A Christian doctor received the following anonymous letter:
Sir:
"I heard you preaching the gospel on Sunday evening; and, if you remember, you were speaking about the sprinkling of the blood on the door posts (Exodus 12). I understood this was a type of the blood of Jesus, and those that are saved have, as it were, the blood sprinkled on their door posts. Well, I have not got that blood sprinkled upon my door posts. I have longed to be saved for six years and cannot find peace.
"I believe that Jesus died for all sinners and that I am among the worst of them. I am in great need of a Savior, yet there is something I don't understand. I will be at the Hall the Sunday after next, if the Lord will spare me, to hear you preach once more. I am afraid I will never get another chance. I have had the gospel set before me plain enough, but I think I get harder-hearted every time I hear it. I have tried to pray for faith, but Satan seems to laugh at me, and tell me I am too late. I feel as if he has too fast a hold on me now to get away from him.
"Oh, will you pray for me, that I might have light, and that I might find the true Savior?
I hope the Lord will bear with me a little longer.
I have given up all hopes of being a Christian.
I shudder to think of the terrible judgment day."
The letter was unsigned and the doctor was at a loss to know who the writer could be. But "God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform."
The Sunday following the receipt of this letter, the doctor was attending a meeting when he received an emergency call. It was to attend a patient who was thought to be dying, if not already dead. He immediately drove to the house to find the mother of the family unconscious, and her husband and several of her children gathered around her, expecting each breath to be the last.
Although in a death-like swoon, she was breathing. The doctor proceeded to apply treatment, and endeavored to calm the fears of those who watched their loved one. He knew his patient was a Christian, and so also was her husband, and some of the other members of the family, but at the bedside stood some of whom the doctor was not sure.
A few minutes later as they gathered around the fire in the adjoining room he asked the father: "Are all your children converted yet?"
"No, no," said he, "I wish they were."
Then addressing the eldest daughter, who had come from her place of employment for two or three hours, and whose name the doctor knew, he said: "Is it true, Mary, that you are still unsaved?"
"Yes," was her reply. This admission was coupled with a deep sigh. Perceiving that she was anxious about her soul, he asked her to come into another room where they might talk together for a few minutes, while others carried out his directions with regard to the mother.
"I suppose you know where your dear mother would be if she died?" said the doctor.
"In heaven with Jesus," was Mary's reply. "And if you died."
"I should go to hell, I know," she answered, bursting into tears.
"But have you no desire to be saved?"
"Oh, yes, indeed I have. I want to be saved, if I only knew how."
"How? Why, it is very simple. 'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.' Only believe Him. Just trust Him as you are— a poor guilty sinner. He has died for sinners; His blood avails to cleanse the most guilty: and He says: `Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out.' Come to Him, that is all you have to do. Just trust Him. Do you think you can?"
"I should like to, doctor. I wish I could. Will you pray for me?"
"Let us kneel together before Him," said the doctor, and while she wept, he prayed. He asked the Lord to spare the beloved mother, if it was His holy will— and save the sin-burdened child who knelt before Him.
As he got up again to see the sick one, he said: "Don't you get off your knees till all is settled, and you have found Jesus."
He found the mother decidedly rallying and she shortly completely recovered. On returning to Mary after a lapse of some minutes, he found her standing, with a beaming, though still tearful face. But these were tears of joy, as she exclaimed: "I have found Him; Jesus is mine!"
By simple faith she had found Him: and peace, and life, and joy in Him working. She went on her way rejoicing from then on.
Two days afterward the doctor learned that Mary was the writer of the anonymous letter!
Was this not just like the Lord? This anxious soul proposed to itself to wait ten days. But Jesus loves to meet the truly anxious one at once, and thus He must needs let the mother fall sick, and the doctor be sent for, just at the moment when the sin-burdened daughter was by, that His own message of grace might be spoken to her.
Reader, may He speak to you now.