Our class had been on a tour to an art gallery and historic buildings in another city. It was all very interesting, but it wasn’t only a pleasure trip. We each had an assignment that was hard work too. So our teachers thought we deserved an evening party at a country club just outside the town.
I was a young Christian then and I didn’t like the thought of the party, but our group went and I had no place else to go. I remember the loud music and the chatter that I might have shared in if I had not known the Lord Jesus as my Saviour.
As I stood there feeling uncomfortable, I noticed another girl sitting at the back near the exit door. I had never seen her before, but somehow I felt like sitting beside her.
She smiled a welcoming smile as I sat down. “God doesn’t want me to join in this party,” she said. “I can’t fit in here because I belong to Jesus.” And then I knew I had found another young Christian!
“Let’s go outside and talk,” she said, and we slipped away without being noticed.
The grass was long and wet with dew, but it was a beautiful summer evening. Wet feet did not bother us at all. We walked on and on, and what a lot we found to talk about! (It’s a wonderful bond to meet a real Christian, isn’t it?) Her name was Marilyn. “Tell me how you were saved,” I said to her.
“Even when I was little I always went to Sunday school,” she said, “and I loved to see the teacher smile when I repeated Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31): ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.’ But I did not like to be told that I was a sinner. The stories of Jesus were interesting, but I wished they would leave the sinner part out.
“But I clearly remember one day when I was five years old. I had my dolls all lined up on the bed, and the bright sun was shining in, lighting up each of my little treasures when suddenly I thought, I’m a bad girl. It came to me just like that, and I knelt down by the bed and said, ‘Lord, I’m a bad girl. Save a bad girl.’ And He did! And it has been real in my heart ever since.”
We shared so many happy things that evening, telling each other how wonderful the Lord Jesus had been in the past, and what He meant to us right then, and what it will be like when He takes us to His Father’s house in heaven as He has promised. We were just so happy as we talked about all these things.
The party was ending as we returned, and the teachers had begun to worry about us, but it ended up all right. The other students were thrilled, excited, exhausted, or jealous and depressed after their party. They had probably tasted the pleasures of sin that only last for a short while, but we had tasted the pleasures that will be ours forever.
Marilyn has been my best friend ever since. Others have told me, “There are lots of things the other girls do that Marilyn won’t do, but she is always ready to help anybody.”
If you don’t have a good Christian friend like that, will you ask God to give you one?
ML-04/04/1999