian, very busy, and my initial thought was that I just didn’t have time.  I recall it was in the hot summer, so it must have been July or August, and as I was considering everything, I thought, “You know, I could be a consultant and visit every Friday, 1:00 to 2:00 pm.  I could drive my air-conditioned Pontiac down each feed-row and watch the cattle eating, and never get out of my car.”

I was an equine practitioner, but I loved to watch cattle eat. They are so humble; they are so serious, and yet so calm and contented when they are eating. So I said, “I will be glad to be a consultant and check your cattle every Friday and if I see something that I need to attend to, then I will devote time to treating that.  I’ll work by the hour, unless I have to involve myself in some treatment or medication.” I also informed Mr. Cavnar that his technicians would administer all medications.

It was actually a selfish, enjoyable time for me, to spend one hour a week, observing cattle. After about three or four months of enjoying my observation for pay, I arrived at the feedlot and they said, “Doc we have a problem.”

 “What’s the problem?”  I asked.

They explained, “If you make too much noise, these calves faint; some of them go into convulsions.”

Well, that meant I had to get out of my cool car and get a closer look. It was a nice operation; the pens were all metal pipe construction, beautifully built. I was quite agile and climbed up to the top rail, swung myself over, landing into a pen of about 125 head of cattle and immediately about half a dozen of them fainted.

So I went to the next pen and did the same, swung over the top rail, landing in the in the pen and more fell out with fainting and convulsions. I went through about four or five pens, and in every one of them, about half a dozen of the cattle fainted and some had convulsions.

I was not afraid of what I saw, even though I was not a feedlot veterinarian. I just wanted to find out what was wrong. Interestingly, not one of the calves had died and that encouraged me.  Bob Cavnar was a very nice friend to me, he knew my reputation and he had confidence in what I would find out.

I thought initially it might have something to do with the ration, what they were eating. I talked with veterinarians and Bobbie called PhDs and experts in the field to arrange phone conferences.

I talked to a feedlot PhD. out of Arizona and he was no help. I talked to Oklahoma State, Texas A&M, Georgia, Colorado State, Iowa State, University of Minnesota, Kansas State, University of Missouri. I consulted with Quaker Oats, other food suppliers and I found no one with any answers. Bobbie arranged a phone call with a PhD from California, who was at the airport between flights. Everything he suggested I had to tell him I had already tried that, and in exasperation he finally said, “Look, I’ve got to go. I’m glad this is your problem and not mine,” which told me he didn’t know either.

I talked to the head of the bacteriology Department of Iowa State University for several hours and he encouraged me greatly. I then talked to a man in Greeley, CO, C.R. Mackey, and he said to me, “You are an equine practitioner and you’ve taken this job on? You’re the boldest man I’ve ever talked to.”

I told him, “I’m the biggest fool you ever talked to.”

As I said, I was a very busy veterinarian and I also had many other commitments. I was president of the North Collin Water Supply Corporation.  I was a partner in a corporation which owned an arena. My partners were a vice-president of a construction company in Dallas, a secretary of a large motor-freight line company, a man who was the president of four small banks and vice-president of another.

In 1968 I had bought a fifty acre farm in north Texas and moved my American Saddlebred operation to that farm. I installed horse fence to build two, five-acre pastures to keep my mares and foals. It was on this farm where Hail to Genius was born, foaled by my mare Patty of Oaks. Hail to Genius won runner-up in the halter class at the Texas State Fair.

I was also one of five veterinarians for the Texas State Fair.

It was God that involved me in the corporation that owned an indoor arena. I was initially a silent partner with 20% of the shares, and I wanted to keep it that way, but later, due to extenuating circumstances, it was necessary for me to be named as president and it was all for God’s purposes in my life. The arena would seat 3500 people.  We hired a manager and produced rodeos, calf-ropings, horse shows, wrestling matches and concerts, including Willie Nelson.

Through the wrestling matches, I met and became friends with Jack Adkisson, a football player and graduate of SMU who became a professional wrestler known to most by his ring name, Fritz Von Erich. He and Johnny Valentine were one of featured matches in the arena.  Jack and I had a number of personal conversations about our lives, we trusted one another. At one point he and I discussed another business proposition, and he told me he would go in with me 50/50 if it was just he and I, however if the others were included, it would be 51/49.

