HE lived in London, an avowed infidel. With no fear of God before his eyes, he refused the Scriptures, which plainly present what is after death, and speak of man’s responsibility before God.
But infidelity is built upon shifting sands, and often takes flight through a change of circumstances, as the following incident will prove.
This man’s wife went to visit a friend who had been converted to God since last they met. The friend had received such blessing herself that she had a great desire for others to know it also. To this end an invitation to the gospel meeting was given to her friend, and she happily accepted it. She had been accustomed to listen to the opinions of her husband, but now found herself listening with great attention to the sweet and blessed story of how God had worked that He might gain the heart of man.
That night she took her place as a sinner, and having afterward claimed the sinner’s Saviour, she went home to entreat her husband to come and hear the gospel too. After much persuasion, the following Sunday evening he consented. But even the reading of the Scriptures proved too much for him, for he rose from his seat in anger and left the hall as quickly as possible.
On his wife’s return home he forbade her ever going to hear the preaching again, and took good care to stay at home on the following Sunday evenings in order to prevent her. But “the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations” (2 Peter 2:99The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished: (2 Peter 2:9)).
A few weeks had passed by when, at two o’clock one morning, a knock came at the house of the writer. It was the friend of the infidel’s wife, requesting a dear old Christian woman to accompany her. No time was lost, and in a few minutes they were on their way to the house of the infidel. The door had been left ajar, so they went at once towards the bedroom. On opening the door they beheld the dying wife, with her eyes gazing into her husband’s face. “George,” she said, “George, you wouldn’t let me go to the meetings; you forced me to sing that song at the party, and now I shall go to hell!” In the presence of his dying wife the husband’s infidelity had forsaken him. There he was, standing by her bedside with Bible in hand, beseeching his wife to believe every word of it! She had only been to two gospel preaching’s, but believing in Jesus as a repentant sinner, she was safely sheltered by His precious blood. It is true that for the moment her eye had been taken off Christ and her soul disturbed, but, thank God, her feelings could not affect her safety. She had trusted Christ, and her safety consisted in what God thought of His death for her.
As the Christian visitor sat down by her bedside, bathing her heated forehead, she spoke to her more fully of that work. Her fears all vanished, vanished forever, and peace once more filled her soul. With that word “PEACE” upon her lips she passed out of time into eternity, from the gloom of that death-chamber into the presence of her Saviour.
The husband, alas! who was at the time so much affected, afterward only made the occasion an excuse for hardening his heart against God.
Reader, are you inclined to infidel reasonings? Beware of trifling with such hardening influences.
I remember what a great impression was made upon me when I saw the import of the following simple story. It was a custom among certain Indian tribes, when anticipating war with other tribes, to hold a great feast. When the feasting was at its height they held counsel as to whether or not they felt equal to the strength of the enemy. But before deciding to go to war it was their custom to have as many days of fasting as they had of feasting. If they did not feel as confident of victory on the last day of the fast as at the height of the feast, they wisely refused to go to war.
Friend, you may have no fear in the days of health and youth and vigor. You may not fear even in the presence of death. But you will tremble in the presence of God if found before Him in your sins.
You may now have passed the days of your youth and never yet had to say to God about your sins. Perhaps you are even close to reaching the allotted number of the days of men, and yet this momentous question has, up to the present, been avoided. But remember, though you may die and go to the grave with this question unsettled, it must at last be raised-raised when you are forever beyond the reach of hope or mercy.
“I DO not ask you to accept anything, but to believe that God has given and accepted His Son for you.”
J. N. D.