Circus time! Boy, oh, boy! It was really circus time! Not only the big signboards all over town said so—not only had he watched everything from the clearing of the big empty lot to the putting up of all the little booths and tents and even the enormous “big top”—not only these things proved it. Not even the fact that he had seen, and smelled, the circus parade.
That parade had really been something, too. There had been more clowns and elephants than he had ever seen at one time before, and even a baby elephant that had acted like he wanted to play with all the kids he passed. And a caged lion on a truck had roared so loudly right when he was passing that Bob had almost fallen off the red fire hydrant he was perched on. That lion had really roared!
But the most important thing of all that said it was circus time was the little piece of cardboard he could feel in his pocket right now—the ticket Dad had given him!
Bob got there early for there were lots of things to see besides the circus itself. There was the fire eater and sword swallower that fascinated him, the snake charmers and all sorts of things. Then he heard a fellow shouting about a “human fly” that was to climb the sides of a tent with nothing to hold onto.
Bob wriggled into the closest position he could and held his breath as the fellow went higher and higher up what did seem to be the perfectly straight side of a huge tent with absolutely nothing to hold onto.
One woman started to scream from fright, but the man on the platform quickly stopped her.
“No noise, please! Absolutely no noise! This is extremely dangerous. The slightest thing might distract him, AND IF...!”
The man didn’t finish his sentence, but everyone knew what he had meant. The climber was far above their heads now and they scarcely dared to breathe. “AND IF...!” Some could not stand to watch any longer and were quietly moving away, but Bob felt glued to his spot. Once the man couldn’t seem to find a hold, AND IF... but he did, and finally to everyone’s relief began to descend again.
The circus was wonderful, every bit of it. But that night when Bob went to bed, the thing that he thought about was the “human fly” who had climbed so high over their heads. “AND IF...!” kept ringing in his mind.
Bob knew the rest of that sentence. The man would have been killed for sure. AND IF he had—then what?
Then other thoughts began to come to Bob’s mind. He didn’t intend to purposely do such awfully dangerous things like that tent fly, but things happened every day and people got killed or died from something. It might happen to him—AND IF...?” What then?
Bob squirmed around in bed and tried to think of other things, but those two words kept ringing in his mind.
Several years went by, and Bob still could not forget those two words. It was especially bad in Sunday school and meetings when God’s Word would speak to his heart, showing him that he was a sinner deserving God’s punishment, “and if...” He was not ready to die, and he knew it, for he was not ready to face God’s holy eye.
Bob had known for some time that the Lord Jesus had died for his sins, and that he must receive Him as his own personal Savior. Somehow he kept putting it off.
“And if...!” How those words kept jabbing his conscience like the thrusting of a sword! Then one day Bob knelt and told the Lord Jesus all about his fear, and how much he wanted to belong to Him. To his surprise he found it wasn’t hard at all, for the Lord seemed to have been just waiting for him!
With a heart full of joy Bob felt like shouting, “AND IF.... I’ll go to be with Jesus!”
“AND IF....” If something should happen to you, boys and girls, could you answer as Bob did?