This little child is playing in a barrel, but I would like to tell you about a little boy who made his home in a barrel—a somewhat larger one than this, of course.
It was in the heart of a great city that this little boy lived, and his name was Barney Morden. Barney was very poor and hungry, and did not know what it meant to have someone love him. The only home that Barney knew was this very large barrel which stood in the alley behind one of the stores. All day the poor lad sold papers in the streets, and when night came he would curl up in his barrel and try to forget that he was lonesome and cold and hungry.
One cold winter night, as Barney was wandering along a gloomy street looking at things in shop windows, he heard the sound of singing. Following the sound he came upon a slow building flooded with light, and over it were the words, “Gospel Mill—Welcome.”
Barney thought it might be warm inside, so he opened the door a wee crack, and then slipped into a back seat. The words of the hymn were these:
“Jesus paid it all,
All to Him I owe,
Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed me white as snow.”
The kind-looking man at the front of the room read to them out of a book Which he called “God’s precious Word.” He told them that their hearts were filled with sin, for “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:2323For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)), and that all of them needed to let the Lord Jesus wash the black sin out of their hearts) and make them white as snow. For the first time in his life Barney heard the story of the Lord Jesus and His death on Calvary. He knew he was a sinner, and oh how he wanted this wonderful Saviour as his own. So he lingered after the meeting was over, and when the kind man told him more about Jesus, he accepted the Saviour right then, as his very own. The man gave Barney a little Gospel of John, and he went back to his barrel.
But he was a new Bareny from that day on! He let the light and love of Jesus shine out from his heart to all whom he met.
The days grew colder and colder, and poor Barney shivered in his barrel, until he was so ill that he could not get out. He just lay there sobbing, until a policeman looked into the barrel one day, and found our little sick boy. He was carried at once to a great hospital, and everything was so smooth and white and clean. It was wonderful, but Barney still wanted one thing.
“Please,” he asked, “will you bring me a Bible and read to me about the Lord Jesus?”
The nurse soon learned to love the patient little sufferer, but she did not love the Lord Jesus, and did not want to rend about Him. After a few days the doctor said that Barney could not live much longer, and when the poor weak voice pleaded again for the story of His Saviour, the nurse could not refuse him. She brought a Bible and read as he directed about God’s love for us being so great that He was willing to send His only begotten Son to die on Calvary, “that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Every word of it was real to Barney, and, by the Holy Spirit, it became real to her also. She knelt by the bedside and accepted the Lord Jesus as her very own Saviour.
Barney died that night; and went to be with the One who had paid it all for him. Will you accept Barney’s Saviour as your own, this very minute? Then you also will be welcomed into Heaven, among the great throng of saved sinners for whom Christ died.
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:1G.
ML 02/08/1953