IT is late autumn, the loose clouds sweep gray and chill over the great city of London, the ends of the long streets are blotted out in drizzling mist; even the hardy sparrow looks pinched and cold as the south-east wind blows about its feathers while it searches for scraps of food between the paving stones. In an upper room is a needy family. The father has been struck down in his early manhood by the ruthless hand of consumption, and, with her child to see to and her husband’s sickness upon her, the mother’s hands are full. Father and mother look down the cheerless street in vain longings for help. At length says the wife. “Go out you must, John, and, borrow that sixpence, for there is not so much as bread left in the house.” And he, who had not been outside his door for days, and whose feeble feet tottered beneath the slight weight of his shrunken body, slowly creeps down the stairs and makes his sorrowful way in search of the neighbor who will lend the pence.
I wonder if in this hour of his distress the sick man remembered his hatred to the letters of his godly sisters, bidding him to come to Jesus; and his vow never to open a letter from them again if they did not once for all “drop talking their religion to him?” Be that as it may, John had not long left his home when a lady, who was seeking in the street for a family, the father of which was ill and unable to work, knocked at his door. She left five shillings in his wife’s hand, and went away. Who that stranger was John never knew, and how it was she was sent at such a time to help him, eternity only will reveal.
As John slowly crept down the street, a young man observed him. He was a Christian, and the poor, wasted form of the invalid drew out his pity. He gently tapped John upon his shoulder, saying, “You look very ill, sir!”
“Indeed I am,” was the answer.
In a kind voice the young man added, “I fear, my friend, that you are not long for this world,” and then earnestly asked, “Do you know Jesus?”
The question went through John, and he muttered in reply, “No, I do not; I know too little of Him, and I am not long for this life.” Promising to call upon him shortly, the young man left.
That question, “Do you know Jesus?” was an arrow aimed direct into John’s inmost soul. There the question was fixed, to be answered in eternity. So absolutely did the words lay hold of him that John came back heedless of the sixpence he went out to borrow, pondering at each step of his return the vital question, “Do you know Jesus?”
ML 09/17/1899