HOW GOD SAVED AN EDITOR.
by L. Laurenson
“ONCE, TWICE, THRICE! What Bible text is that, or rather part of a text? Turn up and read Job 33. 14: "God speaketh once." I remember when God once spoke to me about my soul and about my sins. When I was quite a little boy, I fell into a deep pond. The waters closed over my head, and I felt myself going down, down, down. I tried to cry out, but my mouth only got filled with mud and water, and the last I remembered was that I had got hold of a large stone at the bottom, and was holding on to that. When I recovered consciousness, I was safe on the bank, rescued by a strong deliverer, who had dived in to save me. You think it was foolish for me to lay hold of a stone to keep me from sinking, but I know boys and girls who think because they go to Sunday School and learn verses from the Bible, they will go to Heaven. What you need is a Deliverer, and Jesus has come from Heaven to save you. Will you trust Him? or will you still cling to your own doings, which can only sink you lower and lower into a lost eternity?
"God speaketh once, yea, twice"—and the second time He spoke to me was when I grew up to be a big boy of fourteen. I then lived by the sea side, and had permission to take out my father’s sailing boat, becoming quite expert with sail and oar, as a seaman's son should be. On Sundays, I often took a full boat of boys and girls to the Sunday School, thus saving them a long tramp round the bay. One day after I got my crew safely landed at the pier, and was standing on the gunwale pushing off, somehow or other I lost my footing and fell overboard. It is very remarkable how many thoughts cross the mind in a moment of danger, but among the many things that came before me then was how often I had heard the Gospel, and that I was still unsaved. God spared my life then, and I was rescued a second time from death. But conscience was now aroused, and the still, small voice kept saying: ‘If you had been drowned, where would your soul have been?’ I well knew where, but I did not want to yield myself to God, and the reason was—I did not know His love.
But though I did not want God, yet in wondrous grace, He wanted me, and after many months of vainly trying to silence the voice of conscience by the pleasures of the world, I set about to put my mind at ease by “being religious." I thought I could make myself fit for God. Three weeks of religion without Christ convinced me of this at least, that "the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." I never knew the power of sin till I tried to regulate it, and then I found that sin was a master.
Three weeks—and day by day I got more and more unhappy, till I was utterly at a loss what to do next. The fourth Sunday found me almost in despair. I was miserable, but at any rate, I had found out that I was a sinner on the broad road to destruction. Too unhappy to go to any meeting, I retired early to my room and threw myself on my bed. I cried to God for mercy. I wept over my sins, and getting down on my knees before Him, I said: "Lord, I give it up. I cannot save myself. If I am to be saved at all, Thou must save me.” And there and then He did. Like a flash, the light broke upon me, and I saw that He had just been waiting for me to give up my struggling and accept His salvation; “as many as received Him (Jesus), to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His Name'' (John. 1. 12). As a helpless and undone sinner, I believed on the Lord Jesus Christ and was "saved" (Acts 16. 31). I rose from my knees and praised the Lord. I was so happy, I wept for joy. From that moment, everything seemed changed, for I was changed myself. I had become a new creature in Christ Jesus, for "if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Cor. 5. 17). The old legal bondage was gone for ever, and I rejoiced in a Saviour known; eternal life possessed—God for me, Jesus with me, and His Spirit in me.
Boys and girls, just twenty years have passed away since these events took place, and every year I have learned more of His grace and more of His love. And now I seek to pass on that knowledge by word and pen as He gives me opportunity. While God speaketh “once. Twice, THRICE” to you by His words, His servants, His dealings with you, and by this message, heed His voice "to-day." While the Lord Jesus Christ calls so lovingly "COME unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matt. 11. 28), yield to His call, and trust Him "now." Listen, I pray you, to one more solemn appeal to come right now to the Lord Jesus Christ. Time is short. Death is busy. The Lord is coming. You will spend Eternity either in HEAVEN or in HELL—WHICH?
"Where shall I spend Eternity?
This question now comes home to ME;
What, oh! what shall MY answer be,
Where shall I spend Eternity?" L. L.
“The Finest of the Wheat” HyP.