M. T―got his soul exercised, and afterward saved, out in Nova Scotia. It was very blessed, and striking too, so I will put down what I can; for God may arouse and convert someone else as they read the account. Never shall I forget the old man’s face as he sat on the front seat on my left hand. Misery was depicted on every feature; and no wonder, because for twelve long, weary months he had been troubled by God about his sins, had been passing through soul-trouble. He got roused up under the faithful preaching of G. N―. Oh, how merciful God was to this aged one! I should judge that from twenty-five to seventy he had been a thoroughly reformed man, had given up swearing, had abstained from strong drink, and to his morality had tacked on “the form of godliness,” being a regular baptized communicant; but God’s eye was on this guilty one, and at the age of seventy a heaven-sent message reached his soul, and he felt convinced, had he died―albeit he had reformed, was respectable and respected, as well as outwardly religious―he must have gone to the pit of unutterable anguish and never-ending woe, “where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.” Mark 9:4444Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. (Mark 9:44). He had left God out of his calculations, but the words, “Ye must be born again,” pierced him to the quick, and left him a condemned, guilty sinner, stripped of his self-righteousness under the holy eye of a sin-hating God. Aged Mr. T―stood high up in the estimation of his fellow-townspeople, and well in his religious community; but before God he was an unconverted, unforgiven sinner. The “new birth” with him was “the one thing lacking.” Strange that people overlook or seek to explain away this verse, “Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God;” but there it stands, and must abide. All man’s explanations can never erase it; but heaven’s door must forever be barred against every soul of man who neglects it. It was rather remarkable, humanly speaking, that M. T― came to our meeting; he was such a regular attendant at his own place. But come he did, and that very afternoon he got “peace and joy in believing.” The Scripture which God used to set him free was, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life;” and whilst explaining that it was not believing about the Son or simply believing the Bible (for he had done this all his life), but there must be a living faith in Jesus, the Son of God, upon the Father’s throne, and that whoever really had faith in the Son, let it be ever so weak, God’s Word declares that “he that believeth on the Son” (not hopes to get, but) “hath everlasting life,” a present blessed reality. Well, there and then, on the very bench, he set to his seal that “God is true,” and he knew for a divine certainty that he had “passed from death unto life,” on the authority of Christ’s own words― “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.”
This, then, was enough for him. God had spoken first, a year before, the words, “Ye must be born again,” which had thoroughly aroused him from his death-like slumber and false profession. Now the same voice had set him free. How true the words, “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed!” and so he was “free indeed.” His heart became full, his face shone, his cup ran over, and at once he confessed the Lord Jesus as his own dear Saviour. From this time, he endeavored to walk so as to please and glorify Him who had loved him and washed him from his sins in His own blood. It was now no longer the miserable drudgery of a soul in bondage to sin and Satan, feeling the burden of his sins to be intolerable, but the happy, intelligent service of a freed man; he was now able “to serve the Lord with gladness;” not for many months, however, down here below, for he was to be called on high “to be with Christ,” with whom his happy spirit now is, waiting with Christ; whilst we on earth who “are saved” wait for Him who has said, “Surely I come quickly.”
“Soon He will come, the saints shall be raised;
We who remain alive shall be changed;
Then all caught up at His blessed call,
Changed to His likeness once for all.”
H. T.