“When I was a little boy,” remarked an old man, “someone gave me a cucumber in a bottle. The neck of the bottle was small, and the cucumber was so large, it wasn’t possible for it to pass through, and so I wondered how it got there. But out in the garden one day I came to a bottle slipped over a little green cucumber, and then I understood. The cucumber had grown in the bottle. Now I often see grown men with habits that I wonder any strong, sensible man could form, and then I think that most likely those habits grew into them when they were young, like the cucumber. They cannot slip out of them now, much as they would like to, and only the grace of God can deliver them. If they would come to Jesus and claim Him as their Lord and Saviour, He would save their precious souls and set them free from the power of sin and Satan.
ML 08/18/1968