With all I had going on, an afternoon driving and looking at cattle, watching them eat, would be a very pleasant interlude. Later I would look back and see that God was in all of it, including the day I met Bobbie and agreed to sign on as a consultant, thinking it would be an easy, enjoyable afternoon every Friday—never expecting the kind of problems that developed.  God surely used it in convincing me He might be talking to me. And all during that time, dealing with the feedlot and all of these other activities and investments, God was talking to me—the Lord was riding with me in the right front seat of my car, asking me, “When are you going to preach the gospel?”

One morning I went to the feedlot to see Bob Cavnar and learned he was no longer with the company.  Not long after that, we resolved the issues plaguing the cattle, the company hired a general manager and I soon resigned as their consultant.

Just a few months later I was driving down US-75 and I’ve shared many times my words to the Lord that day:

“If this is you that has been bugging me all these years, if you will sell my shares in this corporation (the arena) I’ll do whatever you ask.”

The next day, He did just that.

Two weeks later, again driving down US-75, the Lord said, “Sell your hospital and practice and obey me,” and after some weeks and months of wrestling with my soul, and by the grace and mercy of God, I sold out, January 2, 1970. I drove away, not knowing where I was going or what God had planned for me.

After selling 121 Veterinary hospital and my practice, I heard about a man leading a church group named Bob Cavnar. A lady had been attending his meetings, and told me about them and him, and I asked, “What does this man look like? This was in 1973, and when she told me I thought, “My God, could this be the Bob Cavnar that I worked with at the feedlot? Someone I had gotten to know and we became trusting of one another to a degree?”

 I learned he had a meeting at the Moody Coliseum at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas and by now I’m thinking, “This has got to be Bobbie.” So I went to a meeting at the Moody Coliseum, and sure enough, Bobbie was leading the meeting. I felt encouraged to meet somebody that I knew in the flesh that was leading God’s people. After the meeting, I went to look for him. I walked around in the Coliseum and in the hallways and finally asked, “Does anyone know if Bobbie Cavnar has an office here?”

“Oh, he’s right down the hall.”

I walked in and Bobbie said, “Doc is that you?”

 I said, “Bobbie is that you?”  I had many conversations with Bobbie during those months in the feedlot and obviously God was dealing with each of our hearts. When we met again at that day, one of the first things he said to me was, “Man, that feedlot was full of demons!” I said, “You’ve got that right.” I knew that here was a man in the Charismatic Movement, that I knew well in the flesh, a man I had great respect for and the respect was mutual.

Following that meeting and during the next year, I met with Bobbie at his home in north Dallas, not far from Midway.  He told me he believed Satan had taken over America, and he was considering moving his group to British Columbia. He never did, but Satan certainly tried to push him to. I spent two hours talking with him one day and he said, “Doyle why don’t you pray, and if you think its right, come join me.”

Bobbie was born in 1924 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.  He was a decorated Air Force pilot and received the commission of colonel at age thirty-three.  After 22 years in the Air Force, he retired in 1964 and went into private business. He held executive positions in two companies, one of those being president of Meat Producers, Inc., a D.H. Byrd & Co. Enterprises, subsidiary. As mentioned above, Meat Producers, Inc. owned and operated the feedlot facility at Melissa. Texas.

He became involved in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal in the early 1970’s, receiving the baptism in the Holy Spirit in Ann Arbor, Michigan in May 1970.  He later became involved in the discipleship/shepherding movement through Ralph Martin of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Bobbie’s son James had joined with Ralph Martin’s Catholic discipleship group in Ann Arbor and had introduced the two men. Bobbie later founded a group called “Christian Community of God’s Delight”, in Dallas, Texas, a group that belongs to a world-wide association of lay communities, formally recognized by the Vatican and their local bishops.

In May 1971, I, along with my wife and daughter, committed myself to a three day fast to seek a right way according to Ezra 8:1 and at the end of that fast, God sent me to Opa-Locka, Florida in 1971 to manage a small animal hospital for eleven months. While I was in Florida and before returning to Texas, I was at a meeting in Ft. Lauderdale where two young men from Juan Carlos Ortiz’s ministry presented the Discipleship “plan”. Charles Simpson and Bob Mumford brought those teachings into the Charismatic Movement after they had heard the teachings of Juan Carlos Ortiz.

Charles Simpson, Bob Mumford, Don Basham, Derek Prince and Erin Baxter later formed a group known as Christian Growth Ministries and these five men were known as The Fort Lauderdale Five. I became well acquainted with all these men except Erin Baxter; especially Derek Prince, who I knew well, we were friends. I spent many afternoons in his and Lydia’s home in Florida.

I returned to Texas in 1972 and soon after, I received a phone call from a friend who told me Charles and Bob were going to divide Hollywood, Florida at Sheridan Avenue, one taking the north side and the other would take the south side. I knew that wasn’t God and said so.

I was seeking a right way, and that day as I drove away from Bobbie Cavnar’s home, I knew in my spirit it was not right that I join him in his work. I knew he was deceived and I couldn’t in any way, walk with him. But to see him and spend time with him again, and see that God was dealing with his life was an encouragement to me.  He was a friend and colleague from my years walking in the natural who maybe had some understanding of what God was doing in my life when so many others thought I might have lost my mind.

The last time I saw Bobbie Cavnar was at the El Fenix on LBJ Freeway. He was always a friend—kind and encouraging and though he was deceived I loved him and still do.  The last I knew about him, he was doing television in Russia for the pope. Bobbie went to be with the Lord in 2002.

A year or two after Bobbie had asked me to consider joining him, I was convinced that the Discipleship movement was not of God. I humbled myself for six years, not wanting to miss God, willing to be corrected. I received much persecution from prominent religious leaders in the Dallas-Ft. Worth Metroplex and the Fort Lauderdale Five, because I wouldn’t allow them to rule me. I had sold my practice and hospital at the direction of God and God had led me every step I took and when they told me I had to be submitted to someone, I told them I was, to Jesus Christ.

I tried the spirits whether they be of God or not and when I knew it wasn’t God, I walked away. You can read more about my overcoming the discipleship movement on my website.

January 1971, a year after I had sold my hospital and practice, God gave me a vision:

“In January of 1971 I laid down in bed about 10:30 PM to go to sleep when suddenly before my eyes I found myself standing at the water’s edge.  The water was crystal clear and I could see the bottom was covered in small brown pebbles that went out for about 10-12 feet. At that juncture was a clear line of demarcation, the water became very blue, deep blue. I was reminded of the water I saw in the South Pacific in 1953.  I raised up, sat up in bed, shook my head, everything remained the same, the vision didn’t go away.  I stood up and the scene never left me. I thought this must be a vision of God.  As I looked up and out the water as far as you could see was deep, dark blue just like the water in the South Pacific Ocean.  In a few minutes I was able to go on to sleep.  The next morning I began to pray and ask the Lord what the vision meant.  About 11:00 that morning it came to me by the Spirit, “You are about to enter into deep water, and if you look to the left or look to the right or listen to any man you’ll drown.” 

By the grace and mercy of God, I was not “gathered by men” although many tried.

A few months after I sold my hospital and practice, and to be frank, I was struggling with what I was going to do, I happened to be in Texas and stopped by M. Allen Anderson’s home. His wife came to the door and when she saw me, she said, “Doyle!” She treated me like family; they both had always treated me like that. I said, “Mrs. Anderson, is Mr. Anderson here?”

“Doyle, he’s dead,” she said.

I was stunned. She explained to me that his doctors thought he ought to take up jogging and one day he fell over dead.

Every person that I might be tempted to look to for help or counsel, God took out of my life, and M. Allen Anderson was one them.

It will be forty-five years in January since that vision of standing at the water’s edge. It was instruction to me then and those words remain faithful to me today and I can boldly say, “The Lord is my help.”

Hebrews 13:6

…The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.

Bobbie was a friend of mine, a pleasant humble man and he, like myself, knew many people of importance; but it doesn’t matter who you know. What matters is:

Do you believe that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, emptied himself of all his creative ability and was born of a woman, made under the law of Moses; that he might redeem the world through his death burial and resurrection?

I am an apostle of Jesus Christ, not by the will of man, but by the will of God and no man can come to Jesus except the Father draw him. The Father, Jehovah, brings us to Jesus that we might believe on the one that gave his life for us and that He could bring us to one accord—one heart and one soul, that being the Church, the Body of Christ .

You will have to believe on Jesus, who paid the price for us to be reconciled back to the Father, Jehovah, if you ever expect to be with the Father and submitted to Him throughout eternity.

And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world. (1 John 4:3)

My prayer for the world is that they will humble themselves and receive in their heart, Jesus Christ the Son of God from the beginning, who laid down his life for mankind, that we might become sons of God.

God Bless,
Doyle Davidson
Servant and apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ

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